Power, privilege, nuts

The incident is now being called a case of “nut rage.” A South Korean heiress threw a tantrum over a bag of macadamia nuts and ordered a flight attendant to deplane, which in turn led to public outrage and her resignation from a number of executive posts, her arrest for possible violation of aviation safety rules, and the Ministry of Transport, which investigated the incident, now having to discipline its own employees.

Real-time ‘telenovela’

The incident could have been the topic of several episodes of a Korean telenovela. In fact, I suspect that the popularity of these television series comes, in part, from the way they portray the rich and powerful—the “beautiful people,” if I might use a term from the 1970s—with their glam and glitter, as well as meanness and arrogance. The themes have been in our own movies and radio and television dramas, but the Korean telenovelas, with huge production budgets, are more effective in creating the larger-than-life images.

I thought I’d check for more accounts about the incident and found many versions from different international papers. I thought I’d write about it as a way for us Filipinos to reflect on power and privilege. I suspect that many of us will think, as we review the real-time telenovela, “Oh, but she was right in doing what she did,” then maybe having some reservations, probably even recoiling in disgust.

Let’s get back to Korea, or rather, to New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport, where a Korean Airlines plane was already on the runway, ready to take off for Seoul. Sitting in first class was Cho Hyun-ah, the daughter of the airline’s chair, and a senior vice president. Cho is American-educated, and holds a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and an MBA from the University of Southern California.

A flight attendant gives Cho a bag of macadamia nuts. Cho is displeased; after all, she is senior vice president for flight service and knows that the nuts should be served in a bowl. (Remember, this is the first-class cabin. We lesser mortals know that in economy, you don’t get any snacks until the flight is well on its way, and when you do, it will probably be peanuts in a bag, tossed at you the way it’s done to elephants in a zoo.)

Cho calls the flight attendant and asks him to get the in-service manual, so he could read out to her the rules on food service. He can’t find the manual, which drives her into a rage. She scolds the attendant and at some point, he, together with a colleague, falls to his knees to ask for forgiveness. She continues to scold them, poking the back of their necks several times with a document folder.

The rage continues and she demands that the erring attendant be fired, and removed from the plane. The plane returns to the gate and the attendant did deplane, later flying back to Seoul on another flight.

Public apology

Word about the incident spread quickly. Korean Airlines first said it was “natural” for Cho to be upset, but apologized for the delay in the flight. Cho made a public apology; the photographs showed her dressed in somber black, her head bowed. Her father called her “foolish” and expressed regret that he had not raised her better.

Cho eventually resigned from all her posts, not just in the airline but in those affiliated with Hanjin, the large chaebol or conglomerate of companies that her family controlled.

Then word spread that the airline had sent people to visit the flight attendant, telling him to lie about the incident in order to protect Cho. It also emerged that the transportation ministry, which was investigating the incident, had been leaking information to airline officials. Four transport ministry officials have been charged with misconduct.

Cho has since been arrested for possible violations of aviation safety rules. (In South Korea, one can be arrested and detained for up to six months, even without the formal charges, to prevent the suspect from destroying evidence related to the case, or from fleeing.)

What do you think now?

I have friends who laughed, sheepishly, admitting they’ve sometimes had “minor” rage over fumbling flight attendants, restaurant food servers, even family help; one was specific about her getting angry with a household help serving takeout food still in the restaurant containers.

Raging on

I’ve heard of, and seen this kind of arrogance on planes—drunk passengers fighting with flight attendants who refuse to serve them additional drinks, for example. Several years back I had a relative who actually boasted to friends about having scolded a China Airlines flight attendant for being “slow.” He called her a “little whore” in Chinese, and told her to kneel for forgiveness. He was unrepentant, even proud of what he did. It’s almost always men, usually the elderly, berating a female attendant.

I would have thought that was all in the past, but no, we even see how the patriarchal arrogance has expanded: Now a woman executive has made a male attendant kneel.

There was overkill, certainly, in demanding that the plane return to the gate. Perhaps, a psychiatrist-friend suggested, Cho was depressive. Another psychiatrist-friend said no, the problem with rage is that once you let go, the rage builds up. And if you’re rich and powerful, the rage can go on and on.

Whatever, we see here the Korean people venting their growing frustration, maybe rage as well, at the chaebols, powerful business conglomerates, many of which are controlled by dynasties. They’re also not happy about the cozy relationship between government and these corporations—a relationship that has proved to be lethal, as in the case of the ferry that sank last April, killing more than 300 people including some 250 high school students on a field trip. Investigations showed that the government’s regulatory agencies had been lax in enforcing safety regulations.

The fact that Cho is the daughter of a chaebol magnate did not help. The Koreans have not had an emperor since 1910, but they do have dynasties both in the north and south dominating not only politics but also business.

For South Koreans and perhaps for Filipinos and other Asians, the telenovelas cater to a kind of yearning for royalty, projected on to the actors and actresses… as well as a need to revile and express disgust with the arrogance of the aristocrats.

What will happen in the next episode of this live telenovela? Will anything come out of the investigations? In the long run, will we see kinder Koreans, and Filipinos, and Asians, as more people begin to speak out against the arrogance that comes from power and privilege?

Will we look back and remember, “It all began when someone went nuts over a bag of nuts”?

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