Education minister calls Starbucks chant at high school baseball game 'regrettable'

By Kim Yong-jae, The Herald Business

Education Minister Choi Kyo-jin said Tuesday it was "regrettable" that students on the Baejae High School baseball team had directed a chant at Gwangju Ilgo that denigrated the May 18 pro-democracy movement and mocked the rival school's home city.

In a Facebook post that day, Choi said student athletes should learn character before skill. "Student baseball players have a high chance of becoming professional athletes in the future," he said. "But players who neglect character and sensitivity to human rights, or who stoke social conflict through a distorted sense of history, fall short as elite athletes."

He said banning regional slurs, racial discrimination and hate speech in sports — and responding to such incidents firmly — was essential because such behavior undermines the spirit of fair competition. "The foundation of why people are passionate about and moved by sports is the value of fairness," he said.

Choi also said adults bore significant responsibility for students who casually used the language of hatred, mockery and discrimination. "Students should be learning love, solidarity, respect and consideration," he said. "Teaching is not simply the transfer of knowledge and skills — it is a continuous process of helping people understand the manners and attitudes they must have as human beings."

He added that the ministry would use the incident as an opportunity to examine how student athletes and school sports programs could develop a fuller understanding of fairness — the great rule of sport — and grow into athletes of character.

The controversy stems from an incident during a game between Baejae High School and Gwangju Ilgo at Mokdong Baseball Stadium in Seoul, where some Baejae players were found to have chanted "Gaya ji gaya ji, Starbucks gaya ji — Tank Day!" toward the Gwangju Ilgo contingent.

The chant drew wider criticism because it came amid an ongoing backlash against Starbucks Korea over promotional language that critics said made light of the May 18 pro-democracy movement and the torture and death of democracy activist Park Jong-chul.

Teachers and some students from Baejae High School had planned to visit Gwangju Ilgo that day to offer an apology, but the visit fell through after Gwangju Ilgo declined to receive them.