'We have no right to crush children's dreams': Politicians push back on 6-month ban for Baejae High baseball players

Politicians from the People Power Party and other parties have called for a review of the six-month competition ban handed to the Baejae High School baseball team, saying the punishment is excessive. The Korea Baseball Softball Association imposed the ban after the team became embroiled in controversy over a taunting chant directed at a rival school during a national high school baseball tournament.

Some players on the Baejae High team shouted "Let's go to Starbucks" toward the opposing dugout during a game against Gwangju Jeil High at Mokdong Baseball Stadium in Seoul on June 29. The remark was widely interpreted as a mocking reference to the controversy surrounding Starbucks Korea's so-called "May 18 Tank Day" promotional event last month. Gwangju Jeil High immediately lodged a protest through the umpires, and as a result Baejae High was handed a six-month ban from competition.

People Power Party floor leader Jeong Jeom-sik said Tuesday on Facebook that competing in national tournaments is a matter of college admissions and career prospects for young athletes. "Not all of the Baejae High players did anything wrong — many of them did not join in the taunt — yet the entire baseball team has been handed a six-month ban. That is excessive," he said.

Jeong added that even if adults have a duty to educate and guide young people, that does not give them the right to trample on children's dreams. "I urge everyone to refrain from imposing disproportionate punishment or heaping criticism on these young teenagers who have not yet had the chance to fully live their lives," he said.

Rep. Kim Jae-seop also wrote on Facebook that while the Baejae High players' use of the May 18 pro-democracy uprising as a target for mockery was "base and inexcusable," the weight of criticism directed at them was "abnormally heavy." "Until recently, the entire government, led by the president, was lining up to attack Starbucks — and now the education minister and politicians are all rushing out at once to witch-hunt the Baejae High players," he said.

Kim said it appeared that some were willing to hold the children's entire futures hostage over a single verbal slip. "What is more urgently needed is a 'real education' for this ugly, entrenched political world that hunts down even children as enemies if they are not on its side," he said.

Calls to lift the ban also came from opposition and independent lawmakers. Reform Party leader Lee Jun-seok wrote on Facebook that a Seoul mayoral candidate had recently been seen beating a sunbae, beating police and beating citizens who tried to intervene — all while invoking May 18 as justification — and that the current president was backing as party leader someone who had "commemorated the May 18 eve in an energetic fashion on a new-millennium NHK broadcast." "That kind of behavior must have made students take May 18 lightly," Lee said. He added that it would be unjust to be "harsher than necessary" toward Baejae High students who grew up watching such distorted examples, and called for the six-month ban to be lifted.

Independent lawmaker Han Dong-hoon also wrote on Facebook that a six-month competition ban for young students was excessive. "Broadcaster Choi Wook, an adult who said on air that people should be bulldozed with a tank, only apologized and is still on the air — and Starbucks was never suspended from operating," Han said.