The Korean vs. Malcolm Gladwell

Culturalism, Gladwell, and Airplane Crashes

http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2013/07/culturalism-gladwell-and-airplane.html#more

Culturalism and Plane Crashes: Reactions and Leftover Thoughts

http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2013/07/culturalism-and-plane-crashes-reactions.html#comment-form

Malcolm Gladwell's Reponse to the Culturalism Post

http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2013/07/malcolm-gladwells-reponse-to.html#comment-form

My Thoughts on Gladwell's Response

http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2013/07/my-thoughts-on-gladwells-response.html#comment-form

If you have read the latest posts on "Ask a Korean", I'm pretty sure you're aware of what I'm talking about. "The Korean" was pretty critical of Gladwell's theory on Korean Air plane crashes. He was corrected by Gladwell and several commenters a number of times, but did not let that detract him from his overall position about how one cannot solely attribute the Asiana plane crash to Korean culture. I agree, but the problem with his argument was that he did not do the due diligence that he excoriated Gladwell  for not doing as well as being a bit too self-righteous and arrogant in his tone as evidenced here:

Well, I happened to share the cultural context of the pilots of KAL Flight 801. I was born and raised in Korea until I immigrated to the United States at age 16. Since then, I have visited Korea numerous times, worked professionally in Korea, and currently interact with Korean professionals on a consistent basis. Most importantly, I speak, read and write Korean at a very high level. If you would like to see for yourself, you are welcome to read my analysis of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision on the two gay marriage cases, published recently by a Korean media. 

So by the power vested in me by Malcolm Gladwell, I declare: this so-called "interpretation" of the pilots' "true intentions" is pure garbage. It is so ludicrously wrong that I cannot think of enough superlatives to describe how wrong this is. Gladwell's exposition on Korean language is completely, definitely, utterly, entirely, 120% laughable to anyone who has spoken Korean in a professional setting. Koreans simply do not talk that way, period. True, Korean language is suggestive and indirect compared to English. But Malcolm Gladwell takes that factoid and stretches it beyond any recognition. It is the verbal equivalent of a Korean woman who, upon hearing that American culture is more tolerant of clothing that reveals more skin, decides to walk down Times Square completely naked.

http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2013/07/culturalism-gladwell-and-airplane.html#more

A commenter named Chris Kahn responds much more graciously to "The Korean's" assertion that Korean language has nothing to do with the crash of KAL Flight 801.

Hello Korean, 

I'm a Korean too - I actually commissioned as an OCS (like the pilot of Korean Air 801) officer, and served as a naval officer on a ship and later as a UDT/SEAL in the Korean navy. I agree with your basic thesis that Gladwell is inexcusably sloppy and that culturalism is over-emphasized in covering the recent crash. 

However, I do think that language was a contributing factor to the KA 801 crash - though such problems are not necessarily limited to Korean culture as the Challenger and Discovery tragedies, and the development of Crew Resource Management by NASA show. 

 First of all, I disagree with your description of the hierarchy of Korean military officers. In every day interactions, "seniority of commissioning date" is the overwhelming factor in deciding how to interact other officers, with actual age coming in as a modifying factor. Commissioning source (Academy or non-academy) heavily affects an officer's career trajectory and chances for promotion, but does not factor into the language hierarchy. Rank also does not affect the language hierarchy, which causes much cognitive dissonance and discomfort should a higher ranking junior officer work in close quarters with a lower ranking senior officer.

The senior pilot was commissioned in '75 and left the Air Force as a major in '87 while the first officer was Air Force Academy class of 26 which would mean he was commissioned in '78 and left the military as a Lt. Col. Hence, the pilot is unambiguously superior to the first officer. This is supported by the language in the transcript where the senior pilot uses the lowest form of speech (반말) to the first officer. From my personal experience, I have never seen any junior Academy officer fail to defer to a senior (in commissioning date) OCS or ROTC officer. 

Second, the flight engineer is clearly much older and senior to both the pilot and the first officer. But there is another factor in play here - engineering is a secondary rating to flying and in the Korean military at least, there is a strong sense that you don't interfere with another officer's turf. Each specialty is highly silo-ed. For example, on the first ship I was on, the Chief engineering officer (Cheng) was senior to the Executive Officer (XO). Hence, at no point did our XO fail to acknowledge the Cheng's seniority, but in return the Cheng was conscientious about not overstepping the bounds of his specialty and interfering with the management of the ship. 

So there were clear linguistic barriers to open communication within the cockpit of the KA 801. The first officer was junior to the pilot, and the flight engineer was used to keeping his hands off the realm of pilots. 

Second, my own experience running exercises as a SEAL has shown that conventional Korean language hinders cooperation in time sensitive situations. For Close Quarters Combat exercises, where team members must work with each other within a room to clear it of "bad guys" safely, and where the situation and command structures are fluid, my unit has mandated that everyone speaks to each other in the lowest form of speech (반말) regardless of rank or age. Not only does this reduce the time necessary to communicate (since sentence endings are shorter), but it makes the junior members of a team much more likely to speak up when they see a corner that hasn't been "held" yet or a potentially dangerous situation. 

Deference to authority is not a unique problem to Koreans (again, see NASA and Crew Resource Management), but I would argue that the Korean language structurally exacerbates the problem. 

To which the Korean responds:

Thank you sir, this is helpful. Like I said, it is always a good practice to refer to someone who is closer to the context. It would have been great if I could speak with you before I wrote the post. Unfortunately, I am just some nobody who blogs for hobby, not a best-selling writer--so I didn't have the wherewithal to reach out to someone like you. I am writing a follow-up post, and I will definitely raise this point.

I'm not buying this attempt at humility. I believe "The Korean" had to be "humble" as it was the only way that he could bow out with his ego intact. The commenter had more legitimate credentials than "The Korean" as far as discussing the Korean Air force was concerned and so there was nothing he could offer to counter it. He had actual experience in the Korean military. Compare Kahn's gracious rebuttal to the way "The Korean" bulldozes Gladwell on how his Korean credentials trump his. Big difference.  While "The Korean" is being "humble", he manages to make a subtle dig at Gladwell for not doing his research. After all, "The Korean" is "just some nobody who blogs for hobby, not a best-selling writer--so I didn't have the wherewithal to reach out to someone like you."

In his following post, "My Thoughts on Gladwell's Response", "The Korean" talks about how he was able to speak to a number of Korean men who had served in the military. Yet he is not able to avail himself of the resources to connect with someone who had served in the Air Force because he is "just some nobody who blogs for hobby". He thumps the fact that he is someone who has "visited Korea numerous times, worked professionally in Korea, and currently interact with Korean professionals on a consistent basis. Most importantly, I speak, read and write Korean at a very high level. If you would like to see for yourself, you are welcome to read my analysis of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision on the two gay marriage cases, published recently by a Korean media. " Surely, his media and personal contacts would have led him to such a connection. So the argument about not being a "bestselling author" is a moot point. I believe that "The Korean" is actually better able to connect to such a contact because of the qualifications he emphasized.

Gladwell notes that I was incorrect about Korea's military hierarchy. For the record, I do not believe I was incorrect in my original post. Recall that virtually all Korean males serve in the military. What I wrote in my post is based on the military experience of numerous Korean men with whom I have conversed. Generally speaking, it is true that a bit more respect is accorded to a lower-ranking soldier who is older than the higher-ranking soldier, compared to a lower-ranking soldier who is younger than the higher-ranking soldier. It is also true, generally speaking, that military pedigree matters in the level of respect a soldier is accorded.

However, I will readily admit that none of the men I spoke with served in the Air Force, and none of them served as an officer on a career track. So when a commenter who said he served as a naval officer pointed out particular features of Korean military officers who serve as a pilot, I readily accepted his authority and posted a correction. I posted the correction because while my general knowledge may not have been incorrect, it was misleading. I wish I had the chance to speak with an actual Korean pilot who previously served as an Air Force officer, but as someone who blogs for hobby in his spare time, I just did not have the resource to find and interview such a person.

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Again, there is a deflection of blame and a shirking of responsibility. "The Korean" had conceded the point to Chris Kahn who had stated:

First of all, I disagree with your description of the hierarchy of Korean military officers. In every day interactions, "seniority of commissioning date" is the overwhelming factor in deciding how to interact other officers, with actual age coming in as a modifying factor. Commissioning source (Academy or non-academy) heavily affects an officer's career trajectory and chances for promotion, but does not factor into the language hierarchy. Rank also does not affect the language hierarchy, which causes much cognitive dissonance and discomfort should a higher ranking junior officer work in close quarters with a lower ranking senior officer.

This is in direct contrast to "The Korean's" point that age trumps seniority with seniority being the modifying factor and that rank affects the language hierarchy, so I cannot see how he can say that his "general knowledge MAY NOT HAVE BEEN INCORRECT" yet still maintain that "it was misleading". It was misleading because if you present things in the wrong context, your argument is flawed PERIOD. And then he follows with one excuse after another saying that he wasn't able to contact an Air Force veteran because he is a "lowly" blogger. 

 I notice that "The Korean" has a habit of pontificating at length when he seeks to deflect focus from his own errors in judgment as he has done many times on this series of articles and elsewhere on his blog. It's just a way to assert his dominance over the subject matter. Rambling so that readers get deflected from his flaws in reasoning. It's just a long-winded way to deflect blame. He can't just say that he was wrong. He has to go off on some crazy tangent like "Well, I will concede the point, but I was right about this, this, and this . . . " 

Many comments said KAL flights venturing into Russia during the late 1970s and 80s were also a pilot error, and it was fair for Malcolm Gladwell to count them as he was tallying up Korean Air's accidents.

The Korean disagrees. He will take the point is a navigation error is a serious pilot error. But the usual consequence of poor navigation into the wrong airspace is not that a military jet will appear and shoot your plane down. There is an obvious difference between wandering into the wrong air space and ramming into a mountain: the former, in most cases, does not lead to a plane crash and deaths.

But if you must insist otherwise, that's fine. This is a small point in the overall assessment of Gladwell's argument, so it is strange to see so many commenters get so hung up on it. In the Korean's mind, the greater problem was that Gladwell never disclosed the fact that two of the crashes that he counted were results of military or paramilitary attacks. At the very least, Gladwell could have let the readers decide if it was fair for him to count the three crashes as a part of KAL's safety record

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He contradicts himself here, stating that wandering into Russian air space was not a "pilot error", but then saying that "navigation error is a serious pilot error". Yes, I admit that you have a point, but I disagree because the consequence of such an action is not as serious as you claim. He just can't admit that he's wrong and has to find a way to make himself right however convoluted that way is.

You know who did have the resource to do so? Malcolm Gladwell. He is a world-famous writer; he can speak with virtually anyone in the world. It is not as if Gladwell had to interview Vladimir Putin about Russia's nuclear launch code. He simply had to speak with a few Korean pilots to test his theory. But this apparently did not happen.

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Deflecting blame for his own lack of research. I'm not buying this. The Korean simultaneously trumpets his large network of professional Korean contacts and Korean language skills to assert his authority over Gladwell on matters of Korean culture while saying that he is unable to find a Korean Air Force veteran because he is just some "lowly blogger". You can't have it both ways. He has also written an " analysis of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision on the two gay marriage cases, published recently by a Korean media", so he cannot sincerely expect readers to believe that he does not have the contacts to do so.

Gladwell questioned why I would not include the two KAL flights that were shot down in the category of pilot error. I would not, because I think there is a difference between a pilot error that puts an airplane in the wrong airspace and a pilot error that puts an airplane into the side of a mountain. But even if I concede the point, several questions remain.

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They're both pilot errors however you categorize them, but "The Korean" does a nice job of nitpicking to deflect his own flawed reasoning.

He's far too generous with his own mistakes and lack of research than he is with a "granular" difference in opinion with someone he excoriates for committing "journalistic malpractice". The fact that he digs in his heels to nitpick at the "granular" difference just shows that he is way more interested in being right than understanding the truth. It's not about the Asiana incident at this point, but whether "The Korean" is seen as right or wrong.

What does that say about him? He's not really interested in understanding Korea, but pushing his own dogma on others. He's more interested in controlling the narrative rather than exploring the story, understanding the truth. As intelligent as he likes to pride himself to be and will not let you forget by constantly trumpeting how he learned English in two years when he was in high school as well as having graduated from Berkeley and being a lawyer, he does not show the true intellectual curiosity and earnestness required to deeply understand things. Yes, I am sure he is very curious about things, but he certainly isn't committed to UNDERSTANDING or ACKNOWLEDGING the truth when it conflicts with his own POINT OF VIEW. If he were interested in the truth, he would quickly acknowledge his errors and move on. But does he do that? No, he will concede the point if it doesn't threaten his sense of righteousness, but will meander when it does, making all kinds of excuses for why he was not able to discern the truth or pointing out how he was more right than wrong. He could write a whole lot more concisely than he does, but his long-winded rambling is just a ruse to deflect responsibility from himself and dominate the discussion.

When the ego becomes bigger than the truth, what hope is there? Unfortunately, "The Korean's" ego is too big and so I would take his comments with a grain of salt. That combined with pig headedness is what causes him to be so bullish in trying to make others wrong when they disagree with him. He is able to admit his errors when it doesn't threaten his overall sense of being right like in response to the Korean military veteran, Chris Kahn. Although Kahn pointed out a critical error in "The Korean's" argument, "The Korean" did not feel threatened because he was able to rationalize it as an acceptable mistake that did not challenge his own sense of "rightness". He somehow rationalized that he had done his due diligence by speaking to Koreans who have served in other parts of the military and that not talking to Korean Air Force members was an excusable oversight. I don't know how egotistical one has to be to make this rationalization, but that is a very convoluted way of thinking. Someone points out something that undermines the foundation of your argument yet you are able to rationalize your mistake as excusable because you are so invested in being right. Because of the authority of the commenter, someone who had actually been on the ground experiencing military culture, "The Korean" could not wield his bloody axe as he usually does. He was humbled, but chose not to admit it by hiding behind this false rationalization. Although Gladwell pointed out more minor errors in "The Korean's" argument, "The Korean" was very brutal in the way he excoriated him. Why? Because his ego felt emboldened by his Korean credentials, which he could not do with the Korean military veteran. The difference with Gladwell was "granular", but he could not give a "graceful exit" as noted by one commenter and had to expound that HE WAS RIGHT AND GLADWELL WAS WRONG. He could not give up his sense of rightness because he was too egotistical to do so and thus, had to rebutt Gladwell in a harsh way.

As a reader, I believe that there were flaws in both "The Korean's" and Gladwell's arguments, but unlike "The Korean", Gladwell was able to leave his ego out of it. I do believe that Gladwell is interested in exploring the truth. As for "The Korean", I cannot. Gladwell was able to address the points earnestly. The Korean was not because his ego is too invested in being right and showing how "fair minded" and "well reasoned" he is.

You're either interested in the truth or not. If you are too pigheaded to admit when you are wrong, then you obviously aren't.