[Reporter’s Notebook] A Statue for Unity Instead of Diverging Dreams

The Debate Over Statues:
Who Deserves to Be Immortalized?
Changing Attitudes Toward Monuments
Controversy Over the Meaning and Purpose of Statues
Recognizing the Collective, Not Just Individuals

A statue that immortalizes a person at the peak of their brilliance. Spending hundreds of millions to create these overwhelming monuments is the highest honor descendants can bestow. However, the story changes when it comes to the question of "who should be commemorated." This is where the dreams of those who wish to erect statues and those who wish to tear them down begin to diverge.

Recently, perceptions of statues have been changing. Some suggest that statues of popular celebrities or actors, rather than historical figures, should be erected anywhere, while others argue that statues of individuals are no longer necessary at all. Overseas, fundamental reflection on the act of erecting statues began after the 2020 incident involving George Floyd, which led to the beheading of numerous statues of historical figures.

There are reasons why people are questioning statues. First, statues are often erected according to the needs of the era, regardless of an individual's actual achievements. For example, after the Korean War, there was a need for figures who could promote regime stability. Statues such as that of Lee Seungbok, the boy who famously declared "I hate communists" and was placed at every elementary school during the height of anti-communist sentiment, and Colonel Park Jingyeong, commemorated for his role in "suppressing communist guerrillas" despite being stigmatized as a perpetrator of the Jeju 4·3 Incident, are notable examples. Additionally, since the 1990s, many statues of historical figures have been erected solely to attract tourists to local municipalities.

Second, the history created by many people is reduced to a single statue. During revolutions, countless individuals sacrificed themselves or stood up to injustice, but their efforts are compressed into statues of only a few prominent figures. The Guardian cited the example of a statue of a female Black activist, stating, "Revolutions are not made by a single individual, but by the collective effort of those who sacrificed their time and energy for a cause," and asked, "Where are the statues for the unknown heroes?" The argument is that there is no need to idolize and glorify any individual by erecting a statue. While radical, this claim is reasonable considering the endless debates over the merits and faults of those commemorated by statues.

Can a society that dictates whom to emulate truly achieve unity? Watching politicians announce their candidacies, they solemnly pledge to carry on the legacy and rewrite history in front of statues of various generals, oblivious to the context behind calls to remove statues. Some politicians even propose erecting statues of former presidents embroiled in controversy, criticizing the country as "one where you can't even put up a statue." At this rate, the divergence between those who wish to erect statues and those who wish to tear them down will persist.

Perhaps what deserves more attention are statues of people without names or faces. Statues modeled after fallen firefighters, police officers, or soldiers, and the Statue of Peace, created based on the average age of victims at the time to represent an ordinary, anonymous figure?these are images of someone who could be anyone, anywhere. History is not built from marble or bronze.