Cyberbullying is justice...
…and other lessons from Revenge Note (Webdrama 2017).
This is a review of a drama that I am watching currently. I got sucked in via Youtube recommendations, and it made me think, particularly in light of recent events around cyberbullying. I hope you can read through till the end.
What does a member of the royal family, a member of a kpop group, and the average teenager have in common?
Sulli’s suicide is said to be her escape from depression, created in no small part by the endless criticism of faceless commentators. Meghan Markle recently gave an interview where she could barely hold on to her composure, talking about how she was first pregnant, then a new mother while the press tore her apart. I’ve been a new mom, and fending off criticism is practically a feature of new motherhood. My heart ached to think of her every imagined weakness and shortcoming being amplified and echoed back to her.
Some say that cyberbullying can simply be switched off. A recent article in Singapore’s Straits Times has a faceless “netizen” offering celebrities this simple exit - just don’t get onto social media if you can’t “get used to it.” That position denies three things - the celebrities’ right to promote, their right to respectful conversation, and the wrongness of being cruel with words.
Which is where this drama review begins. Revenge Note is a web-drama, starring young actors and k-pop performers. On the surface, it seems to have nothing to say. In many ways, the plot is pure wish-fulfillment. A klutzy teenaged girl begins the first year of high school. She gains the attention of her high school hottie classmate and of her brother’s best friend - who just happens to be a rising kpop-star. High school social life is not all unicorns and rainbows, and the characters in this world are from a predictable range of queens, gangsters and awful teachers.
What’s different about this high school fairy tale is that Ho Goo Hee (the first two syllables of her name, Ho Gu, sounds like the term for a pushover) has a mysterious app, called Revenge Note. She is a pushover, yielding to the people who push her around. Even her mom favors her smart elder brother over her. One day, something bad happens to her, and the app mysteriously appears on her phone. It prompts her: “Will you be a Revenge Queen?”. It’s a digital, dark fairy godmother, almost as if Maleficent were an algorithm. All she needs is a name, even if it’s an internet handle, and the app sends a message to the target. Each time she enters one, havoc is wreaked upon the person’s life, and eventually they are brought to justice. The punishment is always in a poetically similar way to the original offence. One day the target is Goo Hee’s bullies. Another, it’s an act of justice, exposing the pervert school teacher who is threatening her friend.
It seemed like more teenaged wish fulfillment to me. After all, if you find yourself in highschool, where social mores are sharpened by razor blade netizen tongues, then certainly there ought to be an app for countering that.
Yet, as the show progresses, we see that Go Hee is herself turning into judge and jury. Three times, we see her hesitate before she hits the submit button, three times, she asks herself if she should not wield her power to execute the offender. Once, she comes very close to entering the wrong name.
This is where this little web drama went from fun to smart, from comedy to commentary. In the beginning, it made you root for Go Hee - clearly, eliminating the bullies is to be lauded. Then it showed that one human being can have too much power, and his or her judgement may not reflect the truth of the matter. It clearly illustrates, that the judgement of a single person is not equal to justice.
Therein lies the thoughtful message of this well-written story - the root of cyberbullying is an individual’s outraged sense of justice. It is not the deliberate pursuit of “hate” that creates cyberbullies, it is instead an emotionally volatile response to an observed offense. “Hate”, as it is often characterized, is a potent concept, but strangely too simplistic. Instead, the online commenter believes that lines were crossed. He/she loves justice, and therefore there is no wrong in punishing the offender.
This reaction chain leaves no room for due process, no space for empathy, no ideals of mercy, no consideration of reformation. These are all things that need time, and space. On the internet, there is neither time nor space. Responses are instant, emotionally driven, and amplified to an incredible volume. Human beings at the other end of this loudspeaker can choose to go deaf or listen and be excoriated. There is no turning it off, because one does not need to hear a sonic wave to feel the impact. The earth shakes when millions of others listen, and respond, and join the deafening chorus.
The Revenge Note is a frightening tool. It’s similar to another incarnation fo the fairy godmother, the genie, who takes your wishes literally. As you say, master. It is absolute, irreversible, and vulnerable to any turn of phrase.
So what’s the lesson of Revenge Note? I am at the 9th of 12 episodes. I am not sure where it is going with the power that Go Hee now wields. I hope it ends with Go Hee discarding Revenge Note, and relying on her empathy, her friends, and her family to help her get through high school. You know, those old, slow things that seem to have little power.
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