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| YouTube star Kang Sung-tae / Korea Times file |
What's your take? Celebrities asked to reveal their opinions about the justice minster nominee
By Kang Hyun-kyung
A YouTuber, who celebrated the 1 million mark of subscribers on Aug. 10, has been paying the price for his rare silence about the contentious justice minister nominee Cho Kuk.
Since last weekend, nearly 200,000 people have unsubscribed from Kang Sung-tae's "God of Study" channel as the star YouTuber has been staying mum on the embattled nominee and his daughter.
His channel used to see a steady rise of subscribers and reached 1.1 million subscribers at its height last week.
The subscribers' exodus, however, has been evident on the heels of his rare silence about the justice minister's 28-year-old daughter's dubious college and medical school admissions.
"God of Study" now has around 920,000 subscribers, and shows no signs of rebounding.
Celebrities ― particularly those who were vocal on contentious political issues in the past ― have been asked to voice their opinions regarding Cho Kuk and his daughter. TV personality Kim Je-dong and actress Kim Kyu-ri who were highly critical of the Lee Myung-bak government's deal to import American beef, were some of the celebrities facing such calls.
Kang, a celebrity study mentor who has appeared on several TV programs, has also been under pressure to give his take about Cho and his daughter ever since the start of the barrage of media reports about allegations surrounding the nominee.
Cho's daughter is shrouded in suspicions with a number of allegations and rumors about her college and medical school admissions, which includes her being listed as the lead author of a highly technical, professional medical paper that was published in 2009 when she was a third-year high school student.
Those who are familiar with the pathology article say the jargon-riddled research paper project is not something an average high school student could possibly take the initiative on from start to finish.
Kang has been vocal on contentious political issues.
He has made political comments from time to time since he opened the channel in 2008.
Back in 2016, Kang was a harsh critic of Chung Yoo-ra, the daughter of President Park Geun-hye's longtime confident Choi Soon-sil who is deemed to be responsible for the impeachment of the former president. Chung was admitted to Ewha Womans University Physical Education Department after she won a gold medal in the equestrian team event at the 2014 Asian Games.
Her admission was later canceled as the Choi scandal dealt a blow to the Park government.
In a video he uploaded on Nov. 1, 2016, Kang harshly criticized Chung and her mother for the "fraudulent academic admission."
"You know what? I am really not in the mood to encourage you guys to study hard," he said in the video, titled "Republic of Korea, the Land Where Hard Work is Forgotten."
"When you look at what's going on here, you'll know what I mean by that. We know there is someone who managed to top the political ladder, although she was not elected through a vote, and swallowed the entire nation to fulfill her greed. In a country like this, our hard work does not pay off. We have no good reason to work hard. We can get what we want if we are good at cheating."
The video he uploaded two years ago has been haunting him recently as various allegations about the justice minister have erupted since Cho was tapped for the key post.
All eyes were on Kang.
But the YouTuber didn't say a word about him or his daughter.
Some subscribers alleged Kang is a hypocrite as he is using a double standard on the almost identical daughter scandals.
Kang broke his silence by uploading a short video, titled "Can a High Schooler Write a Medical Paper?" In the video, the YouTuber mentioned Hungarian-American mathematician, computer scientist and physicist John von Neumann (1903-1957), saying a genius like him could have written a sophisticated academic paper had he been Cho's daughter's age.
The video backfired.
Thousands of internet users left scathing posts under the video, bashing him for his remarks. Some asked if he dared to compare Cho's "mediocre" daughter to the Hungarian-American genius.
In an attempt to calm subscribers' anger, Kang uploaded another video on Aug. 23 as the backlash against him continued.
In the video, titled "My Apologies," he said he was quoted out of context and claimed he had no intention to compare Cho's controversial daughter to von Neumann.
Kang said he has decided not to comment on political issues. He denied rumors that he was offered a seat by the ruling Democratic Party of Korea in the National Assembly elections to be held next year.
According to him, he has received similar offers from the two major parties, one in 2012 and the other the following year. He said he rejected the offers because he felt he was not qualified to become a politician and chose to focus on what he does without being distracted.
But Kang stopped short of revealing his position about Cho's daughter.
