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In July last year, when Korea decided to renew imports of U.S. beef, views were evenly divided between those who demanded protection of Korean cattle farms and opposed U.S.-led neoliberalism, and those who stressed people's right to eat quality beef at low prices.

But the balance tilted in April this year, when President Lee Myung-bak returned after a beef deal was signed in Washington. The atmosphere became heated after MBC TV aired a controversial installment of the "PD Diary" current affairs program on mad cow disease on April 29. Since then, the propaganda of protest organizers aimed at maximizing people's anger and fear of mad cow disease have worked well.

Activists and politically-motivated online media outlets and community portals have coined provocative phrases and political propaganda that appeal to people's emotions rather than their intellect, but government leaders have only offered simple-minded responses, saying, "Just don't eat it, if you don't like it," "There is no problem," or "It's a Satanic act." In a word, the government has been overwhelmed by the protest organizers' propaganda.

In this May 26 file photo, a protester walks in front of an anti-U.S. imported beef banner in Seoul. The Korean reads: "Don't Want to Eat Mad Cow Disease Beef." /AP

One of the favorite phrases used by activist groups to maximize fears of mad cow disease was, "The mad cows will rush in," which has been used by the Korean Alliance against Korea-U.S. FTA since last year. In a leaflet distributed on Apr. 29, such phrases as "mad cows, mad government and people are running mad" were used, subliminally creating a simple equation -- "U.S. cattle = mad cows = BSE-infected beef."

Other illogical propaganda slogans include the allegation that of about 5 million American patients with Alzheimer's disease, 250,000-650,000, or 5-13 percent, are presumed to have been infected with variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the human form of BSE. A spoof Korean movie title "Many Holes in Your Brain" has also been successful in linking Alzheimer's disease with mad cow disease.

Sensitive children and students have responded to the slogan, "You can die if you eat 0.01g of American beef" -- referring to the scrapie prion protein (PrPsc), the substance that causes BSE. Others say even vegetarians can die from cosmetics or instant noodle soup containing beef byproducts. Although these products have nothing to do with mad cow disease, the allegations are effective in exaggerating a vague sense of danger. In this regard, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has been advising cosmetics manufacturers not to use extracts of bovine byproducts for fear of consequences.

Reuters reported that the FDA prevented U.S. makers of pet food and all other animal feed from using certain materials from cattle at the greatest risk for spreading mad cow disease, adding, "South Korea officially announced it would gradually open its market to U.S. beef imports as Washington intensifies safety standards."

But dailian.co.kr, an online Korean newspaper claimed, "After seeing a Reuters report, Netizens suspect that even dogs don't eat (American) beef.'" The dailian story transmuted further when it was quoted later by other portal sites, such as Daum’s Agora forum, Pressian and Ohmy News, which said simply, "In the U.S., even dogs don't eat beef."

These sorts of claims succeeded well in generating anti-American sentiment by taking advantage of anti-beef protests. Such slogans as "Our home opposes imports of beef from BSE-infected cattle" show that the anti-beef activists have succeeded in persuading even housewives to feel as if they should participate in protests for the sake of their children’s health.

Slogans like "mad cow disease-friendly government," a parody of the Lee Myung-bak administration's catchphrase "business-friendly government," and the government employees union's anti-U.S. beef statement, "Are government employees targets of a clinical experiment?" have also stimulated protesters by ridiculing incompetence in the Lee administration.

Some pundits blame the government’s failure to communicate. Park Sung-hee, a professor of media studies at Ewha Womans University, said, "The government should have taken the initiative to use accurate and simple terms to implement its policies effectively. But ordinary people have taken the initiative in the anti-beef candlelight vigils.” As it happens, she says, the Lee administration has already been defined by two terms: One is “Kang-Bu-Ja”, a term conjuring associations of wealth and greed with an allusion to Gangnam, the upscale area in Seoul where many members of the Lee Cabinet allegedly live or hold real estate. The other is “Ko-So-Young,” for Lee's alma mater Korea University, his Somang Presbyterian Church, and his home region of Youngnam or Gyeongsang Province.

(englishnews@chosun.com )