Farmer Lee's Suicide

I started out yesterday with a post condemning the subject of this story — Second cattle farmer commits suicide, injures family. There's little commendable:

The 41-year-old farmer, who is only identified by his surname Lee and lives in the town of Wolbong-ri, Nasan-myeon, Hampyeong County, was found dead in his home after drinking herbicide at approximately 4:40 a.m. on May 5. Immediately before his suicide, Lee allegedly attempted to kill his 36-year-old wife, who is from the Philippines, and his three children by beating them with a farm-machine implement. The four members of his family were sleeping at the time.

But then I read this: "Local residents said that, Lee, who started raising cattle some 10 years ago, had been aggrieved over the loss of all 18 of his cattle since August last year, when the spread of brucellosis forced him to slaughter 14 of the 18 and sell the remaining four." The article later states that "[a]fter South Korea agreed to fully resume imports of U.S. beef, the prices of Hanwoo fell by 300,000 won (US$298) in a week to 400,000 won per animal."

None of this excuses Lee's crimes, including the worst possible crime, suicide. It does give us a context, though.

I really wish Mr. Wendell Berry of Kentucky could pay a visit to Korea. The following passage is from The Unsettling of America: Culture & Agriculture:

The health of a farm is as apparent to the eye as the health of a person. To look at a farm in full health gives the same complex pleasure as looking at a fully healthy person or animal. It will give the same impression of abounding life. What grows on it will be thriving. It will will seem to belong where it is; the form will be a considerate response to the nature of its place; it will not have the look of an abstract idea of a farm imposed upon an area somewhere or other. It will look cared for--groomed, so to speak--like a healthy person or animal; it will look lived in by people who care where they live. It will show no gullies or galls or other signs of erosion. The waterways and field edges and areas around buildings will be grassed, something that becomes more necessary the steeper the ground is

Most Korean farms are, in a word, ugly. (Not those of my favorite county, as I've blogged before — Something About Uljin.) The standard Korean response to any social issue begins with the words, "The government must..." I suspect that that only compounds a problem that goes much, much deeper. Korean farmers are unable to marry their countrywomen, and, as did Mr. Lee, import brides from Vietnam or the Philippines. They are unable to survive without government support. I have no solutions, but perhaps Mr. Berry could offer some suggestions.