This passage examines Seodaemun Prison History Hall in Seoul and argues that, through visually and aurally powerful exhibits and booklets for children, it functions as an anti-Japan educational facility that implants a one-sided image of Japanese rule as sheer brutality.
While the museum praises acts of terrorism as “righteous struggle” and presents exaggerated depictions of torture by Japanese authorities, it pays little attention to the harsh reality of prisons in the Yi Dynasty period or to the efforts of the Government-General of Korea to modernize the prison system and curb cruel punishments and torture.
The passage denounces the postwar distortion of history by which Seodaemun Prison itself has been turned into supposed proof of “Japanese atrocity” and made into one of the representative facilities of anti-Japan indoctrination.

2019-03-02
However, through the postwar distortion of history, the very existence of “Seodaemun Prison” has now been turned into supposed proof of “Japanese atrocities,” and it has become one of the representative “anti-Japan indoctrination facilities.”

What follows is a continuation of the previous chapter.
2-2. Seodaemun Prison History Hall.
Inside Seodaemun Independence Park in Seoul, there is a place called “Seodaemun Prison History Hall,” and this too is filled with anti-Japan indoctrination exhibits that make use of both visual and auditory effects.
In an area recreating an underground cell, the figure of an imprisoned female independence activist emerges from the darkness and cries out in a mournful voice, “Manse, manse!”
There are numerous pictures attached depicting scenes of torture by Japanese authorities, and there is also a wax figure of a Korean man hung upside down from the ceiling and subjected to “water torture.”
Here, three kinds of booklets are sold, one for lower elementary school children, one for upper elementary school children, and one for youths, and at the beginning of the one for lower elementary school children appears the following passage.
“Heading: If you do not obey me, I will send you here!
When you want to force those who do not obey to obey, the best way is to frighten them.
Japan did the same.
About one hundred years ago, Japan tried by every possible means to make our country its own.
Naturally, the people of our country resisted.
So Japan built a huge prison in busy Seodaemun for all to see.
Many people saw it and thought: Do not resist Japan’s invasion!”
Furthermore, it praises the acts of terrorists as “righteous struggle” and writes the following.
“Heading: Righteous struggle — Punish Japan by force!
If we kill the important people in Japan who make major decisions, and bury the ‘pro-Japanese elements’ who, though being people of our own country, help Japan, it will become difficult for Japan to rule our country.
The same will be true if we destroy important buildings for Japan, such as police stations.
Such fighting is called ‘righteous struggle.’”
It also describes torture by Japanese authorities in the following way.
“Heading: They endured even the cruel torture of Japan.
The basement of the security office was a place where the Japanese imperialists interrogated and tortured independence activists.
The Japanese imperialists carried out unbearably cruel torture.
(omitted) When I think of how those patriotic martyrs endured such hardship and carried on the independence movement, my heart aches and I truly respect them.
You too should offer them warm feelings of慰労 and gratitude.”
“Seodaemun Prison” was built in 1921 by the Government-General of Korea for the purpose of modernizing the prison system.
Prisons in the Yi Dynasty period were unbelievably filthy and cruel, and it is said that fifteen or sixteen people were crammed into a single tsubo, and even sleep had to be taken in turns.
A Twenty-Five-Year History of the Administration of the Government-General of Korea (held by the National Diet Library) records the following.
“The prisons before and after annexation were among those institutions least attended to in the old Korean period, and the filth and disorder within them, together with the cruelty in the treatment of prisoners, are such that (omitted) one cannot help but feel one’s flesh creep upon reading of them.”
The truth is that the Government-General of Korea made the utmost efforts to make this “hellish prison” comparable to humane prisons in Japan.
Furthermore, it prohibited the cruel executions and tortures practiced under the Yi Dynasty and transformed society into a modern rule-of-law system.
However, through the postwar distortion of history, the very existence of “Seodaemun Prison” has now been turned into supposed proof of “Japanese atrocities,” and it has become one of the representative “anti-Japan indoctrination facilities.”
To be continued.