Korean Officials Struggle to Define Obscenity

The prosecution in the case of Ma Kwang-soo, a literature professor who was indicted in 2006 for posting obscene materials on his personal website, has been struggling to define the guidelines for what constitutes obscenity.

Kwang-soo's novel, Happy Sarah, was at the center of another obscenity charge ten years ago, as the cover of the book features a man and a woman with their genitals exposed. Kwang-soo was imprisoned for the book's content in 1995.

When Kwang-soo was indicted again in November for the words and pictures on his website, he told the Korea Times that he could not understand the standards the prosecution used to judge literary obscenity.

"I thought legal standards had changed, as more than 10 years have passed since Happy Sarah was ruled illegal by the court," Kwang-soo told the Times.

An official at the Seoul Western District Prosecutors Office told the Korea Times that the investigation has been extended "because [the office] has to compare the case with other literary obscenity cases.

"We have been investigating what kinds of words and pictures on the web have led to indictments of those who posted them and what kinds of rulings they have received," the official said.

Also at the center of the Kwang-soo case is Korea's murky definition of what constitutes obscenity.

"Among Ma's several obscene writings and pictures, some of them are found to be certainly legal while others are still hard to judge," continued the official. "Since there are no specific standards on literary obscenity, we have studied cases and rulings related to the obscenity of creative works."