What makes something feel Korean? Journalist Tommy Craggs joins us to unpack Big Korean Energy, from the ’88 Seoul Olympics to Son Heung-min, Cubs fandom to K-pop Demon Hunters. We dig into how sports and culture shaped his Korean consciousness, how today’s global K-wave ties back to the trauma of war and occupation, and what it means to raise a Korean kid without turning into a samchon.

Follow along on our Substack for more things Big Korean Energy.

An Edited Transcript of Our Convo:

Rebecca: Hi, I am Rebecca Lehrer.

Amy: And I’m Amy Choi. And we are The Mash-Up Americans.

Rebecca: This is our new series on Big Korean Energy.

Amy: What makes something Korean or not and who decides? Oh, it’s just me.

Rebecca: You just, you just decide.

Amy: I decide. I decide, but we go beyond kimchi and K-pop to break it all down.

Rebecca: And helping us out with that today is Tommy Craggs, our guest.

Amy: Tommy is an incredible journalist, a part of Flaming Hydra, co-founder of Oakland Review of Books, and was basically everywhere online at a certain era of online media. He was the editor of Deadspin, executive editor of Gawker. He writes about sports, politics, and media. And by the way, we went to college together.

Rebecca: Here’s our conversation.

Amy: First of all, I’d like to say congratulations to us for spending four years in journalism school and really preparing ourselves for the future and, um, setting ourselves up for success for sustainable careers.

Tommy: Yeah. They, I think they trained us for the industry that was coming. I think they trained us well. Yeah.

Amy: [Laughs.] I think you were my first good friend who was hapa. I didn’t know anybody who had a mixed family. And now like my children’s school, everybody is part Korean or part…like this is now just the world we live in. But I’m just curious, like, what was it like growing up for you in Champaign-Urbana?

Tommy: Champaign-Urbana is where the University of Illinois is. Uh, and that’s, that’s sort of important to this story because I grew up surrounded by like professors brat. And yet we were also surrounded by like farm kids. And so I grew up playing basketball in high school. Like we had a terrible team. Um, but we were…

Rebecca: Then you won the state championships. 

Tommy: Nope.

Rebecca: Okay, so I didn’t see that movie. Sorry.

Amy: [Laughs.] 

Tommy: I went to a high school that was mostly like professor kids. and I think my senior year, I’m pretty sure there were games when we started four Koreans. So we would go around and play these like, you know, farmers’ kids in central Illinois. I don’t think I placed myself so much as was placed, um, in those moments. I just remember that’s when, you know, we would hear variations on Go back to where you came from. I remember there was a game where somebody was wearing like a KKK shirt in the stands. 

Amy: Korean Korean Korean?

Rebecca: Yeah. For all the Koreans. [Laughs.]

Amy: For all the Koreans that were on the team. 

Rebecca: You forgot me. It should be KKKK.

Tommy: [Laughs.] So yeah, that was like,I developed something of a Korean consciousness in that, in that way. There was like a big Korean community in Champaign-Urbana. But, you know, I don’t know how my mom would feel about my saying this, but she always seemed to hold [00:03:00] the Korean community there at, at arm’s length for a number of reasons. I didn’t go to the Korean church. I barely went to the Korean school. I did tae kwon do for like a day. I wasn’t really immersed in the Koreanness of Champaign-Urbana the way that like some of my peers were.

Amy: As a Korean person who’s interested in sports, there was a moment, like, in our childhood where like Korea suddenly became a thing that people knew about. It was the Olympics in Seoul. It was in ‘88, so we were nine years old. Do you remember what your experience of watching it was when you were a kid?

Tommy: I remember ‘88 pretty vividly. I had a, a hodori stuffy. Do you remember the little, the tiger?

Amy: Uh-huh. 

Rebecca: Oh yes.

Tommy: I had that and I was actually in Korea recently. And you still see, like, hodoris still in circulation. Now that I think about it, I, I never really thought about ‘88 as some, like, sort of pivot for specific Koreanness. But I do think that was the first moment I thought about Korea in connection with sports, and I was becoming like a real rabid sports fan right around that time. The idea that the Korean part of me, could also be, you know, into sports. That wasn’t just like an American thing. 

Rebecca: So had your parents been back to Korea, since their immigration?

Amy: My grandmother who came to the US with like three of her daughters were in Chicago. So my grandmother had come, she had gotten her citizenship in the US but then she went back for the Olympics and it was like such a huge crazy deal. Like we watched every single night. 

Rebecca: But I also have to imagine even Seoul — the way that just even anything in Korea even in that, you know, interim 12 to 15 years…so much had changed physically in the place and then that’s also what you’re seeing visually. Right? Like, oh, this is a becoming…big urban new places.

Amy: Yeah. Like it was like a debut. 

Rebecca: Yeah. Tommy, so you’re saying around that age nine, you’re becoming a rabid sports fan. Is this because like the Bulls and the Bears?

Amy: [Laughs.]

Rebecca: Like what’s happening at this time that you’re becoming a, a kind of rabid sports fan?

Tommy: Yeah, I mean, it was definitely Chicago sports, the Bears. I grew up like a big football fan. Like Chicago was kind of the center of American sports for like 10 years or so. and yeah, Illinois, Illinois football was like, was a big thing for me.

Rebecca: Was your dad — was Professor Craggs a football fan?

Tommy: He was, yeah. We had season tickets from, from the time I was like four years old, five years old maybe. 

Rebecca: Wow.

Tommy: Yeah. but yeah, it’s, it’s interesting actually, we were talking about kind of the explosion in Korea’s growth right around the time of the Olympics. And I think we went probably around the time I was three or four, and then again, maybe four or five years later, before the Olympics. And, I remember at every visit my mom kind of remarking on just like how much Korea was, you know, growing. 

Amy: Mm-hm.

Tommy: And the Olympics were kind of the, yeah, like you said, the coming out. And in retrospect, it’s like also part of a pretty bad story. Like, you know, it’s Park Chung-hee and, um, this like, you know, explosive industrialization that had a lot of far reaching effects on Korean workers and Korean people in general…

Amy: Also, like we hadn’t had democracy yet.

Tommy: Yeah. Yeah.

Amy: You know? Like, that’s the other crazy thing is that like all these filmmakers that come out and you’re like, wow, these like anti-capitalist artists. And it was like, yeah. ‘Cause they all grew up getting shot at during student protests.  

Rebecca: Yeah.

Amy: And that’s why they’re the artists that they are right now.

Tommy: I mean, you have self immolations, you know, all throughout the eighties into the nineties. Yeah.

Rebecca: Just the way that our brains try to make history something that it was far away. The repercussions of it were still happening. 

Amy: Yeah. 

Rebecca: And only now could we see some clarity. 

Amy: I feel like the next big sporting explosion of, like, Korea on the international stage was in the World Cup. And that to me as an adult then, where I could, I had a little bit more of a relationship to my own Koreanness and thought more about what it meant to be Korean in America. And it wasn’t just Korean people that were so fucking pumped. And I was like,

Tommy: Yeah.

Amy: They love us! They really love us! And it’s a crazy thing to think about that, oh, at that point still at 22, I felt still in my identity, like so kind of alienated from America that I was so surprised and so pleased that non-Korean people could be rooting for Korea as a team. But what is that feeling like? Do you have that experience of, oh my God…

Rebecca: Or about anything?

Amy: Yeah.

Rebecca: Is there something that you feel still, like, a strong identity with, like Chicago sports or Korean sports you go hard for and feel some connection to?

Tommy: I don’t really think so. And in fact, part of my, like, development as an adult and as, as a sports fan, has been to, divorce myself from like a lot of the teams I grew up with as, as a kid. And just like…

Amy: Why?

Tommy: I mean, I remember, well, 2003, uh, Cubs, the, that’s the Steve Bartman year. They had the lead in game six of the NLCS. They were just a few outs from the World Series. And then, there was the ball hit into the stands. It was a foul ball..

Amy: Oh.

Tommy: …that Moisés Alou could have caught. And the fan, he had his headphones on and he didn’t realize that like the Cubs player could have caught it. And so he like knocked it away. 

Amy: Right.

Tommy: He tried to catch it too, that that was Steve Bartman.

Rebecca: Oh right. I’ve watched that video on the internet.

Tommy: Yeah. It was just this awful moment. They went, went on to lose. And things got so, so toxic and I’m like, why am I, why am I doing this? I was living in San Francisco at the time, but I was going to a lot of Oakland A games and there were fun games and you could go real cheap and sit in the upper decks and, and, like, smoke a joint and nobody would bother you. And it was a great, it was just like great vibes. And I’m like, why am I not just an Oakland As fan? So I was…I became an As fan.

Amy: Right.

Rebecca: I’m just here for the vibes. If the energy is toxic, I’m like what, what are you…

Amy: Well.

Rebecca: It’s all a made up thing. Like, let’s just have a good time.

Amy: It’s so fun until like that dude was getting death threats. Right?

Tommy: I mean, yeah. And everybody was just so miserable. And then there was like, there was that segment of the fandom that, like, kind of delighted in the misery too.

Rebecca: Right.

Tommy: It was clear, like that was such a part of the identity of being a Cubs fan. 

And then later on I developed, I have a, a very strict rule. My only strict rule is sports fandom, which is like all things being equal, if you don’t have like a rooting interest, based on like childhood allegiances or anything, you root for pretty. You root for the team that plays pretty. 

Amy:Ah.

Tommy: So for a few months’ time, I’ll become a fan of the Sacramento Kings in 2003 or whatever. 

Rebecca: Yeah. Yeah.

Tommy: And I became a fan of the Warriors, you know, 10 years ago, just because of Steph Curry. So that, that is my one rule is you, you root for pretty.

Amy: Wait, I have a question. And this is, I think for both of us, because there are a few things in my life that I feel that I need to have like strong boundaries around, but like the idea of having to set for yourself a rule about fandom is so interesting to me because I am not a fan of anything so strongly that like, I need to make a fence for myself.

Rebecca: What do you mean? 

Amy: Like Tommy, that you’re like, I have a rule. Like that sports fandom and your teams can be so all encompassing and seep into your pores so much that you’re like, okay, I gotta…

Rebecca: Reset. 

Amy: Reset like that. Why do you think…what is it about being a fan of a team that makes people fucking crazy?

Tommy: Well, I think in my case, my rule is actually like a non rule. It’s, it is like cheer, like appreciate the aesthetic thing happening on the field.

Amy: Right.

Tommy: Instead of all the, like, accumulated bullshit. You know, and the, the marketing and all that appreciate the nice, the, like, the nice thing the workers are doing on the field.

Amy: Right, right, right. We’re paying them to do nice things for us and to entertain us.

Tommy: Yeah. Yeah. Maybe I shouldn’t call it a rule, but it’s supposed to be liberating.

Amy: Yeah.

Rebecca: Yeah. That makes, I mean, to me, that makes a lot of sense because you act like it’s a relationship to your own, probably like addiction to a certain way, or like there’s a way of that fandom can be so addictive. 

Amy: Yeah. Yeah.

Rebecca: A certain way of it, and you’re like, it’s for the love of the game.

I mean, one thing that we’ve just been really curious about is just about fandoms generally and the intensity of fandoms and the intensity of Korean fandom especially.

You’ve written for 25 years about sports and what’s happening on the field. What kind of other observations do you have about kind of how fandoms work. Have you observed anything about the steps, stages of becoming a fan?

Tommy: I do think a lot of the intensity now that we see in sort of Korean fandom, I mean maybe this is getting ahead of ourselves a little bit, but there is this moment where, you know, like, Korean culture is reflecting Western culture back at the West. 

Amy: Mmmm.

Tommy: And when it goes, you go from that to actually shaping Western culture and, and, dictating its terms and becoming like, not just something reflecting the dominant, but part of the dominant.

Amy: Mm-hm.

Tommy: Um, I think that’s like where you get this like hyper identification, with like culture in, in all forms, whether it’s like BTS or, Son Heung-min. We can talk about Son a little bit more later, but like, Son is interesting too because, you know, the way he plays, when he was at his peak, he was a scorer. He was an attacker. He was this, like, sort of two-footed genius. 

Amy: And so pretty.

Tommy: Uh, and he, he, played in a way…and and quite pretty. 

Rebecca: The way he wears an outfit.

Amy: Just the man can wear…

Rebecca: I need a cardigan…

Amy: Or can not wear clothes, as I like to reflect back on his Calvin Klein campaign and also when I’m feeling down.

Rebecca: There’s a separate section here called hair. Koreans.

Amy: [Laughs.] Anyway, sorry.

Tommy: You’re saying it to this guy. [Laughs.]

Rebecca: I’m sorry. [Laughs.]

Tommy: But just that he’s playing in like the, idiom of, the very best players in the world. It’s not just like a guy sort of fitting in, but a guy who’s like actually dominating in, you know, in the style, of like the greatest players in the world. And so I, I do think that, you know, I think that is where you see some of the intensity start to come in. Um, and that, you know, that happens over the last, what, 20 years or so.

Amy: Is it a uniquely Korean thing that like, I am so called to Sonny? When we were prepping for this, I was like, what do I know about Koreans in sports? I don’t know anything. And then Gabe, my husband, reminded me, he was just like, remember when you love the Steelers? And I was like, why? Oh, I was like, oh, Hines Ward. He was hot. He’s just a Black man with a Korean face, you know? I would watch Steelers games and, like, I think I had a towel. 

Tommy: The Terrible Towel.

Amy: It’s a Terrible Towel. I had a Terrible Towel because Hines Ward was hot and Korean. 

Rebecca: Sure.

Tommy: Yeah. I mean, Hines Ward was like, I think you were asking about like Korean athletes that I first kind of clocked and he was one of the early ones, partly because he was such, like, a recognizable type of Korean. Like GI dad, Korean mom. Like, I had a very similar feeling, like, of affection. He was, and also that he played like this kind of, like, underhanded, dirty, like he pissed people off.

Amy: You know, we always say it’s much easier to be something when you can see it out in the world. And Hines Ward being a little bit sneaky. Like underhanded or like getting on people’s nerves, but then being like so charming and delightful, you were like, oh, we aren’t like all good little nice kids who get As in math, like, here’s this guy playing dirty. And it was cool. 

Rebecca: I do think that’s, to your point earlier, Tommy, about Son playing at the best, the highest level, like the, the sort of feeling of that is what the transcendence is. The issue sometimes that we as people who like truly the depth of our souls believe in the power and importance of a kind of a truly diverse, engaged society. It’s the irony of these fucking assholes…

Amy: Yes.

Rebecca: …who are trying to, use DEI or wokeness as like some kind of the, the maligning and destruction of whatever fragile societal construct and contract we had, but like using that as the kind of bogeyman, but actually for us too, from within. Those were — are hard too. We’re like, no, we just want an even playing field so we can play the same game at the best level. 

Amy: Yeah. 

Rebecca: The way we wanna play it. And we wanna be able to have the dirty player and the non dirty, you know? We wanna…

Amy: Yeah.

Rebecca: The thing that feels awesome, and I think part of what Big Korean energy is about is that like we, we no longer have to just be like, there’s our one representative. Like, it’s like…you get to have the range of, of what Koreanness is. 

Amy: Right.

Rebecca: And that’s so much better. 

Amy: It wasn’t that BTS is just a great pop band that is Korean. BTS is like the greatest pop band.

Rebecca: Right. Totally.

Amy: You know, and then like Sonny was. People say he’s passed his prime. I would say that he’s perfect is that he’s also one of the greatest soccer players…football players in the world. Bong Joon-ho is not just like a Korean director that happened to make a film that crossed over. He’s one of the great cinematic minds in the world.

Rebecca: So let’s, let’s, let’s do a Sonny moment. 

Amy: Okay. 

Rebecca: Okay. ‘Cause in sports journalist mode, what is it about, how, what’s his playing style like? How would you describe him as a player?

Tommy: It has been impossible not to follow him, like, over the last 10 years or whatever. and I mean, I guess the, the, the big thing with, he’s just a prolific goal scorer. Uh, and when he was in the Premier League, he was two footed and he and Harry Kane who’s like this, like, ultimate avatar of, of like the British soccer guy. They were, you know, as a duo were incredible. And I, yeah, I guess seeing him sort of in this like seat of Britishness in the premiership next to Harry Kane, that is an eye-opening moment for the Korean diaspora, you know.

Rebecca: Uh, it’s really exciting, I mean, to have him coming here because it’s such a Korean city, right? LA is so Korean, and there’s just a real sense of pride. And also he’s been doing these press conferences dressed like an…the absolute king that he is. 

I don’t know how old your, your kid is.

Tommy: She’s 10. Yeah.

Rebecca: 10. Okay. So my daughter is nine. And so what is her relationship to like knowing or clocking or engaging with Korean fandoms or Korean things. Like if she sees BTS, does that have…

Amy:  Does it have a extra spike the same way it does for me? 

Rebecca: Or Kpop Demon Hunters?

Tommy: We actually just watched it, uh, yesterday.

Amy: Were you like, this is about our culture, the shame that we all carry? Yeah. 

Tommy: The shame. I did not realize that that’s what it was about. And my God…

Amy: My 12-year-old…we watched it all together and at the end he turns to me and he goes, Mommy, what would your demon say? And I was like, I would be haunted that I, I’m not good enough. And he was like, yeah, and that’s maybe why you think your parents couldn’t love you. And I was like, wow. Just really surely getting in there. That’s your therapized American self talking?

Tommy: Not to go back to Son but just for a moment, it is relevant too that his…he has like a psycho Korean dad.

Amy: Yeah. He fully does.

Rebecca: Wait, can you tell me about that? ‘Cause I don’t know about it.

Tommy: Like he runs an academy. I mean, in some ways Son is a, like, perfect industrial product, exported by Korea. 

Rebecca: Mmmm.

Tommy: And he went through like, I don’t know if his father had the academy at the time, but his father now runs like a soccer academy, has gotten in trouble for abusing kids. Like he is a task master and like frankly, a piece of shit. 

Amy: He sent Sonny to, like, Sonny was in Germany when he was like 13 or 14 or something. Like, yeah.

Rebecca: Like Messi.

Tommy: Yeah.

Rebecca: Do they are, do they have a relationship at least publicly still? 

Tommy: Yeah, yeah.

Amy: Uh-huh. But you can see the video where it was after his final match when he won and he’s like weeping tears and so emotional and everybody, you know, it’s just like the adulation. It was the last match he played before he came to the US and he, like, runs and, like, embraces his dad and his dad’s like patting him on the back.

Rebecca: Oh my God. Wait, so but can you, can you just like more explicitly connect those dots? I think we can make a lot of assumptions about psycho Korean dads here,

Amy: [Laughs.] 

Rebecca: But, uh, can you play, can you play it out a little, like what…what do you think that is about?

Tommy: It is very relatable. My dad was not Korean, but I grew up very aware of Korean dad dynamics, and Korean parenting dynamics. You know, through cousins, through, you know, my mom’s own experience, the, like the withholding of approval, like the dangling of approval. Again, this is not, like, specific, you know, this is not limited to Korea, but there is a very particular sort of Korean inflection.

Rebecca: Of course.

Tommy: Like seeing quotes from him about his son’s success and he said, and he, like, starts telling a story about farmers and making sure you have consistent crops instead of, like, highs and lows. Like, shut the fuck up, man. Just be happy for your kid. He reminds me of Korean uncles, you know, that I, I didn’t like.

Rebecca: Totally. 

Does Sonny have kids? 

Amy: No. 

Tommy: Which is also interesting ’cause Korean, uh, soccer players usually start popping ’em out in their twenties and that he’s waited is interesting. 

Rebecca: Well, a lot of ladies in Los Angeles are ready to see Sonny on the scene. Or men. Or men.

Amy: Just anybody. 

Rebecca: We’ll all be ready.

Amy: You’re Hapa, your mom’s Korean. And your dad is Dr. Professor Craggs.

Tommy: Yeah. White guy from Ohio.

Amy: And your daughter is also Hapa. Is she just Korean from your side? Is there more happening? I don’t know what, what…

Tommy: Yeah. Yeah. I go through this very thing. Like, I don’t know how to describe this for her. I don’t want to say half because it sounds like eugenics. 

Rebecca: Yeah.

Tommy: You know, even Hapa makes me uncomfortable, like a little uncomfortable. 

Amy: Mmmm.

Tommy: There is…there isn’t like a good language for…mixed sounds like eugenics. I don’t like using it. 

Rebecca:Yep.

Tommy: And, over the last few years she has gotten more and more interested in, like, her Koreanness. And I’ve tried to figure out how to like, nurture that and you know, when she’s asking questions, make sure I have answers at the ready, things like that. You know, also, there’s like a really bad and sort of destructive, identity politics afoot around like, you know, Asian American identity, esp you know, especially over the last five years or whatever with, you know, you know. It’s lately gone under the banner of like, Stop AAPI Hate and had a lot of good intentions and a lot of smart people I know were involved very early on. But the whole thing kind of cashed out as this way for, like, well off East Asians to call for more, like, aggressive policing of Black people. You know, framing crimes of proximity as something akin to, like, police killings of Black people in a way that made me like, made me really uncomfortable and really angry at a lot of like fellow Koreans. 

And, and then on top of that you have to work against this like, you know, this sort of tide of a lot of school taught identity stuff, which tends to like flatten social hierarchies of race into this, like, a matter of just natural difference, which, you know, you need to tolerate ’cause you gotta tolerate different…people should be tolerated and things like that, which is like a terrible way of thinking about race, especially in an American context. 

So there are all these like kind of bad parts of, of like, I don’t know, I guess like liberal identity politics that I don’t want, I don’t want to like, encourage in her. 

Amy: Mm-hm.

Tommy: And it’s, it’s, I have found it very hard to like, maintain that balance, and get her thinking about it in a way that she can feel, she can feel some sort of like, pride and interest in it. Without sort of touching some of the worst aspects of it.

Amy:  I have so many things to say about the idea and how watching your own community get swept up in allowing ourselves to be used as a wedge for our own benefit.

Like, and I think that sort of, Asian kind of racial consciousness raising for me came embarrassingly late. Like I was in my mid twenties and I, I read an essay, the Mari Matsuda essay about, the racial bourgeoisie and how Asians are very, very, very useful and effective and embrace the role of pushing down brown and Black people so that we can be closer to white people, whiteness, and it makes us safer and all this stuff.

And I was like, that’s what my parents did my whole life. And oh my God, I never thought about it. And then to be in a place where, like, you can have that consciousness raising and then how do you give it to your children who may or may not be. Lighter skinned or whiter or because of cultural proximity, have more access to mainstream things than like we ever did.

Rebecca: But also remain connected to what it means to be a true minority group like…

Amy: Uh-huh.

Rebecca: I mean, that actually is a, that actually is the point of connection one can make, which is not about tolerance, but it’s like, even if my community is safer now or has more privilege, you know, existence, it can still be like, no, I know because I’ve told the stories and we’ve experienced it and our parents experienced it. Like we have to remain vigilant on other people’s behalf. 

Amy: Right. 

Rebecca: Like, it’s like…

Amy: Yeah, and I think it’s also, I really do wanna get back to like what the experience was sitting down with your daughter and watching Kpop Demon Hunters, because it is also something to be able to be in a moment of like deliberate consciousness raising because you’re a conscientious parent who has thought about your own relationship to your identity in a deep way, and also your political identity and all of these things. 

Tommy: So we didn’t really have a teachable moment yesterday. Because she can, like, smell them coming on.

Amy: Yeah.

Tommy: And she just shuts down. Uh, she referred, yeah, when I’m asking her questions that she doesn’t want to answer, she calls ’em booger questions, which, which I love.

Rebecca: Wait that’s so funny.

Amy: [Laughs.]

Tommy: She’s called them booger questions since she was like four. [Laughs.]

Rebecca: She’s so smart. [Laughs.]

Amy: So good. 

Rebecca: So good. So smart. 

Tommy: Her name’s Nora. I, I, years ago prematurely started the conversation about her Korean identity. By like, I mean this, I am insufferable, but I am talking about the Korean War and explaining…

Amy: [Laughs.] Oh, you’re a Korean uncle. What happened to you? 

Rebecca: No wonder it’s a booger question.

Tommy: Explaining Japanese occupation…

Amy: Yeah.

Tommy: The war, the US occupation. In some ways kids are very, like, they, they can get things like a colonial occupation on some level. They can understand like the, the basic moral dynamics there.

Amy: Right.

Tommy: …in a way that like actually, you know, 15 years of schooling starts to complicate and, and like overcomplicate, something that is actually kind of simple. Like this thing, this feeling you don’t like of being dominated that kids are extremely familiar with and know, like in their soul, this is like a whole political system based on that.

Amy: Yeah.

Tommy: And like she, she got that part of it, right? But I do think it’s important as she, like, you know, sort of thinks more about being Korean, that she starts to see it through the prism of the war. Again, not to be insufferable like me, but I think like, you know, this whole conversation about like Big Korean Energy, like, I have really complicated feelings about, about this, you know?

‘Cause on the one hand I love that my mom gets to turn on Netflix and see a thousand shows and she can feel she’s being addressed by popular culture for the first time in her life in a way that she could not feel in the seventies, eighties, nineties. On the other hand, I’m, I am the guy who was like politically radicalized by reading about the Korean War and about the occupations and, and understanding all the ways that this, like, cultural moment grows out of the war. When the Korean War becomes the prism through which you see like the latter half of the 20th century in Korea, like, all you start seeing is symptoms of the war, of the Japanese occupation, of the US occupation. 

Rebecca: Mmmm.

Amy: Here’s my question…is that when you start to see things through that lens, why is a deeper understanding in being able to see, say, the outpouring of love in a sports fandom or in a pop culture fandom, or Kpop Demon Hunters and…all of this stuff. Why is that not just a more nuanced understanding. That’s the thorny background of like the rose that’s blooming or whatever. Like…and it’s a generational, multi-generational response and it’s also very real. So like I, I see that like, you know, Sonny’s dad being a fucking asshole and being like a tyrant and getting him to the top, or all Korean parents may be being somewhat tyrants…

Rebecca: But actually our Kpop Demon Hunters being such a huge hit and actually being about shame. Like…

Amy: Deep shame and inferiority.

Rebecca: And your demons. To me, that’s what’s the most interesting ’cause that’s actually like the success. It’s actually being very honest about itself and actually met, you know, hundreds of millions of people are relating to it.

Tommy: The thing that I would want Nora, Nora to understand is all the ways that the good and the bad are like, you know, exist alongside each other. And not, not, you know, not in some sort of like, life is complicated way, but in a very, like, straightforward, like, Kpop Demon Hunters. K-pop doesn’t happen if you don’t have like the eighth army stationed in the United States auditioning for camp shows and bringing in Korean pop artists to essentially reflect us culture back at them. And that, you know, that takes on a certain shape and that becomes…

Amy: But then it also becomes the shield against which you fight the occupying forces.

Tommy: Right. Exactly. Yeah. and it, it takes on its own personality and becomes, you know, a part of like the various uprisings and, and things like that. And these things are, you know, again, not to be insufferable, but like these things are dialectically, like connected and intertwined. 

Amy: [Laughs.]

Tommy: Um, and, you know, I would love for Nora to understand dialectics, uh, before, you know…

Rebecca: This isn’t the first podcast episode where dialectics has been mentioned. 

Amy: [Laughs.]

Tommy: [Laughs.]

Rebecca: I definitely did like a whole Hegelian dialectic thing and I was like, wow. I’m sorry to everybody here.

Amy: But I do think that that’s actually also this what, you know, kind of our, our reason for being as the Mash-Up Americans.

Rebecca: Well, let’s be really, let’s keep it highbrow. Our raison d’etre.

Tommy: [Laughs.]

Amy: Well, you know I could spell that goddamn phrase, but I didn’t wanna say it out loud. 

Tommy: In Urbana we say “raisin d’etre.”

Rebecca: The raisin debtor.

Tommy: [Laughs.]

Amy: The raisin debtor, yeah. Our raisin debtor is that the permeability of culture is what makes being a Mash-Up American a framework and way in which to experience the world. That complexity.

Rebecca: Right, like being able to be inside and outside in all of it. And many, which allows you to, hopefully, with therapy.

Amy: [Laughs.]

Tommy: [Laughs.]

Rebecca: …and whatever it is you are doing, which is reading a lot of history books, is to be able to kind of understand, like, what is a given and what you could actually question. You know, like, like what are cultural things that we can just accept and what are the ones like, that doesn’t have to be that way. Like what are the things that serve you and what are the things that don’t without thinking of life as just like a menu…which is also a problem to be like, I’m just gonna choose this part. ‘Cause it’s not really how it works either. 

Amy: I feel like this additional nuance and this understanding, like when we talk about Big Korean Energy, a lot of that force comes from trauma. You know? And like these, this deeper understanding of our historical context, which I feel like is like the second wave of BKE also. 

Rebecca: Yeah. Gruff. Big, big hair, strong vibes. You know what I’m saying? 

Amy: I like it.

Rebecca: Oh, you know, I love it. 

Rebecca: Okay so to wrap up. We’re gonna do a game. 

Amy: It’s the end of the world. Tommy Craggs. You get to choose three Korean, Korean American, whatever, blend of Korean. Trying not to use the word Hapa. Dead or alive. To be on your post-apocalyptic commune. 

Tommy: I thought about this a long time. This is a tricky one.

Rebecca: Okay go.

Tommy: Um, Gennady Golovkin. Little known fact that he, he’s one of the great boxers, of, I guess the last sort of last generation. His grandfather was an ethnic Korean who lived in the Soviet Union. 

Rebecca: Yes.

Tommy: One of the hardest punchers in the history of boxing. For the simple reason that you need fighters in a post-apocalyptic…

Amy: Yes. Also boxing, Big Korean Energy.

Tommy: Yeah. And also just not a lot of people know that Golovkin is, you know, a brother. And then I thought of Euna Kim, Queen Euna. 

Amy: Always.

Tommy: Choosing her because, we’ll, we’ll still need the sublime.

Amy: Beauty.

Tommy: And then the last last one is…would be Kim Jong-Il…

Amy: [Laughs.]

Amy: Who is, uh, I’m picking, I’m counting him as an athlete because he is apparently the greatest natural golfer, uh, the world has ever known. 

Rebecca: Kim Jong-il. 

Amy: Yeah.

Rebecca: I heard that. Yeah, I heard that. Yeah. 

Tommy: Yeah. and picking him, ’cause his, his dad was a great, you know, freedom fighter.

Amy: They know how to keep secrets, which is something that we’ll need. 

Rebecca: Absolutely. I love. This is a great team. 

What has more Big Korean Energy? Okay. We’re gonna just name two things and you get to just pick. You don’t even have…just as vibes. This is just vibes. 

Dodger Stadium versus Wrigley Field. 

Tommy: Uh, Dodger Stadium.

Rebecca: Um, Michael Jordan versus Michael Phelps.

Tommy: Jordan.

Rebecca: Uh, golf versus tennis.

Tommy: Golf.

Amy: Chicken wings versus hot dogs.

Tommy: Oh man. Uh, chicken wings. Chicken wings…?

Rebecca: Thank you for playing. Uh, which has more Big Korean Energy.

Tommy: Was that correct? Did…did I ace it?

Rebecca: Yeah. Oh, a hundred percent. Yeah. 

Amy: Yeah, yeah.

Rebecca: You did.

Amy: I have some points to raise about Michael Phelps. That’s the only one. I feel like his, he’s like very modern, like the torment, the talking about his depression afterwards, the focus on the mental health while also still being a maniac and being the best swimmer. It feels very, it feels very gen Z Korean to me. 

Rebecca: Well, but what about Michael Jordan? Like… 

Amy: Being a monster?

Rebecca: Well, just, he’s just like, um. So resentful.

Tommy: The only person I know who is as powered by resentment as Michael Jordan is my mom.

Amy: You know…

Rebecca: Oh, wow. Incredible. Absolutely. 

Amy: I would like to say you have excellent Big Korean Energy and I appreciate the nuance that you bring to your BKE, and I think that your daughter, Nora — a great Korean name — is in very good hands.

Rebecca: Tommy, thank you so much. 

Tommy: Thank you. This was great. 

Amy: That was our conversation with Tommy Craggs. Ours was a friendship first forged in journalism school where uh, young people really learned the life skills for a sustainable career. Today Tommy is a brilliant writer and thinker, and he remains my favorite grumpy Korean. 

Rebecca: Resentment: a superpower.

Next time on The Mash-Up Americans, we’ll sit down with Joanne Lee Molinaro. Midwest Koreans continue to represent. If you go deep on our website, you can read her essays on the Mash-Up Americans from years ago when she was just starting up the Korean Vegan. 

Today, Joanne is a James Beard Award-winning cookbook writer. We’ll speak to her about the mashing up of Korean vegan food, the relationship between K beauty and ancestral traditions, and how she’s doing the thing we all aspire to do, looking forward, creating a new future and a new way of being, but being rooted in the specificity of her Mash-Up experience.

Amy: There’s also a whole lot more Big Korean Energy on our substack. So subscribe@mashupamericans.substack.com for extras from this series, weekly news from around the world and more. Bye.

CREDITS

Amy: This podcast is a production of The Mash-up Americans. It is executive produced by Amy S. Choi and Rebecca Lehrer. Senior producer is Mia Warren. Development producer is Donna Suh, production manager is Shelby Sandlin. Mixing and Mastering by Kojin Tashiro.

Thanks to DJ Rob Swift for our theme song, Salsa Scratch, please make sure to follow and share the show with your friends.