Foreign man kissing female diver statue in Jeju sparks outrage
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The video drew widespread criticism from Jeju residents and supporters of the island’s haenyeo culture.
PHOTO: THE KOREA HERALD/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
SEOUL – A foreign man sparked outrage online after a video of him hugging and kissing a statue honoring Jeju’s haenyeo, or female divers, went viral, news reports said on July 3.
The video shows the man climbing onto the statue near Hamdeok Beach in Jocheon-eup, Jeju City, and making lewd gestures towards it while his companions laugh nearby.
The man has reportedly lived on Jeju for about a year, while the person who filmed and uploaded the video is a South Korean resident of the island, according to JTBC.
The video drew widespread criticism from Jeju residents and supporters of the island’s haenyeo culture.
“There’s no way someone living on Jeju wouldn’t know what the haenyeo mean to the island. They were laughing and even posted the video on social media. I just don’t get it. Treating a haenyeo statue like a joke is just ignorant and rude,” one user wrote.
As criticism mounted, the South Korean man who filmed the video apologised on social media, saying he felt “ashamed and embarrassed”. The foreign man said he did not realise his actions would be considered offensive.
Jeju haenyeo, which roughly translates to “women of the sea”, are free divers who can hold their breath for long periods as they harvest seafood from the ocean.
They are designated as National Intangible Cultural Heritage No. 132 and Important Fisheries Heritage No. 1, and their culture is inscribed in UNESCO’s list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
Statues honouring the haenyeo have been installed across the island since the 1990s by local governments, fishing village associations and private organisations, particularly at ports, beaches and coastal villages.
The number of active haenyeo on Jeju stood at 2,371 as of the end of December 2025, down 252, or 9.6 per cent, from a year earlier, according to the Jeju provincial government.
Divers 70 or older made up nearly two-thirds of the total at 1,500, followed by 766 divers aged 50 to 69 and 105 divers under the age of 50. THE KOREA HERALD/ ASIA NEWS NETWORK