Lee Hye-sung addresses controversy over Ha Young’s great-grandfather’s pro-Japanese activities: “Should we atone for our ancestors’ sins on their behalf?”

[Financial News] Broadcaster Lee Hye-sung raised a case reminiscent of the controversy over actor Ha Young’s great-grandfather’s pro-Japanese activities, asking whether descendants should bear responsibility for their ancestors’ wrongdoings in their place.
On the 20th, a video titled “The Justice We Believed Was Right May Have Been Wrong | Justice: What’s the Right Thing to Do?” was uploaded to the YouTube channel “Lee Hye-sung’s 1% Book Club.”
In the video, Lee began by saying, “Recently, there was controversy after a public figure’s great-grandfather was found to have engaged in pro-Japanese activities during the Japanese colonial period.” Although she did not name the person, the remark brought to mind the controversy over Ha Young’s great-grandfather’s pro-Japanese activities.
She said, “There is no room for disagreement about the clear wrongs committed by historical perpetrators,” but asked, “Should we atone for our ancestors’ sins in their place?”
She went on to broaden the question from individual responsibility to the responsibility of nations, asking, “Furthermore, should a nation apologize for historical wrongs of the past? If so, where does the moral and philosophical basis for that come from?”
Lee said that recently these thoughts had led one to another, and that she had picked up Michael Sandel’s book “Justice: What’s the Right Thing to Do?” again.
She said she had read the book in high school, and admitted, “Even reading it now, I kept thinking, ‘What does this mean?’ I couldn’t understand it well, so I had to go back, revisit it, and chew over the sentences carefully to digest them. It was a struggle.”
While explaining the book, Lee also presented a hypothetical scenario featuring five independence activists and Yi Wan-yong.
The scenario assumed that five independence activists—Yu Gwan-sun, Yun Bong-gil, Ahn Chang-ho, Ahn Jung-geun and Hong Beom-do—were on a railway track, while on the other side was Yi Wan-yong, known for his pro-Japanese activities. It was a philosophical thought experiment asking whether sacrificing Yi Wan-yong to save the five independence activists would be the right choice.
Lee said, “Even if a variable changes just a little, we can’t come up with an answer right away,” adding, “The world we live in is this complicated. Countless variables are intertwined.”
She then turned to Germany’s acknowledgment of responsibility for the Holocaust and reparations, Japan’s historical issues, and the debate over an apology for slavery in the United States. Her point was that the question of why the present generation should be responsible for the wrongs committed by previous generations also arises in discussions of national apologies for historical wrongs.
Introducing the perspective of philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre, she explained that people cannot be separated from the history of the communities to which they belong.
Lee said, “I wasn’t suddenly dropped into the universe,” referring to the history that had continued since before her birth and the identity shaped within it.
She added, “We can’t inherit a historical consciousness selectively, taking only the proud and good parts of our history and cutting out the parts that make us uncomfortable.”
Meanwhile, after Ha Young discussed her great-grandfather’s background on several variety shows, records of his pro-Japanese activities were brought back into the spotlight, and she became embroiled in controversy. She reportedly later apologized in a handwritten letter and suspended her activities.
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