Recently, the Dissing Event held by Kainuri, a student organization promoting and advertising KAIST, has become a controversial issue. Obvious to become explicit with verbal aggression, the event encouraged KAIST undergraduates to provoke POSTECH by writing rap music dissing the school during the KAIST-POSTECH Science War, and such intentions have been brought into question. Should such activities be promoted by official student bodies? In fact, should any criticism be part of competitive student events? Although common sense dictates slandering others is better avoided, I actually full-heartedly support the anti-POSTECH rallies during the particular season considering the circumstances under which the event is taking place.

When was the last time Manchester United fans were given the eye for insulting Chelsea? As childish, and perhaps even barbaric, as it may be, banter is an integral ritual before playoffs between competing parties. A nearby example, the Yonsei-Korea University rivalry exemplifies the claim. During the competing season, pamphlets and chants of derogatory messages targeted at each other flood the streets; a comic example reads, “The greatest tragedy on Earth: all-boys middle school, all-boys high school, Korea University.” Rather than seen as a sign of heart-felt hostility, the act is more of a war cry and stimulus for motivation, prepping the students with competitiveness. The phenomenon only magnifies in scale when considering foreign examples. For example, intercollegiate sports in the United States (U.S.) have highly devoted fan bases and the clashing team spirits are in no way short of those in international events, such as the World Cup. With the understanding that all the slurs and insults are light mockery, which college students undoubtedly are capable of having, such aggression is unlikely to develop into serious problems and more likely to bring closer the teams in a sort of camaraderie. Playing down the “pep rally” for the sake of gentlemanly appearances is like acting posh in a rave and a huge loss of excitement for both parties for little in return.

On a further note, criticizing the opposing school brings unexpected benefits to the student body. Drawing a line between “us” and “them,” and criticizing the other side bring the members closer together on common ground by instilling in them team spirit. Similar to propaganda but benign in character, it is an effective way to form and share the pride as members of the same university. One may fear that this occurs at the cost of antagonizing the opposing school. However, the fear is ill-justified. The opening and closing ceremonies are celebrated by both schools together and the competing teams get the chance to socialize under common interests. Furthermore, as popular celebrities are invited to perform, everyone can partake in the festivity, enjoy the performances, and mingle altogether regardless of the college one belongs to. Caution for potential chasm from excessive rivalry have already been addressed in the program and need not be of concern.

Most importantly, having an outlet for the tension of rivalry under a controlled environment is far better than having it pent up only to burst in a more aggressive fashion. The Science War is nevertheless a serious competition for the participants, who have been preparing as much as a year. It is reasonable that arguments between serious, opposing parties in uncontrolled manner could possibly become heated and lead to worse outcomes, such as hooliganism. Kainuri is an official student body and is most likely capable of not choosing scripts with blatant insults aggravating sensitive issues. By making the dissing official, the organizations has in fact gained better control over the contents of acceptable expression. By similar argument, suggesting that more events be created in similar nature may even be the wiser action. Banter should stay banter, and giving it official weight prompts self-censoring adequate to keep the words as a joke.

If the committee were to mitigate all forms of criticism between the opposing schools, witty signs and small events stimulating teasing activities would not be all that is taken away. The celebratory hype, rivalry, competitiveness, and source of solidarity and school pride would be disappearing as well as healthier, better controlled methods of tension outlet that may prevent potentially genuine conflict. Therefore, criticism should not only be allowed in school events, but in fact, promoted in these competitive circumstances such as the KAIST-POSTECH Science War.

It is widely accepted as a so-called tradition to criticize the opposing team in any type of competitive event. Not only do these criticisms take part in competitions as funny pranks, but they also play a much bigger role as they encourage and boost the spirits for a more competitive atmosphere. It is very common to see many provoking words and phrases among those criticisms and sometimes, even mean personal insults. The meaner and nastier the phrases get towards the opponent, more satisfied and delighted our own team becomes. This phenomenon is well-proven by our own KAIST-POSTECH Science War and even by Yonsei-Korea University Battle. During the KAIST-POSTECH Science War, the schools are filled with blue and red plank cards and banners promoting fighting spirits. However, after these harsh reproaches, there always have been controversial issues and hard feelings left behind. Though some people argue that all these criticisms were just for a good laugh, there are others who are simply too offended to accept it as such. It is by no means fair to ignore them because frankly, many of these phrases make most people frown at first sight. Therefore, criticism of the opposing school should not be a part of competitive events.

First of all, criticisms toward the opponent team, especially in these very competitive events, are not healthy ones. They are closer to personal insults and harsh slander. Healthy criticism should have a solid basis that can convince and be accepted by the opponent team. However, in the case of criticisms used in these competitive events, there is no valid logic or reason to why we criticize the other team. For example, most of the phrases used to criticize POSTECH in the KAIST-POSTECH Science War can be translated and summarized into two phrases: “KAIST will beat POSTECH in the KAIST-POSTECH Science War” and
“POSTECH is going down.” The only reason these criticisms exist is to verbally attack the other team. It is as if we feel that our team becomes more superior when we demean the other team. If this immature feeling is the main motivation of all these bad criticisms, it must stop. We need to grow up and realize that these outrageous criticisms do not contribute to making our team superior. It is meaningless to put efforts into trying to come up with cheap ways to get under the other team’s skin. As the criticisms are not healthy and only absurd, we should not criticize the other team in competitive events.

Furthermore, criticisms in these competitive events are more likely to make students upset rather than make them laugh, and hard feelings arise afterwards. It happened just a few days ago in the KAIST-POSTECH Science War as well. KAIST criticized POSTECH for having only a few female students and called it names such as “Pohang military.” Also KAIST argued “jokingly” that the reason sports games for female students were not held was because there were not enough female students in POSTECH. The POSTECH Student Council got furious with this jab and demanded a serious investigation regarding this matter and a sincere apology from KAIST. What started out as few laughs turned into an uncomfortable quarrel between the two teams. Even with the exception of episodes where the criticisms turned into much bigger and more serious issues that involved student councils of each school, there are still many little struggles and hard feelings among many students. Who would feel happy when they keep hearing only the bad things about their team? It is wise not to take that risk.