Even if we fight against ‘Yacha Rule’, a variant of school violence… 78% of the offending students received light measures

Byeong-do Han said, “Deliberation guidelines need to be subdivided according to the type of involvement.”

(Iksan = Yonhap News) Reporter Kim Dong-cheol = Amid the spread of variants of school violence such as the so-called 'Yacharul' (a slang term meaning a fight with bare fists where the parties promise not to take civil or criminal liability), it was found that 8 out of 10 offending students received minor measures such as a simple apology or volunteer work.

Even though 'Yachar Rule' appears to be carried out through a one-on-one agreement, it is turning into a social problem as in most cases the victims are forced to fight because they are concerned that they will be left out of the group if they reject the offer.

According to data submitted by the Ministry of Education on the 12th by Rep. Han Byeong-do of the Democratic Party of Korea (Iksan City, Jeollabuk-do), a member of the National Assembly Education Committee, a total of 490 cases of new school violence were reviewed by the School Violence Countermeasures Review Committee from the 2024 school year to the end of August this year.

There are 684 victims and 1,232 perpetrators who have been reviewed.

By type, physical violence was the most common at 88.8% (multiple responses), followed by verbal violence (42.7%), coercion (28.8%), and cyberbullying (18.6%).

However, the measures taken against the offending student were lenient.

Of the 1,961 total measures, 77.7% (1,523 cases) were light measures such as a written apology (No. 1), no contact (No. 2), and school service (No. 3), withholding entry in student records.

Including measures less than attendance suspension, which is a combination of community service (No. 4) and special education (No. 5), the rate was close to 90.2%.

On the other hand, only 9.8% (193 cases) of severe measures such as suspension of attendance, class change, and school transfer were taken.

In fact, at least 64.4% (794 students) of the 1,232 offending students avoided any more severe measures than community service recorded in their student records.

Representative Han emphasized, “We need to subdivide the deliberation guidelines for each type of participation, such as arranging, watching, filming, and distributing, to determine coercion under the pretense of consent,” and added, “We need to establish a protection system for victimized students and apply customized behavior correction programs to offenders to prevent recurrence.”