SEOUL: South Korea's Constitutional Court on Thursday (Feb 26) struck down a 60-year-old statute outlawing adultery under which violators faced up to two years in prison.
The nine-member bench ruled by seven to two that the 1953 law was unconstitutional. "Even if adultery should be condemned as immoral, state power should not intervene in individuals' private lives," said presiding justice Park Han-Chul.
It was the fifth time the apex court had considered the constitutional legality of the legislation which had made South Korea one of the few non-Muslim countries to regard marital infidelity as a criminal act.
Dont be surprised now that when many Nigerians, Kenyans, Ghanians, Zimbabweans, Zambians, Malawians Tanzanians, Ugandans and South Africans next week line up on the South Korean embassy asking for visas so that they can stay in a land where it is ok to do such kinds of acts.
“Public conceptions of individuals’ rights in their sexual lives have undergone changes,” Park said, as he delivered the court’s decision.
In April last year, South Korea blocked the newly launched Korean version of the global adultery hook-up site Ashley Madison, saying it threatened family values.
In the past adultery could only be prosecuted on complaint from an injured party, and any case was closed immediately if the plaintiff dropped the charge - a common occurrence that often involved a financial settlement.
The law was grounded in a belief that adultery challenged the social order and damaged families, but critics insisted it was an outdated piece of legislation that represented state overreach into people’s private lives.
by ROTMANLUV 2023-07-08, 17:34
