Why are there parents in South Korea who voluntarily lock themselves in cells?

Dressed in blue prison uniforms, the mothers And parents They are completely alone in 5 square meter cells. They can’t have cell phones or computers and their food is delivered through small holes in the door.

And even though it’s hard to believe, They are not prisoners, but they are there voluntarily.

This is the Happiness Factory, located in South Korea, which It aims to provide a “lockdown experience” so that fathers, mothers and caregivers learn to communicate better with their children “completely removed from society”.

These children are known as hikikomori —a Japanese term—meaning “the severe social withdrawal of adolescents and young adults.” And that’s it This is the reality for many young Koreans, who spend hours in their rooms with almost no communication with the outside world, a situation that parents find difficult to understand and manage.

This is what is happening during the lockdown in South Korea.

The factory of happiness As reported BBC World , is a 13-week educational program for parents and which is funded by the Korea Youth Foundation and the Blue Whale Recovery Center, two South Korean non-governmental organizations.

The goal is to achieve to teach fathers, mothers and caregivers to communicate better with their children and understand what they feel in their isolation.

For that, The most “striking” activity is that the parents are locked up and incommunicado for three full days at a facility located in Hongcheon-gun, Gangwon Province. In this way, they could experience the “emotional prison” that their children feel.

For example, the mother of a 24-year-old man who had been isolated in his room for three years suffered this confinement because “I wondered what I had done wrong for my son to end up like this, it’s painful to think about.” After the experience, he says that “when I reflected, I gained some clarity.”

And her son, though he always showed talent, began getting sick at an early age. He also had trouble making and keeping friends, developed an eating disorder, and though he began to succeed in college, he eventually dropped out and locked himself in his room. There, He neglected his personal hygiene and meals, which broke his mother’s heart.

As the woman explained, It is likely that the young man was affected by the fact that he was not accepted into one of the best universities in his country. But he couldn’t be sure, because “since my son didn’t talk to me much, I didn’t know what was going on in his head.”

But when she arrives at the Happiness Factory, the mother reads notes written by other isolated young people and He realized that his son “protects himself with silence because no one understands him.”

Something similar happened to another woman, whose 26-year-old son decided seven years ago to cut off all communication with the outside world and became obsessed with video games. She tried to take him to a psychiatrist, who prescribed him medication, but he refused to be treated and remained locked up.

According to academic Jeong Go-woon of the Department of Sociology at Kyung Hee University , In Korean society, young people are expected to achieve great things in life, which creates a lot of anxiety among them. especially if they find themselves in unfavorable economic and social situations.

Even, Parents themselves can be very adamant and closed to the idea that their children should prosper at all costs, which further increases anxiety and pressure in their children.

After experiencing the isolation and life of this program, The mother was able to understand that “it is important to accept her son’s life without forcing him to follow a specific mold.”

According to the data of the year 2023 Ministry of Health and Welfare of South Korea , More than 5% of young people aged 19 to 34 who responded to a survey are in isolation. In other words, if this were a representative figure, More than 540,000 people are said to be voluntarily locked in their rooms, without contact with the outside world.

The reasons for the isolation would be:

• Difficulty finding work (24.1%).
• Interpersonal relationship problems (23.5%).
• Family problems (12.4%).
• Health problems (12.4%).

Journalists from BBC World They asked the first mother what she would say to her son if he finally came out of the isolation in his room. The woman began to cry and, in a trembling voice, said:

“You’ve been through so much. It’s been really hard, hasn’t it? I’ll take care of you.”