Colors of political parties

When the Saenuri Party selected red for the party’s color code I thought Park Geun-hye’s team was very smart, though I wasn’t impressed by its logo that looks like a giant tooth.

The Democratic United Party (DUP), formerly led by Han Myeong-sook, had no choice but to dye their jackets pure yellow for the party’s color as it was inherited from the two late Presidents. But it wasn’t a good inheritance.

The Unified Progressive Party (UPP) was stuck with a dull purplish-red probably because the pure red was already taken by the Saenuri Party. The Liberty Forward Party’s (LFP) Lee Hoi-chang chose a purplish-blue, really feeling blue. The Creative Korea Party (CKP) selected pink, an uncreative choice. And the K-Party (People Thinking Party in Korean) opted for light-blue, thinking cold and lonely. The party’s colors may have predetermined the political fates even before people cast votes.

Human activities are surprisingly influenced by color. Coloration has a strong impact not only on our business activities but also clothing, shopping, dining and even in love affairs. Flowers tell this.

It is known that dogs and cats recognize only two colors because they still maintain an original mammalian nature, the survival activities of which had been mostly conducted at night. When there is no light, animals don’t need to recognize the colors.

Like bees and butterflies, monkeys identify colors. They needed to know ripe fruits, normally in red, in the trees during the day. Not too many people believe politicians’ campaign promises but identify the well ripen candidates by their colors.

For example a bright red has an abstract notion of passion, excitement, blood and revolution and holds a specific association with the sun. Yellow, according to the color sentiment method, holds the notions of hope, ambition, plus jealousy, and reminds of a bevy of just hatched chickens. It wasn’t a good color for raking in votes.

I can never understand why liberal minded Lee Hoi-chang of the Liberty Forward Party selected such a dark color for politics. The purplish-blue is a color for danger, uncertainty and infirmity. It simply reminds of a bunch of over-ripe grapes. I’m sure you don’t want to hear any more about the UPP’s magenta, CKP’s pink or K-Party’s blue.

Korean soldiers wear camouflage combat fatigues with a color combination of green, brown, grey and black. Those are the representative colors of the Korean scenery and mountains, which are the ultimate regressive colors that insects use to assimilate with the natural surroundings in order to seek refuge from predators, or vice versa. American soldiers wear a quite different combination of a khaki hue when they are deployed in Afghanistan or Iraq. They are all fitting colors for winning the war.

Going back to the winning color of red, Italian spaghetti just out of boiling water looks stale and won’t whet one’s appetite until it’s covered by red tomato sauce. Kimchi too looks and actually tastes good after it has been colored by red peppers in its fermenting process.

Colors control our appetite, too. The purplish-blue and violet employed by the underdog LFP and UPP, sorry but really, suppress our appetite. Interestingly, there is no food that bears such dull colors. We wouldn’t pour a source of blue or violet over warm white rice or spaghetti.

Lastly, a color warning to the Saenuri Party; a human’s body instinctively activates a physiological system to protect its own eyes, and blocks out an opposing color such as green in the horny coat of eyes when our eyes see the same overbearing red color too long and gets tired of it.

When our eyes get tired, we get a repulsive feeling in order to protect our body, as we are getting sick and tired of red flags. <Korea Times/Nam Sang-so>

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