Blistex posted:

In all honesty, South Koreans usually protest over some pretty stupid poo poo, and get incredibly violent by throwing fuel bombs and using flame throwers. Most protests start out with the police just sitting back and the crowds getting more and more pissed that nothing is happening. A groups of idiots decide that they should attack the police and start throwing rocks and hitting their shields with sticks. Given that the Korean riot police really have their poo poo together, nobody gets hurt and they just stay put waiting for the crowds to disperse. Some of the organizers realize that if something big doesn't happen then everyone is just going to go home and they take things too far, and the police come down on them hard and usually destroy the protest in under 10 minutes by caving in heads with shields and hitting them with firehoses that are pumping a water/mace mix.

I saw one of the US beef protests in person and the sheer lunacy of the protesters wase staggering. You have old guys and university students running up the the police, falling to their knees, screaming and tearing their clothes off, and the cops are just looking at them in utter disbelief. Then the crazy protesters start tearing at each other's clothes, start fighting each other, and before you know it someone has rolled a propane tank that's spewing flames at the police.