Actually, that Korean law was declared unconstitutional in 2024 (or was it 2025?). The National Assembly was given by the court up to December 31, 2025 to amend it, otherwise, that entire law will be permanently suspended and invalidated.
So far, there are no updates if the National Assembly is working on it. They're busy with all the political issues. The deadline will likely pass and by January 1, 2026, that law will be unconstitutional forever in South Korea.
If anything, it's much better to amend it so not all provisions are removed. This is usually how laws are updated to catch up with the times. But if they don't pass anything by the deadline, all of it will be forever gone.
Depending on which side you are on—absolute abolition or remove only the excessive ones—airing this episode on December 28, 2025 was a good move for those in favour of absolute abolition. 😆
But then again, the politicians often surprises everyone.
Anyway. It is also correct that the law originated from Rome. It was codefied by my favourite Roman Emperor, Emperor Justinian in «Corpus Juris Civilis».
All States in the world today adopted it. However, there are different levels of amendments to update it to today's sensitivities.
For example, here in the Philippines, instead of completely aboshing the entire immunity of relatives in intra-family financial cases, like what was depicted in E08, provisions were added so it can be bypassed.
That is what the December 31, 2025 deadline is about in South Korea. To give a chance to only correct the obsolete ones but still retain those that makes sense. We don't know what effects it will have if the entirety is abolished. It's actually scary.
I mean, these laws were invented for a reason, the best course is we should update it for our times. The main reason the Romans deemed it necessary to create laws protecting the family is because if the family unit breaks, the society and the State will suffer as well.
But we know now that we can update some provisions without putting the family unit in danger. However, abolishing it entirely is like abolishing all laws. It can open up the family unit to all sorts of cases and lead to numerous broken family units, and the one that will suffer is society and the State.
If that happens, we might have to resort to human cloning and test tube babies. Especially for a country already suffering from low birth rates.
Yes, it really is hard to strike a balance. We don't want exploitations, but at the same time, we need to ensure a healthy and functioning family unit.
