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“Better Dead Than Co-Ed”: Korean Women’s University Erupts in Mass Protest, Property Damage, and DDoS Attacks Over Unconfirmed Rumors of Male Admissions in Arts Departments

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“Better Dead Than Co-Ed”: Korean Women’s University Erupts in Mass Protest, Property Damage, and DDoS Attacks Over Unconfirmed Rumors of Male Admissions in Arts Departments

At Dongduk Women’s University, a single rumor has done what no midterm exam or tuition hike ever could: it ignited a full-blown insurrection.

The chaos began when whispers spread through the student community that the university might — hypothetically, potentially, someday — allow a small number of male students to enroll in certain departments, particularly the performing arts, where male roles are traditionally necessary for drama and music education.

There was no official announcement. The topic had not even reached the formal meeting agenda. Nevertheless, the reaction was swift and volcanic.

“The soul of Dongduk is female,” declared the student council in an official statement. “We will not let the institution be defiled.”

The statement was followed by escalating campus action. On November 11, students began occupying school buildings, spray-painting slogans on walls, dumping tteokbokki and eggs on the university founder’s bust, and even disrupting a major job fair, causing an estimated $330,000 in damages.

One radical feminist club, SIREN, launched a signature campaign under the slogan:

“We would rather be erased than opened.”

Indeed, some protestors explicitly called for the honorable shutdown of the university over the shame of co-education.

Meanwhile, online campaigns urged further action. Coordinated DDoS attacks targeted the university servers on November 12, crashing its digital infrastructure and prompting emergency countermeasures. Even sister institutions such as Sungshin Women’s University experienced digital assault attempts, prompting national cybersecurity alerts.

Faculty members scrambled to explain that the rumors were being blown out of proportion. The co-ed proposal, they clarified, was merely a discussion point raised in a planning meeting for the university’s “Vision 2040” restructuring strategy. The idea would have gone through multiple stages of public hearings and internal review before any action — had the riots not derailed the process entirely.

“We were just trying to solve the problem of not having male actors in the theater department,” one professor admitted in a leaked classroom recording. “Instead, we got a campus-wide meltdown.”

The university administration attempted to de-escalate tensions by withdrawing legal action initially filed over the destruction of property. But the damage — reputational, institutional, and literal — had already been done.

In the days that followed, hashtags like #SaveWomenSpaces and #DeathBeforeCoEd trended across Korean social media, while outside observers questioned whether the incident reflected deeper issues of communication, identity politics, and generational distrust.

What began as a harmless, unofficial conversation about admitting male students into a women’s university theater program spiraled into building occupations, statue vandalism, cyberattacks, and national outrage — all in the name of protecting a space that had not yet changed.

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