25-02-2025
Are you living like 'a hothouse flower'? Viral checklist sparks buzz in South Korea
New take on silver spoon theory sparks debate over social privilege and uncomfortable truths
While browsing the internet, 29-year-old Jin Eun-soo recently found herself taken aback when she encountered a checklist known as the 'Hothouse Flower Test.'
The term 'hothouse flower' metaphorically describes individuals who have led sheltered lives, shielded from the harsh realities of the world. The online post that Jin received featured a checklist of eight traits that, according to the author, define a sheltered individual, meaning a person shielded from financial, emotional or social struggles.
It included characteristics such as having never had a part-time job, having only had ambiguous concerns in life -- such as school grades, future career and dating life, being born and raised in Seoul and attending private schools.
At the end of the post, the writer stated that if more than half of the eight characteristics apply, one is 'most definitely or highly likely to be a hothouse flower.'
'I was taken aback by this checklist because it seemed just like another variation of the spoon theory that was trendy a few years ago,' Jin told The Korea Herald. 'South Koreans still use that theory to unknowingly divide themselves by social class. Do we really need another one?'
The spoon theory mentioned by Jin refers to the gold spoon, silver spoon and dirt spoon metaphors that became widely popular in Korea in 2015. The gold spoon refers to those of wealthy backgrounds, the silver spoon stands for those in the upper-middle class and the dirt spoon refers to those from lower-income backgrounds. It received attention from local media and academia at the time for capturing the public's frustration over dwindling opportunities to climb up the socioeconomic ladder.
As the new checklist went viral, users on online communities such as DC Inside showed varying reactions.
One user commented that the checklist can serve as a wake-up call to society, stating that there are surprisingly a lot of people who 'benefit from being raised by financially well-off parents,' no matter the economic struggles Korea goes through as a whole. Another user, however, stated that checklists as such are 'pointless,' arguing that reality is actually very different from the labels often found on checklists, and that they 'only creates a sense of discomfort among members of society.'
When asked why the hothouse flower checklist went viral, sociology professor Choi Hang-sub from Kookmin University told The Korea Herald that it is interconnected with how the spoon theory went viral in 2015, based on the idea that 'being born into a family that is well-off gives you automatic advantages, while being born poor or less well-off holds you back.'
'The checklist can be considered to be 'for fun' and is lightheartedly used by some people to joke about being an 'overprotected hothouse flower.' But it also triggers frustration, as the checklist highlights uncomfortable truths about social privileges that not everyone gets to enjoy,' continued Choi. 'The checklist's main idea being that a sheltered upbringing affects life experiences -- where some are forced to struggle early while others grow up never experiencing hardship in their lives -- shows a form of social anxiety about social privileges, class and opportunities in modern Korea.'
Professor Koo Jeong-woo from Sungkyunkwan University's Department of Sociology also told The Korea Herald that the test may also have gone viral due to Korean society's "collective hatred and jealousy' of those who have lived a sheltered life.
'In Korea, if you've lived a sheltered life, you're categorized as someone who was privileged enough to have not gone through hardships,' said Koo. 'This triggers a sense of relative deprivation in those who feel they are not as well off as others. As a growing number of Koreans are beginning to feel this way with Korea's current economic struggles, some are using the checklist as a tool to criticize those who were sheltered and privileged.'
To move forward as a society, professor Choi added that more 'social tolerance' is needed.
'Society as a whole must move away from the argument that hierarchical and social class differences are the reason for their unhappiness and anxiety,' said Choi. 'We must tolerate the differences that exist among individual members of our society, but more social and institutional attention must also be given to them to help ease their anxiety.'
