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virgomoon
This is being written because I got back into fandom spaces via k-pop and k-pop rpf, and it was incredibly fun. It still is. I enjoy the shows and other assorted content that groups put out, especially for Seventeen. I avoid watching BTS shows because of reasons I’ll get into later. And I do think the music is good! That’s rather subjective, but what I mean is that I specifically enjoy it, and it led me to explore Korean music as a whole more, and I discovered what a beautiful and vast scene of music that exists there. In fact my love for all this developed so suddenly and it was so vast, that I ended up signing for a Korean language course. It even messed up an entire college semester. I’ve made and taken that pitfall.
It’s addictive, honestly. To invest all your time and energy in the fate and escapades of these young people constantly in the spotlight, idols, yet touted to be relatable folks? Incredible. If anyone reading this followed me before May I rarely tweeted about anything else. I loved Haikyuu, yes, but a. I was not aware anitwt and other small pockets of people Who Love Stuff exist, b. I was just too caught up with this. I had left fandom spaces due to personal mental health issues a long time ago, and never had the mental bandwidth to re-join. I wasn’t even aware of ao3. Getting back into fandom via k-pop reintroduced me to all that I had missed, and all the fun I had forgotten was there to be had. I forgot how insane jokes in a fandom are, the peculiar code that you share with other people that can set everyone off giggling at one strange reference to one strange event.
I am a very cynical person – even as I was getting into k-pop I was aware of what the capitalistic force of this area meant. I’m rarely blindsided to what I love, but I think it was an intoxication if nothing else? This makes it seem as if the groups I did love and still do somewhat hoodwinked me into showing emotion – no! Of course there are real people in these groups. Of course what we as fans get hooked on is the idea that these people we hold apart from ourselves as idols, are still people we can hold close to us as our very own. The intoxication was my own. The energy of fandom was easy to be swept up in.
Being a cynical person I can't enjoy any media without delving into meta and thinking about my own relationship to something. Once I had discovered most of fandom I encountered the BBB (Bleak Boyband Bingo, found here) which was so instructive to me realising that other people exist who are equally cynically involved in this space as well! It’s not something I espouse, I usually like fandom to just be an escape, but the way in which k-pop has evolved and the way in which it is very much a space dominated by real people and not people we perceive in rpf fics made me feel depressive all the time. The allure of spaces of spotlight, of fame, and the downfalls. The crags in which we exist trying to see what’s real and what’s not. Bleak fun!
While now I'm heavily involved in non-rpf, non-kpop spaces (aka Who I Was originally) I do think it's a shame when anyone has a vehemently negative reaction to anything. I've read truly outstanding k-rpf that has made me change my outlook on so many things. How do people write that beautiful? Of course it's their love for this space that has brought forth all those words. But it makes sense why people have negative reactions. Yes, k-pop is essentially about exploiting young people for their skills and worth, k-pop is capitalism and a subculture trying to be excorporated within and without constantly, and succeeding. But what isn't, k-pop just makes it more blatantly evident, and it is super evil but there is nuance in everything. This isn't the space to discuss that nuance, but BTS as a band are heavily involved in crafting an image of perfect boybandness free from the realities of what constitutes this position, even if people are aware of the realities they willingly overlook them because instead of dwelling on that it's far more helpful to a fan to just dwell on what they're being fed! Isn't it! On the other hand there is a hyperawareness in other people of k-pop's failings. All of this has occurred because of BTS's meteoric rise to success. The hallyu wave was a long time coming but it has come and solidified now, and I guess when anything becomes an institution it's difficult to ignore the purveyors of the Eternally Unchanging. I mean I'm like that with Haikyuu, but most of the time I'm not aware of what's happening with fandom at large, I just exist in my corner saying my things, and with fiction it is easier to not care about what others are saying because there isn't a living entity that will keep changing. There's a DW post somewhere about what makes RPF so good to read, which also speaks to me personally about a fan's investment in boyband fandoms. I'm sure there are fans of BTS who exist in their similarly crafted, small corners. It's just that this is too big to ignore now, it's too much to not understand critically, and while I understand those who are still here, I can't be.
One of the people behind the Bleak Boyband Bingo (again, a wonderful exercise in boyband canonicity and meta - the AO3 collection for this is ughhhh <3 one day I will make a post for this on fanlore.) once tweeted that k-pop is just a fandom we're trapped in where the ultimate thing to do is escape it but we're drowning together, and while I think there can be two or more ways about it, ultimately, yeah. It's one of those situations where you thought it'd just be you and your friend "hehe"ing each other in your corner but the entire world wants to be privy to your corner. The industry expands and more heartbreak and evil things settle in. An unknown mangaka spending most of their youth trying to "make it" and a young trainee in an entertainment company trying to "break it" or "debut" are similar in terms of wasted potential, but it's the person who decides what is "wasted" and what isn't. There is nuance here again. Maybe I'm ultimately saying class consciousness can benefit anyone and everyone, lol.
While now I'm heavily involved in non-rpf, non-kpop spaces (aka Who I Was originally) I do think it's a shame when anyone has a vehemently negative reaction to anything. I've read truly outstanding k-rpf that has made me change my outlook on so many things. How do people write that beautiful? Of course it's their love for this space that has brought forth all those words. But it makes sense why people have negative reactions. Yes, k-pop is essentially about exploiting young people for their skills and worth, k-pop is capitalism and a subculture trying to be excorporated within and without constantly, and succeeding. But what isn't, k-pop just makes it more blatantly evident, and it is super evil but there is nuance in everything. This isn't the space to discuss that nuance, but BTS as a band are heavily involved in crafting an image of perfect boybandness free from the realities of what constitutes this position, even if people are aware of the realities they willingly overlook them because instead of dwelling on that it's far more helpful to a fan to just dwell on what they're being fed! Isn't it! On the other hand there is a hyperawareness in other people of k-pop's failings. All of this has occurred because of BTS's meteoric rise to success. The hallyu wave was a long time coming but it has come and solidified now, and I guess when anything becomes an institution it's difficult to ignore the purveyors of the Eternally Unchanging. I mean I'm like that with Haikyuu, but most of the time I'm not aware of what's happening with fandom at large, I just exist in my corner saying my things, and with fiction it is easier to not care about what others are saying because there isn't a living entity that will keep changing. There's a DW post somewhere about what makes RPF so good to read, which also speaks to me personally about a fan's investment in boyband fandoms. I'm sure there are fans of BTS who exist in their similarly crafted, small corners. It's just that this is too big to ignore now, it's too much to not understand critically, and while I understand those who are still here, I can't be.
One of the people behind the Bleak Boyband Bingo (again, a wonderful exercise in boyband canonicity and meta - the AO3 collection for this is ughhhh <3 one day I will make a post for this on fanlore.) once tweeted that k-pop is just a fandom we're trapped in where the ultimate thing to do is escape it but we're drowning together, and while I think there can be two or more ways about it, ultimately, yeah. It's one of those situations where you thought it'd just be you and your friend "hehe"ing each other in your corner but the entire world wants to be privy to your corner. The industry expands and more heartbreak and evil things settle in. An unknown mangaka spending most of their youth trying to "make it" and a young trainee in an entertainment company trying to "break it" or "debut" are similar in terms of wasted potential, but it's the person who decides what is "wasted" and what isn't. There is nuance here again. Maybe I'm ultimately saying class consciousness can benefit anyone and everyone, lol.
When ACAB really took off at the end of May/beginning of June, my favourite person from BTS – also the first k-pop band I really listened to – dropped an album that had been expected for a long time. I was living without electricity or water at the time and it was incredibly frustrating to not be able to listen to the new album for a while. When I finally listened to it I was floored. But like I said, ACAB took off at that time. It was a surreal time to be stuck at home in one part of the world when so many other parts were erupting with repressed anger and righteous indignation. It was startling and strange. In this startlingly strange time, we got to know one of the tracks from the album was sampled from a sermon that was openly racist.
This is a personal account of why I’ve not been able to and won’t be able to come back to k-pop fully, at least for a while, so I am not indicting or passing judgment on people who continue to derive so much energy and joy from them. There are way too many. But the apology statement – and BTS’s own stance on the politics of the world at the time – were woefully inadequate and strange. I’ve always found it unrealistic that the phenomena that is the biggest boyband in the world has to strive to be humanitarian and stand for social justice at all times. Though these are the messages they push for through their songs – everything felt immeasurably hollow and bleak for the moment. They are real people who do real things. Instead, fandom and BigHit always tries to convert them into transcendental symbols who cover the range and breadth of humanity at all times – which is fine in a way. I would do that for the medias I love as well. But the problem is the fans – as usual. Their capability for bullying and for violence is shocking and horrifying. Using deadnames is violence. Coming into someone’s dms to deliberately antagonise them is bullying. A critique of these idols specifically is not possible because the space surrounding them will not allow it.
Is the critique necessary? Is fandom supposed to be about all that? If the group has been posited as paragons of social justice – then yes. If discussion generates critique that positively reinforces meaning – then yes. I like it when fans speculate whether leaving Aran Ojiro out of the Nationals team spread of Haikyuu was a consciously racist act or not. I like that people are thinking. Given the nature of how sites like Twitter operate, things snowball fairly quickly, and I hate how discussion can easily grow into something where people are for one team or another. Strict binaries are not cool, people. Your favourites are not black or white.
There is much to be said about why k-pop and k-pop rpf is fascinating, but I’m not the person to say it. This area helped me discover fandom and lead me back to my original loves – the other day I saw Ouran High School Host Club fanart and it was the best thing – but it’s also a devious area, there are too many people here and there is too much noise for anything to make sense. I could curate and look out for spaces (like DW) and people I trust, but it doesn’t lessen the fact that this juggernaut of people drives popular perception and generates activity that leads to consequences. Consequences, there are. I can say Yoongi the person and Yoongi the idol are different – but they’re constituents of the same individual and who knows which supersedes? They’re one and the same.
In many ways, “Strange” (from Yoongi’s album, D-2) encapsulates what I’m trying to say. In his interviews with TIME and Billboard, Yoongi talks of how he is drawing attention to his life and its conditions, but not offering any conclusive opinion on it. It is up to us to do the same. This is of course the oldest gimmick in the book of all artists ever, but nothing is without context. One of the joys of consuming content is having multiple ways to interpret it, but the illusion of being close to the ‘truth’ tickles everyone’s goat. I think that’s what I’m doing here. Talking about what does not tickle my goat anymore. The crises imposed by the occupational hazards of being a boyband are plenty, and I don’t think being in the most popular boyband in the world helps. It brings me acute pain to think of it too much, and that, if nothing else, shows how despite my distance from all this, I’m still caught up with it. I've had to take space from it because there's nothing to gain from being involved in a space that claims to have no harming consequences.
Nothing original has been said in this personal essay, but I will say one more thing: a lot of the things I've discovered here have been incredible. They've expanded the way I think about, well, everything including gender, really, and I met other asexual people here for the first time. It taught me that I still value fiction! But that's an essay for another time.
In the end, I come back to Haikyuu. As always, it's been the people I've met here or seen who've changed me. Encounters that give you something to think about. For that I'm grateful to this space. And now I'm incredibly cozy yelling about things I thought I could only yell about to Ayushi. What a fun time.
Nothing original has been said in this personal essay, but I will say one more thing: a lot of the things I've discovered here have been incredible. They've expanded the way I think about, well, everything including gender, really, and I met other asexual people here for the first time. It taught me that I still value fiction! But that's an essay for another time.
In the end, I come back to Haikyuu. As always, it's been the people I've met here or seen who've changed me. Encounters that give you something to think about. For that I'm grateful to this space. And now I'm incredibly cozy yelling about things I thought I could only yell about to Ayushi. What a fun time.
[edit, 4th Jan '21] i've discovered i'm mostly ok with k-pop as long as i don't start looking at other people on twitter and also avoid bangtan content unless it's given to me specifically on the personal group i have w my friends.
[i keep editing this entry because i have a lot to say without being overbearing and i'm perpetually unsatisfied with this entry - THERE IS SO MUCH TO SAY - but i hate talking about k-pop critically at length it makes my brain bad]
