Unpopular opinion : international fans
Now, this is coming from an international fan myself but I see things that international fans do that really bother me. I do not intend to offend anyone or anything that someone does but I am simply pointing out my opinion.
!) First off, the kpop industry was never meant to spread to the west. The original intention was to spread to neighboring Asian countries (China, Japan, Philippines, Indonesia, etc). Kpop’s first target audience is Korea because that is where communication is the easiest and costs will be less for concerts and fanmeetings since heavy travel is not necessary. Koreans are the main ones that help fund kpop because they are the main ones that are able to attend their events more often than international fans. Their second target audience is surrounding Asian countries because they are close and some (like Indonesia and the Philippines) are easily influenced and it’s easy to export artists out to those countries than the west. Everywhere else is last priority meaning that they are going to focus on their top priorities and make sure that those people have what they need before going and taking care of those in the west. There are rarely any concerts in the west because of how expensive it will be to provide travel for all artists plus staff, book the venue, etc. only groups that have made it big or it is obvious that they have a large fanbase in the west will be able to have any events in the west. (Why aren’t there any concerts in Europe? I do not know. I have not done my research on that since that is not where I am from)
2) Videos are not going to be subbed for you and if they do get subbed, it will take time. Anyone who subs videos knows that it takes a long time to sub them especially if you are translating from one language to another and the video is over 15 minutes. If you cannot be patient and wait while someone subs the video, then learn Korean yourself so you do not need to have subs to understand what is going on, that’s what I did. Do I understand everything? no but I understand enough that if i really want to watch a video but its not subbed, i can still understand most of what they are saying.
3) just because a company does something that benefits another group besides you does not mean they hate international fans, it just means you are not their priority.
4) Stop attacking idols before you understand what is going on. If you think that an idol is saying an offensive word in English then you check what you are assuming before attacking. Bambam should not have been attacked for saying a word in Korean (please note that I am talking about the most recent incident, not the one from 2016). 내가 (Naega) means I am and while it sounds like the N word in English, that does not mean it is. If you do not speak the language that someone is speaking in then ask someone who does what they are saying. It is unfair that idols have to apologize for speaking a language.
5) Stop saying that kpop is all of Korean music, it just makes you look stupid, You saying that Kpop is all of Korean music is like me saying that pop is the only music that Americans listen to. it’s funny that Kpop fans always get mad that people don’t know what the K in kpop stands for but a lot of them dont know what the pop stands for. the pop in kpop stands for popular music, as in it is the korean version of popular music or pop music. A lot of kpop fans only know about kpop and they believe that it is the only style of Korean music when it is not. Rock, Trot, indie, rap, r&b, etc are all types of music in Korea. Any music style that America has Korea also has. The only reason that a lot of kpop fans do not know about them is that their view on Korean music is focused on Kpop and only that but just because you only see kpop doesnt mean that that is the only genre.
6) stop acting like you know everything about Korea because you saw one video one time. Do research about the country if you want to learn about it and be informed about it. You can not get the knowledge by wathcing a single video by an iffy source
7) allkpop, koreaboo, koreanmaps, etc are all KOREAN GOSSIP NEWS SOURCES so please stop complaining when you don’t see them talking about something big happening in Korea if it doesn’t involve kpop. During the burning sun scandal, a lot of people were complaining that they were using the burning sun scandal to cover up sopa when sopa doesnt involve idols but burning sun does. If you want to be that informed about Korean news, look at Korean news sites not kpop sites
8) stop overly obsessing over the ‘gayness’ of an idol and stop fetishizing gayness. It gets to the point where its annoying that people point out everything that an idol does as gay to the point that they are shoving that gayness in the idol’s face. It is fine to joke about it, it is fine to discuss it but what is not fine is taking it from a space where only those in your group hear about it to taking it to that idol and forcing them to hear your thoughts about their sexuality. What’s also not okay is labeling someone as homophobic because they dont like someone’s music. i do not like Holland’s music (its not for me) and multiple people have called me homophobic. his sexuality has nothing to do with the fact that his music does not fit my taste.
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