K-pop Brain Rot
K-pop Brain Rot
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Exams are around the corner
By z
February 14, 2024
K-pop is a revered genre of music that’s been all the hype with younger generations. It is also the subject of many sensitive topics.
Aspiring teens are plucked out of the streets and enrolled in training programs that teach the basics of dancing, singing, rapping, and how to behave in front of the cameras. At first, the training process doesn’t seem that bad, you get a place to stay, your food and training are all paid for, and you’re developing skills you’re passionate about–Nuh uh, it’s not as fun as it sounded, because the pressure is on! If you don’t do well in the industry, you’re expected to pay back your tab after your training, and if you get eliminated from monthly evaluation, BOOM! Bye-bye, you won’t be able to debut !!! Sorry, but you can take poorly developed life skills, trauma, and an eating disorder as a souvenir. Good luck!
The hours are OSHA violations, and trainees are still expected to go to school on top of everything else if they even do. The limits are being pushed on recruitment ages. Most recently a surge of popularity befell the newly-arisen girl group New Jeans, the youngest member being 14 years old, not even considering the time she had to train before debuting. People are concerned nowadays because debuting minors is not good because of the types of music and lyrics that the artists are going to do. Minor couldn’t possibly do mature songs, right? And yet they continue to do that in the K-pop industry. The days spent training are long and exhausting. These companies do this to weed out the people who might not be able to handle this lifestyle. There are reasons why we see idols fainting on stage due to physical health, and long breaks for mental health. This documentary shines a light on the mental fatigue idols experience from the compulsion of managers.
Now, that you’ve completed your training, all that’s left to do is debut, and show your new shiny self to the world. No one knows how long they will train, that process could take between a few months to 10 years. A popular example is Jihyo from the massively successful girl group TWICE. She spent a decade of her life in training. Jihyo started training when she was eight, basically throwing away her entire childhood for a chance to be picked.
You can be dismissed from the team for stuff as little as your looks not fitting with the group image, your eyes a little too far apart, your nostrils too big. “If you work hard, it’ll pay off,” is a mirage company investing in their push. There is no lack of youngins who aspire to be famous. Sometimes skill doesn’t matter, and it all comes down to luck. As an idol, you have to look jolly and professional, even if you’re about to pass away, otherwise, your managers yell at you. Idols are built to be nothing more than “perfect” products pandered to us, preying on consumers and perpetuating psychotic Eastern beauty standards. They’re peddling perfect dolls, alluring, talented, beautiful, and never making mistakes. That is the entire industry. I wonder how they achieve this level of beauty, certainly not genetics. Plastic surgery is, of course, prominent everywhere. But with such strict beauty standards in the East, there is a list you need to hit in order to become “perfect”: pointy nose, plump lips, v-shape jaw, and straight eyebrows, which builds up the “Korean Beauty Standard”. A study done in 2020 determined that 20% of Korean girls have undergone cosmetic surgery. Plastic surgery is all the hype in South Korea. It’s not just socially accepted but encouraged by the media and celebrities.
Now that your face card will never decline, off to your body weight. Trainees are expected to ingest only water to slim down their bodies. Based on artists' past experiences, they go to sleep crying because they worry they won’t wake up. People have even made these deranged diets into trends, really shining a light on the cultural differences. And when you don’t follow the “perfect” body, just get ready for the amount of hate that the fans will give you!
We finally have our perfected molted entertainment machines straight from the assembly line. Now picture this: a K-Pop idol that never ages, always does what they’re told, looks perfect 24/7, never gets sick, performs with 100% accuracy with no mistakes, has zero worries of scandals, and has the ability to change hair color and clothes with 2 mouse clicks. Building the perfect idol from the ground up with a fraction of the time and money spent making them so. Entertainment companies are drooling over this proposition, someone who can make them money without all the pesky negatives. Presenting Saejin, an AI member from the boy group SUPERKIND. Imagine being one of those members who trained for years just to let a non-human idol overshadow you.
Enough dogging on the K-Pop industry, onto the crazy fanbase. K-Pop is massively popular amongst youth because of its poppy element with eye-catching choreography, practiced and synchronized to high heaven. There are many choices of girl/boy bands to invest in. This results in fandoms being created and fandom wars are born. Obnoxious teens and young adults participate in this meaningless internet meanness that benefits no one, to defend people with their lives who don’t even know you exist. I’ll be the millennial pushing “It’s because of that damn phone”, but it really is because of the damn phone and the internet rotting your brains and destroying the part responsible for social norms. Parasocial relationships have been so normalized. It's scary. In the names of their stans and stan culture, traits normally attributed to sociopaths, bullies, and stalkers are unleashed upon any individual whose opinion differs even the tiniest bit. The even darker side of fans that are acutely disturbing, are freaks who stalk, harass, and threaten these idols. Even attempted kidnappings aren’t out of sight.
Recently there's been a desperate movement of Zionist companies sponsoring K-Pop groups to advertise products. One shining example is Starbucks, $12 billion in market value losses. This is effective because of the degraded hivemind stans have. If their favs say something is ok to do or promote, they'll do it.
Koreaboos - “Someone who is obsessed with Korean culture so much they denounce their own culture and call themselves Korean. They usually are kpop fanatics (not fans) or fans of League of Legends, or other competitive games popular in South Korea. However there is a line; if someone just likes the music, language, and culture they are not classed as a koreaboo.” Definition from Urban Dictionary. They are subclass humans who are more often than not, white. Culture vultures. The K-Pop industry knows this, they cater to audiences like these because they’re those bratty little kids who will steal money out of their parents wallets to buy merchandise. But alas, more money comes out from the needy and into the greedy. They’ll milk any source of revenue until the cows come home, no matter how unethical, where have I heard that before?
I normally push the narrative “It’s not about what _____ does to you, it’s what it does for you.” In this case orientalism, essentially promoted pick-me behavior exuded from idols in order to draw in the public. They Intentionally try to appear baby-ish, younger than they are, tying into pedophilia. Whitewashing is so prevalent in Asian apps, that phones automatically adjust camera filters to make you appear lighter, and certain features of your face to fit into their standards. This publication from 2015 illuminates the staggering statistics of public opinion on plastic surgery. Out of the 1,500 respondents, only 13% - 14% regarded people’s appearance as not very or never important. Over 60% of both gender parties think plastic surgery is a plausible solution for better chances of marriage and job landing. These data sets don’t seem to be receding as it’s been steadily increasing since the 1990s.
Whenever someone’s idol does something controversial their go-to excuse is, that they’re from a different world. This implies that East Asians are occupying a higher plane of existence where our nuances and morality don’t exist in that fantastical world. Deifying pale Asians is every bit as racist as the other spectrum of viewpoints of Asians. They revere our entire sort of middle ground of whiteness and non-whiteness. To be a person of color but also be “white”, is why the desire to be this certain race is so much higher than others. We also see this when rich people romanticize being poor; cosplaying as minimum wage workers. Or that belief that it’s mostly white people participating in extreme sports. They get the exhilarating rush that being a minority provides passively. Our inherent selfishness transcends what is possible, our want will never recede, always growing even when you gain.
K-Pop is not just a genre, it is an industry.
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