Victims still reeling from traumatic past, yet bullies forgetful

K-pop has been increasingly caught in bullying scandals as fresh allegations have been made almost every day since last week. Gettyimagesbank

K-pop caught in bullying scandals with a series of revelations

By Kang Hyun-kyung

Singer-actor Kwon Min-a, 27, a former member of the eight-member girl band, AOA, stole the show, Tuesday.

Unveiling several dazzling portrait photos of herself on Instagram, she let her fans know that she's still on the entertainment scene, although she had disappeared from the public eye since last year, following her bombshell announcement that she had been bullied by her then bandmate Jimin.

In the newly uploaded photos, she's provocative and flawlessly gorgeous.

Such stunning images, however, betray her true self. In a recent Instagram post, she admitted that she was still reeling from the consequences of her traumatic past. "I've seen psychiatrists since I was 20 or 21. It was five or six years ago when I realized I couldn't stand that person (who traumatized her) any more… I changed my psychiatrist in March 2018… Now, medication no longer works," she wrote.

In October of last year, Kwon and Jimin were at the center of the spotlight regarding the former's revelations that she had been bullied for almost a decade by one of her bandmates. In two separate statements that Kwon posted on social media, she detailed her traumatic experiences, caused by tensions with the bandmate.

According to her, she couldn't see her dying father, who was then fighting the worst form of pancreatic cancer, and couldn't even cry out because her bandmate forced her not to reveal her emotions, as otherwise, her actions could affect the other members' performance. She claimed she was forced to take a tranquilizer. Later, Jimin apologized, which Kwon said was not accepted.
Kwon quit the popular girl band, ending her contract with her agency, FNC Entertainment.

Singer-actor Kwon Min-a claimed she's a victim of bullying. Korea Times file

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Her recent social media post hinted at the lingering fallout of bullying on victims, as they find it difficult to lead normal lives when their traumatic experiences keep playing on their minds.

It is also a fresh reminder that not only ordinary people, but also some stars, fall prey to bullying because of bullies from within. Actress Seo Shin-ae was reportedly also a victim of school bullying.

K-pop has been increasingly caught in bullying scandals.

On Tuesday, fresh allegations erupted about the shady past of some K-pop stars. Soloist Hyun-ah was pointed to by an anonymous past classmate as a bully when she was an elementary school student, allegations the singer flatly denied.

The name of a member of JYP Entertainment's popular boy band Stray Kids, Hyunjin, emerged as another bully. One Internet user wrote in a post on a website that the singer sexually harassed him when they were in school. JYP was wary of the fresh allegations, saying that it is checking with related people about whether they are true or not. It warned of legal action against those who are responsible for spreading false information with malicious intent.

JYP Entertainment's boy band Stray Kids members pose in this photo. One of its members is accused of having bullied his classmate when they attended elementary school. JYP said it is checking with related people about whether the allegations are true or not. Courtesy of JYP Entertainment

While several stars are facing allegations regarding their past deeds, for some bullying is not just something that happened before they debuted. It's still happening in some K-pop bands.

Last year, Irene, a member of SM's girl band, Red Velvet, came under fire after an unnamed staff member disclosed what she had gone through.

The staffer wrote on social media that she had experienced a hell-like 20 minutes that day. "I've worked in this industry for 15 years and met various types of people… Before working with her in person, I'd heard a lot about her, and I thought I had been fully prepared to deal with her… But I was wrong. I became speechless at the electric needles fired by her… I had 20 minutes of hell-like moments," she wrote. She didn't specify which star she was referring to, but used the hashtag of Red Velvet's song, "Psycho," and another song performed by Irene and Seulgi, causing people familiar with the girl band and each member's character to conclude that it had been Irene.

Irene and her agency SM offered apologies to the unknown stylist, vowing that such inappropriate things won't happen again. Accepting the apologies, the staff member deleted what she wrote.

"As for the bullying scandals that rock K-pop, I'm so sorry to see such things in the news," said Paul Sneed, professor at Seoul National University's Department of Hispanic Language and Literature. "The Korean entertainment industry is a quite unique climate in many ways. I have never heard of any such thing in other cultures. I think the vulnerability of the artists in Korea in such a hierarchical system perhaps fosters such a dynamic."

Sneed is the author of the 2019 book, "Machine Gun Voices," which summarizes his decades of experiences in Brazil and his exposure to local street culture, which affected the creation of the homegrown pop music genre called funk carioca.
Noting that he is not an expert on Korean music, he said that the problems of pronounced hierarchies make individual artists vulnerable. "With pressures and insecurities, as well as trauma, figures emerge that engage in bullying. It's horrible and needs to be changed," he said.

Sneed, meanwhile, said that for some musicians, their traumatic past motivated them to express themselves through their music, and a certain music genre was created. He noted that gangster rap is an example, and some Brazilian musicians used it as a form of resistance.

"As for gangster rap, it's important to remember that such musical forms arise as part of identity politics for marginalized groups. African American communities and the residents of the favelas in which I lived, worked and conducted research in Brazil also have a very unique dynamic," he said. "These communities have historically been victimized by oppression from the dominant sectors of society, by those who hold power (historically the whiter, more European descended folks in positions of power and authority in areas like politics, commerce and religion). The folks deeply involved in the culture of gangster rap are the ones who have been bullied and are now inverting their relatively powerless social positions on to the rest."