The Good and the Bad of the K-pop Industry
 |
| K-pop group BTS in 2016. |
If you go to a K-pop group’s concert, you will find fans who do not speak Korean singing every single word to songs entirely in Korean. My introduction to the genre was the K-pop group BTS. While I don’t know a single word of Korean, I can sing BTS songs as if I were fluent. K-pop is a music genre originating in South Korea, which emerged in the 1990s. K-pop has become a global sensation. Today, fans sell out stadiums thousands of miles away from the place K-pop artists call home. Though you may not understand the Korean words being sung, I urge you to listen to BTS’s performance of Born Singer. Listen without the English subtitles and then again with the English translation. The intense emotional connection these artists have to these words transcends language, making it abundantly clear that they are pouring their souls into this life onstage.
 |
| BTS performing Born Singer. |
BTS’s
dedication shown in Born Singer is also accompanied by the pain the singers have
gone through in the process of becoming idols. Min Yoongi of BTS says it
perfectly in Born Singer with the line “Even if my body hurts the cheers come
rolling in.” I love BTS and the vulnerability in their music and performances.
But with a dedication to life in the K-pop industry comes the extreme pressure
of a life dictated by the public eye. Many K-pop stars – often referred to as
idols – reach unimaginable levels of fame, but those who do were signed by
powerful companies and endured rigorous training before they could even debut
their first song.
When
you dream of something your whole life and put years of sleepless nights and training
related injuries into that dream, could you imagine it all being taken away in
an instant? This is the constant fear that idols must live with. To enter the
idol career, applicants must be accepted by a company as a trainee. They must
take singing, dancing, acting, and language lessons – often while still in
school. Their days can start as early as 5 am and end as late as 1 am, and this
training process could last five to ten years. These trainees may function on
less than four hours of sleep. If these pressures alone were not enough, they must
undergo evaluations to determine whether they are skilled enough to continue
with the company. These evaluations could end their dreams with a single inadequate
performance.
At
the age of 27, Kim Jonghyun, the lead singer of K-pop group SHINee, took his
own life. Jonghyun began training with his entertainment company at the age of 15.
While I do not pretend to understand the all of the reasons for Jonghyun’s
death, the K-pop industry is where Jonghyun grew up, and where – under the stressors
of maintaining his image as an idol – he made the decision to end his own life.
 |
| Jonghyun Memorial |
In his last moments, Jonghyun was concerned that others would say he had failed them. In his last text messages to his sister, Jonghyun wrote “This is my last farewell. Please let me go and say I did a good job.” In a note which Jonghyun asked to be released to the public in the event of his death, he commented on his career, saying “It wasn’t my path to become world-famous […] It’s quite funny now that I think about it. It’s a miracle that I endured through it all this time.” In just a few lines, Jonghyun shows the painful reality of the lives of many K-pop idols trying to survive in the grueling industry.
 |
| Members of K-pop groups SHINee and Super Junior carrying Jonghyun's coffin. |
Jonghyun
was found unconscious due to carbon monoxide poisoning on December 18, 2017. He had performed on
stage just nine days earlier. It is heart wrenching to watch Jonghyun
during what may have been his final goodbye to fans.
I love BTS. I said it before and I will say it again. So I cannot say that the K-pop industry is insidious and uncaring. The industry has helped many – evidenced by BTS’s wide outreach and loving message. But the problem comes when there is no one there to help these idols whose whole lives are tied to their image and ability to entertain fans. There is no doubt that the K-pop industry horribly failed Jonghyun and many idols like him. There are two sides to the K-pop industry, and it is difficult to reconcile the idea that the same industry which produced BTS's love yourself movement failed to save Jonghyun. The K-pop industry may not be entirely at fault for Junghyun's death, but there is significance in the fact that Jonghyun suffered because of the idol lifestyle. Though Jonghyun was is not the only idol to have suffered, the K-pop industry is still haunted by the image of SHINee members carrying the coffin of one of their own.
To learn more about the process of becoming a k-pop idol: https://rojakdaily.com/entertainment/article/1728/the-extremes-that-koreans-take-to-become-a-kpop-idol
To learn more about Jonghyun’s death:
https://www.thejakartapost.com/life/2017/12/19/the-full-text-of-jonghyuns-death-note.html
To learn more about Jonghyun’s life:
Its funny because I personally did not know what K Pop was until I came to Pittsburgh. My small town in Eastern PA, just didn't listen to that or branch out a whole lot. It is super interesting to think of the rigorous training these idols are put under to endure this type of life. How psychologically damaging this training has on these kids at such a young age. Look at Michael Jackson and the abuse his father put on him and his siblings, you can understand and even see the underlying affects in his adult life ,the toll it had taken, he was an odd fellow as an adult and clearly this could be a reason. In Korea this type of training at such a young age reminds me a lot of the Soviet Union, how these kids that show somewhat of a potential and talent are groomed to do this one thing and one thing only to be the best at. When the USA in 1980 beat the Soviets at Lake Placid it shattered these kids lives because this was they were training their entire existence since they were young. They were supposed to be the best and beat everyone and what would happen if this situation was a matter of singing and dancing just for music and money.
ReplyDeleteAfter finishing your blog, I listened to the performance of “Born Singer”. The two lines that especially stuck out to me were, “I’m drenched with the blood and sweat I’ve spilled,” and, “After the performance tears leak through.” I would not have understood the meaning behind these lines without first understanding the process these singers experience before performing on a big stage. I was shocked by the amount of pressure these performers endure in order to follow-through with their dreams. I found an article that describes the K-pop training period for young Korean girls, and found that even after the girls are signed by a label their training does not stop: “They’ll be weighed every morning and night, the number reported to a master trainer each time, and their menus will be controlled.” What I found most shocking is that plastic surgery is one of the most well-known methods of transforming teenagers into pop stars in Korea. One of the K-pop trainers is quoted saying, “If a girl has a bad face and a good body, the problem can be fixed with plastic surgery.” The physical, mental, and emotional dedication these performers have brings to question what are we willing to do to chase our dreams? It also makes me wonder what do the parents of these young stars think about this process?
ReplyDeleteArticle: (https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/8x49y3/inside-k-pop-training-centers-korea)