The title "Separation Of Kpop And State" 😭 that's genius

I hate when people use the "It was an accident, they didn't know!" because why are they always 'accidentally' racist, homophobic or just right wing... How often do you see idols 'accidentally' wearing something with left wing politics, pro black, Palestine, LGBTQ+ etc? Rarely. Too coincidental for me.

Imagine far right people "claiming" you as their own because of your language dialect. Nightmare honestly

All art is political, whether they want it to be or not

Mark is Canadian. He understood what the flag meant. I stand by that as someone whose best friend is Canadian.

I have two questions

1. Why do none of these artists ever accidentally wear a black panther shirt or ACAB earrings or a Nelson Mandela shirt or something? Why is it always something insanely right wing and anti-equality? The closest I’ve seen is a couple girls where a shirt with feminism on it 😭

2. Who the HELL is all of their PR managers and are they not responsible for checking their pictures before they post them? Ever since I was young everyone always talks about how strict and constraining their lives are and how every single part of their lives are controlled by management so I would imagine even though social media is accepted, they’d AT LEAST have to run it by a manager or an intern just to CHECK???

Kpop wants to have it's cake and eat it too. You can't be apolitical whilst using kpop as a soft power

Mark originally pretending he was innocent and wasn't aware was wild to me :(

idols not double checking what the hell they put on is actually concerning. I have few shirts with japanese words on it and I checked what those mean cause I don't wanna support a weird group or saying... it's the bare minimum????

its always hilarious to see that these idols go through SO MUCH PR training and yet still find ways to show off their idiocy/ignorance (idoicy mostly referring to mark), incidents like these and kpops overly conservative and uncreative approach to music, direction, etc. are just increasing my disappointment in the genre

To quote Michael Jordan, "Republicans buy sneakers too"

I'm so exhausted that people still act like kpop idols are extremely isolated and ignorant, especially when many of them are either some form of mixed or grew up outside of korea.
It's 2026, kpop has planned to appeal to the western market for over a decade. You're telling me not one of these companies and/or idols spent five minutes online to make sure their outfits don't espouse bigoted messages when they can't even show the peace sign in photos for fear of political backlash? And if they truly didn't, why should I support someone who cares so little about a country they want to sell things to?

The president of South Korea declared martial law and majority of Korean celebrities were completely silent on the matter and I thought that was insane.

realistically, there is going to be one k-pop idol in every band who is conservative. karina from aespa is a great example. also, there is no such thing as being strictly "apolitical." politics has an impact on people's everyday lives, even if they don't always realise it because the effects are micro.

Also to Chaeyoungs Hakenkreuz shirt, she wore that shit to a Jewish restaurant💀 and I'm sorry but you should definitely know about the first and second world war like that's basic ass history

i hate the hypocrisy fans have when it comes to these things. when an idol wears clothes with an offensive or insensitive slogan or image they "didn't know" or "dont choose the clothes they wear" but the second it is something they agree with or see as positive like, say, clothing that is part of a pride collection, all of the sudden they chose the clothing and are fully aware of where they come from and what they symbolize and are "allies"

the thing about karina's post that leads me to believe it was on purpose was the caption of the post that had a rose emoji. That same rose emoji was the logo of the party. I don't think you can accidentally post yourself posing with three strong political simbols during the elections

When's the last time an idol accidentally wore trans pride clothing? Islamic calligraphy? Hell, even the decolonial puerto rican flag? Being ignorant about what you wear isnt a flex. It should be deeply embarrassing that you were handed a tshirt with what is very obviously a national flag on it, didn't ask what country it was, and wore it for photos. They would not be this forgiving if someone wore something resembling the Japanese rising sun.

Kpop from it’s beginnings is inherently political. It started as a form of resiliency against the Japanese occupation and later the war. The mix of Korean with English popular songs (especially rock and roll) rhythm is fundamental to the creation of the basis of what’s now known as kpop. The founder of today’s system of the business is also part of very political matter, with SM and Lee Soo Man. To any interested I would recommend to read John Lie’s “Kpop. Popular Music, Cultural Amnesia and Economic Innovation in South Korea”

Ngl I really liked your own connection to the K-pop is escapism segment, you definitely brought your storytelling skills to play hereee