BBC News : Hanni Pham - K-pop singer was ostracized because her family has roots from the Republic of Vietnam ?

8 February 2023

Hanni Pham - K-pop singer was ostracized because her family has roots from the Republic of Vietnam ?

Author, Bui Thu
Role,BBC News Vietnamese
8 hours ago

Hanni Pham of NewJeans attends The Fact Music Awards 2022 on October 8, 2022 in Seoul, South Korea

Hanni Pham, a member of the Korean girl group NewJeans, is now at the center of calls for a boycott because Hanni's family is said to be "supporting the Republic of Vietnam", a country that ceased to exist in 1975.

The Tifosi Facebook website page and the Cánh website page have just posted an article titled "There are many idols, but the country has only one".

The article reported that the family of Vietnamese-Australian singer Hanni was "revealed" that "brings extreme anti-Communist ideology, distorts the country's history and promotes the invasion and massacre of soldiers. Australia in Vietnam…”

This page also accuses singer Hanni of cheating for profit. Especially the problem here is the love of the Fatherland and idols.

A K Flower Facebook page with more than 400,000 followers even mentions that the singer's members, including Hanni's mother, grandfather and aunt have yellow flag avatars and have feelings for the Republic of Vietnam.

Currently, the company and Hanni personally have not officially commented on this issue. And the Facebooks that are said to be Hanni's family are temporarily locked Facebook before this wave of attacks.

Dr. Ha Hoang Hop from Hanoi told the BBC on February 7 that:

"Young people and audience fans of singer Hanni are right, because Hanni is a good singer. Hanni should be proud of himself, of his love for Vietnam! There is no monopoly on love for the country, because there are many ways to love the country. Hanni and the young Vietnamese generation are not responsible for the sad and happy pages of Vietnam's history, and they can't be victims of any kind of politicization of beliefs, aimed at fighting peace. national filial piety."

Why was Hanni ostracized?

The image of Hanni Pham (left) is boycotted because of her origin related to the Republic of Vietnam

The general point of the boycott wave is that singer Hanni is not transparent about his background related to the Republic of Vietnam and deceives Vietnamese fans.

Accordingly, these people believe that if the NewJeans group targets the Vietnamese market, a Vietnamese-born member like Hanni must have a "clean resume". So when fans found pictures of Hanni's family to flag, they felt betrayed.

“Because you cannot make money in Vietnam if you are anti-communist. The fact that the family and the management company try to hide Hanni's origin but still try to make money in Vietnam is disrespectful and deceiving the audience," one person commented on the incident under the article Tifosi.

Also following this line of view, because it was initially thought to be "clean in terms of ideology" as well as background, in the ceremony to celebrate the 30th anniversary of establishing diplomatic relations and raising the level of partnership relations between the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the Republic of Korea, the new group NewJeans was selected to speak and Hanni personally was given priority to speak in Vietnamese. But in the end, her family supported the Republic of Vietnam and therefore did not deserve to represent Vietnam.

Several groups were formed to protest, boycott Hanni

Another argument promoting boycott is that an idol's ideology can affect the behavior and thinking of young people. Since Hanni allegedly grew up in a family with anti-communist traditions, she will mislead Vietnamese fans.

Since then, supporters of this viewpoint have emphasized: "Idols are many, but the Fatherland has only one" or "Culture and art is also a front. If you lose an idol, you won't die, if you lose your country, you'll die without a place to bury." These pages called for a boycott, demanding that Hanni speak out about her political views.

One comment read: "His father sacrificed his blood, his great-grandson idolizes the man who opened fire on his ancestors."

However, it should be noted that Hanni personally has not made any statements related to the Republic of Vietnam or the communists, but the family of the singer is said to have expressed support for the Republic of Vietnam.

Haunting the specter of war

Those who boycott singer Hanni also believe that supporting a person whose family "follows" the Republic of Vietnam is treasonous to the country of Vietnam, even though she has Australian nationality and Vietnamese origin.

Professor Alex-Thai Dinh Vo currently working at the Center for Vietnam and Archives, Texas Tech University, USA commented to BBC News Vietnamese on February 7:

“The call to boycott shows us the virulence of discrimination that persists nearly 50 years after the war, whether in Vietnam or in the diaspora. Much is also due to education, education here is the concealment of information about history, politics and society.

“The specter of war,” a type of hauntology, actually originates in the people of the larger class as well as the ruling elite, and over time they pass on the story of the ghost to generations. after. Therefore, the next generation is easier to 'bring' enmity, not simply because the enmity comes from within them, but it is raised over generations (2-3 generations)... so they gave a series of discriminatory, hating reactions based on background – but they themselves did not understand the consequences and even definitions such as patriotism, communism or nationalism,” said Alex-Thai Dinh Vo. identify.

Facebooker Tan Trung Nguyen Quoc also mentioned the concept of "hauntology".

He also analyzed Directive 221 CT/TW (June 17, 1975) of the Secretariat of the Third term of the Communist Party of Vietnam on educational work in the South after 1975.

“The directive set out the direction to ‘resolve’ the education system in South Vietnam by the government of the Republic of Vietnam, which no longer exists.

“Accordingly, on the basis of background, the principals of schools of the old regime, teachers, intellectuals, etc. are considered to have reactionary seeds, have a bad personality and have a 'depraved' way of life will be removed from the system.

“This agitated educational mindset changed only slightly in the mid-1990s. But this was enough for many capable generations of South Vietnam to be completely excluded from the international political-scientific space. family,” explained Mr. Trung.

Tifosi page with more than 200 thousand followers posts about love of country is more important than love of idols

National reconciliation?

Gen Z grew up with access to the internet and digital and electronic devices from a young age. However, when people of this generation have supposedly harsh reactions towards the Vietnamese-Australian singer of a Korean group, many people question the so-called reconciliation between Vietnamese people together after nearly half a century.

According to Professor Alex-Thai Dinh Vo, the way Gen Z reacts like this shows their lack of understanding as honestly and as carefully as possible about their own history and culture, that of Vietnam.

“I thought that with education, internet and convenience to access and improve, there would be a desire to understand and understand more, but no. Some people use the phrase 'rule of the people'," he explained.

Referring to national reconciliation as the Vietnamese government often calls for, Mr. Alex-Thai Dinh Vo said that the country could have come to reconciliation, and such things will not happen. If the two sides honestly sat back, looking back at the truth of the war and its consequences... instead of disparaging each other day and night, seeing each other as haunted ghosts.

“Typically, in discussions, representatives of the Vietnamese government always call for harmony and reconciliation but always condemn those belonging to the Republic of Vietnam.

"For example, they asked the US government to provide money and technology to help find the remains of soldiers who died in the war. The US spent about 6 million USD on the condition that they find the remains of all Vietnamese, including People belong to the Republic of Vietnam, but the Vietnamese government always refuses and just wants to use that money to find each person on their side.This story shows us the lack of sincerity in the calls for harmony and reconciliation.

"If this continues, it will be difficult to bring about the understanding and sympathy needed for a true reconciliation, so the reactions of Gen Z are not surprising actions," said Professor Dinh Vo.

Regarding Hanni's case, Facebooker Tan Trung Nguyen Quoc commented:

“The fact that a child born in 2004, who has never made any sensitive political statements, is attacked and cursed by a class of Vietnamese teenagers... just because she is the child of a family that was once a family part of the government of the Republic of Vietnam (there are still more than two million Vietnamese like that in the world) is the reason why I always laugh unless some Vietnamese intellectuals both at home and abroad mention 'harmony and reconciliation of the people'. race'.”

The official view in Vietnam on national harmony and reconciliation can be found on the National Defense page.

An article in 2019 on this site wrote about the events of April 30, 1975 and Viet Kieu as follows:

"The Spring 1975 General Offensive and Uprising of our army and people (the culmination of which was the Ho Chi Minh Campaign) won a complete victory and the country was unified. On this occasion, unfortunately, some civil servants working The work for the Saigon henchman government and the people due to the propaganda henchmen had left the country, displaced, lived abroad... due to the lack of true information in the country, due to the propaganda. Therefore, there have been many people's misconceptions about the Party's guidelines and lines, our State's policies and laws in general, and national harmony and reconciliation in particular, leading to discrimination against the regime. our society and state.

"National harmony and reconciliation is a consistent undertaking and policy of our Party and State. In which, it is clearly stated: taking national and ethnic interests as a common point, actively expanding relations. to all our compatriots residing abroad, regardless of ideology, personal history, even those who still have prejudices and complexes with the social system."

Source :

Hanni Phạm - ca sĩ K-pop bị tẩy chay vì gia đình có gốc gác VNCH? - BBC News Tiếng Việt

Hanni Phạm, thành viên nhóm nhạc Hàn Quốc NewJeans, hiện là tâm điểm của lời kêu gọi tẩy chay vì gia đình Hanni bị cho là "ủng hộ Việt Nam Cộng hòa", quốc…

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