Posts by mariaVSkpop

these days, mainly jazz (everything from bebop to fusion to more contemporary scenes) and progressive/tech deathcore/death metal.

After the whole Snowdrop reaction thing happened recently, it came to my attention that there is a huge petition going on to cancel the show. In the beginning I thought it was something like the online petitions that happen sometimes when people get angry about rotten tomatoes scores or something like that, but I then realized that it was an official petition for the Korean government officials to cancel the show. Does the SK government actually have the powers to intervene and cancel a show, or stop the release of a movie, or retract a song, ban a novel etc?

Just to clarify, I have no horse in the race about the show, I am curious though if the SK government can intervene in such a way in matters of artistic expression and creativity.

Quote from fantasygoose

I remember thinking this about some of the male Justin Bieber antis were jealous because girls liked him and not them.

But years later I was like "Nah, it wasn't because they were jealous."

And then now I'm like: "There is a bit of truth in this."

Some might have been jealous of him.

Even though I don't think I have been jealous of a female celebrity because guys liked them.

Actually, I didn't know what celeb guys liked.

And I think back then I assumed that most guys my age were perverts, who probably would want sleep with those celebrities.

And I used to be like "sex is evil."

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Bieber and his stupid fans got hate in my circles only after what happened to Esperanza Spalding when she won that grammy instead of bieber, previously everyone just agreed that the music was just bad. But those attacks were absolutely horrible. hey, at least that introduced me to one of the most awesome female musicians around.

Quote from ashyyxy

i genuinely have no idea how to answer some of these questions. Most if not all neopronouns are exclusively meant for online use, because we know they'll never be used for us irl. Neurodivergent people (like myself) use neopronouns because we have a very complicated relationship with our gender, and we feel as if neopronouns express our gender identity better.

thank you

1) Do you support the introduction of laws that will compel people to use neopronouns in everyday speech?

2) Do you think that since there will be a point where there would be hundreds or thousands of neopronouns that it will cause more problems than they solve in such large numbers, especially in everyday interactions?

3) people (english speaking people online that is) have been very vocal about other languages adopting the neopronoun logic. This will not translate well, or at all, in other languages, yet they are adamant that if they are not implemented this will proves the other countries/cultures are sexist/transphobic etc. Isn't this a form of americano-centrism/anglo-centrism and even cultural imperialism?

Quote from Tic_tac_toe

I’m too jet lagged for this bestie we aren’t the same. I can’t even tell if you’re serious or not.

I mean kpop fans are cults as an exaggeration of their devotion not that they’re the KKK or something.

Also yes the Exotics is my EXO cult on AKP. We are very devoted.

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In the first part I am somewhat serious because I have been commenting here about toxic and cultish behaviours in segments of the army fandom and I got a backlash about that from some users. And never said they are cults as in real cults, but that they exhibit cultish and toxic behaviour (not all fans, specific segments)

The exotics part was just a joke, but indeed it is true in the greek language, if you try to read the word Σxotics in greek (greeklish more specifically - greek written in latin letters, old school from when chat apps did not work well with the greek alphabet) it reads like s-hot-ics which reminded me of the whole darkness/scottish words in greek. It is a running gag here in greece about the wrong usage of greek letters by foreigners and how that would sound when read in Greek. So don't mind it, just noticing stupid things, and I hope you get over your jet lag quick.

Quote from Drew_B

You're definitely right about the girlfriend surrogates. BTS and any kpop idol is not allowed to date, acknowledge, or even look at a member of the opposite sex or all hell will break loose.

Edawn and Hyuna was one of the first things I came across when looking at kpop fandoms and scandals and all that and how their company just fired them for being a couple. If this happened in a western country the company would probably milk it like there was no tomorrow to promote the groups new single or album and gain free coverage by the press from the controversy. Wasn't it like that for britney spears and the nsync guy? Or I remember incorrectly. It's been years. But yeah, the dating scandals thing and the whole dating bans thing are so weird to me, but it is a completely different culture so it is what it is.

Quote from Tic_tac_toe

Kpop fandoms are cults no doubt about it. Is this even something people will contest lol.

7th, no 8th page so take from that what you will.

As an aside, the letter Σ in your guild name is the letter sigma from greek, it is not read as E but as an "s" and the way Σxotics is read in greek it reminds me of the words for darkness (σκότος - skotos - especially evil darkness as in you know who) and the more old word for a Scottish person (Σκώτος - read the same as the other one). So yeah, you either have something to do with the dark one, Scotland, or I am just losing it after arguing for hours in circles in this thread and my mind makes strange associations.

Quote from paradise52

For the fourth time I do not care about your arguments calling army obsessive, what I did not like about what you said I singled out. You're not going to get an agurment from me because I do not care about proving you wrong, I care about what you said which was offensive and you could have made your point without using those examples. I'm not going to doxx you, stalk you, the only thing I did was call it offensive and it made you so triggered you're still crying about that, for someone who want to call out army you sure don't like people disagreeing with what you said lol

And no, you don't need my approval, just meant that if you want real discussions you need to write your points better and not make those comparisions and expect people to be ok with that, that's all.

And yet here we are, for the what? fifth time now?

I did not see any disagreements about my posts. No one countered that there is no segment of army who are obsessive, think they are girlfriend surrogates of bts, behave in toxic, cultish ways etc etc. And I did not even say all armys! I initially said many armys. Not even the majority. And yes, in a large fandom like army a small minority is still many many people. And if you think my points are is insulting, ok. But that does not make them not true, does it? So, is there a segment of army who behave as I described or not? That's the whole point of the discussion we are having.

Quote from Ves

I would never say some points you have don't have merit, because they do, but it is a gross misrepresentation that this thread applies them only to ARMY because it basically applies to all fandoms. They all have these toxic components that tend to stand out in how loud and disagreeable they are. And that was the first point I made to you. As to why other ARMY are not simply replying kindly to your points comparing "ARMY" to a cult and other regimes, it is because ARMY is being singled out on this thread and you are contributing to that.

I know you say you don't care about who Drew is, etc, but the fact that this is on a troll thread means your points will not get the consideration they might get in another more neutral thread and if they were given in a more neutral manner that didn't seem to be targeting just ARMY. And if you feel attacked, it is because they feel attacked too. Simple as that.

And here you are, doing it again.

I am finding commonalities in specific behaviours of specific segments of the fandom with specific cult member behaviors and specific tactics of propaganda agents online with online tactics of specific segments of the fandom when negative news about bts arise. Stop misrepresenting my points.

And this is a specific thread and i am talking about this specific topic. In threads about general fandom behavior or whatever I would talk about that.

I am not a kpop fan. Like some songs, some videos are cool, i find the phenomenon interesting but that's it. Don't respond to me like I am a fan of some other fandom trying to bring army down and you are trying to defend your fandom . I don't belong to a kpop fandom, I don't belong to any fandom, music or otherwise.

Quote from paradise52

Excuse me? Listen, I'm going to explain one last time because if you think of staying on this forum or having any meaningful discussion I'm going to give the benefit of the doubt. First off you literally described a behaviour very well gender defined and compared it to army, NOW you're making your points after being called out. Like I said from my very first post I DO NOT CARE if you want to call fans obsessive or whatever, I'm not going to argument with you because I don't care about this discussion, at all. Second, if you want people to discuss with you stop playing holier than thou using big words to try to make your point more believable, everyone here has reading comprehesion and understood completely what you said. Third and last, for someone claiming you didn't like the agressive treatment you sure feel more than fine saying I have internalized misoginy for absolutely no reason, go off, it doesn't change that people understood your intentions and no one but a troll is taking what you said seriously.

For the last time, that behaviour I described was for a very specific segment of the fandom, and nobody, nobody so far has denied that that segment of the fandom does not behave in such a way. There are fans who think they are a girlfriend surrogates to bts, they are incredibly obsessive, cultish in their behaviour, aggressive, and deny anything that a bts members may have done wrong. And I dare you to deny that. I dare you to deny the existence of these people.

And yes, these people's behaviour remind me of the inner circle of selected partners of cult leaders. What are you going to do about it? Call me names? Stalk me? Threaten me? Doxx me? And in the next comment I specifically said again, 1. this is a specific segment of the fandom, 2. this behaviour is not exclusive to females, it is human behaviour in general and can be present in all age groups, orientation groups, and so on, but in THIS SPECIFIC MOMENT i am talking about THIS SPECIFIC SEGMENT of the fandom, that reminds me of this very specific thing. I am tired of repeating that like I am talking to a wall.

And of course, you don't want to argue but here you are, arguing

Secondly, I am not talking like I am holier than thou. The whole discussion is going around and around in circles and it is tiring. Simple, is there cultish behaviour and toxic behaviour observable in the army fandom? Yes! Is it all armys or even the majority of them? No. Can we discuss about the behaviour of the toxic armys? Why the hell not? Can we bring personal experience to the discussion? I don't see any rule that prevents that!

As for the internalized misogyny comment it was a tease, but I will take responsibility and apologize if that is what you want, no problem with me. Now, will you do the same for misrepresenting my points? Will you accept that there is this cultish and toxic segment in your fandom? Will you apologize for your reaction?

Also, hell, i did not know that i had to get your approval to post my opinions on this website. Good to know, for future reference.

Quote from Ves

I have no clue who you are talking to, but Drew is the one that tried to make this out to be a competition, to be clear. I was just debating with you, though I'm sorry you didn't feel that way.

I do not recall whatever thread you are talking about, your introduction as you say, but I can see it's really stayed with you and this thread I guess is more of the same in your opinion. Sorry to say, but this is the way of AKP. If you put it out in public, especially in a place like AKP, assume you will get backlash and be prepared. It's not great that it is this way, but it is a reality. And it's not just ARMY. Say things like this about any other big fandom, comparing them to regimes and what not, well... it won't be met kindly. Not sure what you were expecting, but it seems you need to be made aware.

I don't care about the other user. And if that user is a troll it is a successful troll because we are still responding in this thread.

Of course it stuck with me because it was the first interaction I had in this forum, and as you can see from the numbers of my posts etc I don't really take part in many discussions, just read what other people post, check links and videos etc. And as I already mentioned, I had never seen such a strong reaction to a single comment not even in forums debating religion/atheism and politics.

As for the backlash, I don't care. As you have seen I reiterated my points clearly many times and i think that even you can agree that many users have gone pass them and misrepresented them, trying to play the victim. But I did get a better understanding of the psychology of some armys, so I guess that's a win?

Quote from Drew_B

mariaVSkpop proved her point by winning all arguments.

Plus MassiveKpopFan was too intimidated to get involved.

The scoreboard doesn't lie.

Quote from Ves

This is the first scoreboard I've ever seen with a name. And proclaiming that ARMY have been defeated...

Melodramatic much?

Ok Drew, whatever you say

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I wanted a discussion, not a competition. And I don't think I proved any points because there was no discussion, people were either calling me names, talking past me or entirely misrepresenting my points. And, in the end, if the user that attacks you and calls you names is an army, then fellow armys will not admit that it is toxic behavior, even when directly given the opportunity to do so.

Quote from Ves

I take credit only for what I do and I believe everyone else should too, positive or negative. When I say ARMY as a whole tend to be very charitable, I use words to imply that I don’t mean to generalize (“as a whole”, “tend”) and would encourage others to as well.

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As an aside, I do talk about ARMY being charitable as you mention since I am one of the charitable ARMY. While I personally donate to charities too, I also participate in group ARMY donations when they support a cause I feel strongly about since I believe together, we can make a greater impact. I know many other ARMY who feel this way and this is basically the only thing I use my Twitter account for.

There is always good and bad - people need to recognize that and that people are individuals. Discussions like this serve the opposite purpose - to pigeonhole and defame based upon a stereotype. You want to talk about ARMY? How about we stop always focusing on the toxic minority and talk about EVERYTHING? But no one does that. Everyone who is not ARMY just seems micro-focused on putting them down for their own purposes, nefarious or otherwise.

Anyway, since we agree on the above and you’ve acknowledged your original comment was just grossly generalizing ARMY, based in your own anecdotal experience, we can leave it here.

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No prob, if you also admit that the behaviours I described are real and observable and present in segments of army (not all, not the majority) and that the akp users that attacked me and called me names are toxic and cultish.

Quote from BlackpinkHouse

I ask one question when evaluating if a fandom can be likened to a cult.

Do the fans retain enough individuality and honesty and courage to offer criticism of one or more members of the group? In other words, has an Army on AKP (or whatever fandom we're talking about) ever publicly come out and said something critical of a member or the group as a whole?

I'm not talking about shade towards Hybe, or saying a BTS song is your "least fave". Those are copouts, fans love to criticize labels or producers to scapegoat them for something the fans dont like. Also, using words like "least fave" is a copout, when i see that i automatically think the fan deep down believes the song sucks but is too scared to say that lest he or she be cancelled by the rest of the fandom.

I'm talking about honest direct talk about a member's shortcomings or flaws, or questioning core fandom beliefs related to a member or group (BTS are all brothers, they're not "work friends," they're all BFFs, etc etc). Or being 100% honest about their music, including just saying directly how you feel (eg Dynamite is absolute trash, Idol is unlistenable, etc).

That's what i need to see to say affirmatively that a fandom is not a cult.

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Just a general observation, kpop is the only music scene I have met so far that there is the notion of listening to and supporting exclusively one band/group/artist and multistanning or whatever it is called is seen as betrayal. Again, not all people in all fandoms etc etc. I admit I haven't really looked into the japanese or chinese idol scenes, so I may be missing something, maybe it is a characteristic of idol music in general and not just kpop.

Quote from Ves

This is where the argument devolves - ARMY was never supposed to mean more than those who really like BTS and find merit in their artistry. It is those who are labelling it a cult and toxic that are re-defining the word to include morality and the worth of a person by the actions of some in the same fandom. I am not defining myself that way - you who are re-defining the word are.

I did not define anything. You try to present it like I gave fandoms a new meaning, I haven't. I explicitly say in my comment the following: a) you can like an artist and not belong to their fandom, b) just be you own individual, even if you belong to a fandom. You are not responsible about anyone else but your own self and your own actions. That's it.

So here is the problem that arises now from your new comment.

A lot of actions have been made by armys, like gathering money for various purposes, supporting people and charities and so on which is really admirable and I always thought it is really great that people can come together and pull resources to help people.

Now, not all armys took part in these positive actions, a segment of the fandom did, right? Should these positive actions reflect on the totality of armys? Because if a segment of the fandom does something bad, then only that segment should take responsibility and not the whole fandom, right? So, the same should be for when something positive is done by a segment of the fandom. Which would also mean that this redefinition of the whole fandom you are talking about, is also done by some armys, right?

Quote from Gayyoongles

God, another misogynist exposes theirselves on the forum.

Y’all can’t understand girls or women liking shit without sexual attraction being involved.

Using big words, writing essays does not make you look ‘intelligent’ btw.

I’m fairly sure that’s what you were going for. Everything you’ve written is beyond problematic. Not only downgrading girls, but to compare fandoms to political regimes is just ew.

If your only purpose in life is to ‘conduct research’ on a forum, I’d say you’re very in need of either a hobby or a job.

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Personal attacks don't work on me. Again, if I said something factually wrong, please correct me. If you have another pov please present it. Otherwise, you are just calling me names and thus proving my point.

Quote from Ves

Thanks for clarifying that you are really talking about the more extreme sides of any fandom, not really anyone on AKP. It's not just ARMY or even kpop fandoms, but that minority is found in basically any fandom for any person or any thing. Far be it for anyone to deny this exists. And yes, I did say minority. That ARMY has caught your attention is likely a symptom of ARMY being the largest fandom at the moment. Because "minority" is relative. Minority for ARMY might be roughly the same number as the whole of the aghases. It might even be more than the remaining f(x) stans. But it is still a minority.

I never said all fans, never said majority, the most I mentioned is "many" which does not indicate a majority or a minority, just that these people who behave like that to me seem to be many. For others could seem to be a few, for me they seem many. Nonetheless, logically, they are a minority, of course. And army is huge and a small portion could feel like a huge number of people. Never said otherwise.

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So consider this - say you liked a group, any group and were therefore considered part of "xyz fandom" since you liked said group. The "extreme" minority, acting out and being extreme as they do, gets all people who like xyz labelled toxic and a cult. How would you feel? What would you do? Stop liking xyz? Or maybe just continue liking xyz and stop letting a label define any part of you, but what it was originally meant to do - indicate that you like 'xyz'

So here is how I see this. Liking a group/their music does not automatically means you are part of a fandom. I absolutely love the music and the talent of hundreds of musicians and composers and groups and producers across dozens of genres and scenes, and I absolutely do not belong to any fandoms. So why the hell would I care if some idiot somewhere said or did something and happened to also listen to some artist I also listen to or respect or whatever.Hell! Let's go full Goldwin's, Hitler and the Nazis adored Wagner. Wagner was also an antisemite. I fucking hate Nazis and antisemites, to the point were I had a very serious confrontation with supporters of Golden Dawn many summers ago (GD was a neonazi greek party, even got to the parliament for a few years before some PMs were arrested and the party dismantled). Yet, this is one of the most beautiful pieces of music I have ever heard in my life, an it is just a fucking introduction!

So I don't buy this line of thinking you present. And the most important question I have is, why the hell would you want to define your own identity, your own value as a person, your own morality, by a) the fandom you belong to, b) the actions of the members of said fandom

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The problem here, beyond the behavior of that extreme cultish minority is the fact that the rest of you are letting yourselves be brainwashed into believing a majority is just the same based upon a minority. And this is how stereotypes and prejudice are born.

Who is this "you" you are mentioning here? Is this a group i belong to? I never once said a majority. What is a majority based on minority? Are you talking about extrapolation? A majority is a majority, a minority is a minority. This is really confusing me. And again, who is this "you" and why do I belong to this "you"?

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PS - Realize you are talking to a guy who reveres a group who hasn't actually been active for years now, but he won't let go. He's not making this topic to actually debate - he just wants to put down ARMY. But thanks for helping him all the same. I'm sure he's very happy.

This honestly means absolutely nothing to me. I don't care about background or whatever. I expressed my opinion and that is, if you have to say something on my opinion that's great, the rest is you being passive-aggressive for absolutely no reason since I don't care about fanwars. I don't care who is happy or who is sad about what i said. And a topic of discussion is independent of who brought it up, the important thing is the arguments and the discussion itself.

Quote from paradise52

How is me saying you can make your analysis on fandom behavior but just not be offensive a deflection? Everyone here understood you trying to claim armys are more aggressive and act like actual religions and states that literally kill people on a daily bases and on just to put the cherry on top you went to claim that female fans act obsessed because of hormones… which I thought you would talk about hierarchy in fandom spaces which is very much real and they you went and delivered that

Like I said I don’t mind if you want to talk about controversial stuff but at points you’re just saying offensive stuff and trying to pass as your observation/analysis

You are mad, aren't you?

Lets take it one by one:

1. Never claimed something about armys and religion. I was talking about cultish behaviour and parallels with specific cult elements. You have not presented a counterargument to the points I made, just tried to play the offended victim card, thus I call it a deflection. If you offered counter arguments, then it would be that, counterarguments, not deflection

2. You try to create a strawman. There is similarity in how a portions of army react when something negative appears about bts. Flood the social media and forums, deny the news, claim it as fake news or antis propaganda, clean the searches, make personal attacks. place the group as victims etc. The same behavior is observed in online political troll campaigns such as the those by the CCP. In no case did I parallel the bts fandom with governments, just pointed out the parallels of behaviors of a segment of the fandom with online troll campaigns. so, burn strawman burn!

3.a)female fans act obsessed because of hormones… : where the hell did I say that about hormones? Where the hell did I talk in general about ALL FEMALE FANS. WTF?
b) also quite sexist, you imply that such behaviour of obsession is not possible by males, cis, trans, non binary etc individuals but only women. Is this called internal misogyny? This obsessive behaviour can be exhibited by all humans, regardless of sex, gender, orientation, age etc. In this case I just mentioned a very specific segment of army and what it reminds me of. It is your responsibility to offer a counterargument here and not create another strawman.

4.The hierarchy in fandom spaces is something really interesting, if you would like to talk about that I have no problem. I am sure I can provide some insights with regards to jazz fans, or metal fans and so on that kpop people might not be aware of, and I am sure you can offer me information about kpop fandoms I am not yet aware of. Hell, I am sure we can spot similarities across genres and fandoms. So, we can talk about that if you want, no prob.

5) Finally, I can't do something if you take offense in something I mention. If you have counterarguments, please present them. I would be more than happy to learn new stuff and expand my knowledge on things, and recognize if what I mentioned is factually wrong. But don't come to me with the "I am offended" speech, it does not work on me. Counterarguments, or keep walking.

Quote from Drew_B

I agree kpop fandom is a fascinating world to watch. It's one of the main reasons I'm still involved despite only liking about 10% of kpop output since 2016.

I wonder who's considered worse. Teen fans of big hair bands in the 80s, teen fans of rap music in the 90s, or kpop fans of the 10s?

I remember those weird eminem fans from back in the day.

In rock and metal, Tool fans is the most recent obnoxious fandom I remember. Before them, probably mallcore/scene kids/mainstream emo/crabcore.

Some obsessive 80s metalheads are still around, and so are some crazy classic rock fans for whom music stopped in 1978 or something. Also and some purist black metal fans (post black metal did drive them mad though).

Jazz and classical don't really have fandoms, but there definitely is a portion of the listeners of these genres that think they are above everyone else because they listen to jazz/classical, fuck 'em.

Electronic music is weird since it cycles very fast/it is very fragmented these days.

And then you have american-pop fans like Beyonce fans or Lady gaga fans, but i think these are growing older so are less aggressive. Maybe Ariana Grande, Cardie B or Eilish fans?

Quote from ultraaviolet

not u comparing army's to governments.......and strange erotic cult stuff...

I dunno about you but frankly the army's I interact with on this forum are fine. If your going out of your way to argue with them it might be a you problem....seriously it sounds like you are strangely obsessed with them from this post......

1.I am drawing a parallel, yes. If you have any experience of how the Erdogan propagandists operate onloine, especially with regards to genocide denialism, or the wumaos operate, you will definitely spot the similarities.

2.I am talking in general, not this forum specifically. Or do you deny the smut fan fictions, obsessive comments, reaction to dating rumors in the past and so on. Again this is my opinion as an outsider of the fandom wars who is not supporting any side, just making observations.

3.This is only the second time I have commented in a bts related thread specifically because I wanted to avoid armys as much as possible.