“I’m convinced that K-Pop is still a niche in the West,” he began and went on to ask, “Is it possible corporations are pushing BTS so hard cause it’s not working? There’s a lot of big corp incentive for the K-Pop model of cultural manufacturing to work over here”
In a series of tweets, he claimed that the global success of the band was backed by corporates and said, “The music industry filters what’s popular and the corporations follow, but that’s risky cause a non manufactured popular artist might be dangerous and difficult to control or predict.”
Hi @Mat_Zo! White girl from the southeast US here and I love K-Pop and have several favorites other than BTS. Meanw… https://t.co/WE2Hf1JgZo
— Amber LV (@TheAmberLampz) 1628614000000
Sharing his observation of BTS ARMY handles on Twitter, he said, “And it’s suspicious how every k-pop stan on the internet has an anime character for their profile pic…”
“Not saying they aren’t real but it adds to the fake vibe of it all.”
He also critiqued the K-Pop industry for “controlling” their artists and linked it to Disney’s Mickey Mouse club. He tweeted, “The problem with the Disney stars era is it wasn’t sustainable or easy to maintain without public backlash, whereas k-pop stars have every aspect of them under struct control and everyone knows and no one cares.”
“K-pop doesn’t hide the fact that it’s manufactured by grooming children into cultural icons,” he wrote.
Fans and supporters of the band took offence to his statements, calling them racist. A few even dug out his tweets from years ago to state that he was racist. Following the backlash, he issued an apology to the band saying he “never intended to hurt or offend anyone.” He also announced that he would be “stepping away from social media” in order to reflect on his actions.
