I’ve had it with the majority of the K-Pop fandom. I don’t know how I’ve managed to be a fan for so long.
I’ve noticed on a few accounts how obsessive fans have become over idols and what they need to understand is that it’s just music but everyone seems to be divided into mini bitching communities – as one of my friends put it.
This was uploaded back in 2010 when there was an LA festival with a range of K-Pop idols. There isn’t much but these group of girls somehow found the hotel floor that 2PM Wooyoung was in and even got into the elevator with him. And then (later or earlier, I’m not too sure), they managed to get in an elevator with Junsu asking him as well about Doojoon. For some reason, the idea of getting as far as to the idol’s hotel floor is considered pretty cool from the comments that were shown on there. Gives me the impression that they are close to being compared to as sasaengs without realising it themselves.
Unfortunately, the fancams of these seem to be either deleted or removed from YouTube. But they were up for a good year. This was the only one I could find 
K-Pop is such an addiction. It’s a routine to keep up with the latest news to be as up to date as everyone else, to keep up with the latest music…you honestly have to have willpower to break away from anything related to it. Especially friends who love the music too.
Apart from PSY’s achievements with Gangnam Style (which seems to not stopping any time soon), the Korean media has been hyping up the “success” of Korean idols that have tried in the past 3-6 years of advancing into America. It’s lead to the impression that fans think K-Pop has taken over the world and become a mainstream genre. In fact, K-Pop is still a niche market but the music and idols have changed no? Maybe it’s me but I preferred when there was less idols in 2007-2009 and the music wasn’t completely Westernised. Now some people think because of Gangnam Style, most K-Pop songs are a joke.
It’s got to the point where a lot of my friends have begun to speak about the obsession of some fans more often now. The obsession is causing them to pull away from K-Pop – or what they loved of it at the start. But like I’ve wrote before in One does not Simply Leave Kpop, there are so many ways of people being obsessed over the music that it is hard to just say “I’m gonna stop listening to Kpop” but also people can pull away and would rather learn and take an interest in Korean culture more. I think for me I had to stop and take a step back when I realised this. Stopped going to events, meeting new fans and took a look at Korea for its culture rather than its idol music. Sadly, I have more attention to the music which doesn’t help since I would like to learn the language and culture but I am not fully interested.
asiabang’s article on Kpop Glory also made me think of something to do with fans obsession towards their idols. There are some Kpop idols really are blocked from giving their opinion on political views and what ever goes on around the world unless their company says it’s okay. That’s probably why Kpop fans feel that Kpop is an escapism because when watching these idols or listening to the music, we don’t feel concerned about reality and what’s going on in our world.
Everything is secluded and it’s perfect to create obsessed K-Pop fans. I can understand why a lot of people are pulling out of the fandom now. One girl on tumblr said for a year, she had been considering changing her blog from K-Pop/editing to a One Direction blog because she had no interest in the genre anymore – too many fanwars etc. She lost about 500+ followers which is what she expected would happen.
Anyways, most of the obsessive fans need to stop and take a step back. It’s not cool to get upstairs to the hotel floor of where your idols are staying, you don’t need to know everything that goes on in your oppa or unni’s life nor are you amazing for being so knowledgeable. We are all on the same page and like the same music, so stop with the fighting.
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I feel you girl. It’s really scary how obsessive some people can be. I wonder if the idols are feeling any sort of reverb from this. I’d like to hear their opinions on it.
I’ve always been a much more casual Kpop fan and enjoyed their music immensely from afar, usually with just a couple friends, with none of us being affiliated with densely populated online Kpop fan communities– and it’s been a perfectly fun and enjoyable fandom within our own small ecosystem.
I always find it sad when different elements in fandom unrelated to the actual content KPop outputs causes one to leave the genre altogether, but sometimes those things fuse and are impossible to isolate one from the other so it’s understandable why it happens. There’s always the danger of this happening, and it’s the double edged sword most fans run into when jumping into this stuff.
Hope people heed the advice, great article!
On one hand, it is pretty cool to be that close to your idols, but on the other hand that’s straight up stalking… which people probably should get in trouble for.
You’ve got a good point about the escapism aspect of Kpop idols. Perhaps this is why Jpop idols tend to receive such a specific type of audience (older dudes), since their portrayed purity and naivety allow for a fantasy world.
It’s unfortunate that as niche genres expand, much of the attention gets focused on the negative aspects of it such as crazy fans and foreign practices, but I guess that’s the right of passage of any genre or subculture. We just have to keep on trucking and hope for the best.
But yes, let’s not drown ourselves in our own kool-aid. It’s always a good thing to take a step back and see the bigger picture.
Not to sound awful or anything, but I would SO JUMP Wooyoung, if I was in the same elevator as him hehehehehehe~ He’s my fav in 2PM…me likey O_O
Aside from me being creepy, I do agree with you; especially about the PSY comment and people thinking K-pop is just a joke now. I feel so bad for groups like Sunny Hill and BEG, who work to make their music actually mean something, rather than about love (which most of the idols never experienced…)
Good post ^_^~ I expect more from you now haha~
You’re definitely speaking the truth here! I think K-Pop has always had a very obsessive fanbase, but with time, it seems like it became a competition of who can be the most obsessed fan. Not only this, but the fact that Korean artists are so rarely exposed to “scandals” makes them lose a little bit of their humanity. There’s something very alluring and fascinating about the flawless execution of their work on stage, and how they, themselves, embody their music… but it makes them look inhuman as well, so it drives people insane. In the case of western fans, it also doesn’t help that their idols are so far away.
There are very few artists and groups I really love in K-Pop, I think J-Pop is more my thing because artists can express themselves more freely, regardless of concept or genre. It makes me happy to see that other fans are also noticing these terribly obsessive habits most fans have adopted nowadays, which are mostly just borderline dangerous… it just makes me a bit worried for the artists if all that’s left of the K-Pop fanbase is the mass of overly-obsessed fans we see today
I agree to your comment Alvy. I’m one of those obsessed fans. I just realized with your comment what made me addicted to them. From an obsessed fan point of view, it really is their inhuman perfection that hooked me. I tried so much to reach them, I wanted to be like those passionate fans for them that it turned to an obsession. Seeing them makes me happy as well as overly sad because I know I can’t meet them personally, I wanted for them to know me, love me as well but it is so impossible that it is hurting me. I am taking a step back now slowly. They became my world when I think people around me doesn’t love me back, I turned to them when I didn’t feel enough excitement in my life. I needed to be up to date to everything about them or it’ll feel like dying not to. Every sad things I watch on the TV makes me think that what if it’s them then I get paranoid about it. I felt the need to see them but at the same time it kills me not to be close to them like how I wanted to.
It is really the trend now to be an obsessed fan, because people saw it as a passion and that others think its good.
I tried to be as perfect as them until the time that I hated myself because I’m ugly ’cause I felt I needed to be as pretty as them, as talented as them until I break. I’m taking a step back now and moving on though it’s had because they became my life for a very long time and it feels like having no life and losing someone important.
I hope someday I’ll be laughing about this and be able to enjoy listening to them again.
I pray that a lot of fans realize this before they fall to what happened and still happening to mine.
Marry, your comment is perfect. What you said is very truthful about a LOT of K-Pop fans. You described it perfectly!
I totally feel the same way. The elevator story reminds me a Jpop group (I forgot which one) was holding a concert in America and there were fans who were staying in the same hotel as them, but there was no stalking or anything remotely like that happening. I guess it goes to show the obsessiveness of Kpop idol fans (does this happen to non-idol kpop artists?).
Eventually, like all fads, the Hallyu “wave” will come crashing down.
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I could completely relate to this. I think the obnoxious, obsessive and small minded fans have completely ruined kpop for me.
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