BLACKSWAN's Youngheun speaks up about ageism in the K-Pop industry

[Jikrytae]

26 minutes ago, hynapia said:

I didn't see that because I don't follow Suju but yeah, I always see people dragging them for their age and constantly saying they should retire/disband or go to a "nursery home" when majority of them aren't even 35 yet. Curiously, I don't see Irene, Taeyeon or even BoA getting so many ageist comments in comparison to them, which it's curious because women usually face more ageism everywhere. I guess it's because Suju has a track record of problematic behavior but in any case they should drag them for that, not always because of their age.

Also yeah, these "woke" people literally find everything problematic. One thing is calling out things like racism, homophobia, sexism etc and another making a fuss for any little mistake.

Irene does get ageist comments, and it will probably get worse after her scandal. I've already seen people commenting on how her leaving the group would lower their average age to something more palatable. Taeyeon doesn't usually get them because of how many people like her, but SNSD was definitely getting them just before they broke up. Same goes for Brown Eyed Girls, T-ara, etc.

[hynapia]

17 minutes ago, AchariPickle said:

true true bro

you know sometimes you hear some people regarded old so many times that it makes you wonder how old they look and i just watched suju's recent mv and they don't look old at all just their age lmao, also i did see some comments abt taeyeon being too old but that was when she was dating baekhyun and stuff

Damn i wonder how g-dragon will be perceived age wise when he has his comeback 

exactly, they just look like normal people in their early-mid 30s, it's not like they look ancient or anything. But again, I guess people is specially harsh towards them for being problematic, because for example Rain is pushing 40 and he barely gets ageist comments. On the contrary, people say he's still hot and stuff. But yeah, in general people usually call idols over 30 (and sometimes even over 24-25) "hags" on the regular. And like I said, many times these comments come from people in their late teens that aren't even that far away from 25.

With GD i've seen mixed reactions. Some people are anticipating his comebacks and other people are like "nobody asked for this old hag".

[hynapia]

5 minutes ago, Jikrytae said:

Irene does get ageist comments, and it will probably get worse after her scandal. I've already seen people commenting on how her leaving the group would lower their average age to something more palatable. Taeyeon doesn't usually get them because of how many people like her, but SNSD was definitely getting them just before they broke up. Same goes for Brown Eyed Girls, T-ara, etc.

I guess it'll depend on the people you see on your tl and stuff but I usually see everyone praising Irene for her visuals and calling her a goddess (even after the scandals). Some people have joked about her age sometimes but it's nowhere close to how they constantly drag other idols for being "old" even since 24-25.

[AchariPickle]

1 hour ago, hynapia said:

exactly, they just look like normal people in their early-mid 30s, it's not like they look ancient or anything. But again, I guess people is specially harsh towards them for being problematic, because for example Rain is pushing 40 and he barely gets ageist comments. On the contrary, people say he's still hot and stuff. But yeah, in general people usually call idols over 30 (and sometimes even over 24-25) "hags" on the regular. And like I said, many times these comments come from people in their late teens that aren't even that far away from 25.

With GD i've seen mixed reactions. Some people are anticipating his comebacks and other people are like "nobody asked for this old hag".

true bro

though gd comeback has a lot of mixed opinions, i have rarely seen any age related ones lolol

[felidae]

22 hours ago, hynapia said:

 

Yeah, and it's not even towards the idols but towards the fans too. I've legit seen people in stan twitter putting stuff in their bio or cards like "if you're older than 22 don't follow me" or saying that being into kpop where you're over early 20s is "embarassing". That's why I never say I'm in my mid 20s unless they ask me directly or something.

It's funny because sometimes I've seen this shit even from people in their late teens and it's not like they're THAT much younger than people in their early-mid 20s.

Is this "stan twitter" behavior in general or kpop stan only? Fellow 20ish and older fans of cpop group I'm into are swept up like this by younger fans, and the group gained many kpop fans (including me) since the beginning.

[ribbonribbon]

This is the problem when younger fans use KPOP as a fantasy of youth, as in those high school drama/movie: a bunch of young guys (or girls) living together, thriving for their dreams.

So aging, growing up, dating,... becomes a threat to their fantasy, and the knee-jerk reactions is to bash  them. 

But probably because of Twitter, or because of generation gap, I see this problem becomes more and more mainstream with new generation. Twitter stans are definitely problematic than normal, but we also need to remember that many of the young fans are on Twitter these days and the opinion on forums are actually the minority. 

On Suju, people keep referring them as being old and problematic, but the main problem is their problematic is 10 year-old comments on a variety show, and frankly, some of those problematic comments were deemed normal at the time. People use today standard to treat older generation, (beauty, youtube views, fandom size, album sales... ) and refuse to acknowledge the age difference, yet hating their age at the same time.

[Simpatico]

23 minutes ago, ribbonribbon said:

This is the problem when younger fans use KPOP as a fantasy of youth, as in those high school drama/movie: a bunch of young guys (or girls) living together, thriving for their dreams.

So aging, growing up, dating,... becomes a threat to their fantasy, and the knee-jerk reactions is to bash  them. 

 

I think you've hit it on the head. Debuting older (or even an older group continuing on) forgoes the fantasy they are not dating or living together or having lives outside the group. Obviously a 25 year old or older has their own existence (and experience) beyond the group.

Reminds me of when Pristin disbanded and the majority sentiment online was that only Xiyeon (who was 18) might be able to debut again and still be an idol because she was still "young". At the time Nayoung (the oldest) was like..23? Which is still very YOUNG for an artist in the West.

[eunheart]

26 is not old, no where a hag too. Funny how you call people over 23 years old as old hag when they only entering adult life.

I hope they're able to break that stigma and their company actually able to promote them well.

 

[hynapia]

3 hours ago, felidae said:

Is this "stan twitter" behavior in general or kpop stan only? Fellow 20ish and older fans of cpop group I'm into are swept up like this by younger fans, and the group gained many kpop fans (including me) since the beginning.

Mostly kpop fans. I don't usually see cpop or jpop stans being so annoying about the age thing and calling anyone over 25 a "hag" but there's not that many cpop/jpop stans in stan twitter to begin with so...

[hynapia]

5 minutes ago, eunheart said:

26 is not old, no where a hag too. Funny how you call people over 23 years old as old hag when they only entering adult life.

I hope they're able to break that stigma and their company actually able to promote them well.

 

Exactly. I get that people making those comments are usually people in their teens but still calling someone as young as 22-23 a "hag" is literally ridiculous. Like I said, even when I was 15 I didn't consider people in their 20s old at all but gen z teens are so weird. It's like they think they're gonna stay in their teens forever. They even say stuff like "I'm still babie uwu" even when they're 17-18. Like no, you aren't a "babie". You're in fact only 4-5 years younger than the people you call hags.

[cranberries]

I feel bad for kpop idols who treated like they're old when they're actually not