Am I crazy but I feel like ever since that lady called ICE on the Korean workers in Georgia in September there's barely been any kpop performers coming to Georgia. Usually they'd come to Atlanta and that'd be like their only stop in the southeastern US. But other than twice and g idle idk any other when Atlanta use to get a lot.
The obsessiveness over useless things to me is so crazy. If it is about the music and performances than it is useless.
Should our focus not be on the music and performances.
What is up with the overanalysing of everything small detail that does not relate to music and/or performances.
I kinda wish idols would stop sharing things about themselves as fans do not know how to set boundaries.
Also why are ya’ll pushing idols to speak on world issues? What is up with the performativism.
I would rather have an idol who acts on something rather than speaking about it.
Do idols need to speak on issues that do not fully understand?
Can they just do their job please 🙏
Which is putting on a show using stop with all the overanalysing of behaviours.
And this isn't an isolated incident; it's a cycle.
I'm not very good with words, and I probably won't express this opinion as clearly as I'd like, but it's something I've been thinking about a lot lately, and I'd like to share my thoughts on it.
Girl groups debut being praised as "refreshing," "different," "the future of the industry." This was the case with TWICE, BLACKPINK, ITZY, aespa, LE SSERAFIM, and NewJeans, among others.
But this initial hype is often not genuine; it's used as a tool. These groups are placed on a pedestal not only to be praised but to serve as a comparison and to belittle others.
The problem begins when this group grows too much.
When TWICE dominated the 3rd generation, they were constantly attacked, groups like Red Velvet and BLACKPINK were used to diminish them. As soon as BLACKPINK "took" Twice's place as the biggest girl group of the 3rd generation, everything changed, they became the target and ironically TWICE became a reference to criticize them.
The same thing happened with ITZY and aespa, who started with enormous support and quickly became the target of intense criticism. Then, LE SSERAFIM and NewJeans entered exactly the same cycle.
Just to be clear, I understand some of the criticism directed at NewJeans and the groups mentioned above, but calling them bitches and wishing ill on these girls is not the right way to point out these criticisms. It's interesting to note that in the case of NJ, everything that was previously praised, the concept, the music, the identity, became described as "overrated" or "boring." In online spaces, especially forums and communities, criticism often crosses the line and becomes dehumanization.
We can also talk about Katseye, which was constantly praised when used to attack the performance of other girl groups, but is now constantly attacked on the internet.
And this isn't limited to the groups; it directly affects the members. Idols like Jennie, Lisa, Sakura, Wonyoung, Daniela, and many others are treated as if they've committed something unforgivable. And platforms like YouTube and other networks end up amplifying this cycle, since negative and controversial content generates more engagement and visibility.
The cycle repeats itself: a group is elevated, used as a comparison, reaches the top, becomes a target, and is finally replaced.
And so a new girl group of the moment always emerges, inevitably becoming the next target.
This is more of a meta focused thread but I always found it funny when people here complain about fans retreating to their respective fan subreddits while simultaneously accusing them of being in an echochamber.
I mean, is it really that surprising?
If you constantly see the same narratives about your faves on here wouldn’t you gradually start retreating to your safe spaces over time too?
My breaking point here was someone talking about how the aespa members reminded them of bullies and that comment getting dozens of upvotes without the mods doing shit. I guess that‘s just how it is…
For boy groups, most of their fans are female. But for girl groups, it really varies. There are girl groups whose fandom consists of 80% female fans, but there are also others with around 70% male fans. Some groups even have a 60:40 ratio.
At first, I thought it might be because of their concept, like feminine/cute concepts vs. girl crush. But that’s not always the case. I’ve seen two girl groups with cute concepts, yet one has 80% female fans while the other has 80% male fans.
I’m a fangirl who stans boy groups, so I’ve always been curious about this phenomenon. I feel like there are other reasons I don’t know.
Photocards being graded seem to be taking off and this will be explained on why this is bad.
No quality control. Let us say I buy a Deadline album for Blackpink, Jisoo edition, and you buy the same album. We are guaranteed to get the same 3 Photocards of Jisoo, but I open mine and find that one was misprinted so her image and the back are flipped upside down. You open yours and find the same photocard has a crimped corner where it got caught in the punch/cut machine. Same photocard, same album, completely different, and the worst part is, these errors aren't uncommon.
The value: It might increase for certain collectors. But I can guarantee that the majority of collectors whether they're casual or must collect it all, will only care if theres serious damage. Back to those Jisoo cards from the first example. The one with a damaged corner would be unlikely to be accepted by most Blinks, but its an album card. The damage sucks, but at most you might pay 5 to 10 dollars for a second hand copy. Graded? Well, what would that really do for you? Because it is in a slab does that mean that it has an exponential growth? And to whom would that growth be applicable to?
My point stands that these cannot be graded reliably. PSA, Tag, and any other sites have zero templating to actually grade photocards due to the points I've made, specifically the first one. Ultimately it is up to you whether you do or not but dont go grading PCs then get a shocked Pikachu face when no one wants to pay 2-20x (or beyond) the value for it.
i might get hate for this but i have a pattern of not listening to a group’s releases after a member leaves 😭 i know it’s not their fault, but listening to their songs without that member makes me feel empty. this happens to me a lot.
first one is with btob. i’m a big fan of btob but when ilhoon left, i felt very very empty. i couldn’t listen to their songs after that, even though i streamed btob4u’s music. it just hurts being reminded that i can’t hear his voice in their songs anymore, especially since his parts were my favorite. the only time i was able to accept ilhoon’s departure and listen to their new music was when he started becoming active again. so yeah, i only streamed their “be together” album last year.
second is with exo. exo is my ult. i know they haven’t been complete since 2013, but i became a fan in 2016 when they’re left with 9 members. and i’m gonna be honest that i haven’t listened to the songs they released this year without cbx. i know cbx didn’t leave the group, but let’s be real that they’re not in a good situation. i am even a kai-biased but i just can’t bring myself to listen to their music when some members who play a very big part in their songs are missing.
third, nct. mark is my bias in 127 😭 i love mark so much, his solo, his collabs, everything. his parts are my favorite in many nct songs. when mark graduated from nct dream, i didn’t listen to the albums they released as ot6 at the time, and i have only appreciated their past two comebacks during the nct 2020 era. and i was so happy when mark came back to nct dream.
i want to break this pattern with nct but i am just really brokenhearted about mark’s departure. what hurts more is that i love him so much and that leaves me no other option but to fully respect and understand his decision.
Hey hey hey there fellow Kpop enthusiasts! I'm pretty new to interacting with others regarding K-pop, just had a question, what's your guys's favorite song depending on your mood? Mine are...
Whimsical: Feel My Rhythm (Red Velvet)
Anxious: NOT OKAY (ateez)
Frustrated: Crazy (4Minute)
Lugubrious (feelin' droopy/down): Every Relationship In The World (Park Sae Byul)
Confident: S-Class (Stray Kids)
Romantic: Cosmic (Red Velvet) OR Love and Hate (Yuk Jidam)
I'm curious to see what everyone else's picks are!
A Korean celebrity posts wedding pictures. A bunch of K-pop stans (typically from countries whose weddings involve a lot of pageantry, or so they say) just absolutely bamboozled by their causal attire. A bunch more stans taking shit way too far and making Koreans out to be some uncouth savages for wearing jeans. Koreans clap back. International stans claim that Koreans are being xenophobic for said clap back. I-roach continues to live on as a term in Korean twitter.
Never change stanz.
Hello, everyone! I return with my wrap-up of what was going on in kpop and the releases that I liked best in March!
So, the full post can be found here, where I mention debuts, include the link to the full list of March reviews, specifically mention the non-March 2026 releases I reviewed this month, and what I was listening to (the most listened to song was a surprise for me, but number two was not), and some plant pictures to herald spring.
The four weeks of music show wins (which I am keeping track of three different ways to make my life easier for the end of the year) can be found here. Most of the weeks are a full slate of music shows, which is good for the groups, and I also pick a non-winning group from each week to share their stage because I'm still peeved about The Show being canceled and am doing my small part to keep talking about the groups that would have been on The Show.
I'm actually going to give the full list of the songs I really liked, but I'm not going to include the reasonings, though I'm sure you can guess from reading the reviews. If you want the reasonings though, you'll need to go to the full post.
Eighteen of the releases from March I loved enough to put on that playlist. At some point, I anticipate having large swathes where I don't like them as well, but until then, I'm just feeling really spoiled.
For both the Greatest Hits and the Battle of the B-Sides, the big posts where I celebrate older songs and offer a good starting point if you've never heard the song or are looking to get into the artist, they was carefully crafted in the order because I had NU'EST's anniversary, JR's discharge, BTOB's anniversary, Stray Kids's anniversary, and xikers's anniversary that I wanted to celebrate. March is a very busy month for me because of the number of groups I really like that debuted in March.
Greatest Hits:
Battle of the B-Sides:
That's it, everyone! I'll see you all in about a month with a fresh batch of wins, songs, and celebratory posts!
If you've got any suggestions for me, feel free to send me a message, or drop a comment, or you can submit it via The Form. I am fresh out of submissions at the moment, and while April is a "where the wind takes me" kind of month, if you give me a time sensitive request, I'll do that one instead of whatever it happens to be.
Went to the Magicman 2 concert in Oakland! Let me preface that the concert and show were great.
However, I couldn’t say the same for the meet and greet. The whole thing was so behind schedule since the meet and greet was supposed to start at 4:30 but ended up being at around 6ish. Which meant the whole thing was so rushed to make sure we had enough time for sound check and for the concert to start on time. Not sure if there were issues that caused the delay, but I was expecting things to start on time since kpop concerts are usually pretty timely. And Jackson just seemed not in the best condition or 100% at the meet and greet.
Were the other cities like this too? Just disappointed and frustrated at the situation since I was really looking forward to having a good interaction with Jackson that wasn’t so rushed. I’ve been to other meet and greets before, in which the artist at least had time to say something to you???
Since Eurovision Song Contest Asia finally is confirmed kind of, who do you think may represent South Korea?
Information published so far
- In collaboration among EBU, Voxovation and S2O Productions (Thai concert promoter)
- The host for the year is Bangkok.
- The finale to be broadcasted on Nov. 14.
- Confirmed participating nations, as of now are following 10 nations
Bangladesh
Bhutan
Cambodia
Laos
Malaysia
Nepal
Philippines
South Korea
Thailand and,
Vietnam
- The point will be half from viewers half from panelists.
- Official website eurovisionasia dot com
I expect South Korea to exploit K-pop popularity thus, a big name idol group.
So a lot of survival shows for idol groups are known to be pretty bad. But a lot of people say &Audition was “the best” and “the healthiest“. Thoughts?