It is a well-known ARMY fact that BTS was not treated well in Korean media early on in their careers. This treatment is cited as one of the reasons ARMY is now so protective of BTS when the group is covered in Western media now that the group has broken into the scene. In fact, their treatment in Western media is one of the founding tenets of the very series of which this article is a part.
With several recent BTS appearances on Korean TV, including in “You Quiz,” a variety show, which is a bit of a break from tradition for them after the formulation of “Run! BTS,” our staff got to thinking about this old piece of ARMY knowledge. Part of what we do here is expose and discuss media misbehavior, so that (hopefully) something can be learned from their example. But another part of what we do here is to get to the truth of the matter — to get to the root of the issue and provide information so that our readers may educate themselves and others (as applicable) on the situation.
In looking at this issue of BTS in Korean media, that’s what we’re going to be doing today.
This article already had challenges in its fledgling stages: sources. As international fans are likely well-aware, finding reliable news sources located out of South Korea can be a bit difficult at times. If you aren’t fluent in Korean, this challenge becomes even greater as, naturally, Korean media sites are printed in their own language and Google Translate can only do so much. Fans translate BTS-related material, but it would be a lot to ask them to take hours to scan multiple news sites per day and to then spend multiple hours translating all the articles which might have something related to BTS.
A few reliable English language news sites do exist, such as Soompi, which report on pop culture in South Korea, including K-pop and K-dramas, which has helped immensely. However, having access to multiple sources is critical when researching to make sure that as many aspects of the story are being covered as possible. This makes it hard for us, as analysts and journalists, to assess the situation with our own eyes to see if everything we think we know about how BTS is treated in the media from their homeland is actually the case.
The next logical step is to ask the internet. Before we go any further, we must acknowledge some key points about this: everything which is discussed for the next paragraph or two must be taken with a grain of salt, for we are discussing user opinions and cannot in all cases verify the truth of the claims made. As with all comments on the internet, one must view them with a discerning eye and the knowledge that, without some sort of material to support what is being said, these opinions may or may not represent the entire truth of the situation. They do, however, bring up some interesting points for discussion.
Unsurprisingly, a lot of people have asked questions about whether or not it is true that BTS has been or is still being treated poorly by the media in South Korea. And, of course, on the standard user-provided question-and-answer sites, there is a wide array of different types of answers, ranging on the bell curve from “lol fans are just nuts” to responses that are actually well-thought-out. Again, please keep in mind that we are discussing others’ opinions here only at the moment, so truthfulness is difficult to verify.
One answer in particular from user Juno Lee, on the website Quora, stands out. She comments specifically in her essay several times that BTS is not the only group to have negative experiences in Korean media, citing BTOB as an example of another group that met with similar issues of being singled out for looks, concept, and so on. The reason for this, she says, is that there are other companies in the music industry that are looking out for their own in the news.
Now, this is something we can talk about.
Lee’s statement that the “Big 3” companies have “connections” with reporters is troubling, but even more troubling is the fact that there is some evidence that this is the truth.
In 2019, BTS held a press conference to promote their Map of the Soul: Persona album release. During this press conference, a reporter asked the group a controversial question about their WINGS album and the “Blood, Sweat & Tears” music video, specifically asking if it was “plagiarizing” the work of French photographer Bernard Faucon. What was clearly meant to put the boys on the spot ended up being an opportunity for Suga to show off his savage professionalism as he took the mic and uttered the now-nearly-famous shut down: “The legal team at our agency is dealing with the plagiarism issue. We have the same position as our agency,” finishing off with a calm “Thank you.”
The interesting thing is that, later on, it was speculated that the journalist responsible for the question was somehow related to YG Entertainment. If this is the case, it would support Lee’s assertion that the “Big 3” companies, of which YG is a part, have some sort of influence over the media.
This example about the press conference is not the first time that YG has been involved in a media-related scandal. As reported in Seoulbeats’ article entitled “Naver’s News Manipulation: Compromising K-pop’s International Fanbase?”, the Korean Google equivalent, Naver, was involved in a media manipulation scandal, again with YG Entertainment, centering around the Burning Sun scandal that came to light in 2019.
Naver has a history of shifting things around to suit their own ends, partially because of which organizations are responsible for running it: the Korea Communications System (KCC) and Korea Communications Standards Commission (KCSC), both of which have been under fire in the past for political bias, according to Seoulbeats.
Politically speaking, Seoulbeats lists a few instances related to the presidency of Park Geun-hye where Naver made some interesting decisions: “the portal deleted the keywords ‘ seven-hour operation,’ suggested when a user would look up former President Park Geun-hye. The keyword referred to the rumor that the President’s response to the Sewol ferry disaster in 2014 was delayed due to a plastic surgery procedure. Naver justified this by classifying the keyword in its ‘rumor’ category.” They also removed over 15,000 keywords related to the officials involved in the corruption of former President Park’s administration (for which she was impeached and removed from office in 2017).
As the article points out, the above-mentioned activities are not technically illegal from a strictly legal perspective. However, they could be considered unethical, as they affect the public’s “right to know,” which is one of the governing tenets of news and journalism.
In the K-pop world, company interests prove to be the impetus behind this strategic media manipulation. In 2017, Naver invested 100 billion Korean won, equivalent to 8.85 million USD, into YG Entertainment. As Seoulbeats explains, this means that any negative news about YG would affect Naver’s stocks. When the Burning Sun scandal broke, Seoulbeats stated that Naver’s coverage of the event was “disappointing,” and that “articles related to YG, Madam Lin or Jung, and more were either placed below the scroll of the news page or removed from the trending list altogether. One could potentially blame algorithms, but for such crucial news to not be on the front page seems to signify Naver’s prioritizing of its stocks in YG over the public’s right to know.”
In the days of primarily printed news, placing something “below the fold” on the front page, where someone picking up a copy of their morning newspaper wouldn’t immediately see the article, conveyed a sense of unimportance. The prime real estate was “above the fold.” Now, it correlates to above and below the scroll. Moving articles regarding the Burning Sun scandal below the scroll isn’t illegal either, but you would think that, once the situation began to unfold from rumor into a full-blown exposé, with real victims and criminal activity, it would warrant a spot on the front page, above the scroll.
Again, none of this is illegal. But it is interesting and is a compelling piece of evidence to support what Juno Lee said on Quora: that the “Big 3” has some influence over the news companies in South Korea. If this is the case, as it would seem to be, then we have issues of neutrality and objectivity also impeding the public’s right to know. Additionally, it would explain the “snubs” or slights that BTS and other non-Big 3 companies may have experienced.
In recent months, BTS has been appearing on more Korean TV shows, with more scheduled appearances on the way. What exactly has prompted this change is uncertain, though doubtless, the COVID-19 pandemic has contributed at least in part. One could argue that now that the group is such a huge powerhouse in the Korean music industry that Korean media cannot afford to slight (or appear to slight) BTS. However, this wouldn’t explain any continued article coverage that favors one group over others.
With one of the primary tenets of journalism being objectivity, if a news company, Naver or otherwise, is deciding for the public what they can and cannot see, either by making it difficult to find or by favoring one party over another, then are they really meeting that tenet of objectivity? No. It may not be active discrimination, but it does affect the public’s ability to get information, and information is critical to making decisions.
It’s hard to make any definitive determination from all of this — after all, much of it is based on opinion and possibilities, rather than any definitive source that demonstrates, unequivocally, with hard evidence, that there is some sort of systemic media manipulation ring or purposeful snubbing of BTS. While it may seem like that is what’s happening, it's hard to prove with what we have here before us. Lacking access to sources, we can only go so far.
To speculate and offer our definitive answer would only be to offer our interpretation of the information we have. Instead, we present the information that is available to you for your own analysis and research. We hope that in reading what we have discovered and visiting the links we’ve presented here you will be able to make your own decision about what is happening. If you can think of anything that we’ve missed, please feel free to comment below or reach out to us on social media. This discussion will never be untimely, and as BTS continues to appear in media, it will continue to evolve.
They shall continue, and so shall we. Every new appearance is another opportunity for recognition for them and triumphs for us.
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Written By: Anna Moon
Edit By: Aury
Checked By: Mheer