203 | K-POP Fans' Hallyu Observation: Idol Girl Group Breaks Free from Male Gaze and Becomes a Symbol of Feminism?
Text/Cai Diyan (graduated from the Department of Political Science of National Taiwan University, now an international news editor/reporter) (Original post published on August 31, 2022)
As we all know, South Korean female idols are called "extreme professions". Ever since I started following K-POP many years ago, I have found that misogyny in the idol industry is a difficult exercise to solve.
First of all, the top executives of South Korean entertainment companies that build idol girl groups are mostly middle-aged men. Secondly, they believe that the conditions for the popularity of women's groups are to provide good fan service and attract the male market. The result is that girl groups are almost built to satisfy male fantasies; female idols are told that if they want to succeed, they must know how to please others, do things they don’t want to do, endure showing coquetry anywhere, and be treated like dolls.
This constitutes the most criticized situation in the idol industry: female idols in their teens play the incarnation of purity, sweetness, and sexiness, singing commercial, simple and brisk bubblegum music in order to gain applause. In the MV, the feeling of love is conveyed, showing the expression of seeing the heartbeat of the object of interest; in the fan meeting, the male fans are allowed to make close eye contact or light touch, and risk being sexually harassed.
"Does supporting idols promote the trend of objectifying women?" As a feminist, while I love female idols, there will always be intractable contradictions in my heart. Do you have to endure misogyny when you become famous in the music world?
Fortunately, the empowerment of female fans and female idols is changing the idol industry.
Since the mid-2010s, the fourth wave of feminism has emerged around the world, and the purchasing power of female fans for female idol products has greatly increased, making entertainment companies aware of the changes in the target market, and then turning to planning in line with modern women’s values, which will make women obsessed ( Girl Crush) idol music.
Therefore, it is not difficult for fans to find that the recent girl groups no longer deliberately show off pure or sexy. From (G)I-DLE , whose members wrote lyrics and music, aespa, which focuses on the world view of AI virtual heroines, ITZY , who became popular in the style of Girl Crush, to STAYC and LE SSERAFIM , who have deep magnetic voices, the girl group began to step out of the male gaze and show Confident, handsome and diverse beauty.
The evolution of the girl group is correct, and the same is true in terms of business performance. Now after BTS, the most popular K-POP idols are almost all girl groups. TWICE, BLACKPINK, Red Velvet, aespa, IVE and other girl groups are not only well-known, but also have strong fan support. Their new works continue to break market forecasts: aespa, a newcomer group that just returned in July, has a total pre-sale volume of 161 albums. 10,000 sheets, setting the highest pre-sale record in the history of K-POP girl groups.
This is a particularly rare phenomenon, since male singers dominate the pop music scene regardless of the region. Just 5 years ago, the same was true for K-POP. At that time, the pre-sale of girls' albums only exceeded 100,000, which was great, while the sales of boys' groups often exceeded 700,000. But now feminism is slowly curing the misogyny of the idol industry, and at the same time bringing about an era of unprecedented high sales of girl groups.
South Korean pop music critic Kim Young-dae also discusses the evolution of girl group styles in recent years in his book "The Secret of K-POP Conquering the World" . In this regard, he concluded: "I think the right to speak in this era is actually in the hands of women."
[This article is not over, see "Walk the World" for the full text: K-POP fans' observation of Hallyu: Idol girl groups break free from male gaze and become symbols of feminism? 】
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203. K-POP Fans' Hallyu Observation: Do idol girl groups break free from the male gaze and become a symbol of feminism?
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