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Super Junior’s leader, Lee Teuk, left a sour comment on his mini-hompy about Korea’s performing arts culture and of its audience on July 19, which is causing strife amongst netizens once again.

Leeteuk wrote,

 “You people who nit-pick idol culture and fandom should go think about it yourself. You can’t even see your own self, and you are pointing fingers at other people.. Go look in the mirror.. I really hate this.”

His surprisingly harsh tone has got many fans and netizens alarmed and curious why Leeteuk exploded. Many are attributing his invective at the recent “Cass Tok Concert” held on July 18, while others are blaming anti-fans who left him rude and hurtful messages on his mini-hompy; I’d say it’s an culmination of both and Leeteuk got fed up. But his message is more relevant to the recent “Cass Tok Concert,” where some of the audience left their seats when Super Junior was performing.

The Incident (Testimony from a concert-goer)

The “Cass Tok Concert” was a concert restricted to people over 20 years of age, which meant that teens, who make up the majority of SUJU’s fanbase, were no present. Therefore, most of the concert-goers were adults in their 20’s, 30’s and 40’s who were mostly intoxicated from a few drinks. Many hip-hop artists were lined up to perform for this event, which makes Super Junior stand out with their teen-pop genre. But SUJU-Happy was lined up to perform last. A few jaded concert-goers decided to leave early because it was getting late; however, there was a segment of the audience who cussed out SUJU members as they left their seats, emptying the front rows. Despite the shelled-out front rows, SUJU members had to continue with their performance, and SUJU’s leader Leeteuk could not face the crowds as he performed. Acknowledging the fact that the concert was open, allowing revelers to exit freely, the members of the audience who left early are not at fault. Therefore, Leetuek wrote his sauerkraut message, addressing the few members of the audience who left shouting obscenities at SUJU members.

Looking at Leeteuk’s message, we can notice the conspicuous prejudice against idol culture that many older generations hold. This incident also harks back to the SNSD silent treatment at the Dream Concert, which shows Korea’s problematic fandom culture. But it all comes down to a generation gap. The emerging trend of idol fandom has caused a significant rift between the social and cultural customs of Korea’s younger and older generation. The older generation is not able to understand the rapid, transient pop culture of the youth, which leads to conflicts pertaining to behavior and manners. This SUJU-Happy incident proves once again that Korea’s performance culture is still in its developing stages (and should I dare say, is still low-class).

Many ELF fans were outraged at such ill-mannered behavior by adults. They left messages, such as “Even though we were at fault for the silent treatment during SNSD’s performance, we did not leave the performance hall; instead, we just did not respond to the performance” and “It is not the appropriate conduct to leave the performance hall during performance intervals.” The 10’s generation ELFs condemned the immature actions of these adults and took it upon themselves to point out their blatant hypocrisy.

I must testify that I’ve read various blogs and comment boxes and a lot of older netizens leave condescending messages that attack fandom culture. Part of their reason is that they fear fandom is consuming the time and attention of the youth and causing unnecessary ruckus. The recent vendetta between crazy fans and anti-fans has generalized to a condemning of the fandom culture. This over-generalization has caused many idol groups to come into scrutiny and attack because an attack on fandom is an indirect attack on the idol groups themselves. Yet, these idol groups are innocent from the violence that arises due to obsessive fans. And thus, Lee Teuk is just sick and tired of fans fighting, pointing fingers and accusing the next fan of being more aggressive and rude than themselves. But it’s always hard to define the “normal and acceptable” behavior of a fan when there are so many gray areas.

However, one thing is certain – the glaring hypocrisy of either generation. The younger generation is ignorant of their obsessive-compulsive behavior that drives fandom into a blood-stained path. Then the self-righteous adults chide these “immature” young kids for being foolish. Yet this recent event allows one to wonder whether the older generation – the very people who judged unfavorably against the “immature” young fans – is at the greatest fault by setting a bad example.

 

Source: Naver blogs, sookyung.wordpress
Credit: soyboy