There’s this move that happens a lot in K-pop spaces when someone, usually a Black fan, points out colourism in how idols get treated, or anti-Blackness in styling choices, or CA that keeps happening and the response is often “that’s Western fans imposing American race politics on Korea.”
But the framing misses the point that Black K-pop fans aren’t all American, they’re not all Western and when Black fans from different countries and regions point out the same patterns, dismissing it as “US centric” is itself a deflection tactic.
This is not just me talking, even academics are covering this, and in this recent academic study looking at fandom and racism looked at this exact dynamic in fandoms of non-anglophone content like K-pop, C-dramas, and Thai BL. The researcher found that critical fans in these spaces face a complex situation and they get accused of Western imperialism AND they have Black fans across regions noting that anti-Blackness and colorism aren’t uniquely American exports, they’re global systems with colonial histories.
One person they interviewed said “We keep having these conversations about how colorism works for instance. And so yes, I do think that there is pushback against Western fans coming in and ‘Telling us how we should feel about things.’ And then there’s [US] Black fans saying, ‘But this is still not okay.’ And I think it’s important to have these conversations.”
The “you’re being US centric” accusation functions the same way as other dismissal tactics we see on internet i.e. by reframeing the conversation away from the actual issue being raised and onto the identity and motivations of who’s raising it.
I’m not saying every critique is valid or that cultural context doesn’t matter, it absolutely does but when Black fans from multiple countries are pointing out the same patterns, maybe the issue isn’t that they’re all confused about cultural differences.
What do you all think? Is this something you’ve seen play out in K-pop spaces?
Sharing the source of study here which made me do this post- https://doi.org/10.1525/fmh.2024.10.1.107
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