あち

I’m sorry to see more ONCEs on my mute list than users from one particular toxic group, so I’d like to share a few thoughts. I don’t even want to write this, because the negativity in it disgusts me, but lately many overseas fans feel like they’ve gone too far. I remember how much damage the “akgae” (Korean shorthand for malicious individual fans) did to this fandom in Korea back in 2018. Many Korean fans left at the time. Because I could foresee a situation like this, I honestly hoped with all my heart that every member would stay with JYP, and that the group would stay actively promoting for at least two or three more years. (Once individual members leave their agency to work independently, it inevitably becomes hard to keep up steady group activity.) Even so, each member is entitled to pursue complete autonomy in her individual activities, according to her own thoughts and inclinations. You may have a bias member, but if you’ve supported TWICE as a group, then every member is an idol we cheer for and a precious part of our own memories. We should simply cheer them on. More than anyone, the members themselves know how precious TWICE is, and this doesn’t mean they’re leaving the group or drifting away from it. Not understanding the Korean entertainment industry or the Korean stock market, having very limited ways to learn about JYP’s internal affairs, and being a foreigner with poor access to information: none of that gives you a license to spout false claims. TWICE is a group JYP created, and its entire career so far is the product of the efforts of countless JYP staff you know nothing about, along with the members themselves. JYP has done incomparably more to build TWICE’s success than most individual fans have. This is not something you can carelessly run your mouth about, wearing the badge of “fan” and indulging half-baked delusions. I don’t want to divide the fandom by nationality, but what on earth has happened to overseas ONCEs, Japan excepted? They seem unable to make even a rational, sound judgment. If you’re a fan, at least respect what the members wrote in their heartfelt letters before running their words through the filter of your delusions. I’m a Korean fan, but I also follow this company closely as an investor, and I’ve come to understand how much goes on that fans never see. Even I sometimes can’t understand certain strategic decisions the company makes and end up frustrated. (The company’s employees are not stupid. They know what fans are thinking, and almost everything is a strategic decision.) That frustration sometimes boils over into a post, but at the very least, I can tell the difference between what I can say and what I can’t. The company has clearly gone through plenty of trial and error, and it may look terrible in some areas of communication, but we don’t know even a tenth of what’s going on behind the scenes. That is itself part of doing business. Since the group contract is still in place, JYP had no reason at all to make a big announcement on the group account about three members not extending their individual contracts. To me, it’s simply common sense that the members’ handwritten letters, which have nothing to do with group activities, would come across as more sincere on their personal SNS than on a group marketing channel. Fundamentally, given the governance of Korean content production and the realities of the advertising industry, there are almost no companies in Korea that can offer management with more bargaining power than JYP across the entire range of entertainment activities. The members know this very well. Each member understands the K-pop industry far better than you do. Even so, rising above all that, in activities that are theirs alone, separate from the career the company built (TWICE’s entire career), they have decided to chart the direction of the rest of their careers on their own. That is an expression of agency and the judgment of mature individuals, not the trivial reasons based on your delusions. The members are not so foolish as to be trapped inside your twisted fantasies. Every one of them is smart and admirable. I understand that most of the fandom is at an age where it’s hard to think from multiple angles, and I know that the nature of overseas fandoms makes them vulnerable to agitation by some people within individual countries. Your hatred of the company is your own business, and so are your delusions and nonsense, but don’t sink so low that you stain the name of TWICE and its fandom. If the hiatus feels unbearably boring, if the stress from your delusions has reached its peak and everything looks negative to you, and you can no longer support the group’s activities in a healthy way, then please leave the fandom. If that’s you, then to me you look like nothing but trash, worse than an anti, using the members as a tool to bad-mouth everything about the company. If not, then think back on the old memories, hold on a little longer, and cheer for them with a truly pure heart. #TWICE #ONCE