Image credit: nwjns YouTube channel
The K-pop industry, which is known to be one of the most conservative and cautious working environments, is going through its most vocal era in its history.
On 11th of September, New Jeans started an unannounced livestream titled: ‘what New Jeans would like to say’, through an unofficial and newly opened YouTube channel named ‘nwjns’, which is now deleted. Such a live stream is claimed to be the last measure the girls could think of in defense to what has been done to their band New Jeans and their music label, Adore, which is one of the labels that are under the management of the biggest Korean entertainment firm, Hybe.
The youngest member Hyein began the livestream stating “what we will be talking about in this livestream today is ultimately aimed to be reached to Hybe. New Jeans tried hard to communicate with Hybe by having meetings and expressing our opinions, but considering what is happening to us even after these meetings, we could not help but feel like our voices were not heard properly, like the communications were blocked. We thought unless we take drastic measures like what we are doing now, our thoughts and opinions would never be delivered”.
The eldest member Minji pointed out that “due to the conditions of our contract, we are not able to open up about everything, but we promise to try our best to speak up in the most honest way”. She continued that she “cannot think of a person who approached me with an open heart as much as the CEO of our music label, Hee-Jin Min”. Another member Dani added “therefore it is natural for us to feel like we want to continue our relationship with our CEO Min and continue working with her under the music label that is led by her”.
Such mention of their previous CEO is the result of Hybe’s recent decision to remove Min from her CEO position in their music label Adore. The girls expressed how shocking it was to find out about their ‘motherly figure in the industry’ being fired by Hybe online.
Hyein also mentioned the recent scandal caused by the new CEO of Adore, Joo-Young Kim, who was appointed by Hybe’s board of directors to replace Hee-Jin Min. CEO Kim allegedly threatened the movie production team of New Jeans, Dolphiners Film, to delete all the videos of New Jeans posted on the YouTube channel they created for the fans of New Jeans, Ban Heesoo. Although such postings were arranged and agreed upon in advance by Adore under Hee-Jin Min, the new CEO expressed his wish to pursue legal action for misusing his artists’ videos. The director of Dolphiners Film, Woo-Seok Shin publicised the threatening emails from CEO Kim on the story highlights of his personal Instagram account and accused the new Adore management team of ‘deleting New Jeans from the K-pop industry”. The members of New Jeans expressed their deep concern about the safety of their future as an artist and the works they have been working on under their new management team in Adore.
What worried the public the most was what Hani exposed. Hani, the foreign member of the group, spoke up about the internal bullying she experienced in the building of her management company. She stated “ on the 4th floor of Hybe’s building is where all the artists receive hair and make-up care. So, I bump into many artists and staff members on that floor. Today, I was in the hallway on that floor and I saw another idol group and their manager walking pass. I said hello to them but the manager told the group to ’just ignore her’. I was right in front of them. I don’t understand why I should be treated like this”.
The members concluded the livestream demanding Hybe to bring back their CEO Hee-Jin Min by the 25th of September. They also strongly expressed their distrust in Hybe’s management by stating that “we do not wish to agree with or conform to the society and the environment that the new management team is trying to make”, and that “the management style Hybe pursues is wrong”.
It is analysed that such independent measures taken by K-pop artists against their own management firm is finally shedding the light on the ambivalence of the K-pop industry in the most open and honest way to the public. The environment of the entertainment industry is known to be uniquely predatory. This is known among the artists themselves, however, the systemic pressure forces them to ‘make compromises’ when faced with such unfairness in order to succeed in the industry. In the history of the K-entertainment field, we have witnessed countless artists ending their lives over such unfavorable social structures and wrong practices that are so deeply rooted in the industry. After the Me Too movement and the Writer Strikes in Hollywood, now it seems to be the time for the K-entertainment industry to undergo some changes in its system in order to carry on the impact it has over the society, and further develop the entertainment culture.
