Asian Junkie Asian pop. Without discretion.
About a week ago, ENHYPEN member Jay made an apology for basically being a bit dumb and dismissive of Korean history. However, people felt the apology was lacking due to him not expressly citing what the problem was, and so he recently made a second apology that was more thorough.
I’m writing this because I want to deeply apologize once again for using the wrong expressions and misrepresenting our nation’s history during our Weverse Live on January 10.
I apologize for the fact that, wthout knowing enough about our nation’s deep history, I misrepresented it due to my lacking vocabulary. At the time of the live broadcast, I was expressing my thoughts on Korean history based only on the limited material I had encountered, and I didn’t realize that I could be conveying the wrong message. Although the fellow member who was with me tried to fix this, I was too careless at the time to realize that.
Also, my choice of words in my previous apology was very lacking. I should have been more careful in deciding what to say, and I apologize for this as well. Using the wrong expressions and misrepresenting our nation’s long history when I don’t even have the vocabulary to properly express my apologetic feelings was truly thoughtless behavior.
After the Weverse live and my previous post, I realized the weight of my mistake while reading the words of ENGENE [ENHYPEN’s fans] and many people, and my heart ached. I felt how my mistake could grow into a huge problem, and I reflected on my mistake. However, I also felt that this wasn’t a matter that could be solved only by self-reflection, and in order to make right something that started with my words, I thought I needed to properly acknowledge my wrongdoing and make another apology. I thought that there shouldn’t be another lacking choice of expression in this apology as well, so I pondered over it and wound up posting this message a bit late.
I’m still thinking about and wondering what I should do to avoid repeating this kind of mistake again. I think the ideas I’ve thought of up until now are still lacking. I will ponder it more deeply, and I want to consistently show you my efforts through actions rather than words. I will make an effort in the future to become a careful person who listens to what many people have to say.
Because it seems that I have caused great damage to our group through my lacking expressions, I am sincerely sorry to the ENHYPEN members and the ENGENE who love us. I will make an effort to not only say this with words, but to actually become a better person and stand before ENGENE.
Regarding this issue, there are comparisons being made between this and the past history scandal situations of Seolhyun and Jimin, Hyosung, and Tiffany, though I feel like they’re somewhat different. In this case, the ignorance itself isn’t over a specific big issue like the others (An Jung Geun/Ilbe/Imperial Japan Flag), but more of the dismissive attitude towards Korean history as a whole. Still, all four of those mentioned have since mostly been able to rehab their images after apologies* (not counting whatever further “issues”), so Jay should be able to as well after this.
*As for the debate about male/female idol levels of backlash, I obviously acknowledge that reality. However, the women in question were also like mainstream popular celebrities, which Jay is not (respectfully).
For me, I still feel like before, it just came off rather stupid. But in the end that’s all it was, so not gonna act like it’s deserving of some huge scandal or whatever. Thankfully, the reaction to this seems to be a lot more positive, and hopefully it blows over from here.
