Asian Junkie Asian pop. Without discretion.
Hello again everybody, no I am not dead, just decided to break for the Olympics like K-pop did for a bit. Anyway, so apparently I missed some HYBE/ADOR updates, and of course there was more of it because god loves to punish me.
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As sorta predicted, HYBE’s message discipline with regards to Min Hee Jin‘s texts was paying off a bit in terms of public perception, as she’s faced backlash for the way she handled the alleged sexual harassment case. Thus, ADOR had to make a statement to explain Min Hee Jin’s actions.
“The sexual harassment case was already concluded with a ‘no charges’ decision by the HYBE HR Committee on March 16. Given that HYBE handles legal, HR, and PR matters directly through a shared service system, it is perplexing why this issue is being revisited, contradicting the previous conclusion. This sudden reinterpretation to attack CEO Min Hee Jin is unfair.”
They essentially claim all she did was mediate a conflict fairly.
“CEO Min Hee Jin listened impartially to both sides and worked diligently to mediate the conflict. She fulfilled her responsibilities by issuing warnings to prevent similar issues in the future. Additionally, she proposed improvements for better HR procedures and transparency to HYBE.”
Of course, there was still the matter of the leaked Min Hee Jin texts from Dispatch that seemed to confirm that something happened between the two and that she was taking the side of the male executive. However, Min Hee Jin finally responded with something of substance, releasing the (alleged) full chat logs to show the context.
Summarizing the exchanges, it basically paints a picture of a bunch of miscommunication between the parties involved, and that the employee felt the executive was interfering and nitpicking (bullying, sorta), resulting in a report against the executive for violating company ethics. The HYBE review came back without finding a problem, and the employee ended up telling Min Hee Jin she would resign, but Min Hee Jin tried to get the employee to work things out and reconsider. The executive and employee allegedly then did meet up, where the executive apologized to the employee and worked things out, but the employee decided to resign anyway.
Essentially, her point is the employee resigned unrelated to the workplace harassment claim and that she never covered for the executive, instead mostly scolding him for his actions and trying to mediate the dispute to keep the employee on at ADOR. By her account, it also sounds like it was less about sexual harassment and more about the power harassment, which is lumped into the company ethics violation reporting.
Additionally, one section in particular has been pointed out as Dispatch maliciously editing Min Hee Jin’s words, where Dispatch imply one convo is about the sexual harassment…
- MHJ: “I trusted you even before you even tried to defend yourself. But what do you mean you don’t remember? Doesn’t that mean you could have done it?”
- Director A: “I said that I might have said that it was better than watching with two men. I also told you that I never called her a young lady.”
- Director A: “I’m sure ‘B’ feels wronged, I know she really wanted to work at ADOR.”
- Director A: “I am sorry ㅜㅜ. You are cleaning up the mess I’ve made again. I won’t cause trouble in the future.”
…when the mess they’re referring to appears to be the executive being power tripped/bullied in the past and her having to step in to stop it.
- MHJ: “I understand that. But because you had also been a victim of bullying throughout your career, I thought you would be good to ‘B’.”
- MHJ: “I thought you would understand her better and be nicer to her. How can you treat ‘B’ the way you’ve been treated by (Blurred).”
- Director A: “I will do my best to change my mind state.”
- MHJ: “If you treat ‘X’ like shit and then treat ‘Y’ like shit. What would you say if (Blurred) said that they treated you like shit because they were passionate and cared about you. What would you do then?!”
Furthermore, Dispatch represented a segment of the texts at the start as…
MHJ: “I trusted you even before you even tried to defend yourself. But what do you mean you don’t remember? Doesn’t that mean you could have done it?”
…as if she was defending him, but the actual texts show her questioning him.
- MHJ: “I trusted you.”
- MHJ: “But this is an unacceptable answer.”
- MHJ: “It isn’t like you’re denying it. You are saying you don’t remember?”
- MHJ: “Doesn’t that mean you could have done it?”
- MHJ: “You are the only one who doesn’t remember.”
- Director A: “I told you over the phone that time we spoke. I told you I don’t remember.”
- MHJ: “I don’t remember either. Rewrite it then.”
Yeah, that’s not rewriting things for clarity, that’s just editorializing. But as I always say with Dispatch, it’s important to remember which side they got leaks from and what they’re representing.
I will note, however, that she didn’t seem to address the texts she sent to the executive after this was resolved, which disparaged the employee and women, in general. That basically still calls into question her credibility and perspective on this. We also haven’t heard from the employee in question (and we may never), but that could clear up a lot about what’s going on.
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Regardless, as has been pointed out by others, all of this navigation of PR stuff in public is effectively meaningless in terms of general public reaction if their side loses in court. In the end, that’ll be the main thing the public focuses on.
That said, it doesn’t mean we have to simply pretend all this stuff doesn’t exist, and there’s already ample evidence that both parties are either incompetent, suck ass, or both. Quite frankly, I think the truly scary thing is that netizens might be right that if you open up the texts of any other executive in K-pop, you might get similar mess as what we’re seeing from Min Hee Jin. That said, it should also make one realize that she’s mostly just another rich K-pop executive and not some kind of victim of the system.
