K-pop makes small inroad at the Grammy's; Bruno, Laufey and Paguia represent

It’s official: When it comes to the Grammys, the Recording Academy is still playing the same tired game of "look, but don't touch" with K-pop.

Despite Rosé and Bruno Mars practically blowing the roof off the building with their opening performance of "APT" at the Grammy awards Sunday, the night ended in a way that felt all too familiar to anyone who’s been paying attention.

Katseye's performance of their hit "Gnarly" nominated Best New Artist and Best Performance by a duo/group, reinforced the high energy and entertainment value of K-pop.

If you’re feeling a sense of déjà vu, you’re not alone. This year’s shutout of Rosé in the major categories—losing Record of the Year and Song of the Year—mirrors the frustrating history of BTS at the Grammys. For years, the Academy used BTS for ratings, inviting them to perform "Dynamite" and "Butter," yet repeatedly denied them a win in the Best Pop Duo/Group Performance category.

A trophy for K-pop

There was one win, however: the Grammys finally "gave" K-pop a trophy this year, but even that felt like a backhanded compliment. The win for "Golden" from the KPop Demon Hunters soundtrack happened in the Visual Media category during the pre-show, away from the main stage.

The team for "Golden" meant Grammys for EJAE (Kim Eun-jae), the Korean-American singer, songwriter, and producer, also known as the voice of character Rumi and her co-singers Korean Americans Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami; producers Teddy Park and Park Hong Jun and Yu Han Lee, Hee Dong Nam and Jeong Hoon Seo, songwriters and producers.

Laufey
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There were other winners

Asians were not completely shut out at the Grammy's.

Everyone's favorite Asian Icelander, Laufey, won a Grammy for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album.

“I owe everything to my music education, to my arts education … we cannot cut arts funding, it’s so important. What you all do here is so important. I love you all so much,” she told the crowd.

The trophy balances out the Grammy she won last year.

Additionally, Marco Paguia, the Filipino American music director/pianist and the original cast of the Buena Vista Social Club. won Best Musical Theater Album for their work on the Broadway musical.

Paguia's Grammy win, follows the Tony Awards’ Best Orchestrations and a special Tony  that he earned last June for his work on the Buena Vista Social Club.

Let's not forget that Bruno Mars energy. Besides singing with Rosé at the show's opening, he had everyone dancing to his new song "I Just Might," which he debuted last night. It's almost a given: he'll be among the nominees next year.

SCREEN CAPTURE

The 6-member K-pop group Katseye performed at the Grammys Sunday night.

View from the edge

For K-pop, the pattern is clear: the Academy loves the global viewership and the high-octane energy K-pop brings to the telecast, but they still refuse to grant these artists the "prestige" of a General Field win. 

Rosé was good enough to open the show, but apparently, her historic impact wasn't "enough" to take home the hardware.

The Grammy's problem is that it tries to be all things to all genres, and when a new genre comes along like K-pop, it doesn't know how to categorize it. "APT" and "Gnarly" tried to bridge the gap with English lyrics, but, apparently, to no avail. However, "Golden" was able to break through which perhaps signals an opening.

Years ago, the recording industry was criticized for not recognizing country music and hip-hop so it had to make new categories to give those genre's their deserved recognition. The academy had the same problem with Latin music and gospel. The solution was the same.

Does the Academy need a complete overhaul of its voting block to finally recognize K-pop as global pop, or are these "performance-only" invites just the new normal?

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news, views and chismis from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X, BlueSky or at the blog Views From the Edge. 

Grammy nominees Rosé, Katseye and Demon Hunters are breaking barriers

Bruno Mars and Rosé are nominated for Grammys

The 2026 Grammy nominations are out, and it's a game changer for K-pop. We're talking history in the making, folks. This isn't just about a nomination here or there in some niche category; this is about breaking into the mainstream, the real deal.

The music powers-that-be, the Recording Academy itself, finally seem to be waking up. For years, we saw BTS get nods, which was great, but it always felt a little... contained. Like they were testing the waters.

Now? They've opened the floodgates.

The biggest story has to be Rosé of the K-pop female group Blackpink. Her collab with Filipino American Bruno Mars, "APT.", is everywhere, and for good reason. It's a fantastic track. It's earned nominations for:

• Record of the Year
• Song of the Year
• Best Pop Duo/Group Performance

Think about that for a second. General field categories! This is the first time a K-pop idol has had a song nominated for the biggest awards of the night. That's a huge moment, a real cultural shift.

Ethnically, Rosé is Korean, but she was born in Australia and has dual citizenship in Korea and New Zealand where she calls home.

But it doesn't stop there. There's this song "Golden" from the K-pop Demon Hunters soundtrack—yes, you read that right, a soundtrack—performed by this fictional animated group HUNTR/X. 

The real-live singers providing the voices of the animated characters are Korean Americans EJAE, Audrey Nuna, and Rei Ami.  EJAE brings Rumi’s vocals to life, the genre-blending artist Audrey Nuna sings as Mira, and alt-pop rapper Rei Ami performs as Zoey.

FYI: The 68th Annual Grammy Awards nominations were announced on Nov.7, 2025, and the awards ceremony will take place on Feb.1, 2026. It can be viewed on CBS or stream it live and on demand through Paramount+.

They also landed nominations for Song of the Year and Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, plus Best Song Written for Visual Media. This is the first girl group Song of the Year nod in nearly two decades! Unbelievable.

And then we have KATSEYE, the new global group from HYBE. They're up for Best New Artist and Best Pop Duo/Group Performance for their single "Gabriela." This is a group formed through a reality show, showing the global reach of the K-pop system.

Leader Sophia was born in the Philippines; main dancer Daniela is American with Venezuelan and Cuban roots; all-rounder Megan is from Hawaii with a Singaporean Chinese mother; the charismatic Manon is Swiss Ghanaian; vocalist Lara is Indian American; Yoonchae (the youngest of the group at 17) is Korean.

What does all this mean? It means the Grammys are finally judging K-pop on its artistic merit, not just as a side attraction for the fans. It's no longer just a "phenomenon"; it's legitimate music being recognized at the highest level.

The K-pop group Katseye are up for Best New Artist Grammy.

Besides the multi-Grammy winner Bruno Mars, who teams up with Rosé in their hit single, other Asian artists are:

• Carolyn Kuan: The conductor of the American Composers Orchestra is nominated for Best Opera Recording for the work "Huang Ruo: An American Soldier."

• Huang Ruo: The composer of "An American Soldier" is also recognized in the Best Opera Recording category.

• Hue Park, a South Korean musical lyricist, for the Broadway musical Maybe Happy Ending in the Best Musical Theater Album category.
• Charu Suri, an Indian American jazz pianist, for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album.
• Dijon, a Guamanian American producer/artist who is nominated for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical, as well as for his contributions to Justin Bieber's album in the Album of the Year category. 

Perhaps it was no coincidence that graphic artist Masaki Koike helped announce the nominations. The Grammy awards this year are historic in another way. It is the first time the Grammy spotlight is shining on K-pop girl groups. Previously, only the male gorup, BTS, has received Grammy recognition and honors.

The Grammy nominations is a victory not just for the artists, but for the entire genre and its global fanbase. 

Zooming up to the 25,000 feet level, it means Americans and the rest of the world are seeing Asian and Asian American artists influencing the lives of the global village in ways we couldn't predict just a few years ago. Perhaps it means a door is creaking open towards acceptance, appreciation and acknowledgement -- not just for entertainers, but for all of Asians, Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders at all sectors of society.

It's about time. The world is watching, and K-pop is taking center stage. 

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news, views and chismis from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X, BlueSky or at the blog Views From the Edge. 

Analysis: There's something troubling about the Billboard Music Awards

K-pop girl groups NewJeans, left and Black Pink won Billboard awards.

Taylor Swift's domination of the Billboard Awards Sunday night was not a surprise. The 33-year old pop music artist won 10 trophies. Less of a surprise was the 11 wis by her male counterpart, Morgan Wallen, who broke out of the Country/Western genre.

On the heels of Swift's massively successful Eras tour that boosted the economy of the host cities, the 33-year old queen of pop, who has been a professional entertainer since she was 16-years old, walked away with 10 trophies.

But even Swift's feat was topped by country singer Morgan Wallen who won in 11 categories.

        FYI: Complete list of Billboard Award winners.

The Asian nominees, all from South Korea, dominated the K-pop categories. Duh! Would it be possible for a non-Korean group to win in these categories?

With super group BTS sidelined for several reasons -- mandatory mlitary service and a desire to strike out as single artist -- perennial favorite BTS was not nominated in any category. That left the door oopen for other K-pop groups.

The girl group NewJeans was named the "Top Global K-Pop Artist" and favorite Black Pink won Top K-Pop Touring Artist.

Stray Kids, 5-STAR wonTop K-Pop Album, a new category specifically created for the Korean music artists.

The Filipino American nominees, not being White, Korean, Black, Latino or Indigenous failed to win in their respective categories. Olivia Rodrigo lost to Swift in the Top Female Artist category. Beyonce beat Bruno Mars as the Top R&B Artist.

It should be noted that the Billboard awards, started in 2003, is based on album and digital song sales, streaming, radio airplay, touring, and social engagement rather than artistry or by membership voting.

Breaking down the Billboard awards by race may not be fair except to point out that the group with the most discretionary funds to actually purchase music are Whites. However, the categories as designed by Billboard appear to be race specific without specifically mentioning race. 

So what about Fuerza Regida, which was named the Top Duo/Group? The Mexican American band is one of those exceptions that was so good it could not be overlooked.

Generally, in order to overcome accusations of a White-preference in the music industry, Billboard and the Grammys (which will be awarded next year) broke music into categories which were born out of racial environments.

It can't be denied that Rhythm and Blues came out of the Black experience, which gave birth to Rock, which today, ironically, is dominated by White males with giant  speakers. 

Country/Western, rightly or wrongly, with few exceptions is almost wholly White music that originated from poor White immigrants from Western Europe who settled in Appalachia. Although there are those who would strongly deny it, the genre has been heavily influenced by Black Gospel and the Blues. The banjo, the most distinctly musical instrument associated with that genre, after all, came out of Africa and popularized by Black slaves.

So-called Pop music, which has the potential of being a melting pot, is still mostly White, since Black artists are almost always placed in the R&B and Rap categories and Latinos shuttled into Latin genres (again, exceptions occur).

Artists like Rodrigo and Mars are the exception to these generalizations because, well, Billboard has the same problem as others in defining Filipinos. The Filipino talent, afterall, is to adapt to the surrounding environment. They are so good at adapting people it is awkward to put them into a music box. Are they really Asian? Are they Latinos of Asia? or Are the darker-skinned Filipinos and soulful artists the Blacks of Asia? 

Rodrigo, growing up in in Southern California suburbs,hones her musical roots in the angst-driven teen society of White suburbia.

Mars, who began his performing career as a mini-Elvis impersonator, knows that the roots of Elvis's music came from the Black artists that merged Gospel, jazz and the Blues.

For non-Whites to cross over into race-rooted musical genres is not easy; at least not as easy for Whites to go wherever they want. It requires that the artists of color to be so outstanding that they can't be ignored by the music industry. This is what happens whenever Mars comes out with a new album either as a single or as duo as he did when her partnered with Anderson Paak as Silk Sonic in 2021-2022 and in 2016-2017 when his 24-K Magic album swept almost all the R&B awards.

And you can be sure to see Rodrigo's presence at the Grammys and next year's Billboard awards after her second album,  Guts, with three hits, "Vampire," Bad Idea Right?" and "Get Him Back."  It appears that Guts will be as successful in sales as her breakout debut albur Sour and will likely be included as Album of the Year.

Race influences almost every aspect of American life, including the nation's music. That's not a bad thing, but it needs to be acknowledged, accepted and appreciated.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me at Threads.net/eduardodiok, @DioknoEd on Twitter or at the  blog Views From the Edge.

BTS confirms that they will serve in the South Korean military

K-pop's biggest star, BTS, will not avoid military service in South Korea.

K-pop supergroup BTS will serve in the South Korean military, says the boy band's management organization Big Hit.

Even though most of their songs are in Korean, the seven-member boy band has turned the world of entertainment on its head since its debut in 2013. BTS was the first South Korean musical group to win Grammy's and to make it to the top of the music charts in the US market.

Monday, South Korean music label Big Hit Music announced that the boy band will be going ahead with mandatory military service, starting with its oldest member Jin. Where then, does it leave the band and its fans?

Big Hit, says that BTS plans to come back together as a group "around 2025," after all seven members complete their service.

"Since the creation of BTS over ten years ago, the band has risen to international success, broken records, and catapulted K-Pop into the global stratosphere," Big Hit's statement reads in part.

"Big Hit Music has focused to the milestone moment when it would be possible to respect the needs of the country and for these healthy young men to serve with their countrymen, and that's now."

Big Hit says that the first BTS member to enter the military will be the group's oldest performer: Kim Seok-jin, who is known as Jin. The 29-year-old plans to enlist as soon as his solo project is rolled out later this month.

“Group member Jin will initiate the process as soon as his schedule for his solo release is concluded at the end of October. He will then follow the enlistment procedure of the Korean government. Other members of the group plan to carry out their military service based on their own individual plans,” stated a Big Hit press release

According to the Associated Press, Lee Ki Sik, the commissioner of South Korea’s Military Manpower Administration, told members of parliament on October 7 that it’s “desirable” for the seven BTS members to enlist for mandatory military service to ensure fairness in the system.

Under South Korea's mandatory conscription system, the country requires all able-bodied men to serve at least 18 months in the armed forces by age 28, because of the ongoing threats from North Korea. South Korea is technically still at war with North Korea. This is because the 1950-53 Korean War ended in an armistice and not a formal declaration of an end to the war by either side.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow @DioknoEd on Twitter.

BTS meets with President Biden to talk about inclusion and against anti-Asian hate

SCREEN CAPTURE / MSNBC

BTS held a brief press briefing before meeting with President Biden.

For a brief period Tuesday, the White House was the center of the BTS universe as the world's most popular K-pop band met with the most powerful leader in the world.

The seven-member boy band visited the White House to share their message against the anti)Asian epidemic.

Before meeting President Biden, the group met with the White House press corps

"Today is the last day of AANHPI Heritage Month, we join the White House to stand with the AANHPI community and to celebrate," band member Kim Seok-jin said through a translator.

The translator interpreted for Jimin, who said, "We were devastated by the recent surge of hate crimes including Asian American hate crimes. To put a stop on this and support the cause, we'd like to take this opportunity to voice ourselves once again."

"It’s not wrong to be different. I think equality begins when we open up and embrace all of our differences," added Suga.

The White House’s official video of a BTS-less briefing last Thursday, for instance, had garnered fewer than 16,000 total YouTube views as of Tuesday afternoon.

The White House’s official video of a press briefing usualy garners about 16,000 viewers. As BTS took the sstage, viewership shot up to 310,000.

BTS' meeting with the President in the Oval Office was closed to general media apparently because Biden's social media team wanted exclusive coverage. 

WHITE HOUSE

The wildly popular K-pop group, BTS, met with President Biden in the Oval Office.

During the brief meeting, the group expressed their dismay at the continuing hate directed at AANHPI and thanked him for signing the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act earlier this year.

In return, the President thanked BTS for their work and the use of their enormous platform to work against the anti-Asian attacks and xenophobia.

The group's visit with Biden was the latest example of this White House leveraging the power of celebrities to bring attention to key priorities. Last July, Olivia Rodrigo was enlisted to help promote COVID-19vaccinations.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow @DioknoEd on Twitter.

BTS named Time's 'Entertainer of the Year'

Although the boy band BTS is from Korea and most of their hits are sung in Korean, the wildly popular K-pop group is impacting Asian America.

Time writes: "For 28-year-old Nicole Santero, who is Asian American, their success in the U.S. is also a triumph of representation: 'I never really saw people like myself on such a mainstream stage,' Santero says. She’s writing her doctoral dissertation on the culture of BTS fandom, and she runs a popular Twitter account that analyzes and shares BTS data. 

“Anytime I’m awake, I’m doing something related to BTS,” she says. “This is a deeper kind of love.”

Even in this time of Covid-19 when concerts have been cancelled and large gatherings are discouraged, the group was able to introduce its first song performed in English, "Dynamite," which sprung into Billboard's No. 1. BTS' album containing the hit did the same. It was the first time in Billboard history that a group's song and album reached the No. 1 status in the same week.

Unless you've been living under a rock the last two years, you should know the members of BTS are: Jin, Suga, J-Hope, RM, Jimin, V and Jungkook.

BTS's fans, dubbed the Army, sing along with the group -- in Korean -- even though they can't speak a word of Korean. They have followed and supported the seven-members' groups social activism. When the group gave $1-million to Black Lives Matter, Army followed suit matching their idols.

When Donald Trump insisted in holding a rally in Tulsa, OK, the Army reserved thousands of tickets under fake names making it seem like Trump would fill the arena venue to capacity only to have less than a third of his supporters showed up.

“There are times when I’m still taken aback by all the unimaginable things that are happening,” BTS member Suga tells TIME later. “But I ask myself, Who’s going to do this, if not us?”

It is hard to deny the effect the group has on young female teens. The young men -- all in their mid-20s, with their dance choreography, mops of hair in various colors, slim physiques is creating a new image for Asian American men, who have long suffered under the stereotype of the asexual, neutered Asian man.

Shedding the novelty aspect of an Asian group breaking through the American music scene, BTS has broken through the racial barriers In an industry dominated by American gatekeepers.

"@bts_twt isn’t just the biggest K-pop act on the charts. They’ve become the biggest band in the world—full stop. Between releasing multiple albums and breaking every type of record in 2020, BTS ascended to the zenith of pop stardo," tweeted Time.

TGIF Feature: BTS breaks NPR viewing records to benefit public media

Public media stations got a pleasant surprise last Monday. BTS, the 7-member boy group who are the current kings of K-pop, appeared on National Public Radio's Tiny Desk concert and set a record for online viewership.

And BTS' fans, who call themselves the BTS Army, came through big-time and ended up donating generously to the NPR-affiliated PBS, Public Broadcasting Stations that aired the laid-back, intimate concert.

Public radio stations are independent operations and there’s no central database of donations, says NPR spokesperson Isabel Lara, who notes that the concert now has more than 6 million views online, and NPR Music got 100,000 new subscribers to its YouTube channel since Monday morning. The Tiny Desk concert broke the viewership record in just 25 minutes.

One doesn't usually associate K-Pop with PBS or NPR, which skew towards an oldr demographic, but the nonprofit media might reconsider their audience with the success of the BTS appearance.

BTS had intended to spend 2020 selling out arenas around the world, only to spend these last few months performing in isolation in their hometown of Seoul. It took a global pandemic to get on the group's schedule. 

Billie Eilish previously held the first-day Tiny Desk record for views, with 782,000 on the first day of her session. BTS had 700,000 views in the first 15 minutes the mini-concert was online, and more than 950,000 by end of the session, NPR’s Anais Laurent says.

Without their coordinated clothing and noted choreography, the Korean band dressed casually, seated in a row for their session, taped at the Vinyl & Plastic by Hyundai Card record store in Seoul. It was is also the first occasion on which the group performed its No. 1 hit, an upbeat, funky “Dynamite,” its first all-English recording with a live band. A couple of them couldn't sit still and had to get up and dance.

From there they went into a more mellow, ballad mode, with "Save ME," from 2016.

“It’s been the roughest summer ever,” BTS’s RM says in the session, “but we know that spring will come” before moving into another of their hits, “Spring Day.”

EDITOR'S NOTE: For those who might have missed the performance on Monday, enjoy:

Anecdotally, Lara says, people—many of them for the first time—definitely seem to be donating to say thanks for the concert, something they've been missing in these pandemic times.

Gabe Rosenberg, the digital news editor for Columbus, Ohio, NPR affiliate WOSU, encouraged the BTS Army to donate to public radio stations to say thanks.

Rosenberg’s social media quickly filled with responses from BTS fans saying they’d done exactly that, a phonomenon also experienced by other NPR affiliates such as the San Francisco-based KQED.

“My TweetDeck was relatively unusable for most of the day.” Rosenberg says the surge of contributions is especially welcome during an extremely trying time for local journalism. “One Tiny Desk concert can’t really reverse the effects of a pandemic on a local newsroom’s budget, but it does something to make you a little optimistic about why you’re doing what you’re doing.”

The donations are not new to the BTS Army. When BTS donated $1 milllion to Black Lives Matter, in 24 hours, the Army matched the donation. At every concert venue, the group donates a portion of their earnings to a local charity.

BTS makes big splash at MTV awards Sunday

SCREEN CAPTURE / MTV

BTS gave a high-energy performance of their newest hit "Dynamite" at the MTV Music Awards.

BTS, the K-pop boy group, continues to impact the American music scene proving they are no flash-in-the-pan wonder. 

AAPI presence in America's music world came from the Black Eyed Peas, who  introduced their newest member of the group, a Filipina singer now known as Jray-Soul and the Filipino American R&B artist H.E.R. won the Video for Good award.

RELATED: Who was that Filipina singing with the Black Eyed Peas?

The seven-member BTS from South Korea won three awards for “On,” which took best pop, best K-pop and best choreography (for Son Sung Deuk, Lee Ga Hun and Lee Byung Eun). The group also won best group.

The group aslo wowed with their performance of the English0language smash "Dynamite" in a -- rather appropriately -- video. Because of the coronavirus, the socially distanced annual awards show was part video, part virtual and part live performances from several locales.

The high-octane debut performance of "Dynamite" was the K-pop sensation's first-ever appearance at the MTV Video Music Awards.

The biggest winner of the evening was Lady Gaga who walked away with five awards, including the coveted Artist Of The Year and was awarded the first-ever Tricon Award for her art and philanthropic efforts.

The artists reminded the audience that the music artists were aware tthat heir platforms and performers were aware of and part of the social upheaval in today's world.

The show opened with host Keke Palmer giving a tribute to actor Chadwick Boseman, who died Friday (Aug. 28). 

Video Of The Year went to The Weeknd for ‘Blinding Lights’, who also won Best R&B for the same track. The star used both of his acceptance speeches to call for justice for Jacob Blake and Breonna Taylor.

SCREEN CAPTURE / YOUTUBE

H.E.R., otgehrwise known as Gabriella Wilson.

The Video for Good award went to the Filipino American artist, H.E.R. for her video "I Can't Breathe." She first performed the song on Juneteenth in honor of the slain George Floyd and released the video the next day. 

"Thank you so so much," said the artist in a pre-recorded video. "I can't believe I am winning the VMA. I am so proud to be a part of this category. All the other nominees were super dope. And I'm super proud of everybody speaking out on social injustice."

K-pop fans surprise US political establishment

ANALYSIS

American media and Washington DC-based pundits were caught by surprise when a new player in the political scene made its presence known last weekend.

K-pop fans embarrassed and stymied the Trump campaign when the candidate's rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma drew a paltry crowd 6,200 to the 19,000-seat BOT Center making the indoor venue appear empty.

Tik Tok Tlkers and K-pop fans took partial credit for the poor attendance. They said they registered for tickets using fake names and phone numbers  with no intention of attending the political rally meant to bolster Trump's flagging poll numbers.

Prior to the rally, Trump bragged about the million ticket requests and organizers planned for 100,000 to attend. 

To the uninitiated, political activism and K-pop, the musical genre emanating from South Korea, may seem to be an unlikely marriage.

But operating outside the bubble of politics and East Coast media giants that often sets the tone of national conversation, K-pop fandom has been quietly organizing and have set up a global network that has been spreading the political consciousness of the boy and girl groups known for their choreography and wholesome attractiveness. 

They were able to turn their social media savvy into an effective spamming machine that jammed up white supremacist hashtags and curtailed the attendance at the Tulsa rally.

When Texas police asked for personal videos of looting and violence that might occur during the demonstrations protesting the killing of George Floyd, videos of favorite K-pop groups showed up instead overloading the app.

They did the same thing on the hashtags generated by white supremacists in an attempt to drown out #blacklivesmatter. A counterattack of a flood of videos, fancams and memes of favorite K-pop groups rendered useless the hashtags #whitelivesmatter and #alllivesmatter. 

When BTS donated $1-million to the Black Lives Matter movement, the gorup's ARMY said "let's do this!" and raised a matching amount in less than 24 hours.

The social activism didn't come about overnight.

K-pop groups like BTS told its fans that instead of sending them presents, fans should donate to charities instead, a practice that began before BTS popularity went worldwide. At their concerts, BTS offers bins for donations for local charities.

After a decade of leveraging social media as a way to bring awareness to artists and using organizing fans to raise money for worldwide causes, K-pop fandom of individual groups are built around digital organization on a massive scale.

K-pop fan groups main purpose is to promote their favorite artists and their performances  through social media, by flooding the virtual world with photos, videos, memes, fancams and gossip. As a natural outcome of their tech-smarts and passion, they are in constant contact with each other.

So when it came to online organizing for something other than a concert or a new record release, like political causes, the virtual mechanism was already in place.

In the US, the K-pop fans have expanded beyond the Asian American fanbase to include other people of color and members of the LGBTQ communities. As a result, the political outlook leans to the politically progressive spectrum.

In addition, fans appear to acknowledge the deep roots in Black culture from which their favorite K-pop acts draw their music and choreography. Favoring Black Lives Matter and opposing Trump is not a far stretch for the passionate fans.

Whether they can turn that passion into results in the voting booth remains to be seen. Except in 2008 and 2012 when Barack Obama was running, the youth vote has been largely absent from the polls.

Political experts who could cite treaty minutia or quote verbatim the paragraph and line of court decisions, haven't been able to reach out to this particular demographic.

Through the Internet, K-pop fans -- as representatives of Gen Z -- have shown that young people do have political opinions and care which political candidates are elected. They care about racism and climate change. They want equal justice and world peace. They are angry at the world they are inheriting and disillusioned at what they see a failure of older generations to address the issues they feel are important.

The question remains: are they willing to act on their beliefs.

What's needed is a group like BTS to tell their ARMY in the US to go to the polls this November. An endorsement from K-pop idols could be enough to get this group of voters away from their computers and smartphones in order to stand in line to vote or to think months ahead of time to ask for a mail-in ballot. 

In a strangely fitting way, it would be another sign of the Alice-in-Wonderland world we live in today if K-pop fandom turns out to be the answer to the Russian and Chinese spammers and bots interfering with US elections.

Legions of K-pop fans turn to political activism to thwart Trump rally

TWITTER

While thousands of Trump supporters attended the Tulsa rally, it was far short of expectations.

UPDATED June 21, 2 p.m. to include final attendance numbers.

K-pop fans, known for their zealousness, weaponized their social media prowess against the Donald Trump campaign.

Instead of the hundreds of thousands expected at the Trump rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma Saturday, the 19,000 arena looked empty with only 6,200 in attendance and the preparations for the outdoor overflow went unused.

Part of reason for the low attendance at the BOK Center can be attributed to the alliance between fans of the Korean pop music genre, Tik Tok Talkers, Zoomers and other social media netizns who were urged to reserve tickets to the Trump campaign event on false accounts with no intention of attending.

Trump had boasted that millions of tickets were requested and the campaign prepared for a crowd of 100,000.

The anti-Trump campaign was done in secret and it wasn't until late Saturday did its effectiveness was shown when more than half the seats in the auditorium were empty.

Former Republican political strategist Steve Schmidt, an outspoken critic of Trump, tweeted on Saturday night: "My 16 year old daughter and her friends in Park City Utah have hundreds of tickets. You have been rolled by America's teens.

'@realDonaldTrump you have been failed by your team. You have been deserted by your faithful. No one likes to root for the losing team.'

Several young activists posted videos on social media encouraging other K-pop fans and TikTok users to request tickets using fake names and phone numbers, and even offered instructions on how to generate phone numbers using Google Voice and other internet-connected phone services.

“We all know the Trump campaign feeds on data, they are constantly mining these rallies for data,” Mary Jo Laupp, a former employee of Pete Buttigieg’s campaign for president, told the New York Times. “Feeding them false data was a bonus. The data they think they have, the data they are collecting from this rally, isn’t accurate.”

Schimidt added: "This is what happened tonight. I'm dead serious when I say this. The teens of America have struck a savage blow against @realDonaldTrump. All across America teens ordered tickets to this event. The fools on the campaign bragged about a million tickets. lol." 

Twitter users acknowledged the influence the young people had in fizzling out the Trump rally.

Fans of K-pop groups like BTS, Black Pink and other South Korean groups have been getting increasingly involved in American politics in recent months using their social media savvy and their globa network to support causes like Black Lives Matter and to overwhelm hashtags like #Allliesmatter and #Whitelivesmatter. 

After the Trump campaign solicited messages for the Trump's birthday on June 8, K-pop fans posted a ton of prank messages.

Click here to view some of the Tik Toc Talkers trolling Trump

Earlier this month, when the Dallas Police Department asked citizens to submit videos of suspicious or illegal activity through a dedicated app, K-pop Twitter claimed credit for crashing the app by uploading thousands of “fancam” videos of their favorite K-pop groups.

They also reclaimed the #WhiteLivesMatter hashtag in May, by spamming it with endless K- pop videos, making it harder for white supremacists and sympathizers to find one another and communicate their messaging.

After BTS, the immensely popular boy group, donated $1-million to Black Lives Matter aftre the death of George Floyd, within 24 hours, the group's fans matched the sum.

Whether it was a teenage prank or a political act, ithe K-pop fandom's influence and activism  caught the attention of US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, one of the savviest politicians using social media, who praised the Zoomers and K-pop allies involved in reserving tickets.

BTS nominated for three American Music Awards

By TenAsia, CC BY 3.0, Link

ASAM NEWS
International sensations BTS received three nominations from the American Music Awards this week, but many fans said they should have received more., the Hollywood Reporter said.

The Korean boy-band group has been nominated for “Tour of the Year”, “Favorite Social Artist”, and “Favorite Duo or Group-Pop/Rock”.

While some might feel that three nominations are a lot to receive, some fans of BTS actually feel that the group deserves more, according to Distractify.

After six years of touring, it has also been announced that the KPop band will be taking a break from music.

Apparently, being idolized by adoring fans and performing in front of thousands can be taxing.

Fans have no need to worry, as this has been expressed as just taking time to recharge, not a breakup.

"This period of rest will be an opportunity for the members of BTS...to recharge and prepare to present themselves anew as musicians and creators," the statement from TIME read.

The American Music Awards are set to take place on November 24.

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