K-Pop Called Out for ‘Slave-Like Exploitation’ By North Korea

A North Korean propaganda website has accused South Korea’s K-pop industry of treating popular groups such as BTS and Blackpink like “slaves.”

“Slave-like exploitation”: In an article published on March 13, the North Korean propaganda website Arirang-Meari claimed that K-pop record labels are exploiting young artists, according to NK Economy.

These artists are also allegedly “deprived of their body, heart and soul.” They sign contracts at a young age and are “treated as slaves by malicious and corrupt entertainment industry conglomerate bosses,” NK News reports.
In addition to this mistreatment, the Arirang-Meari article declares that K-pop record labels “suck most revenues out of the singers under a nominal purpose of using the money to train them,” according to The Korea Times.

The beginning of the Arirang-Meari article via NK Economy

Ongoing speculation: The reasons behind the publication of this article are still unclear.

Foreign media is not freely available to most North Korean citizens.
However, some of them find ways to smuggle media such as TV shows, movies and music into their country, CNN explains.
Sang-sin Lee, a research fellow at the Korea Institute for National Unification, told NK News that publishing Arirang-Meari’s article might be something North Korean propagandists did to crack down on foreign media.
Lee speculates that North Korea is “working on producing some sort of counterintelligence, claiming that these popular songs are being made under poor conditions — ‘slave-like’ exploitation of young trainees.”

South Koreans react: Several K-pop fans shared their thoughts on the Arirang-Meari article on social media.

According to The Korean Times, one of these fans wrote that “Kim Jong-un must be an avid K-pop fan. Maybe he doesn’t want to reveal that so he wants his people to distance themselves from K-pop while he can enjoy it secretly?”
Another fan wrote, “K-pop must be on fire in North Korea right now, mesmerizing North Korean youths and all.”
As of this writing, well-known K-pop labels such as YG Entertainment, SM Entertainment and Big Hit Entertainment have yet to publicly address Arirang-Meari’s article.

Feature Image via Getty

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