I'm tired of the herd mentality winning. The defamation against Min Heejin is so low and performative that it has genuinely triggered social anxiety in me as a creative. The fear that any artistic choice I make can be completely distorted by narratives pushed by an audience eager to find a new villain to cancel, armed with their Wikipedia-level knowledge. ALL the speculations about Min Heejin being a pedophile come from a single poisoned seed. But once the soil is contaminated, everything that grows in it is tainted. Every idol who has worked with her has spoken positively of her,Taemin, for instance, who accepted awards in her name (before the chaos with HYBE, MHJ was always reluctant to be in the spotlight), Yeri’s support was twisted by the public because of an emoji. Krystal openly expressed her affection for MHJ several times in various interviews, even celebrating her birthday with her, as several photos show. Now let’s talk about the accusations: the so-called "romanticization of pedophilia" was quickly turned into “she is a pedophile.” But none of these claims hold up. Min Heejin is 45 yo. Her youth was in the 80s and 90s. The sensationalized reaction to a Brooke Shields photo was deeply malicious, just like the outrage over certain artworks. It’s twisted and unhealthy to be incapable of separating imagery from history. Do you research the historical context of every image you find on Pinterest? Moodboards are a thing of aesthetics. The vintage girlhood aesthetic represents freshness, youthfulness,a type of beauty that can be sexualized, but that depends on the viewer’s gaze. Lolita lying under a water spray is just a girl on the grass, portrayed by a beautiful use of colors & light, as itself it's just a beautiful and innocent view but the disturbing tone comes from the director’s pov that has to convey the eye of the male lead, not from the subject herself. Min Heejin is an aesthete being crucified by the 2.0 bigotry of our times, where people mask ignorance with a superficial intellectualism that lacks real culture, debate, and study, emotional outrage with no sense of consequence. And when someone takes their own life because of false accusations - oh, the internet - YOU are the internet. Some people say, “Better safe than sorry.” But what if your way of “being safe” is the death of somebody? your cure is the poison. Take Cookie, for example. That controversy exposed the close-mindedness of the international market, which seems to forget it's consuming a Korean product and that globalization has not flattened culture. “But the lyricists speak English” yes, two Swedish writers and one Korean. Of course they’d need to understand American slang...this american ethnocentrism is so toxic, why must everything be read through the American lens? Min Heejin wanted to build a transparent and ethical environment with ADOR. Other companies would’ve gone silent or posted a vague Instagram statement. ADOR published full-length documents. But once people have nailed you to the cross, it's uncomfortable for them to do a step back. Nobody want to feel like a culprit or a stupid, so it's always all in. Moreover, official planning documents about NewJeans’ debut concept confirm that the group was never directed toward questionable themes or markets. Quite the opposite. The reality is that Min Heejin is being condemned for having a taste for a nostalgic, vintage youthfulness, (like many others giver the success of her work) something she herself lived through. And everything is twisted to paint her as some kind of deviant. Art will always be controversial, our society is not a monolit, but controversial does not mean guilty. Unlike other CEOs, there isn’t a single accusation she has refused to respond to. That’s the point: she has always strived for transparency. The HYBE case is proof of this. The first 2024 press conference, with full English subtitles available on Tikkitokki’s YouTube channel, is something a guilty person could never have pulled off. No delays, no prep time, just a raw, immediate press conference the day after the audit. People mocked her flood of words and emotion, gosh a human being human, but what they really revealed was moral integrity and a powerful sense of justice, not just for herself but for her entire team. She privately raised concerns to HYBE (a fact) shared by choreographers and NewJeans' parents, but the public reduced her leadership and care to egotistical drama. And speaking of parents, so much talk about minors and protection, yet when a CEO actually builds open, ongoing relationships with both idols and their families, it's suddenly called grooming? “If she were a man” but she’s not. Creatives, idols, and families have shown her their full support. Yet people on the outside arrogantly claim to know better, accusing her of brainwashing simply because every new piece of information continues to prove that Min Heejin is not the monster your justice-fueled entertainment fantasies demand. She’s a woman highly skilled at her craft, trying to build a cleaner system rooted in organic growth, high-level creativity, and the treatment of idols as human beings—respected, heard, and supported. Because listening to them means valuing their vision, not treating them like dolls to be rebranded every three months with a new concept. PLEASE, stop being swayed by the noise. Stay lucid. Be vocal. Let’s bring the narrative back to fairness and reality. The level of defamation here is inhumane. We don’t know her personally and even if we did, it wouldn’t change the core truth: people are mutable beings. She could one day become the next Neil Gaiman, just like anyone else could, but this possibility does not stop our support for the people around us who we consider valuable. We must stay grounded in reality, in context, and in fairness. Because this kind of airy condemnation is a dangerous game, a fire anyone could one day throw at us regardless of fairness. Right now, Min Heejin public reputation journey feels like a Black Mirror episode. So ask yourself, what is your stand and what kind of print are you living online? are you conscious of its consequence? If she will ever do something despicable I'll drop my support in 1 second, but until that moment I'm seeing a valuable creator that could revive a toxic industry being treated unfairly beyond measure and I wonder, if the internet is chewing her like this, distorting reality, who is safe? I'll attach a MHJ lecture excerpt. It's hard to change the mind of a polarized mob...before commenting, take a moment to reflect. https://preview.redd.it/a18wk3gj01ef1.jpg?width=1408&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ec40a54698312c34f00ea790649a0a284106db25 submitted by /u/VastEffective112 [link] [comments]
