The K-pop music industry is one that took the world by storm in recent years through the mainstream media. From catchy songs to the perfect-looking idols, what’s not to love? Apparently, quite a lot. Here are just some of these things that you may not know about the industry:

TRAINEE LIFE: The experience starts immediately with trainees. After becoming one of the few who actually get accepted in auditions out of hundreds upon thousands of people, they spend hours training with the constant worry of being cut and the fleeting hope that they’ll debut. It’s an even tougher experience for foreign idols who had to leave their families and come overseas to pursue their dreams only to suffer harsher training conditions because they aren’t Korean.

THE IMAGE - BODY: What’s more is the pressure of being perfect. The image. Entertainment companies in Korea have actually developed a formula for calculating the ideal weight for a female idol—the person’s height in centimeters minus 120 is the ideal weight in kilograms. This means that if a woman is 163 cm (5’4”), then her weight should be less than or equal to 43 kilograms (94 lbs), 16 lbs less then a healthy weight for someone of that height. Trainees are weighed on a weekly basis to check if they are meeting the “goal” weight. Some go to such an extent that they end up starving themselves and suffer through diets with freakishly low amounts of calories such as the “Momo diet” named after a trainee who ate only ice cubes a week and lost 15 lbs before her debut.

THE IMAGE - FACE: Along with a perfect figure, your face has to meet Korea’s toxic beauty standards. You must have a small face, v-shaped jawline, full lips, big eyes, aegyo-sal, pale skin, a small nose, a thin and high nose bridge, double eyelids, straight eyebrows, and clear skin. Some companies will pressure idols to get plastic surgery to meet these standards if they haven’t already done it of their own accord but due to its normality, some idols will get surgery on their own also because of the pressure to uphold this perfect image.

DOUBLE STANDARDS: Accompanying the perfect image expected by the fans and company, there are also the set double standards for idols, although they are mostly directed towards female idols. Body shaming - For idols, there is a stressed importance placed on having a perfect body figure. When male idols gain weight, fans say, “They look sexier,” but when female idols gain weight, they are quickly pressured to lose it because they look “fat.” There is even a formula for female idols’ weight and they are under close monitoring as trainees, but males don’t have a specific limit.

Another example is when male idols go through plastic surgery before their debut, it is brushed off as “puberty” whereas when females do, they’re called “addicted plastic monsters” by the fans.

SCANDALS: Many idols get placed into false dating scandals for things as small as simply making eye contact during an award show. Fans will also deliberately search for male and female idols both visiting the same monument around similar times and try to make it into something it might not be. Then there are bullying scandals. Usually, it’s either the idol being accused of harassment by supposed former classmates or the idol being accused of supposedly bullying the staff. Sometimes cases are proved false and sometimes they are proved true. Either way, the idols are forced by the company to release an apology. There are also “pick me” scandals where idols are accused of being too cute for attention. In one case, an idol ate a strawberry with two hands and received a lot of backlash for it. Another idol received hate for singing and dancing to another group’s song on VLIVE because fans said that she was acting “fake” and “cringe.” There are also lazy dancing scandals that happen when an idol doesn’t give full energy into the performance. They are usually because of exhaustion, sickness, or injury. Ignorant netizens plaster fancams all over social media platforms which leads to idols being heavily criticized.

SEXUALIZATION: In addition, Idols are very sexualized by the media and fans. More specifically, those who are minors, as there has been a rise in younger people debuting. If you want more information on this, then check out this article. Not only are they sexualized onstage, a 17-year-old idol went through a security check and was inappropriately treated by a security staff member who recognized him and was seen giggling and behaving unprofessionally. Hyein & the cookie controversy

EFFECTS: As you can imagine, this all takes a huge toll on the idols, who are just normal people. On one end, there is crying on stage which they only receive more hate for, or fainting during performances due to exhaustion. Sometimes, idols have to miss concerts and go on hiatuses due to health issues caused by the previous factors. In some cases, depression as a result from netizens and trolls negativity towards them, leads to suicide. An idol’s recent death has brought attention to the suicidal trends by young K-pop idols such as Sulli who hanged herself in October of 2019 at the age of 25. Only a month later, her close friend Goo Hara also committed suicide.

Clearly, the KPOP industry is much more complex than it seems.