I'm a straight, teenaged, girl living in California (US), but I get so pissed when I look at stuff about KPOP, and I see the most homophobic, ignorant comments! These people act as if it is impossible to be gay in Korea, that it is unspeakable.

I have one thing to say to these people: Hong Suk Chun.

I love him! He is so freaking ground-breaking! He is like the only out man in Korean show business. He is so awesome.

However, these people do not piss me off as much as others. I understand that some people are just so extremely homophobic, and there is nothing I can do about it except try to change their views with my words. The people that really piss me off however are two different categories.

1. The 'criminal' profiler

These people are the type that seeks out information on their idols, and 'defends' them to anyone who mentions anything about their idols being or seeming gay. These people act as if being gay is wrong, and get extremely offended if you say something like that about their idol. They act as if you just accused them of murder or something. It is ridiculous. I admit that not everyone who denies their idols being gay is rude, and in a sense they are right because most people are firstly under the impression that people are straight before they even know (with certain exceptions). But if you think about it, this is very wrong as well. It is like people are "Innocent until proven guilty" when it comes to being straight or gay which brings me back to the sometimes unintentional criminalization of homouals.  It is just how societies everywhere primarily are I am sad to say. I understand that we want to get away from the stereotype of the flamboyant gay man and masculine lesbian, but these people are not seeing it like that. They think that saying that someone is gay is rude and disrespectful like it is wrong to be that way. There is a constant tension between the homoual stereotypes and people's view of the world in which they assume that everyone they meet is straight.

2. The hypocritical fan

I seriously find these people disgusting. These are the fans that love their fan-service, but are actually extremely homophobic. They take the word hypocrite to a whole new level. I find it astounding how some of these people get all excited when male idols do something flirty with other male idols, but the actual idea of two men being together disgusts them. I seriously stare in awe at some of these people's comments. They 'fan-girl' over skin-ship, but if anyone says anything about them being or acting homoual they say things like "Oppa would never be gay; that's gross!". Maybe I am overreacting, but when read thing like this I want to seriously punch these girls. I start to imagine them saying it in their disgusting 'cute' voice, and I just get so angry.

I admit that when I talk to people who are new to KPOP, my explanation for the way the boys act is "a mixture of fan-service and social norms of Korea" because that seems like the most unbiased, open point of view. It is a statement that would not offend anyone which is my intention.

However, there are some exceptions to the social norms of Korea in the case of KPOP like for example people who are not originally from Korea like for example Kevin from U-Kiss. He has shown significant characteristics of the 'stereotypical gay man' as per American views, but it does not mean that necessarily that he is gay. I have met feminine men, or 'divas', and masculine women, or 'Tom boys', that are straight.

I have also heard that KPOP stars get a significant amount of money for fan-service which may possibly give more affirmation that KPOP idols' skin-ship may be fake, but it doesn't not explain some idols' behavior where they are not on a television show or at a performance. The fact is that there is never a real way to determine anyone's true uality. That is something only the person in question would know and sometimes not even then. A person could deny their uality their whole life simply out of fear. Fear of society. A person in Korea could be fired simply because they are gay and no one would care because there is no law against it (in Korea). I feel that in societies like this, most gay people would just decide to live a lie rather than risk everything that they have worked for. We just can't be so determined to discover someone's uality and put labels on it because love isn't that simple at least I think so.  You really don't know what you like until you actually fall in love.

In my view, a perfect world is one without labels, where you just love who you love, and we no longer rely on what attracts us to define who we are as people. Because it really doesn't matter who you are - or think you are - attracted to: it matters who you fall in love with. 

Well, I could continue but this is a long rant, so I am just going to end it here.

<3 you if you read the whole thing!