#but fans want to see riize as seven

[bandzboy]

okay yes sm has released a statement about what has been going with riize and say they are gonna take action against people that have been invading their privacy (idk how much of this is true but anyways) my question is… why didn’t they do this with seunghan? they just put him on hiatus and then made him apologize they did nothing to protect him making it seem like he did something wrong i genuinely go crazy bc of this fucking company

[hongssimi]

don't wanna cry // hong seunghan

ᝰ synopsis .ᐟ seunghan didn't know how loved he was. he thought leaving was for the better. if only he had realised earlier, would things have changed?

ᝰ pairing .ᐟ hong seunghan x those who love him

ᝰ genre .ᐟ angst

ᝰ word count .ᐟ 1.4k+

ᝰ warning .ᐟ mentions of events from october 11th to october 13th including funeral wreaths, hate, bullying, and death threats

ᝰ author's note .ᐟ got on tiktok and got depressed, again. so i guess… here's an angsty, sad, and traumatic one shot that would probably make you cry. song recommendation while reading, seventeen's don't wanna cry.

i think it's better for the team if i leave.

seunghan didn't expect the amount of funeral wreaths left for him in front of his company's doorstep. piles, after piles, after piles of them. each more hurtful than the next.

"riize is 6"

"hong seunghan out"

"freeloader, get lost!"

"i respectfully pray for the peace of mind for the deceased"

respect? where was the respect in question? they were treating him as dead. a perfectly alive and breathing 21-year-old who had just celebrated his birthday just days prior. what had he done so bad to be treated like this?

his head was feeling so complicated. where exactly did he go wrong? he had discussed with the company and the members. they seemed to be in support of him coming back, despite the risks of losing the current fanbase that was built around the six members while he was on hiatus.

seunghan used to hear the members tell him stories in the dorms about their fans holding up banners with his face or slogans with the phrase "riize is seven". they would excitedly text him after performing, telling him that he shouldn't give up. everyone wanted him back. but he didn't believe them. he knew it was just make him feel better. or he thought he did.

walking away from the wreaths, the black-hooded boy headed towards his favourite space. his advertisement board at seoul forest station. a place of comfort. he remembered the very first time he had his face on the board was when he debuted. and then it appeared again in january. since then, it was always his face at that specific location in the station. fans nicknamed the location "seunghan's spot".

the last time he read the notes on the board, the words of support were so sweet. in those messages, fans really missed and cared for him. he was even approached by someone, giving him support and telling him to stay strong. that they would wait for him to come back.

seunghan's birthday board was fuller than ever. he almost couldn't see his face on the board. he just stood far away, staring at the countless amount of notes, feeling apologetic. seeing the backlash for the past two days, the company asked to meet with him, asking him if he was sure he wanted to stay.

seunghan wasn't sure why they asked him that. he was even more confused why they did nothing about the funeral wreaths outside the company. was it not illegal? he had so many thoughts, all left unanswered. where was the "family" that he thought there was, the reason to why he even decided to join this company?

seunghan was not a boy to be left alone. he was one to make rash decisions, and needed someone to hold him back. as an F, he needed his fellow F to empathize with him. he needed his Ts to ground him down that he should stay. but they weren't there.

all his bandmates could do was to post a thinkpiece on weverse, saying they convinced him to come back, in the midst of an overseas schedule. they thought long and hard about the decision and decided to risk it all. they were willing to get scolded for the post, willing to lose fans to be on stage again, but with him. but they got called liars, accused of having the post ghostwritten, words being put in their mouths that they never wanted him back.

seunghan felt guilty. the members never deserved the hate. they've achieved so much without him. he didn't want to ruin it by coming back. he put the members first, like the sweet boy he was.

he got in contact with the company. and that's when he realised he made a big mistake. hashtags were trending. boycotts were happening. protest trucks were driving in. in-person protests were held. international news were covering his story. he realised he was essentially coerced into leaving the team.

"no seunghan no riize"

"riize is seven"

"sm, why did you listen to the minority?"

"sm supports bullying"

"sm, where's the protection you said you would do?"

"sm, reveal the lawsuit processions. if you even did any, for the past 10 months."

there were much, much, more people anticipating his comeback. they were truly, supporting him. he never realised how much of a human rights issue the funeral wreaths were until it was pointed out. he never realised the company was all talk, no action. he was their artist, why didn't they post about filing lawsuits when they announced he came back?

seunghan realised his idea of the company's image being family was just extremely clouded. he finally understood what it meant when people said to never trust companies that market themselves as family.

at some point, at night, he was called to the company again. he was crossing the street, all covered up, when he saw someone with his photocard dangling on their bag. he lowered his cap, apologetically, knowing it was a fan who was probably hurt by him leaving. he didn't want to be recognised and hurt them further. he left quietly, heading into the company building.

he was told they would write up a notice about monitoring any slander written against him. until the notice was posted. did the company never wanted him back? how come his friends had ongoing lawsuits, but there was nothing in his notice? what about the past 10 months where people were saying just about anything? what about the person who lied about his ex-girlfriend being a minor? what about the person who invaded his privacy by leaking photos of his private life?

seunghan was honestly sick and tired of it all. he was always kind to everyone. hell, he was even kind to animals. he even bought a necklace to support a cause related to animals, even though he's afraid of all animals. what did he even do to deserve such treatment?

more projects came out. some were even writing public letters, making an e-book of letters for him. he read all of them. even those he couldn't understand. he just stared at the foreign words and smiled adoringly, knowing it was messages of good wishes for him.

some foreign fans even wrote in korean. some were in perfect korean while some were painfully obvious that it was translated by machine. seunghan tried his best to understand it all, and it was all so sweet.

"seunghan, i miss you"

"i miss you with rii7e"

"hani, i wish you stayed"

"seunghan-ie, i'm not crying so please come back"

"seunghan, come back before i steal sohee"

"seunghan, come back, let me lure you with crayon shin-chan merchandise"

some of the messages were truly hilarious. coping with sadness by being funny. he loved his fans. they were truly positive. their jokes made him smile.

"have you eaten? are you living well?"

"eat some rice, don't just eat bibimmyeon, okay?"

"are you doing well? i'm not doing so well, but i hope that at least you are"

"seunghan, we will always be proud of you. keep your head up"

"hani, don't apologise. you didn't do anything wrong."

"seunghan-ie, you were just a teenager who made some mistakes. we all have mistakes"

"seunghan, cheer up!"

"seunghan, we're always with you"

so many messages were concerned for him and his well-being. even though he knew that they weren't doing well either. they waited ten months and lost him just only after two days, without even getting to see his face.

one of the messages he read stuck to him, "i really want to cry, but if i cry now, i might not be able to see you at all. so i'll fight for you."

reading the messages just made him break down, and cry. guilt, apologetic, comforted, sorry, sad, happy... seunghan felt all kinds of emotions. he didn't want to cry, he wanted to pretend he was fine. but how was he supposed to be fine, when his fans were crying because their words of love weren't enough to make him stay?

he didn't know how to fix the problem. he didn't have much power. the last time seunghan came back, he was previously just on hiatus. this time, he had truly left the team. he wondered if he could even come back. at least to make briize — no, brii7e — happy? he just cried, cried, and cried. he didn't know how to make it a happy ending.

why didn't he hold on just a bit longer?

why couldn't he see the amount of support he had this whole time?

if he knew, would things have turned out differently?

why didn't i realise sooner?

✶⋆.˚꩜ AFTERTHOUGHTS .ᐟ˙⋆✶ i'm crying as i write this. seunghan, i miss you so bad. how are you? are you eating well? you are so strong. i'm sorry i couldn't do more to protect you. just know that i will always be proud of you, always. and so will all brii7e and hongjjanggus. we love and miss you so much.

✶⋆.˚꩜ PERMANENT RII7E TAGLIST .ᐟ˙⋆✶ [OPEN]

do not repost works © hongssimi

[yutasbellybuttonpiercing]

I am admittedly a little hesitant about the boycotting RIIZE part of boycotting SME as a whole. Don’t get me wrong, I understand the logic of it all and how this could give SME a nudge, but I also worry a bit about how the other members would feel seeing their numbers go down; I don’t want them to get down by the fact that people are boycotting them when they did nothing wrong. I’m not really sure what to do☹️

believe me, the members understand. wonbin actively posted that he and the other members want seunghan back just as much as we do, and they may or may not be dropping hints left and right that they believe riize is seven. i get the sentiment, but i'm strongly advocating for the boycott.

it might seem like it's just about getting justice for seunghan, which it is, but it could also have a huge impact on the entire industry in terms of normalizing dating among idols and a wake up call for delusional fans and other companies who treat idols as nothing but products to make money from.

idols are humans too, and they deserve to be protected, respected and treated as human beings that are allowed to live their lives. it would create a space for idols to make "mistakes" (i don't want to call it that because i do not see smoking and dating as mistakes, but you get the point) and not be shamed and hated for it to the point of having to leave their group or the industry entirely. in the end, they're just young people with a dream, and who are we as fans to crush them just because of something that everyone else does every single day.

by boycotting riize and sme, we have the chance to make a better future for every single idol. even if they found the decrease in followers and streams a little saddening, the end goal is getting them their friend back and making the world a better place, and that would mean much more to them than money and fame. they understand.

[kl125]

I’m not even a BRIIZE, and I usually don’t use this account for my kpop stuff, but this whole Seunghan/RIIZE situation genuinely has me pissed off. That man did NOTHING wrong. He smoked a cigarette and had a girlfriend, both BEFORE HE DEBUTED! Okay…and…? Why should that matter? That’s his life. Those are his choices. Idols are not our virtuous, innocent dolls to be packaged and sold to the masses. They are HUMAN BEINGS who deserve the freedom to live their private lives however they choose. To be essentially bullied out of a group when the other six members wanted him there and were supporting him is vile. And to make these announcements and decisions when the other members were out of the country and couldn’t immediately come to his defense is repugnant.

And before you jump in and say, “Leaving was his choice,” yes, that’s true, but judging from his statement, he felt like that was his ONLY option. He didn’t see any other solution. SM did not protect him from the hate. They KNEW there would be immediate backlash based on how this situation has unfolded from the beginning, but they should have also known it would eventually die down. They should have stood behind their choice to bring him back, and given him the support and protection he deserved. Once again, HE DID NOTHING WRONG EVEN FROM THE JUMP!

Instead, SM caved immediately to the demands of toxic OT6 stans rather than listening to the overwhelming support of actual BRIIZEs and the general public. It took hours for those funeral wreaths to be removed, and not before Seunghan was made to walk through them, ALONE I might add. I get that the OT6 “fans” were loud, but given time, they would have found a new “issue du jour” and moved on. That’s how it always works with toxic fans.

Anyway, SM sucks, I feel awful for the members, especially Seunghan, and RIIZE is SEVEN!

[ddodol]

hope everyone's doing well <3 it took me some time to come to this conclusion, and trust me when i say that i've thought about this a lot.

this past month has been a downward spiral ngl and i believe people are rightfully mad, although some are directing their anger towards people that don't deserve it. i want to fight for what i believe is a blatant mistreatment but i feel like my love for the group has gotten to a point where i only feel hurt and disappointment, and that's the last thing i want to experience as a fan. i would also like to move on, but accepting this new chapter is going to be difficult for me as well.

i still maintain the fact that i love all members equally, may it be the current or former member(s). i want to be stubborn and continue writing for all seven but i'm afraid it'll only add to my heartbreak. if i were to trust what i understood from anton's speech, albeit heavily censored, i want to respect their decision to move forward. if i didn't take his words at face value, i'd be no different from the people that refused to hear out the members' decision or even wonbin's letter.

like i said before, i will be waiting for the day when i can freely laugh and enjoy riize with only six members. i can only support them from afar for now, but know that i still love the boys with all my heart :((

(re: plans for this blog + some announcements, read if you'd like)

on that note, since i am an nsfw blog (and i know this is kinda inappropriate to add at the end so i put it under the cut), i will still be writing the remaining two weeks for last month's kinktober because i want to see it through, along with one fluff headcanon. it will also be the last two fics i will write for seunghan until i decide to write for him again whether it's as a solo act or him being back in riize, who knows. after all of that, do expect me to be inactive on this blog for a while. i might focus on writing for eunseok and maybe other members whenever i have one ready, but for now, i think i will be branching out to other groups or my other biases.

i don't want to link my other writing blog yet because there's nothing there but if you see me around, you'll know it (i hope). and if you do recognize me, come say hi <3

[violettkoala]

This is going to be long as hell because I need to rant lol.

I've been trying to think why this whole situation with Riize is stressing me so much since I didn't really ever considered myself a briize, and the conclusion is that is it unfair. The whole thing is too unfair.

I truly believe Sunghan won't come back. I would be happy as hell if he did but given how fucking psychotic and batshit crazy those OT6 k-briizes are, I don't see how he would want to come back to that environment. Even if the rest of the members want him to come back, which I am sure they do.

I now truly believe that that pussy ass bitch of a company that is SM never intended for him to return and decided to announce his return as a distraction from what is happening with T**il and they just wanted to see if the Korean fans would complain or not. And as soon as they started complaining, they made him leave the group. The fact that the members were clearly excited for Sunghan to return, and the fact that everyone could see how distressed they were at the airport. It hurts. And I genuinely don't know how any of the 7 members will heal from this and trust those so-called "fans".

Sadly SM, and other companies tbh, don't care about international fans, they never did, and they never will. They just see us as a way to make more money. So as happy as I am to see all the international fans, not only briizes but K-pop fans in general, demanding his return. I don't think it will ever happen.

At least Seunghan can somewhat move on from this and heal. But the other members, knowing that they have to deal with that fandom that will hunt them down for literally anything they do (I've heard that they are going for Eunseok now for god knows what reason) I actually feel bad for them. Having to see those fans in person and pretend like everything is fine like Seunghan was never part of the group. It is all so fucked up tbh. and the whole reason is that SM is incapable of handling these types of situations, they are so bad at it that it's actually baffling. How they can create the best kpop groups and yet treat them like utter shit, They've done it with every single group they've debuted.

Honestly, the whole kpop in general has become a shitshow and it's not enjoyable anymore.

So yeah, I hope the international fans and the seven members heal from this in some way. But as optimistic as I want to be, I don't think things will get any better.

And for those Korean ot6 stans that were sending death threats to Seunghan, I truly hope that once their frontal lobe fully develops and realize the magnitude of their actions, they will find the nearest wall and hit their head on over and over again.

[junhuiste]

honestly…moving forward i don’t think i’ll be able to engage with riize the way i have been. when i say riize i mean the group as a whole with its promotions, management etc, not the other 6 boys themselves. like the institution ?? of riize ?? if that makes sense lol. i didn’t even bias seunghan and i actively kept up with the group during his hiatus, but at this point, i just can’t look at their content without feeling melancholic about it. maybe that’ll change in the future but i don’t know.. knowing that the members were supportive and encouraging of his re-integration and now seeing them walk through the airport so bleakly, that they weren’t there with him when the departure announcement dropped, is so upsetting like my heart genuinely hurts for all of them.

and i think the most cruel part is that seunghan’s decision to leave wasn’t even fully on his terms—sm neglected to protect him and could’ve prevented a lot of damage (granted there will still be a great deal of it regardless) up until this point. they cornered him when he was alone while his members were promoting overseas and left the six of them to deal with that news on a plane ride back where they’d be bombarded with cameras flashing in their faces. riize became one of my ults fairly quickly and i’ve been a fan of sungtaro since 2020 but if i stayed an active briize and interacted with their content normally i’d just be thinking “god they don’t wanna do this fucking shit” when it pertains to fan events (fan signs/calls, concerts, etc). and obviously so many idols put up a front with fan events even if they don’t want to because it’s their job but in riize’s case it’s just….how can they ever look at their fans the same way again knowing they forced their friend and fellow member out? that they can’t step out of line in any way and one misstep means they’re next on the chopping block. the whole thing just sets a dangerous precedent for the rest of the group and i feel so sad for all seven of them.

with the boycott, i can’t say i’m for or against it right now. he’s not coming back to the group…but also lack of sales sends a message (orbits seriously deserve their flowers for standing on their business boycotting bbc post chuu’s exit…like it was so powerful to see that a kpop boycott actually did something)...but it’s sm and unfortunately i’m pink blooded so obviously i know that company has a history of blacklisting people. and even though it’s a totally different case from riize, as a fan of hybe groups, seeing the backlash over the hybe boycott (which if it isn’t clear i 10000% support) has me so pessimistic. hybe hasn’t seen a single cent from me in the longest time but apparently that’s controversial but i digress. edit: i’m leaning towards boycott!

lastly i wish seunghan the utmost peaceful healing journey after all of this. while there’s good intentions i see no point in asking for him to come back to the group. he walked through a parade of wreaths protesting his very existence so how can you expect him to come back to the group, do promotions and fan calls and see those very fans that wished death upon him? even if a million ot7 truthers outnumbered the ugly antis, the people dancing to siren in front of his wreaths and laughing, seunghan shouldn’t be expected to face them ever again. like i don’t know guys this is a real human being who people wanted dead for doing nothing wrong and now his friends have to cater to and be a puppet for such people. i still love riize and all its members and i want to support them so bad but i think i can only do so from a far far distance. goodbye for now briizeville!

[evnseokz]

hey everyone,

i want to address something that’s been weighing heavily on me. i apologize for not speaking up sooner; i've been trying to collect my thoughts and express my feelings clearly. when the notice first came out, i felt a surge of anger, and that emotion hasn’t subsided. i believe it’s absolutely inhumane and irresponsible of SM to allow this situation to unfold. it’s beyond me why the wreaths weren’t taken down immediately or why legal action wasn’t initiated. i can’t shake the feeling that we failed seunghan, and i wouldn’t blame riize if they held some resentment towards us.

that said, i recognize that not all of us are responsible for this, especially since international fans have shown nothing but support. i think it’s crucial to voice our anger and to use our platform effectively. however, i also believe a boycott is necessary to make our stance clear. i want to clarify that i will NOT be unstanning riize. they need our support now more than ever, and i can only imagine how this affects all the members.

i will be boycotting SM by refraining from purchasing anything from them, streaming their artists, or engaging with their social media. my commitment to supporting riize and seunghan remains unwavering, no matter what path he chooses. i truly hope we can reach SM about this, and while it may seem daunting, i hold out hope for Seunghan’s return. i genuinely believe that if they had given things more time, the hate would have subsided, though i respect seunghan’s decision.

as for my writing, i plan to continue supporting all seven members. however, it pains me to see them in any context right now, so i might take a short break from writing for them until i can reconnect with their content joyfully. i will still try to remain active and continue writing for enha during this time. i hope you all understand my decision, and i genuinely hope for better days ahead.

thank you for your understanding, and take a break from this if you need it <3 feel free to dm me if you want to talk.