#if i see any of THOSE shipper after the movie i will kms | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

blarhiv · 5 years ago

Text

Pre-Debut Fan on Shipping and KM

Guys,one wonderful Anonnie decided to bless us with so well written article.So,please,read it <3

Anonnie,thank you for sharing with us your thoughts!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

BE WARNED VERY LONG SHIPPING/KM POST AHEAD!!!!

First of all, I just want to clarify that I’m a KM supporter. By my current understanding and my own personal definition, this is to say that that while I believe in the possibility of these two individuals being in a real-life relationship, I am at peace with the reality that it is also conceivable that they are merely very close, wonderful friends. I will get to KM a bit later, but I first want to go through some general commentary on the statement of the fandom in regards to shipping first. I’ve tried to be as respectful as I could and so, things have gotten quite lengthy indeed.

PART 1: Shipping and Fandoms

Shipping Wars

My first point of major contention lies in shipping wars—in quick and easy summation, I truly really fail to understand shipping wars.

It doesn’t quite make sense to me that there are individuals warring over which ship is real when, no one in the band has ever confirmed a heterosexual relationship, never mind an in-band relationship. So, why fight about it when we can enjoy the lovely bonds between human beings and celebrate good, ostensibly healthy relationships?

If shippers were really into their “ship” (for lack of better terminology) for the bond between those two people, I feel that it is imperative to acknowledge what complete injustice one is doing by participating in something so meaningless and hateful as shipping wars.(Now, despite my refusal to get involved in shipping wars, I do empathize and understand those combating the wretched comments and criticisms these toxic individuals in the fandom say about undeserving band members. But I still do implore people not to argue over with some of these hyper-volatile, toxic individuals about why their perspective is inherently flawed because these people are highly unlikely to entertain a healthy, open discourse about a difference in opinions.)

And at the point where shippers are determined to evince the realness of their ship, I think their intentions are automatically highly suspect.

Why?

If one is truly trying to celebrate the connection, the supposed love, and the affection of said ship, there absolutely shouldn’t be a pressing need or compulsion to prove others wrong for not sharing the same perspective as yours.

At that point, it becomes less about a celebration of love and more about selfish gratification—whatever it is that may be incentivizing said shipper (And there are, unfortunately, a plethora of self-serving reasons people ship which are not limited to the fetishization of gays/Asians, the determination not to have their dreams of being with a band member to be shattered by their significant other being a female, the egotistical compulsion of needing to be “right”, etc.). And if one is shipping with the genuine intentions of supporting a potentially LGBTQ band member or generally supporting two humans demonstrating great love (whether it presents itself in a platonic or romantic expression), it needn’t matter what the label or status of that relationship is.

So, if one is supporting with selfless intentions and a sincere desire to see members happy, there’s no point of arguing about the “realness” of a ship because at the end of the day, all the ships in the band are real—because they all have honest, genuine relationships with one another as friends. Shipping Real People

This is also a highly controversial subject and I believe it is mainly due to the lack of boundaries people have set in place when they participate in shipping real people.

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with real people ships—but only under great constraints and self-monitoring. Most people who ship real people do so because human beings are naturally drawn to and attracted to love—that is to say, people love love. That’s why people enjoy romantic movies and relationships between characters on television shows. That’s why writers like to write about love and photographers take pictures of things and people they love.

However, the problem lies in people who take liberties with how seriously they can invest into a real person ship or how entitled they begin to feel towards someone else’s life.

This is where para-social relationships come into place—through the use of social media, fans are given ultra personal ways to interact with celebrities causing them to believe that they’re connected to their idols despite the reality that it is a one-way relationship. These celebrities do not know you—and therefore, they owe you absolutely nothing in regard to their personal life. And so, I absolutely do not condone writing or tagging or demanding things from any real-life ship (ie. VLives, Twitters, fan meets, InstaLives, etc.) where one could be causing the human being distress or pressure. They are, at the end of the day, real people with real feelings and real lives—and we, as fans or spectators at best, are simply entitled to no components of their life.

I think there are instances that you can comment on a celebrity’s life and have it be a perfectly innocuous encounter. For example, it’s quite alright to appreciate and feel second-hand joy at seeing two people whom one respects and follows as a fan looking happy with their potential partners (as in the case of KM) or commenting supportively on a confirmed real-life couple’s Instagram photos (Justin and Hailey Bieber, Michelle and Barak Obama, Hyuna and E’Dawn, Cara Delevine and Ashley Benson, etc.). Feeling joy at seeing someone else happy or commenting something cute and chill on a real-life couple’s picture doesn’t cost anything nor does it harm anyone. But if you, as a fan, begin to demand things from said people if the real life couple breaks up (Justin Bieber-Selena Gomez, Cole Sprouse-Lili Reinhart, etc.) or you hate the real significant other after one half of a popular ship is revealed to be dating someone else (Zendaya-Tom Holland-anonymous girlfriend), that’s when you’ve got a real problem and you need to reassess what you’re doing. If you are going to ship a real-life ship, do it sensitively—don’t personally bother these people with your unsolicited advice and woes, they don’t care about your ships, they just want to live their lives.

Fetishization and Homophobia

Another deeply problematic that comes with the shipping territory is the fetishization.

There are, unfortunately, many fans that like the idea of a real ship right up until the point there’s a possibility where the members might actually be part of the LGBTQ community. It’s sexy and sensual, a “guilty pleasure”, to imagine the idea of gays, but the actual concept of homosexuality as a real part of someone’s identity is somehow unacceptable to many fans. This is definitely a problem in the Asian music industry.

While girls fawn over the boy-boy interactions on stage, these same young women are equally likely to be disgusted by the existence of actual homosexual men trying to celebrate their love on the streets—and the KPop industry feeds into this by via methods like encouraging fan service between members or the Pepero game.

This is deeply disheartening as there are, without doubt, LGBTQ members in this industry—we may not know them by name or face (aside from Holland), but they certainly do exist. And how sad is it to imagine that the closest to acceptance these human beings will ever attain for their sexual preferences is on stage for the gratification of fans who won’t even support them if they actually come out? If you only enjoy same-sex interactions on stage, feeling repulsion or deterrence in supporting a gay or lesbian idol based on their sexual preferences, you probably have some soul searching to do.

Another thing I’ve noticed is the tendency of same-sex shippers to modify a harmless interaction between members as they make jokes or innuendos that splatter a hue of raw sexual essence onto the moment—this is, in part, some fetishization. We should try to avoid this as gay men are trying to escape the sexualized view a large majority of people have about them.

And KMers are guilty of this—after all, sometimes when a boy says he wants to do his laundry, he really just wants to do his laundry.

So, this is something else to keep in mind.

General Homophobia

How many times have bloggers received comments about how X members can’t be gay or how if X is gay that the anon can’t be a fan of that person anymore? I’ve definitely read several too many in my time and these are all exemplifying comments of people who house internal homophobia.

Unfortunately, the need to explicitly state and prove homosexuality will always be a symptom of the heteronormativity of most societies—and I do understand why it happens and it’s not always a malicious assumption.

What I peacefully and regretfully do not understand are aggressive fans who flagrantly deny the possibility of any other sexuality aside from being straight—these instances really make me suspect these are mainly female fans that can’t stomach the possibility of their idols not being into their gender or are straight up homophobic without any other reason. (That being said, I also don’t encourage any same-sex shippers/supporters to make assumptions about sexualities either. It’s fine to support and to suspect the possibility of a same-sex relationship, but there should always be that margin for error since none of these idols are definitively out.)

Conclusion to General Shipping

TLDR; my basic point in the first part of this ridiculous essay is that, we should really all respect one another as members of a single fandom. And beyond that, we should all respect the people whom we are shipping, taking great care and using our sensibilities to ensure we aren’t making real people uncomfortable.

PART 2: KM

History as a Fan of BTS

So, I just want to clarify that I am a pre-debut BTS fan. I literally read about JM and JK a couple days before they were due to debut and as a huge hip-hop fan, I was immediately interested in their concept. I instantly fell in love with JM’s voice and JK’s multi-faceted talents (and live vocal skills)—that is to say, I was most interested in these two members from the very beginning. As of recent days, I have detached myself from the fandom, preferring to keep a great distance away due to the toxicity and negativity I’ve unfortunately been privy to as the fan base grows bigger and bigger—and it really does make me incredibly sad. I’ve always been into BTS for the music—they were what I listened to bussing up to school as I admired the Cyphers by the rap-line, the gorgeous fluidity of JM’s melodic voice, the deep resonance of TH’s voice, and JK’s talents as a quality, consistent singer despite his age.

And now, sometimes the ship wars and solo stans are louder than the positive members in this community. Luckily, I’ve found a small niche of BTS blogs and KM blogs that have made this experience a lot easier (for KM blogs, many thanks to people like blarhiv, slowlybutobvious-jikook, gaja-aegiya-gaja, chaotic-jikook, singwriteluv, jiminkoo, etc.)

Shipping as a Whole

Now, as for the shipping component. I want to clarify I’m a very selective real-person shipper—I don’t look for mere skin ship or overt proclamations of love or popularity of ship.

Of course, these are initially the easiest features to discern a shippable “ship”, but I’m well practiced in the KPop industry and know these factors between members are virtually useless in discerning romantic interest.

On top of being a selective shipper, I also think it’s safe to say I’m pretty respectful about shipping as I always try to maintain reasonable skepticism and I’ve never commented anything about shipping on any forum that could make the involved individual uncomfortable. With all that being said, the beginning of BTS, I did not see ANY SHIPS that I could’ve deemed suspicious enough to be considered real. They were all just young kids that were trying to pave their path to success and just boys messing around on their early television appearances whilst trying to promote their albums.

And even when YM and TK began to gain traction as the fandom’s decidedly largest ships with some believing them to be “real”, I still didn’t see it—and this is said with utmost respect to their closeness and respect for one another as teammates, colleagues, and close friends.

Undoubtedly, their interactions were playful and adorable, but there was nothing in how they interacted to rouse any suspicions whatsoever. I would view their interactions as commonplace as any other men in regular friendships—with their culture and their age and their jobs in consideration. Again, I never understood people who truly believed in the validity of these ships.

Now, to be fair, I have, of course, also participated in casually shipping a few members for fun too. For example, I thought Sope was cute and I was drawn to VM’s friendship as well—JM and TH were so ridiculously cute and close, it was nearly impossible not to casually ship them. In the earlier years, since I believed there to be no "real" ships, I was on board with other casual shippers but was greatly confused by those who believed the big three ships (YM, NJ, and TK) were actually real.

My View on Early KM

I first started tuning into KM when I saw a particular Bomb clip of JM and JK messing around with a phone app where their voices were autotuned. Whilst JM was laughing, JK just had his face crinkled up with the softest look on his face. I was like, “huh”—but it definitely wasn’t enough for me to begin thinking it could be real.

Since it was one isolated incident, caught directly on camera, it wasn’t nearly enough evidence to make any logical inferences. At that point, I’d just be jumping onto the train of delusion. While on the subject of early KM, I also want to take this opportunity to quickly give my take on this malicious narrative that JK doesn’t like JM—as a pre-debut fan, I’ve never bought into this.

Between JK’s self-proclaimed shyness towards JM’s unadulterated fondness for him, JK’s proclivities to drop honorifics on camera even from the beginning, JK telling JM he teases his hyung because he likes him—I was almost flabbergasted when I first caught inklings of it.

This is such an outrageous vilification and outright character assassination of a young kid in his teens who didn’t know how to deal with his hyung’s affections, despite having always confirmed and reassured JM that he does, in fact, like him.

The fact that so-called fans to this day still try to drive this narrative despite the fact that JK has set fire and gasoline to this toxic roller coaster ride of lies and delusions is actually unfathomable to me. Never mind the exact type of relationship KM have, it’s just so distinguishably clear that JK really, really likes JM judging by the amount of time they spend together and how beautiful JK’s smile is when he’s around JM.

The Shift

Essentially, I casually shipped Sope, VM, and KM at some point—they were my favourites to see interact and I was always cooing over how adorable their bonds were with one another. And if I’m being frank, I was especially partial to the latter two ships because of how attentive and caring JM is to his younger members.

JM’s kindness has always touched my heart.

I find JM’s interactions with people the most fascinating based off the fact that he is just an enthralling, ethereal human being with this gorgeous voice and enormous heart—and for that, he was my very favourite member always.

But, of course, I am a KM supporter.How did this happen?

Well, my eyes nearly bugged out of my head at the infamous back hug at 2015 KBS Music Festival—especially since it was JK being so unusually expressive and forward with his affection. But perhaps this was a cultural thing? I definitely felt some cognitive dissonance as I tried to explain the strange, almost romantic aura of the moment using logic despite sensing that this string of reasoning didn’t sit quite right with me. But again, one isolated incident is a whole lot of nothing in the world of skin ship and KPop.

But as we all know, at this point, we got see KM get closer and see their relationship develop and I was really all for it as I was incredibly pleased by that personal growth in JK as a maturing adult and the joy it conversely seemed to bring JM with this newly matured JK.

JK’s Development

A large part of my transition over from casual to serious “shipper” is actually because of JK. I’ve always viewed him as a talented individual, as aforementioned, but other than that there was certainly other larger personalities that caught my eye quicker—between JM’s big heart, JH’s enormous personality, and TH’s quirks, he was definitely quietly existing in the background when he wasn’t performing. But he really just grew into himself and I think any fan can see that.

There’s all the general ways he grew up, his physique and his facial structure and his height, but more than anything my heart softened immensely when I began to see what a beautiful soul this boy had always had. I’m not saying that he’s not without flaws—because another a huge problem in the industry is the fans’ tendency to idealize their idols past the mortal realm of making mistakes or having character flaws—but anyone can see he’s clearly matured.

The way he treats JM only gets better and better with each year.

And I genuinely don’t feel that it’s delusional to say the way that he treats JM is vastly different from any other member. He is kind-hearted with a dreamy view on the world and he’s good to his hyungs after everything they’ve done for him when he’d been a child, but he’s that in tenfold around JM. To say he doesn’t play favourites when JM’s involved is being willfully ignorant because there’re so many recent examples alone (the way he splashes water on SJ vs. JM, the way he roughhouses other members vs. JM, the way he gives JM a big pancake because of an impending punishment vs. SJ in same predicament, the attentive way he watches JM in interviews over other members, the way he monitors JM's health via food and drink, etc.).

I also want to mention as a disclaimer that these comparisons aren’t made in any type of malicious way or with the intent of discrediting relationships between JK and other members. It’s simply instrumental in understanding why such a large population of non-shippers have been drawn to KM as a potential real pairing versus any other pairing. If everyone stopped inserting their own captions and interpretations of JK’s actions and only had the source material in front of them, no misleading historical content to waylay new fans with a tired and counterfeit narrative, it’s pretty clear that JK displays incredible fondness and tenderness towards JM in a conspicuous manner.

It doesn’t make his relationships with the others any less, it just makes his relationship with JM just that little bit more. It’s not about putting down or undermining the other relationships, it’s just about acknowledging the reality of JK’s obvious magnetism towards JM. If a fan really cares for JK, it’s almost cruel to disregard the fact that his face lights up when he’s with JM (WeVerse picture, JM punching him on the shoulder, FaceTime picture, VLive, etc.) and his voice softens when he speaks to JM (Run episode with JK slating, Run episode playing palm game, Run episode asking JM if he’s ready, etc.).

These examples aren’t delusions, it’s reality—the evidence are quite literally in photographs or videos. As a longtime fan, I honestly and sincerely mean this—JK has become a handsome man in my eyes not because of his appearance (though he’s undeniably good-looking) but because of the way he treats JM and others he cares for. As the years pass by, his heart and soul has become more and more beautiful in my eyes. I can’t attribute it fully to JM, but I can certainly say that my heart melts when I see his interactions with JM—not because I am a shipper/supporter but because as an empathetic human, I am viscerally drawn to humans with kindness in their hearts. The man treats JM so, so well. I know I keep repeating this but it’s just a grave injustice to ignore how much JK cares for JM. Never mind your projected desires and your biases, just look at what’s in front of you and just appreciate that enviable, lovely bond. Even if people will choose to disregard romantic overtones in GCFt or the meaningful lyrics during the times JM shows up in GCFsai or the fact he has the most screen time overall (which is fine), it'd be prudent to at least acknowledge the fact that JM is incredibly treasured by this young man.

JMs Shift

Another thing that made me suspicious was the transition of JM’s behavior as well.

I find it harder to read JM than JK in many ways—perhaps it’s just an introvert relating with follow introvert—but there are differences in his behavior that also made me question things as well.

It’s obvious that JM used to be a little much for shy, introverted JK in front of the camera and that that behavior tapered off as the years went by. I do think a large part of it is due to JM growing up (although I do suspect some part might be due to vicious fans who might’ve hurt his feelings about his personality) and reigning himself in. But even then, he was still visibly touchy and affectionate with JK—just as he is with all his other members—whether he was petting his head, openly calling him cute, or what have you.

In my view, the most telling thing about JM is how careful he seems around JK—something in his behavior feels tailored in a way that’s still affectionate towards JK but in a way not to rouse suspicion even if the body and eyes don’t lie.

I’m not sure if it even makes sense, but I do sense a certain sense of caution about how JM treats JK in the public eye in comparison to JK who reliably wears his heart on his sleeve. He seems to be more aware of cameras and the public eye than JK does. It’s really hard to verbalize, but I’ve sensed a discernible change in how JM treats JK—it’s not bad or worrisome, it’s just different.(Although, they’ve gradually become a lot more carefree this year.)

Time Skip

I don’t want to bore everyone anymore than I already have, but the point of how I became a more serious supporter compared to my origins as a casual shipper is based off suspicious trends and continuous patterns in the boys’ behaviours over multiple years.

Even now, I continuously try to translate the boys’ body language, vocal tone (when speaking to each other vs. another member), facial expressions, and constant mentions of one another as a platonic demonstration of affection. And some interactions are pretty harmlessly adorable, just a little something to wet the lips of any casual shipper, but with the surmounting amount of moments it becomes really hard for even the most logical person not question the nature of their relationship.

KM and Ship Wars

Clearly, the progression of their relationship has been the target of incredible hatred and frustration on the parts of hostile members of other ships and it’s gotten to a point where they’ve resorted to subterfuge to try pilot a plane missing a wing—that is to say, they’re trying to keep an aircraft based on intentional mistranslations, vicious lies, and carefully crafted stories of events that have been disproven afloat.

The incredible discrepancy between what sorts of behavior can be categorically classified as fan service seems to conveniently shift based on whatever is keeping the fragile balance of their dreams alive despite evidence to the contrary.

The moment we try to discount or negate the relationships a member has with another one in the name of a ship, there’s absolutely a problem that needs reassessment—this goes for all fans including KMers.

KM and Coming Out

I want to clarify very firmly that if you are a true supporter of KM, one who selflessly wants their happiness above everything (which includes everything from the potential of KM having other significant others, KM being single, KM being involved in a fling, etc.), you absolutely do not want or need them to come out.

If they do come out, of their own choice and volition, you can happily support them, but you do not need or seek this from them.

And may I carefully remind people that if you want them to come out for the sole purpose of feeling vindicated against other shippers, you’re not a true supporter and you’re in this for selfish reasons. So, if you imagine your first instinct will be an outcry of “I told you so, I’m right” with the express purpose of throwing it in another ship’s face, please evaluate your role and incentive in being a KMer. It doesn’t matter if you’re right or if you’re wrong—all that matters are these incredible boys who inspire people on the daily are happy, healthy, and well. I honestly want their happiness and safety over a confirmation of a relationship any day and I really encourage all supporters to feel this way as well. In a conservative Asian society, it wouldn’t be easy to maneuver as an openly homosexual man. I implore you to consider the occurrences of hate crimes in more liberal countries. It’s not going to be an improvement, only likely to be a far more isolating experience, in a more traditional country with homophobic tendencies as the majority sentiment. So, while I know most reasonable supporters feel this way, this is a reminder to toxic shippers to stay in your lane and stop demanding things from other human beings that owe you nothing—they don’t owe you pictures of WeVerse, they don’t owe you selfies with one another on Twitter, and they don’t owe you a coming-out story to prove your ship right.

Conclusion

To sum up, I’m not saying that KM is real for sure.

No one can know that except their personnel, their friends, and their family—or sadly, in a conservative country, perhaps even just themselves. The point is, we as fans, absolutely cannot know for certain.

And this is mainly why I'm not too concerned or bothered about timelines or specific dates. We don't know and there's no point (for me) to delve this far into the realm of speculation. But to each their own as long as you're not being invasive to KM!

However, I’m not unconfident in saying that if they are not real, the likelihood of any other same-sex relationship in the band is highly unlikely—though not impossible.

I also want to reassure everyone that I love the bonds between all the members and encourage everyone to understand that even if you favour or don’t favour one member over another to realize that your opinion really doesn’t matter in comparison to how BTS feels about one another—they love one another.

And at the end of the day, shipping isn’t so important that we need to fight over it.

After all, if all we’re trying to do is support love, then shouldn’t we be doling it out to?

And with that, I’m out!

Thank you to anyone for reading and keep well and healthy everyone!

PS Thank you very much to Blarhiv to allowing me to use her blog as a platform! This very, very special individual we should all treasure in the KM community!!!❤️❤️❤️

(omg anonnie this is too cute тттт Thank YOU).

#jikook #Kookmin #jungkook #jeon jungkook #jimin #park jimin

243 notes · View notes