Bullying allegations revolving around the K-Pop industry are showing no signs of stopping, with many Korean idols and celebrities getting affected by these rumours. Certain programmes involving the accused idols had to be halted due to these accusations being thrown around.
A few days ago, SEVENTEEN’s (세븐틴) Mingyu (민규) was one of the few idols caught in these accusations but was hit hardest of them all, with two recent alleged bullying incidents resurfacing. The SEVENTEEN member’s first allegation began on 22nd February when an anonymous netizen claimed that he was part of a group of delinquents or bullies when he was in middle school.
But now, another accusation was thrown at Mingyu of past bullying. According to a post by a writer on Nate Pann, she came forward to make a claim on the idol’s sexual harassment against her on 25th February.
She even posted her graduation certificate to prove she is an alumnus of Burim Middle School where she graduated the same year as Mingyu. The writer also showed a detailed map of the school classroom where Mingyu bullied her.
The writer was a schoolmate who attended a hagwon, which is an after-school academy in South Korea that consists of small classes. The hagwon was located behind her former school, in a basement of an apartment complex. According to her, there was a student who mixed with everyone and was very popular in class.
That student happened to be Mingyu from SEVENTEEN. Anytime the victim wanted to speak up in class, the idol would poke fun at her saying, “What do you know?”. He even said, “Don’t act up” to the victim, which resulted in her silence throughout classes, and was too scared to speak up. She went on to state that Mingyu was involved in a group of boys that would bully her and that the idol continued on, making sexual remarks around her which is a form of sexual harassment.
The victim also exclaimed, “That boy would also…say sexual jokes around me. He would say those things even with the teacher around. It was to the point the teacher had to say, ‘Don’t say those things since we have girls here.’ It wasn’t as bad when the teacher was there, but he didn’t change a bit when the teacher wasn’t in the classroom”.
It was also stated that even during break time or self-study, the idol would express more sexual remarks. Mingyu would shout out, “eummo-reul kkumyeotdani!”, which is a phrase that means two things, where ‘a conspiracy has been plotted’ and that a ‘pubic hair has been decorated’. The idol even drew strands of hair on the blackboard and the writer still won’t forget such a scene. Even if the victim could not clarify who was exactly the one responsible for the drawing, she knew that Mingyu was involved in that incident.
Due to the victim’s traumatising time back in high school, she has claimed that she has been going through therapy due to those harsh moments. Believing that self-endurance would help her get through it at first, she didn’t bother to open up her past experience with Mingyu because of that. Thus, she remained quiet until now.
The writer mentioned, “I am suffering from depression and anxiety, so I didn’t want to fight against someone if I do make this post. I also thought he was only bad to me”. But she went on clarifying why she made the decision to write this post, which is because of how many blind fans would shield Mingyu from any allegations. Writing this post would make people or fans aware of the things that happened when she was the target of Mingyu’s alleged past harassment, shedding light on the type of person he once was. Here are her therapy reports and medicinal prescriptions as proof.
If you think that’s the end of his alleged past upbringings, unfortunately, that’s not all to Mingyu’s bullying revelations. Another case recently resurfaced claiming the K-Pop idol of ableism based on another writer on Daum Cafe.
The writer stated, “This post is based on the testimonies of acquaintances and is true. Also, the victims are afraid that they will be identified and will be targeted. Therefore, please stop searching for information about the victims”.
The victim also made a detailed explanation of what happened. To clarify, the writer explained, “A is the witness to Mingyu’s bullying, B is the victim, and C is another victim, but he has a disability. A, B, and C all attended Burim middle school with Mingyu, but the person writing this post is a friend of A who did not attend Burim”.
Written in the post, consists of multiple conversations between A and B discussing what the idol did.
More screenshots further detailing his alleged ableism behaviour.
In this screenshot, showcases the anger towards Mingyu’s bullying misconduct.
Skimming through the conversations based on those chat screenshots, Mingyu had bullied a classmate with a disability. The netizen also mentioned how the victims have been discussing this issue before it submerged online. Because Mingyu was a famous idol member, they were scared to spill the tea on the idol’s misdeeds.
At the end of the post, the writer explained that the victims gathered the courage to unveil the truth about Mingyu as they felt upset upon seeing the shield of fans on such a horrible human being. The writer apparently linked his story to the previous accusation on Nate Pann, stating, “we decided to raise our voice because we saw another person on Nate Pann speak up. We are afraid we will get retaliation from the perpetrator and his fans, but we want to reveal that he’s not a nice person that a lot of people believe”.
