There are many similarities between T-ara and AOA’s internal bullying scandals, typically the following points.
Recently, netizens have been surprised by the shocking “plot twist” in the scandal of AOA members being accused of bullying member Mina. Based on many posts exposing Mina of being “the other woman”, overreacting on social media, crossing the limits, netizens recently have altogether “switched sides” to defend AOA.
Overall, this scandal has many similarities with T-ara‘s breaking scandal years ago. Eventually, both victims were gradually exposed to their true behaviors, but the two girl groups still have to suffer injustice till the end.
Acting as victims and destroying their former groups
On July 3, 2020, more than a year after her decision to leave the group, Mina suddenly posted on Instagram and revealed that she had been bullied for 10 years when she was in AOA. Accordingly, she once attempted to commit suicide because of depression but failed.
Based on Mina’s allegations, fans quickly “inspected” and called out Jimin for being the bully Mina was talking about. At the same time, ChoA, Seolhyun, and the rest were also blamed for being bystanders, seeing their fellow member being bullied without speaking up.
After that, Mina continuously shared long posts on her Instagram. She revealed that Jimin and other AOA members had come to her place and asked for forgiveness, so she accepted their apologies and wished to put an end to the controversy. Mina also said that AOA’s leader had an insincere attitude when apologizing.
Mina’s words successfully enraged and made the public turn their backs on Jimin and other AOA members. Netizens continued to ask Jimin to leave the group. The other members also faced a lot of criticism for being bystanders.
As a result, just over a week later, Jimin officially withdrew from AOA and suffered a boycott from the public. The other members also had to halt their activities for a long time.
This scandal of AOA reminds many people of T-ara’s bullying scandal back in 2012. Based on the implicit captions of T-ara members on social media, netizens immediately made speculations and spread many pictures to prove that Hwayoung was bullied by T-ara members. Without any clear evidence, netizens quickly put the blame on the remaining 6 members and pity the “victim” Hwayoung.
Many fans turned their backs on T-ara members, causing their promotion schedules to end earlier than planned. Brands represented by T-ara all canceled their contracts one by one. Some members who were in the middle of filming were removed from the projects they were taking part in. From the peak of their career with many great achievements and high coverage, T-ara was suddenly labeled as a “bully” group and ended up having their career ruined.
Being “revealed” of their true personalities: One person who is called a “viper”, the other is a mistress bearing the label of a false victim
On September 8, Dispatch officially spoke out to expose the falsehood in the “second T-ara scandal” with the conclusion, “Mina is a victim of Jimin, but Mina can also be a harm.”
Specifically, this information site has released a 128-minute recording and reconciliation messages between Mina and the group members, especially Jimin. Accordingly, the former leader apologized to Mina many times sincerely, but it was Mina who persistently demanded that Jimin remember the mistakes she had made. After all, this is a never-ending “reconciliation” between someone who doesn’t remember what she did wrong and someone who doesn’t accept an apology.
Besides, the truth about Mina’s personality is gradually revealed. Two longtime managers of the group have admitted that Mina is really scary and extremely sensitive. At the same time, a video posted in 2017 denouncing Mina’s convex attitude was also “dug” up.
The video was posted by a Chilean YouTuber. He shared his thoughts about AOA members when collaborating with them in the group’s MV “Heart Attack”. When it comes to Mina, he feels that she is very self-directed, usually goes against the crowd, and always alienates everyone, and doesn’t greet anyone. The “victim” of the bullying scandal is not inherently gentle, but rather a mean, arrogant and harsh person to everyone.
Besides, the fact that Mina was accused of robbing someone else’s lover also made netizens stir. She admitted the act of being the third person in someone else’s love story but did not forget to play the role of the victim who blamed her boyfriend for being cheated on. The half-hearted attitude despite admitting it was wrong, but it was not her fault, and at the same time, repeating the old bullying incident with Jimin made people doubtful about AOA’s scandal that year.
Recently, she also constantly bored the audience by constantly mentioning the case of being bullied by Jimin even though the story has long passed and the former leader of AOA has gradually become more secretive. Mina’s attitude of always being the victim made netizens simultaneously hate her, saying that it was she who was the source of the scandal that year, and Jimin was the one who suffered the most.
Similarly, Hwayoung from the role of the victim was gradually exposed as the true villain. It is she who is the lazy one who pretends to have a hurt leg to avoid performing or curses other members for no reason, even her sister once sent a message threatening to “scratch” Ahreum just because she was a member that made Hwayoung uncomfortable.
In addition, there are countless other actions such as leaving before the show, taking advantage of the old group’s fame when preparing for a comeback, showing a harsh attitude towards T-ara on her SNS, or often pretending to be a victim in front of the camera… All the brazenness mentioned above of Hwayoung made netizens indignantly call her a “viper snake”.
The sad ending for the two groups
The audience finally had a day to “admire” the real faces of Mina and Hwayoung. They used to be victims of bullying, but in the end, they turned out to be the source of everything. Both Mina and Hwayoung took pitiful actions to win the audience’s sympathy, causing their group to immediately receive heavy criticism and curses from the audience.
AOA has lost the talented leader Jimin. Before that, the group was on the rise and had a stable performance with a series of hits like Like A Cat, Heart Attack, Good Luck… However, just because of this unnecessary bullying scandal, the group lost many opportunities and gradually became sporadic. Main vocalist Yuna also left early 2021. AOA is in danger of disbanding.
T-ara has permanently lost the glory of the top Kpop group. Despite being vindicated and continuing to work hard, the group still could not regain its reputation. Even members Soyeon and Boram couldn’t wait for the day when they could once again hold the trophy with the rest of the members and decided to leave. T-ara is a painful and unfortunate scar in Kbiz.
