21 Chinese fanbars of Kpop artists have been banned for 30 days by Weibo for inappropriate fandom culture.
As reported recently, the Chinese entertainment industry is witnessing a massive purge, strictly dealing with acts deemed inappropriate. Not only celebrities, but also fan bases or individual fans also face consequences if there are violations in online behavior or unhealthy ways of supporting idols.
Although Chinese celebrities have suffered the most, Chinese fan sites of Kpop idols still could not avoid being affected. K-pop fans are well aware of Chinese fans’ level of wealth and spending power when they often pour large amounts of money into projects to support their idols. However, perhaps from now on this culture will be abolished or restricted when Weibo has now tightened its regulations and is ready to suspend any Chinese bar that promotes unhealthy fandom behavior, including showing support for Kpop idols.
On September 5, the first fan base of a Kpop idol that became a “victim” was JIMINBAR – Jimin‘s Chinese fan base (BTS). Accordingly, this C-bar was banned by Weibo for 60 days for its inappropriate behavior of fundraising for a birthday project, posting contents that easily creates a rivalry in supporting idols. JIMINBAR is the C-bar that caused a controversy over their collaboration with Jeju Air to create a Jimin-themed airplane.
JIMINBAR’s fundraising project for Jimin’s birthday has been ongoing since around April 2021, which was before the Cbiz’s purge occurred. However, because Weibo is in the process of eliminating inappropriate behavior, this fan base was affected. Faced with this situation, many other C-bars quickly “clean up” the mess or cancel ongoing projects. However, due to Weibo’s strict management, there have recently been 21 more C-bars of Kpop artists that got suspended.
At 0:00 on September 6 (China time), Weibo issued a 30-day ban on the 21 fanbars below for the reason: “Unreasonable and excessive propaganda to pursue artists”. The current list is as follows:
EXO’s fanbars
EXO吧投票组 (EXO)
灿白吧ChanBaekBar (Chanyeol and Baekhyun)
吴世勋吧_Ohsehunbar (Sehun)
BTS’s fanbars
防弹少年团吧_BTSBAR (BTS)
金南俊RM_Daily (RM)
郑号锡j-hope_HopeWorld (J-Hope)
金硕珍JIN_JinHit (Jin)
BLACKPINK’s fanbars
ROSE朴彩英吧官博 (Rosé)
LISA吧官博 (Lisa)
TheWind风向婆婆 (Lisa)
NCT’s fanbars
NCT_NeoLab共感实验室 (NCT)
李泰容吧_TaeYongBar (Taeyong)
郑在玹吧_JaeHyunBar (Jaehyun)
李马克吧_MarkLeeBar (Mark)
罗渽民吧_JAEMINbar (Jaemin)
Other fanbars
姜涩琪吧_SeulgiBar (Red Velvet seulgi)
onIyU-IU李知恩 (IU)
张元英中文首站 (Jang Wonyoung)
Although this list is already quite a lot, netizens believe that this number will not stop when Weibo seems to be determined to ‘purge’ and ban all fanbars with an inappropriate way of supporting their idols.
If the Chinese side continues to tighten this issue, the activities of fanbars will be delayed, including birthday projects or support album purchases. The birthday celebration can probably be omitted, but for artists with a large source of revenue and album sales from China, it will probably be more or less affected.
(The list will continue to update if available..)
