I’m back again after several months just to weigh in on another topical controversy. The Beomhan situation is the perfect opportunity to talk about performative activism, virtue-signaling, and the toxicity of kpop twitter.

For those who do not know what happened, here is an article explaining the situation.

To start, this post is not only going to be about Beomhan, but also the social sphere surrounding him at large. Obviously, I can’t write this post without addressing his behavior. As far as I’m concerned, he’s an imperfect person who doesn’t deserve the level of hate and vitriol he has received. He is flawed. He has made irresponsible choices. However, the blow-back he has received is completely disproportionate to the harm he caused. I regret that he retracted his apology, and hope that he can come back with a clear head and address everything.

I am not here to armchair diagnose, so I will only be using the information we have. He has an established history of mental health issues and has expressed suicidal ideation on his public platform. I believe this is substantial enough that we can acknowledge it without it being mere speculation. This is vital context for his actions- going on impulsive rants and his habit of oversharing online.

I’ll be the first person to call him out on repeating the r-slur, even with context, because it shouldn’t be repeated. I believe he should apologize for it. However, actions speak far louder than words. The conduct within this community is far more ableist than his casual use of the slur ever will be.

Confronting ableism comes with confronting hard truths. These truths go beyond our society being built on ableism, but go further to include the necessity to give others grace and good faith, to reject the urge to police, and our duty to let go of hate. Sometimes people going through mental health issues are assholes because of it. This does not excuse that behavior, but part of truly being a good ally is being willing to forgive and recognize those moments. Beomhan went on live and seemed to be having a genuine breakdown as the pressure got to him, and people immediately jump to say mental health is not an excuse, but the truth is somewhere in between.

Mental health issues do not excuse behavior, but it can explain it, and indicate just how much scrutiny to place on a person. When someone does something because of mental health issues, perhaps they deserve a little leeway, grace, and a lighter social sentence.

This fucking sucks, because there shouldn’t be social sentencing at all. It is not our job to police others. We do not have any authority to tell others what is or is not acceptable. People online are acting as judge, jury, and executioner. I see people goading him to suicide. I think we all should be a lot kinder and less self righteous. I am tired of the high horses. We waste a lot of energy persecuting others at the detriment of their mental health for the sake of social media posturing.

Policing and holding each other accountable in a social sphere is necessary to a certain degree to keep from harming one another, however it is this entitled mentality to establish social normativity that ultimately results in ableism. It is this arbitration of acceptability that alienates everyone outside the norm. It is this same policing that shames Beomhan, that shames stimming, that shames addiction. It is a cultural slippery slope that we all need to be mindful of and give due diligence.

It is ultimately not the words, or the actions, but the mentality that is insidious. Many of us are full of anger and have few outlets to channel and deal with those emotions in a healthy way. It goes without saying that social media hate campaigns are not a healthy way. Social justice causes becoming more mainstream is amazing, but it is very disheartening seeing people use them as shields and ammo. People use social justice causes to justify their hateful behavior to themselves. They want a socially acceptable way to channel their rage and feel productive. People convince themselves that they are fighting on the front lines to combat these social ills, when in reality, they are perpetuating them.

Words like the r-slur are more than a leverage point to use against an opponent on twitter. Ableism is more than the r-slur. Ableism includes disregarding mental health, spreading hate, and feeling entitled to decide what is or is not acceptable from a disabled or mentally ill person. You do not get to arbitrate what is or is not excused by a person’s condition, and you should not feel that you do. All the authority you have is to decide whether you personally forgive the behavior or not.

Persecution and punishment are not the way to foster change. Shaming can definitely help pressure people with harmful views to keep them to themselves, which is good. However, cruelty only breeds resentment. Beomhan is not going to grow as a person and become better when he is being beaten into the ground.

Beomhan hurt some feelings and should apologize. He should not lay his life down for it.

The kpop world is full of moral panics and witch hunts, and likes to hide behind a cloak of social justice, which is just insidious. Social justice causes will never be a justification for harassing and harming others. Fighting for social justice isn’t always straight forward, easy, or convenient. It means examining your own biases, building patience, and faith in a world that continues to hit us with blow after blow. But no one said it would be easy. Sometimes the hardest job is to just keep your mouth shut, spare judgement, and let go.