4 K-Pop Groups Who Got Harshly Criticized By Netizens Due To Scandals

Number 1 faced controversy as soon as they debuted.

Content Warning

This article includes descriptions of suicide or self harm that may disturb some readers.

Scandals are one of the worst things that K-Pop groups can experience, as netizens are quick to criticize idols when they get involved in one. Here’s a list of 4 K-Pop groups who got harshly criticized by netizens due to scandals.

1. A.KOR

A.KOR was a girl group that debuted in 2014, and they received criticism as soon as they debuted. Not long after their debut, member Kemy released a diss track targeting Park Bom

Kemy

At the time, Park Bom was making headlines due to her smuggling amphetamine tablets from the United States. While amphetamine is legal in the United States, it’s illegal in South Korea. Despite Park Bom providing medical proof that showed her history with the prescription meds, she still received backlash from netizens.

Park Bom

While Park Bom was dealing with this, Kemy released a diss track saying that she got off easy due to her being an artist from YG Entertainment, as well as many other things.

This didn’t end well for Kemy or A.KOR, as many netizens criticized them for this.

Here’s the full diss track below.

2. T-ara

In 2012, some rumors started spreading that former T-ara member Hwayoung was bullied by some of the T-ara members during her time in the group.

Hwayoung

Some netizens then started to gather “proof” of this, such as when Eunjung “forcefully” fed Hwayoung a rice cake.

While the T-ara members tried to explain things, it was already too late, as netizens were harshly criticizing the members. After this scandal, T-ara’s image never recovered.

People would later come out and reveal that this bullying rumor was false and that Hwayoung was the actually bully in the group.

3. GLAM

GLAM was a girl group who debuted under Big Hit Entertainment in 2012. However, the group ran into a lot of controversies, with the biggest one being when member Dahee was found guilty of blackmailing actor Lee Byung Hun.

Dahee
Lee Byung Hun

Dahee was then sentenced to a year in jail, and GLAM’s image took a hit due to all of this. Not long after Dahee was sentenced to jail time, GLAM disbanded.

4. AOA

In 2020, former AOA member Mina revealed that Jimin had bullied her during their time together in the group.

Mina

This eventually caused Jimin to retire from the entertainment industry, as her image took a massive hit due to this scandal.

Jimin

After this scandal, AOA received some backlash as well, and they had to cancel a lot of their schedules.

Mina also stated that the other AOA members were bystanders during all the bullying, and this caused some AOA members to get criticized by netizens.

To me they are all the same bystanders and the way they said that did hurt me. At the end, when everyone came over and Shin (Jimin) made an apology that wasn’t even genuine, the other Kim member asked the question of “What about the good times?” Mind you this member is still young. So I just let them say whatever they want but I really didn’t understand why she was asking that. She talks bad about her in front of her but tries to be on her good side at other times. I guess this could be seen a trying to have a good social life but to me it didn’t look genuine and I didn’t understand it.

— Mina