I was attacked by a kpop fan - an exploration of why cancel culture is another injustice and needs to stop
I got attacked in a fandom that’s very important to me, and I need to talk about it because I’m still feeling hurt, shocked, and quite honestly…scared.
But in writing out the first draft, I realised a few things.
i seemed to want validation more than to discuss the broader issues, probably because no one had my back and i’m human just like anyone else…
the amount of details were overwhelming even to me
i don’t want this to do the same thing that those people did to me, because it does bother me that they might be feeling upset, too
So I thought hard about how to trim this down to the important points. Idk if I managed it. But none of this is meant to elicit an attack on the other person. I just think that cancel culture is an injustice, and needs to stop.
First, what happened:
I saw a fun post on X and wanted to participate. So I did. Mid way through typing it out, something looked wrong - there were some hidden posts around mine. I’ve never seen that before, and started getting the vibe that someone was attacking me and then deleting it.
I decided to keep going, check it after, and hope for the best, because I had quite literally decided the day before that I needed to try participating more consistently. I’ve been worried lately that I’m invisible, and this was my solution.
Turns out that the post author themselves was the one hiding MY posts (not someone else’s), and then they replied saying that our opinions were different. At the time, I had no idea why they were talking about opinions. But I apologized because I could sense something was wrong, and I said I’d take it down.
Their response was to call me crazy and rude (full of audacity) to post my own thoughts under their thread. So I switched to trying to defend myself because I had no idea where that came from, but they dug in deeper to attack me. I finally tried to regulate a little and said that the exchange wasn’t healthy and we should mutually block once I deleted the posts they didn’t like.
They didn’t give me time to do that.
I felt like I had whiplash from the situation, so after researching a few things to see why this might have happened, I made a post reminding people in that kpop community to be kinder to each other or join boxing if they needed an outlet for their aggression.
Yeah…
Their followers came by my profile within 30 minutes to attack me further.
They started denying my reality, insisting that the other person was right and I was the problem, and then posted literal lies that screenshots could disprove. It finally stopped after about 6 people did this to me. At least…I think it was only 6 - some of them were posting comments and blocking fast so there might be some I missed.
And it was only through one of these attacks that I learned what the real problem was the whole time: the thread person had thought I was sh1tting all over the work they put into their thread by replying with my own thoughts.
Which was not the case at all - I loved what they prepared and wanted to participate! It just wasn’t in the way they were expecting, and they didn’t tell me that was a problem.
It does suggest that their ego was bruised, although it’s hard to know for sure because again: that information came to me second hand.
What I do know for sure is that they had 500+ followers, and I have 38 who seem to be mostly bots - they don’t interact with me. Which means that when more people kept coming to attack me…
I was dealing with this all alone (I know what resources exist if that became too much)
it was a sore spot for me…because it looked like I was failing to participate/be visible in a positive way
Regardless.
All of this could have been easily solved if they clearly set a boundary. Like turning off post replies, or limiting replies to followers, or clearly stating (to me): “hey, that’s hurtful to me when people post under my threads so can you delete your response?”
And one thing I did wrong: I could have stopped, taken a deep breath, and asked a clarifying question to see why they were attacking me. But I think I didn’t do that because I didn’t understand how they could make that leap even after I apologized.
Long story short: both of us weren’t clear on what was going on…so I apologized, but they escalated to attacks…I defended…and then they got mad at me for defending myself…and then other people continued those attacks but didn’t have the full story…so I tried to tell them my side of the story/kept defending myself, and then they got mad at me for that.
Any way you shake it, it was just a bad time.
And that leads me to Cancel Culture
Situations like this happen to people all the time. And we all know what happens to the target if it gets out of hand. It’s very hard to stop a cancel. So when more and more people came to attack me, and I knew I had no one who would defend me, I got scared.
I was already hurt and shocked….actually, my IBS symptoms returned so I was also in a lot of pain, and later got dizzy because I wasn’t breathing enough. But I got scared when I realized how naive I had been to try to be part of a fandom with my pen name.
If I had known people could get upset at others for just participating, I would have stayed anonymous.
But when I first made that decision, I had wanted to believe the best of people. I thought this fandom in particular was a safe inclusive space. I wanted everyone to know that Kpop is really important to me. I wanted everyone to see the joy and happiness it brought me. I wanted to join in on other fan’s joy and happiness…and that’s what I did for a solid year on X.
There were many times that I posted my own thoughts under other peoples threads without any problems, too. So in hindsight…I don’t think that was the issue OR a social mistake at all.
But now because of all that…I’m kind of afraid to participate in that fandom. What if someone does that to me again? What if those people are still trying to do something to me since I didn’t do what they wanted?
I don’t have resources to prevent cyber bullying. I barely have enough to eat most months.
And no one stepped in to help me. Everyone who commented appeared committed to denying my reality, calling me problematic, and telling me to “take the L.” They didn’t seem to care about my side of events, or finding a solution.
My fawning used to be really bad in the past to the point where I always took the L…and let me tell you: taking the L doesn’t make these situations any better. I’m not ready to explain what people did to me when I took the L.
But those memories are why I stopped fawning in this situation and turned to self defense, and I should not be cancelled for that. Everyone should defend themselves when they’re attacked unjustly. And NO ONE should be told to just "take the L” when the person saying it hasn’t checked both sides of the story.
It’s morally wrong that just because someone has more “friends” or power, then they’re the ones who get to be “right” even when they might not be.
What’s the Science Say?
One of my social psyc profs told us that around 2016, they were starting to see a disturbing trend in the research: people hated opposing views so much that they wouldn’t even take money to listen to them.
AND even worse: if forced to listen to an opposing view, they would go and research their own view to double down on it, polarising to that belief even more.
Polarising like that means there are very clearly defined in-groups and out-groups. And the fact that money (something people value highly) couldn’t solve it means it went deep.
Plus, I think it was Baumeister, probably in his book “Evil: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty”, who suggested that conflict between in-group and out-group people can lead to acts of evil really fast because people tend to dehumanize anyone that isn’t in their group.
These in-groups and out-groups can also be formed over many things. One example is Korean fans vs international fans. And of course there are also going to be some groups where the moral distinction is clear, like regular fans vs. stalker fans.
But more often than not, there are NO moral differences between the groups.
Which means that dehumanization/cancelling is often unjust and we need to talk about it.
The only study that’s looked at how to both create and destroy polarization/dehumanization of groups was one with boys from the 1950s. They put them in camps and got two groups to hate each other fiercely, and then tried to make them friendly again.
But nothing they tried to make them friendly again was working.
The only solution that worked was when the camp truck broke down, and all of them had to pitch in together to fix that situation so they could go eat. The researchers concluded that working together on a meaningful task that benefitted both groups was the only way to solve the dehumanization problem. The groups were open to getting to know each other after that.
Aka? It was super easy to get them to hate each other, but really hard to bring them back together again.
Which makes it really alarming that the 2016 research showed that people won’t even take money to listen to people with other beliefs/groups. A collaborative solution isn’t easy to create online, and there aren’t camp counselors to arrange it between groups.
So...
I’m not really sure what we can do to stop cancel culture other than work on pausing/regulating during tense situations, and increasing communication skills.
But it’s clear that something has to change or else there are going to continue to be injustices where the powerful and connected are the only ones who survive a cancel unscathed whether they’re in the right or not.
For me…I feel afraid, and hurt. I took all my info off that X account, and I probably won’t participate much in that fandom anymore, but they still know the name.
My imposter syndrome with writing has also been having a field day. I thought I had nearly figured it out and I was working harder to make my dreams come true. But…is that all pointless now?
I don’t know.
“Go get a real job” - yeah, sure, I’m trying that, too. Can you put in a good word with the interviewers so they’ll want to hire me over the 100 other applicants, please? Wait, a social recommendation would require people to care about me, which comes from participating in communities…which is what I was trying to do more of and got attacked for. Silly me.
See the problem?
***Edited to add - Of course there’s more science on these things, too.
Like Ashe’s conformity studies (and replications), which show that people won’t speak up even if they know something is wrong unless they see someone else doing it. So if someone is trying to defend themselves alone, they likely won’t get help defending themselves unless someone has the courage to speak up.
And another study is the Milgram obedience studies (and replications) - people do have some morals, but women are just as likely to be excessively violent even if they weren’t told specifically to do something. If they think highly of the observer, that can influence their decision in how far they go to harm someone else.
All of the bystander studies also show that if there are more people around (which there is the illusion of many online), then people will rationalize it as “someone else will help.” But since everyone is doing that, no one ends up helping.
Bandura’s Bobo doll studies (and partial replications) also show us that girls/women and boys/men are susceptible to repeating violence that they see. So since cancel cultures are so pervasive, it makes sense that everyone reaches for that action in certain situations.
Social psyc shows that women are socialized to use relational aggression, which is things like ostracizing/deleting evidence/making sure there’s no evidence (he-said-she-said), etc. Because it’s a recognized social norm, the impact is the same as physical aggression.