The Quiet Revolution of BTS ‘Ships’
It’s 6:30 pm on a Tuesday, and I’ve spent the entire day down a YouTube rabbit hole. Not exactly uncommon in these COVID times, but with titles like ‘BTS moments you can ABSOLUTELY relate to’ and ‘When BTS is so done with ARMY’, it’s uncharted territory even for me.
The k-pop group BTS is one of the biggest things in music, with their latest hit Dynamite spending two weeks at #1 on the top of the Billboard Top 100 in the United States. Since the seven boys debuted in 2013, they’ve established a global fandom — who call themselves ARMY — and become the latest in a long line of boy bands who’ve captured the hearts of young girls (and some guys) everywhere.
The first boy bands wore striped vests and sang a cappella in barbershops, but the mania surrounding them is often traced to the Beatles in the 1960s. From NSYNC in the ’90s, to the Backstreet Boys in the 2000s, to the unforgettable mayhem that was One Direction in the 2010s, each generation seems ready to worship an ensemble of dancing and singing boys.
But this generation of super fans have a new avenue of fueling their obsession, and they’re using it to reimagine male friendship.
The internet has allowed BTS’ global fanbase access to a museum-worthy archive of music videos, dance rehearsals and television interviews to watch. The band even gives fans a periscope into their lives through the Korean livestream app V Live, allowing fans to see the members in a different light: not just the blaring spotlights of a stage, but the subdued tones of their day to day lives.
Thousands of fan-made videos can be found on almost every social media platform — some are merely a collection of the sexiest moments of the creator’s favourite band member, others are stitched together snippets of rehearsals intended to show how dedicated the seven are to perfecting their performances. Yet the most popular — and maybe most important — simply show the band hanging out and being friends. Of course, videos of the attractive young men winking into the camera do well, but those that show the band members hugging, kissing and holding hands outweigh them in both volume and popularity.
Often compilations of interviews or behind the scenes clips, these videos give the impression that the members really care about one another. They’re constantly hugging each other during performances, or stroking each other’s hair, or even holding hands during game shows. It’s all soaked in a level of adorableness so intoxicating I want to scream “KAWAII” into the stratosphere.
This has led to a culture of ‘shipping’, wherein fans choose two members and their relationship, and highlight it through their fan-made content.
Spending any time on these fan communities means learning another language (other than Korean), where the names of the band members merge to become portmanteaus so you can easily find content of your favourite ship. For example, Taehyung and Jungkook (the two youngest members of the band) make up the most popular ship: ‘Taekook”.
Shipping videos of the members has become an integral part of the BTS community. I, for one have, spent many more hours watching clips of the members on game shows, goofing around, than I have watched their actual performances. These soothing videos are the gooey core that connects fans to the band personally, despite the language barrier.
Ellen Rodriguez, a 21 year old from México, who started following the band after watching the music video , introducing her to the bright world of K-Pop.
“Everything was so new to me. The choreography was really the main factor for me. I remember being amazed by the flow of their raps.”
At the tail end of 2018, after watching the floodgates of BTS creators from afar, she decided to take a splash with her YouTube account, crazyformyself. Now with 32,000 followers, Rodriguez’s videos like ‘bts being best friends for almost 9 minutes’ and ‘jinkook being the funniest duo for almost 8 minutes’ have been viewed millions of times.
And Crazyformyself is just one of many fan accounts spending countless hours translating, editing and posting videos of the band being just so jovial.
But the question is: why? When fans have the chance, why do they mold the band’s image into something so adorable?
Partly it’s because these boys appear to be — and probably are — very close. Spending almost every day with a handful of other guys cooking, cleaning, singing, and dancing together — not to mention the shared hardships and successes — it would be hard not to get close with the other members.
Beyond proximity, this perceived closeness may be traced — like gunpowder in a Road Runner sketch — to cultural differences. South Korea’s men have transformed themselves over the past few decades, as cultural taboos have been washed away in a gender exfoliation. Besides make-up and stylish fashion choices, BTS have embraced skinship — touching, biting, hugging and so on between two guys — which doesn’t have the same connotations in Korean culture as it does in the West.
This cuddliness is no doubt partly for the camera. They’re not going to film themselves being nasty to one another, let alone release the footage. Their record label, seeing the popularity of fan ‘ships’, are savvy enough to at least hint at the possibility of something deeper between the members. But despite the work of amatuer Dan Browns, it’s clear that their relationship is (probably) platonic.
The real explanation might be found in a rather obscure place. In 1985, academic Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick coined the phrase ‘homosocial’, referring to same-sex relationships that aren’t sexual or romantic, like an all-guys get together or camping trip. In the case of boy bands like BTS, these homosocial bonds are frolicking and always positive: spaces where men can just hang out, act silly with each other, and not have to worry that they’re, well, men.
In reality, we know male friendships don’t look like the loveable boys from Bantang. They can be gross, sexist, demeaning and, above all, deeply afraid of anything gay. The initial feelings of joy when watching these guys laughing and playing around eventually fade to sadness.
Reading through the comments on these videos, and you’ll see people talking about how envious they are of the band’s tight-knit relationships.
“This video made me realize that i will never have a strong friendship like [BTS] ??” wrote one person. “This video makes me feel lonely cuz I don’t have such friends…” wrote another. “I wish I had these types of caring friends like BTS”.
As a gay man, it can be tricky navigating friendships with straight guys, filled as they are with trip wires and macho posturing. I’m careful not to make my straight friends uncomfortable. I second guess everything I say and do, making sure it isn’t soaked in gay subtext. It’s emotionally taxing, as I’m sure it is for my straight friends, who have to monitor what they do to not suggest they’re flirting.
And this is what I and many others find so calming about watching clips of BTS hanging out. While scouring through message boards, I found one commenter talking about these ships, saying, “I started binge watching BTS videos when I was extremely depressed. Their videos made me laugh like crazies. I was unaware of the shipping or even shipping is a thing. I’ve always enjoyed every moment between any of the members because it’s pure.”
These videos show how close men can be to one another. It gives us a dream of male friendships: open with their feelings, caring for one another and, most of all, so much touching.
When I asked Rodriguez what draws people to these friendship videos, she explained that “ you can tell [their friendship] is genuine and they’re relatable. They care about each other and most importantly they respect each other.”
“I want a friendship like that.”
Originally published at https://www.lanewaydispatch.com on October 19, 2020.
