T-Ara: Falling off the horse because of the shocking bullying scandal in Kpop, vindicated but it's too late

Considered one of the "miracles" of Korean music in the 2010s, but T-Ara is like a flower that "soon blooms and fades" when on the peak of glory, suddenly "falls down". bottomless pit because of the shocking scandal.

T-Ara started with 6 members including Boram, Qri, Soyeon, Eunjung, Hyomin and Jiyeon. They attracted attention as juniors of two famous groups SG Wannabe and Seeya. The group owned many trends at that time such as: Cry Cry, Day By Day, Time To Love, Roly-Poly, We Were In Love, S.exy Love...

Even T-ara is expected to become a national group like SNSD. Many people think that only these girls have the ability to become a rival of SM's g.irl group.

Around 2009-2012 was the golden age of girls. The song Roly-Poly helped T-Ara bring in $ 2 million in sales and was the most downloaded song in Gaon history with 4 million downloads in 2011.

Also in 2011, T-Ara signed a contract of 4.7 billion won with J-Rock entertainment company for their Japanese debut. This is the highest contract amount of any Korean g.irl group debuting in Japan.

Even after the scandal broke out, they still earned a contract worth 5 billion won with Longzhen Culture Development (China). This shows that the real value of the girls' reputation and activities is great.

However, for the purpose of enriching the lineup, the management company decided to add two more members, Hwayoung and Ahreum. Following that, the announcement of 14-year-old member Kim Dani joining T-Ara of the management unit MBK caused a strong wave of protests.

It can be seen that T-Ara has no say in changing the group's personnel. In addition, the constant change of members also causes many disadvantages to the career of a potential g.irl group.

The company left it behind after the scandal buried its reputation

In July 2013, Hwayoung left the group right when T-ara was at the peak of popularity. Her departure caused the group member bullying scandal to break out and the people who stayed behind suffered from public hate.

Specifically, when the Day By Day promotions had not ended, the girls quickly appeared in Japan to hold a concert in Japan. The girls are also the first Korean g.irl group to have the opportunity to perform at Budokan Dome with a total of more than 20,000 spectators.

Hwayoung at that time due to an injury was unable to perform the choreography with the members. Things only stirred up when fans found "insinuations" on Twitter by T-Ara members about a person who lacked "determination". After their performance at Budokan, the T-Ara members took to social media to post meaningful status lines, and the opening was Hyomin. She wrote: "There is a difference in the level of determination. Show us more determination. Fighting!". The others joined in, with Jiyeon referring to someone who was "very good at acting".

A series of "insinuating" tweets by T-ara members and the response of Hwayoung and her sister - Hyoyoung have created mixed waves from the public. The public began to lean towards Hwayoung when thinking that she was being bullied by the rest of the group.

Netizens presented a series of evidence, directly targeting T-Ara members and accusing them of bullying members of the same group. Facing pressure from public opinion, on the night of July 30, 2021, MBK sent an official press release on the matter of member Hwayoung. Accordingly, Hwayoung will officially close her journey with T-Ara after nearly 2 years due to complaints from a team of 19 people in the company related to T-Ara. Kim Kwang Soo (MBK's CEO) also directly affirmed that bullying was not the reason why Hwayoung had to leave the group, and T-ara's tweets on social networks were not directed at anyone.

But the announcement is only adding fuel to the fire amid a storm of controversy over T-Ara. The most regrettable thing about Kim Kwang Soo is that he did not r.eveal the whole truth and story behind the group's conflicts of interest during their activities, but only terminated the contract with Hwayoung for the same reason as the attitude. "uncooperative". The T-ara members were almost in a passive position, unable to speak on behalf of the group and the company and could do nothing but sit still and wait for the "brick". T-ara's next comeback was also announced to be postponed indefinitely.

Immediately after the "ultimatum" issued by MBK on the night of July 30, 2012, many T-ara fans, because they could not find a good reason, decided to leave the fandom. They burned albums, stoned the band they once loved so much. Only in the first week of the scandal broke out, a series of brands that T-ara participated in advertising such as Tony Moly, Daewoo, Look Optical simultaneously requested to cancel the contract ahead of time, the cost of compensation for damage was up to billions of dong. .

Facing the weak explanation of 7 girls, netizens can't seem to let go. People poured into T-ara's performance video, leaving merciless insults, curses, and curses comments for the members. Many fans in Korea even went directly to the company's headquarters, throwing rotten eggs and bricks to express their anger. Even the wave of boycott was so strong that anti-fans were ready to threaten to k.ill T-ara members. Stages with T-ara's appearance received boos and curses from the audience.

In September 2012, T-ara returned after the scandal with S.exy Love. The song is a sequel to the MV drama "Day By Day" with a science fiction genre. But this seems to be a comeback to complete T-Ara's 2012 plan without any hope of helping the girls be vindicated. S.exy Love left a brief resonance in the hearts of fans because the negative pressure from the public made T-ara's song promotion time greatly reduced.

Throughout 2013, T-Ara continuously favored the Japanese market. After Areum's departure in July 2013, T-Ara returned to the original lineup of 6 members. Efforts to recreate the group's image through consecutive comebacks in the second half of 2013 seemed to have come to a dead end.

A series of music activities were actively promoted by T-ara during the 4 years after the scandal. From Jiyeon, Hyomin, Eunjung's solo music projects to music products combined with domestic and foreign artists, all of them could not regain the girls' reputation.

Tears were shed but in return there was only silence from the audience. In early 2017, Boram and Soyeon left the company, ending their artistic journey after 7 years working as members of T-Ara.

Was vindicated but it was too late

The thought that the story of T-Ara would be forever forgotten, in 2017, the war was suddenly re-ignited by former member Hwayoung. After finishing with T-Ara, Hwayoung began to achieve certain successes in the acting field. Appearing in TvN's Talk Show Taxi program, Hwayoung had her own experiences when talking about the old scandal. This is also not the first time Hwayoung mentioned T-ara after leaving the group.

Whether it was unintentional or intentional, Hwayoung's way of mentioning T-Ara made many fans uncomfortable. In the past, when T-ara participated in promoting the song "Little Apple", Hwayoung also shared an image of a pinned apple on her social media account. When T-ara came back with So C.razy with a sailor style, Hwayoung did not hesitate to immediately put on a sailor suit and upload it to her personal account.

And this time it seems that things did not go according to Hwayoung's plan. Because she was so upset that she complained five times seven times in the media, a former employee who worked with the group stood up to denounce the whole truth about the scandal that took place 5 years ago.

According to this employee, T-Ara is not completely innocent, but the whole problem comes from the Hwayoung sisters. A series of screenshots of the chat where Hwayoung's sister threatened member Areum have been released, including many heavy words like "scratch Areum's face", "I will wait for you at the Music studio". Bank",... Needless to say, netizens were surprised after knowing the whole truth.

This staff member revealed the true story of Hwayoung's injury at the concert in Japan. She asked to be carried away, supported on crutches when the injury was not really that serious and behind the camera, Hwayoung was still able to walk. Hwayoung even voluntarily dropped out of practice, leisurely got her nails done, and abandoned the concert. A series of evidence from the former staff helped the audience realize that T-Ara was loved by the production crew, but it was only at this moment that everything was clear.

After the above information was posted, a series of evidences were searched by netizens to summarize and vindicate T-Ara. The audience had to admit that there was no sign of bullying or isolating Hwayoung.

T-Ara has spent 5 years living in fear of estrangement from the public and home fans because of an unauthentic scandal. Up to now, although it has been exonerated, the notoriety left for the group is still an indelible scar.

The girls have spent half of their career to find justice for the injustice they have suffered. This is probably the most unfair case in the history of Korean entertainment.

T-ara's 15th anniversary comeback, Roly Poly version 2 coming soon, bombarding Kpop with 2NE1? Minh Lợi11:01:11 21/05/2024Recently, Hyomin posted an Instagram story with photos r.evealing T-ara's 15th anniversary project and checking in at the photoshoot with the members. This information currently makes Kpop fans restless.