South Korean government provokes outrage by saying K-pop stars are alike | News from the world

The new broadcasting guidelines developed by the South Korean government have provoked outrage by suggesting that television programs feature similar K-pop stars.

The guidelines, which criticize the stars by calling them "lean" with "similar hairstyles and makeup, and outfits exposing their bodies," were released earlier this month by the Ministry of Equality Gender and Family (Mogef).

The paragraphs that provoked the offense advise limiting the number of K-pop singers appearing on a television show, lest similar appearances promote unrealistic and narrow standards of beauty.

"Do singers on TV show twins? They look seriously identical. Most are members of a group of idols, "say the guidelines, according to the Korea Times. "Most of them are skinny and have similar hairstyles and make-up with outfits exposing their bodies."

The Korean government has filed a petition calling for the abolition of the ministry on the grounds that it had tried to censor "the look of the female pop star," the Korean daily Joonang Daily reported. The petition says that the ministry was going "on the road to [dictator] Chun Doo Hwan, starting with censorship on the Internet and now censorship in appearance.

Comparisons with the dictator, who led South Korea since the early 1980s, were also established by opposition politicians, including Ha Tae-keung of the small opposition Bareunmirae party, reported the Korea Times.

"The ministry of gender says that K-pop idols should not be together on TV because they are all skinny and pretty with pale skin," he wrote on Facebook. "What is the difference between this and the repression of hair length and skirts during Chun Doo-hwan's military dictatorship?"

The government reaffirmed that the guidelines are not mandatory but are intended to mitigate the negative effects of unrealistic standards of beauty. South Korea is renowned for its cosmetic surgery industry, with one-third of the country's young women suspected of falling under the knife.

Last year, South Korean women launched a social media movement against the country's culture of demanding beauty standards, which suggests women are engaged in cosmetic surgery and painstaking care regimes. the skin in several stages.

The movement, called Escape the Corset, allowed Korean women to publish selfies without make-up and videos of themselves destroying their makeup, in a rebellion against the standards of beauty.