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Opinion | K-pop deaths of Goo Hara, Sulli and Jonghyun leave industry with blood on its hands

  • To have three celebrities from the same industry, in the same country, die in less than two years shows that something has gone tragically wrong
  • Pressure placed on singers and performers by K-pop industry, and lack of mental health support, has reaped a devastating cost

Reading Time:3 minutes
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The tragic death of K-pop star Goo Hara highlights the immense pressure felt by Korean stars, and that much more support could be given to them by the K-pop music industry.

It’s time to admit it: something is rotten in the world of K-pop.

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On Sunday, singer Goo Hara, 28, was found dead in her home in Seoul six months after she survived what is believed to be her first suicide attempt. Her death came just six weeks after Sulli – another K-pop star and Goo’s close friend – took her own life aged 25 after a long battle with online bullies.
The spate of K-pop suicides started almost two years ago when Kim Jong-hyun, better known as Jonghyun from top boy band Shinee, killed himself in December 2017 at the age of 27.

The trio are of course not the first music icons to commit suicide – Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain famously died by his own hand in 1994, and more recently we have seen the death by suicide of The Prodigy’s Keith Flint (March this year) and Chester Bennington from Linkin Park (July 2017).

But to have three celebrities from the same industry, in the same country, die in the space of less than two years indicates that something has gone tragically wrong in K-pop.

Goo, 28, was found dead in her home in Seoul on Sunday, six months after she survived what is believed to be her first suicide attempt.
Goo, 28, was found dead in her home in Seoul on Sunday, six months after she survived what is believed to be her first suicide attempt.
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The pressure the K-pop machine exerts on its stars – particularly women – is immense. It begins the moment they enter training schools as teenagers: they have their mobile phones taken from them, they are cut off from family and friends, forbidden from engaging in normal youthful relationships, and are taught to project a bizarre, conflicting image of both innocence and sexual availability.

And the cost for any transgression – particularly from K-pop’s obsessive sasaeng fans – can be huge.

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