Yo peeps I’m back after taking a quick breather and what a time I chose to come back eh. Today I opened up the kpop subredit for the first time in 5 days and what’s the first thing that strikes out at me, news of this new Idol called Holland. What’s all the buzz circulating around him you wonder? Well it looks like the media is labeling him as the first openly gay idol in history there…. Is he tho, I’ll get into that in a moment. But to start I do wanna give him his props for being able to come out in what is to this day very much considered a conservative leaning country.

A lot of thought must have gone into this heavy of a decision. Now if only we knew what the response will be overall ahead of time. Chances are he has a long road full of all sorts of obstacles ahead of him there. It ain’t all that easy to be an idol to begin with. But hey to focus on a more positive note,  it does seem like international fans are 100% rallying behind him so he’s definitely not alone at least.😊

Although I speculate it shouldn’t be THAT hard for the Kpop community if anybody, in today’s climate specially, to accept him with open arms. In the age of all these “gay ships” as they like to call ’em, it feels like it would be outright hypocritical to now have an actual gay idol out there and then for them to turn their backs or worse to scorn him. Don’t cha think?

I mean when you look at it these days its not all that uncommon for gay/lesbian compilation moments between idols to get a bunch of views, and for all these “boy x boy/girl x girl love” fanfics to be made out of their lives either. Then on top of it the way I see it you do have idols themselves showing and having showed growing support for LGBTQ rights over the years. That’s bound to have some effect on society since they impact so many youths right? In fact it may have already happened 😮 , because in all the recent polls I’ve been finding, time and time again it’s been showed that younger people are increasingly becoming more open to same-sex relationships. It’s just a fact.

One of them by the Pew Research Center for example showed those in the 18-29 bracket specifically are overwhelmingly supportive nowadays. 71% if you’re curious. More interesting tho is how overall back in 2013 S.Korea was one of the countries leading with the biggest change in terms of acceptance growth.

Add in there as well a bunch of other little things happening more recently like EXO using gender neutral pronouns in their latest album. Something I’ve noticed other groups doing more and more off and having done in the past too. Then we got the rise of same-sex friendly themes in music videos done by non gay artists which have been getting positivd receptions. ANDA’s Touch from a couple years ago and Chuu’s more recent Heart Attack come to mind. Pretty much yeah it definitely seems like more of an open and welcoming era playing field to go for it nowadays. 😇

Thus I think, and genuinely do hope, things go well for Holland in the future. In the meantime you can show some support yourself if you so choose by checking out his latest MV for Neverland. Which by the way showcases the love between two guys in it, and brings up the the wanting to escape to a place were that kind of love can be expressed more freely. The closest I’ve seen to something similar being portrayed in the past was K.Will‘s Please don’t. However if you’ve checked that one out you already know it doesn’t really portray a “relationship” exactly like this newest MV does. Which please, do give a try.

Holland– Neverland

Now in terms of this MV as you can see it’s a simple yet very sweet music video. Not a lot going on in the shots but you cant deny that it’s quite aesthetically pleasing on the eyes. Maybe not the most groundbreaking when it comes to the sound department tho as you’d hope for but it’s nice too. It’s got a kinda of mellow feel throughout but I find all those lower angle shots aiming up toward the sky lighten up the mood nicely. I can’t help but feel like it’s one of those artsy type of choices to subconsciously remind peeps out there watching to keep their heads up when things are down. Maybe I’m looking too deep into that sort off imaginary but regardless I think it’s more laid back than sad even without coming to such a conclusion.

And sure I’ve seen some people already complain about his voice but I tend to like that more nasally type of sound in singers so I wasn’t bothered by it. However the real sad thing here is that it earns a 19+ rating for simply featuring a gay kiss from all the reports I’ve been reading. Yup that’s sad indeed since there is literally nothing “R-rated” here that i can see to actually warrant such a rating and is actually as pg as an mv can get. But you can’t make all progress in one day I suppose. In the meantime I’ll look forward to how much further this artist is able to help push things. From what I’ve seen he is from a smaller label which means less marketing but at the same time I think it’s what frees him up to be himself.

Oh and yeah before I forget when it comes to if he is the first openly gay kpop artist or not, technically nope. A quick google search showed me that you also got Marshall Bang too. Tho it does seem his stuff has mostly been in English, that could be why the title has gone to Holland instead. Either way that shouldn’t detract from embracing the diversity here I think. 🙂

Welp you now know my thoughts how bouts you share yours? 😃

P.S. Why the name Holland? Probs because The Netherlands(informally used to be called Holland) was the first place to legalize same-sex marriage. Just a little quick history lesson there. 😛