MTV Faces "Double Standard" Accusations When Dealing with K Pop Artist and BTS' Fans Want Answers

When MTV announced this year’s categories, the company faced immediate backlash from K-pop fans. Instead of nominating BTS in the main categories, the MTV VMA’s introduced a Best K-pop category. EXO, NCT 127, Blackpink, TXT, MONSTA X, and BTS were all nominated. K-pop fans were not happy and accused the awards ceremony of being racist and xenophobic. 

BTS’s “Boy With Luv” music video has over 514 million views on YouTube and it was only released in April 2019. The song is also a certified platinum hit. Their album Map of the Soul: Persona was recently certified gold. Despite this success, the group was kept out of major categories like Video of the Year and Artist of the Year. 

In 2019, BTS won two Billboard Music Awards, became the first group since the Beatles to have three Billboard No. 1 albums in less than a year, and sold out Wembley Stadium in London. The “Boy With Luv” music video broke three Guinness World Records for “most viewed YouTube video in 24 hours,” “most viewed YouTube music video in 24 hours,” and “most viewed YouTube music video in 24 hours by a K-pop group.” There is no doubt BTS earned a place in the major categories, but MTV shut them out.

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