"Don't steal our culture." Following THIS promotional clip, NewJeans members were bombarded by Chinese netizens' criticisms.
Here's why they are receiving malicious remarks.
NewJeans Introduces 'Hanji' in Collab With Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism
On January 6, "rookie monster" NewJeans appeared in a promotional video released by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korea Craft and Design Culture Promotion Institute.
The video, "2022 Korean Wave-linked Collaborative Content Planning and Development Support" project introduced the girl group as its "Korean Wave IP."
In particular, the ad contains NewJeans globally promoting the excellence of Hanji and new Hanji cultural products which include a talk show under the theme.
The quintet also featured the traditional way of opening flower Hanji and making Hanji lights with Hanji jang, a national intangible cultural asset.
To boost the culture-promoting video, NewJeans even wore modern hanbok that boasts their beauty while talking about the traditional paper's (Hanji) excellence, charm, and value, revealing five relevant keywords.
In the video, fans around the world can also see NewJeans personally pulling a string of Hanji made of jiseung craft, admiring Hanji products and watching a craftsman demonstrate the delicate creation of Hanji, each member choosing their favorite flowers to experience the art.
NewJeans Terrorized For Promoting Hanji
Following the video, a lot of Koreans were delighted that the girl group decided to promote the product, amid the weakening Hanji industry in the past 50 years. Koreans were hopeful that the quintet's influence and power will encourage not only local but foreign fans to embrace its excellence.
However, Chinese netizens came to NewJeans' official SNS (Instagram, YouTube) to express their anger over the group and the clip.
In context, some Chinese web users accused NewJeans of promoting Korea who are stealing their culture.
- "The art of paper-making belongs to China, and Korea only inherits Chinese paper-making technology. They tried to take away our culture as if it is Korea's own technology."
- "Koreans steal our Chinese culture. You don't even try to know our history before you steal it."
- "China is still the first country to make paper."
- "This is ridiculous."
Chinese netters were also disappointed with NewJeans for allegedly being a platform to spread "misinformation" and "cultural theft."
On the flip side, Koreans and K-pop fans defended the "Hype Boy" singers, emphasizing that the group is promoting Hanji, the Korean traditional paper, not papermaking itself.
- "It's not a video about paper-making technology, it's a video about Korean paper."
- "Chinese can't even distinguish between paper technology and Korean paper product."
- "When did the video say that Korea was the originator of papermaking?"
As the topic sparked heated discussion among Korean and Chinese netters, spreading on various SNS and online communities, even the Korean Paper Association decided to defend NewJeans.
"Papermaking technology was introduced from China's Cai Lun's technology, and there is no introduction of Korea as the inventor of papermaking in the NewJeans hanji promotional video."
READ MORE: NewJeans Unedited Visuals Become Hot Topic– Here's Why
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Written by Eunice Dawson.
