Just two decades ago, K-pop was a regional curiosity—a blend of J-pop inspiration and Korean pop, largely confined to East and Southeast Asia. Today, it is a global cultural and economic superpower, generating over $12 billion annually and commanding a fandom so devoted it rivals religious movements in scale and intensity.
But K-pop’s most surprising and strategically significant expansion has occurred in the Muslim world. K-pop has not just penetrated but reshaped youth culture, consumer habits, and even national soft power strategies. Indonesia—the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation—hosts over 15 million active K-pop fans, with fan clubs operating in every province (“K-pop Fandom in Indonesia”, Tempo.co, 2024). In Malaysia, K-pop dominates streaming charts, university campuses, and even public diplomacy events (“Malaysia’s K-pop Generation”, The Star, 2023).
This isn’t organic growth alone. It is the result of deliberate state-backed investments.
Saudi Arabia, under its Vision 2030 plan to diversify beyond oil, has made K-pop a cornerstone of its cultural rebranding. In 2022, the Saudi Ministry of Culture signed a landmark $1.3 billion deal with HYBE, BTS’s agency, to launch a local boy group, build an entertainment academy in Riyadh, and co-produce concerts across the Gulf (“Saudi Arabia and HYBE’s $1.3B K-pop Deal”, Arab News, 2022).
Meanwhile, Indonesia and Malaysia have embraced K-pop through cultural diplomacy and industry partnerships. Indonesia’s Ministry of Tourism has featured K-pop stars like NCT and BLACKPINK in national campaigns to attract young Asian tourists (“Indonesia Uses K-pop to Boost Tourism”, Jakarta Post, 2023).
Malaysia’s government has hosted official K-pop festivals in Kuala Lumpur, co-sponsored by state-linked media firms, calling them “bridges of regional friendship” (“K-pop as Soft Power in ASEAN”, ASEAN Briefing, 2024).
So discussing this industry—and any similar industry, whether of drama or anime—holds true: the strategic path they take is always the same. If you are a K-pop addict or you know someone who is, do share these insights with them.
The Rise of Hallyu: From Economic Collapse to Global Soft Power
The Korean Wave, or Hallyu, did not emerge suddenly but grew out of deep social and economic changes. After the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997, South Korea was struggling with massive unemployment. Men and women began competing for the same limited jobs, which changed how appearance, behaviour, and sensitivity were valued. In this competitive environment, image became a survival tool. According to James Turnbull, a cultural critic and writer based in Busan, this was the moment when makeup and beauty became part of everyday male life because men now had to compete with women not only in skill but also in looks and presentation (Turnbull, The Grand Narrative, 2013).
Before the 1990s, Korean masculinity was more traditional and closer to the Western ideal of muscular strength, authority, and heroism. This was partly due to American influence after the end of Japanese rule, when the United States helped establish the modern Korean state. Dr. Sun Jung explains that popular culture in Korea at the time mirrored Western masculine models, focusing on toughness and dominance (Jung, Korean Masculinities and Transcultural Consumption, 2011). However, by the mid-1990s, a slow transformation began.
The first big change came with the group Seo Taiji and Boys in 1992. They introduced hip-hop beats, English lyrics, and soft boyish looks. This combination was new to Korean audiences. Many conservative viewers criticised them for being too feminine and for rejecting traditional masculine norms. Yet, as Dr. Joanna Elfving-Hwang notes, their style opened the door for a new kind of masculinity that was emotional, fashionable, and artistic (Elfving-Hwang, Korean Masculinities and Transcultural Modernity, 2013). Even though they were criticised, their innovation left a permanent mark. One of the members, Yang Hyun-suk, later founded YG Entertainment, which became home to global groups like BLACKPINK.
Around the same time, an artist known as V2 was censored because his soft and gentle style was considered inappropriate for men. His career ended, but his influence lived on. Soon after, the boy band H.O.T. (High Five of Teenagers) became the first idol group to adopt a deliberately cute and soft image. SM Entertainment, the agency behind them, even conducted surveys among high school girls to study what kind of male image they liked most. The surveys showed that young girls preferred boys who looked gentle, clean, and emotionally available. SM then made it a rule for male idols to appear soft and innocent in both looks and behaviour.
Cultural scholar Kim Youna writes that K-pop’s global success depends on the commodification of male bodies that attract a female audience. She explains that K-pop redefined male beauty by presenting bodies that were clean, hairless, odourless, and emotion-driven. This kind of masculinity appears unthreatening and is especially appealing to young women (Kim Youna, Male Beauty and the K-pop Industry, pp.132–135). Sociologist R. W. Connell had already explained how industries profit by turning gender itself into a market product (Connell, Masculinities, 1995). K-pop took that theory into practice, selling gender as a visual and emotional brand.
This transformation was not limited to Korea. Across East Asia, including China and Japan, a similar androgynous trend appeared among those born after 1990. In China, younger women began to prefer dating younger men, who were considered more emotionally sensitive and refined. Historically, East Asian societies valued cultured and gentle men over warriors or soldiers. Unlike the Western world, which admired knights and masculine strength, Confucian traditions admired education, refinement, and emotional calm. This made it easy for soft and elegant men to become the new standard of beauty in pop culture.
The change was visible even in films and animation. The Korean animated movie Demon Hunters earned remarkable profits simply because it had strong female leads and soft-featured male characters. The storylines and aesthetics reflected the growing popularity of non-threatening male images.
By the late 2010s, K-pop had transformed from a national experiment into a global economic force. BTS’s album Love Yourself became the top album in the United States in 2018, marking a turning point for Korea’s cultural exports. In a public lecture at Harvard University titled “Hallyu in Asia: A Dialogue,” J.Y. Park, founder of JYP Entertainment, clearly said that Korea’s aim was to export its culture just like it exported cars or technology. The state supported this cultural mission. In 2018, France’s AFP News reported that BTS alone generated five billion dollars for the Korean economy and attracted over eight hundred thousand tourists to the country. President Kim Dae-jung proudly described Hallyu as Korea’s “chimney-less industry,” an economy that produced global influence through culture rather than factories.
Another reason K-pop spread so easily was its image of clean living. Most idols are shown as people who do not drink, smoke, or have public relationships. This discipline has made K-pop especially popular among conservative and religious audiences, including Muslim youth. But was it like that?
Why Girls Are More Prone
To understand how dangerous K-pop became, let us examine how it impacted Muslim girls. One of the deepest reasons K-pop became so powerful among Muslim girls is the feminised image of its male idols. Unlike traditional portrayals of men in Western pop—i.e., muscular, dominant, loud—K-pop redefined masculinity into something soft, emotional, and aesthetic.
This form of beauty has a name in Korean culture: kkonminam (꽃미남), literally “flower boy.” It describes men who look gentle, wear makeup, have flawless skin, and express emotion openly. Studies by Joanna Elfving-Hwang (2011–2018) and P. Ayuningtyas (2016) show that this image was carefully crafted by Korea’s entertainment industry as a marketing tool. Companies realised that female fans, especially in conservative or patriarchal societies, were more emotionally drawn to men who appear kind, empathetic, and safe rather than sexually aggressive or distant. We call them Feminised Idols of K-Pop, and everyone is aware of it—to the point that male K-pop idols do advertisements for female products.
Ayuningtyas’s 2016 study, “Indonesian Fan Girls’ Perception towards Soft Masculinity as Represented by K-pop Male Idols,” found that Indonesian Muslim girls described these idols as “ideal men” because they were gentle yet strong, beautiful yet respectful. They did not threaten cultural norms—instead, they offered a fantasy of balance: men who could be protective and pretty at the same time. The study showed that these traits built an emotional bridge that normal male figures in local cultures rarely cross.
In her broader research, Elfving-Hwang explains that K-pop soft masculinity is not accidental—it is an industrial aesthetic. Idols are trained to smile warmly, cry publicly, show affection to one another, and present vulnerability as a virtue. This “emotional openness” creates the illusion of intimacy. Female fans begin to feel that the idol understands them, that he is emotionally available, that he feels safe.
That illusion is then magnified by algorithms. Social media platforms detect which fancams, edits, and idol moments get more emotional reactions from female audiences—slow smiles, tears, gentle gestures—and push them again and again. The same algorithmic pattern that keeps users hooked on TikTok trends is now applied to human faces and emotions. Each short clip of a soft-spoken idol becomes a small dose of digital affection. The fan feels comforted, seen, and validated—and keeps watching.
This explains why Muslim girls, more than boys, fall into these cycles. Girls are socialised to respond more to emotional intimacy and aesthetics. They are also the primary consumers of romantic fantasy in most media. When those emotional arcs are merged with rhythm, style, and colour—all wrapped in moral “safety”—it becomes an irresistible emotional package.
Sociological data supports this pattern. Global fandom surveys show that women dominate K-pop fanbases. According to Social Fans Geek (2023), about 55% of global fans identify as female, while Statista (2021) found that female fans engage in more intense activities like collecting photos, joining fan cafés, and checking schedules. For specific groups, the difference is far wider—one Aladin Music dataset showed that 76% of STAYC’s album buyers were women, while male buyers made up only 11%.
This gender imbalance also shapes the industry itself. Producers, stylists, and agencies build their idols for the female gaze: pastel lighting, skin care routines, emotional lyrics, and choreographies that emphasise grace rather than raw strength. Even the voice tones are adjusted in mixing to sound tender and vulnerable.
For Muslim audiences, the effect becomes layered. In cultures where physical contact between genders is restricted and emotional expression by men is rare, K-pop idols offer an emotional fantasy that feels both romantic and safe. The girl can adore him without guilt; he is distant enough not to be real, yet near enough to comfort her imagination.
But this safety is part of the trap. The idol’s gentleness, his polished face, his emotional words—all are products of industrial intimacy. Every smile, tear, and whisper has been designed, rehearsed, and packaged for monetisation. The more he appears “soft,” the more he sells. The more “vulnerable” he seems, the more the fan feels needed.
This doesn't end here. Wonyoungism—an online trend inspired by K-pop idol Jang Wonyoung, focused on self-improvement and a hyper-feminine aesthetic—involves adopting positive habits like excessive less eating, skincare, and exercise, combined with a soft, "it girl" style, all driven by the idea of becoming a more confident version of oneself. It has unfortunately led to health issues with girls around the world.
Inside the K-pop Industry’s Addiction Design
K-pop’s global grip isn’t magic; it’s method. Behind the glitter lies a highly industrialized system where emotional attachment is not a byproduct but the main focus. South Korean agencies—HYBE, SM, JYP, YG—operate not as music labels but as builders of parasocial dependency, using psychological principles, aesthetic control, and data-driven feedback to create lifelong devotion (“Industrialised Intimacy in K-pop”, Elfving-Hwang, 2018).
Here’s how the industry does it—it’s all by design.
1. The Trainee Trauma
Young trainees, often recruited as early as age 10 to 13, endure years of harsh, militarized training under near-total institutional control (“The Dark Side of the Limelight”, Chase, 2023). Their diets, sleep, social interactions, and even emotional expressions are tightly managed (Kim, “Cultural Factory of Idols”, 2022). The psychological toll is severe; chronic anxiety, eating disorders, depression, and trauma are widespread (“Mental Health in K-pop”, Asian Journal of Psychiatry, 2024). This environment doesn’t just build performers; it normalizes emotional suppression and performative vulnerability. By the time they debut, every tear or smile is a rehearsed reflex, not a spontaneous feeling (“K-pop Idol Factory”, Jung, 2012).
2. Persona Engineering for Mass Attachment
Agencies deliberately assign each member a hyper-defined emotional role—the “aegyo” maknae, the stoic leader, the nurturing “mom”—not based on personality, but on market-researched psychographic segmentation targeting youth across Asia and beyond (“K-pop: Popular Music, Cultural Amnesia”, Lie, 2015). This ensures that within one group, every fan finds “their” emotional anchor. Even group dynamics—hugs, playful teasing, protective gestures—are choreographed to show soft homosocial bonding, a non-threatening male intimacy that fosters safety over sexual tension (“Soft Masculinity and Homosociality”, Elfving-Hwang, 2011).
3. Soft Masculinity as Guilt-Free Adoration
The kkonminam (“flower boy”) look—flawless skin, pastel fashion, delicate features—combines feminine beauty cues with masculine form to create idols who are desirable yet non-threatening. Among young Muslim fans in Indonesia, this aesthetic is seen as embodying “hygienic, and boyfriendable boys” who align with religious and cultural values. Fans describe these idols as “halal crushes”—emotionally expressive without moral compromise. Agencies boost this through color psychology and gentle lighting, ensuring fans can consume endlessly without disgust or guilt. (“Indonesian Fan Girls’ Perception of Soft Masculinity”, Ayuningtyas, 2016)
4. Killing Points and Choreography
K-pop routines are filmed for fancams, not concerts. Every performance includes “killing points”—micro-gestures like a wink, lip bite, or direct gaze—timed to camera cuts so each idol gets a solo emotional highlight. Choreographers explicitly design these “point choreography” moments to be clipped, looped, and shared. As one dance expert notes, “The TikTok-ification of choreography has revolutionized fan engagement through… ‘kill-points’” (“Killing Points and Viral Choreo”, Seoul Dance Review, 2023). These seconds become dopamine-triggering doses of perceived personal attention, rewound endlessly by fans. (“Choreographing Fan Desire”, Jung & Shim, 2014)
5. The Comeback Ritual for Scarcity
Groups disappear for months, then return through a carefully planned sequence: cryptic teasers, concept photos, member-specific videos. This exploits intermittent reinforcement—a behavioral principle where unpredictable rewards increase anticipation. Perceived scarcity directly fuels FOMO (fear of missing out), which drives impulsive buying and obsessive monitoring (“Scarcity and Impulse Buying in K-pop”, Martiza, 2025). Fans mistake this engineered suspense for genuine excitement, but it’s controlled deprivation—one of psychology’s strongest addiction triggers. (“The Comeback Ritual Economy”, Jin & Yoon, 2017)
6. Industrial Empathy
Fan service—like handwritten letters, live-streamed confessions, tearful speeches—is organized emotional labor using standardized empathetic scripts (“Industrial Empathy in Asian Pop”, Hong, 2020). This creates parasocial relationships—one-sided bonds where fans feel deeply connected despite no reciprocity (“Parasocial Bonds in Digital Fandom”, Sauz, 2025). Even public breakdowns are calibrated to trigger protectiveness. As one study observes, “parasocial relationships may lead to high levels of empathy from fans toward celebrities”. The idol appears fragile; the fan feels essential, deepening loyalty through emotional rescue fantasies. (“Parasocial Attachment and Loyalty”, Ma et al., 2022)
7. The Photocard Gamble and Its Addiction
Albums are sold in multiple versions with random inclusions—especially photocards—turning purchases into loot-box gambles (“The Photocard Economy”, Inaguma, 2024). Fans buy dozens of copies hoping to “pull” their bias, activating the same dopamine loops as slot machines (“K-pop Merch and Gambling Mechanics”, Ardhiyansyah, 2021). One fan admits, “I genuinely think I have an addiction” (Fan Interview, Korea Herald, 2023), while research shows fans treat photocards “as a living human being” (“Emotional Scarcity in K-pop Collecting”, Journal of Consumer Culture, 2024). Behavioral economists confirm these systems resemble gambling, triggering the reward system and contributing to addiction.
8. Controlled Crisis and Leveraging Scandal
Agencies often manage—and try not to suppress—controversies. Dating leaks, mental health breaks, or temporary disbandments trigger fan “defense mode,” increasing online activity and spending (“Crisis as Commitment Tool”, Lee, 2021). Research shows unilateral loyalty strengthens fans' commitment to their idols without requiring reciprocation (“Parasocial Resilience in K-pop”, Ma et al., 2022). Outrage and sympathy both feed engagement; even pain becomes productive. And HYBE uses Weverse to gather real-time data on fan reactions, trending moments, and purchasing patterns (“Weverse: The Data Engine Behind BTS”, HYBE Investor Brief, 2023). If a member’s gesture goes viral, it’s repeated in the next comeback. As one analysis notes, “Weverse is an efficient platform to keep track of fans' behaviors, search for their needs to provide merchandise”. The system learns what melts hearts—and quickly refines it. This is cultural feedback looping, where fan emotion directly shapes content. (“Monetising Fandom Through Data”, Song, 2021)
10. Intimacy Simulators
Platforms like HYBE’s Weverse and SM’s Bubble simulate private connection with idols—“text” fans, post selfies, and reply to messages (“The Illusion of Intimacy in Bubble”, Lee, 2025). Fans know interactions are limited or automated, but their brains treat them as real. As one study states, Bubble sells communication and the illusion of intimacy at a cost (“Parasocial Platforms and Profit”, Sauz, 2025). These apps blur community and commerce, keeping fans in a closed ecosystem where belonging is monetized (“The Business Model of Weverse”, Song, 2021).
Between Faith and Fandom
For tens of millions of young Muslim women, growing up in societies that police public expressions of emotion and leave personal and intimate needs unmet (I'm saying about haram desires), K-pop idols offer something many describe as "halal yearning!!!": a form of admiration that feels spiritually permissible, even healing.
Yet this bond is not free. It's precisely crafted, psychologically engineered, and financially extractive—so how can it be real?
The male idols of K-pop, with their flawless skin, emotional literacy, and pastel-draped existence, create a radical alternative to dominant models of masculinity throughout the Muslim world. They cry unashamedly, they hug openly, they speak of mental health. To young Muslim women raised in cultures that equate maleness with stoicism or authority, this softness is revolutionary.
In Indonesia, the world's largest Muslim-majority nation, fans consistently describe idols as embodying "the ideal Muslim husband": clean, caring, respectful, and non-aggressive (“Indonesian Fan Girls' Perception of Soft Masculinity”, Ayuningtyas, 2016). They're not sexualised—they're aestheticised as moral beings. As one 19-year-old university student in Bandung put it: "He's beautiful, but not in a way that makes me feel sinful. I can admire him and still pray." (“Faith and Fandom in Digital Indonesia”, Mulya, 2022).
This is not an accident. The K-pop agencies, mindful of their huge Southeast Asian market, deliberately sanitize male sensuality, replacing frank sexuality with what scholars refer to as “emotional chastity”: intimacy without physicality, passion without provocation (“Industrialised Intimacy in K-pop”, Elfving-Hwang, 2018). For Muslim fans, this creates a rare space where devotion doesn’t demand guilt.
I was surprised to find that Muslim K-pop fans are not passive consumers. They actively negotiate boundaries: many mute suggestive dance moves in fancams, avoid dating rumours, skip concerts with revealing outfits, and focus on the lyrics about perseverance, self-love, or anti-bullying themes (“K-pop and Islamic Ethics in Digital Fandom”, Sari & Rahman, 2023). But this does not stop them from fitnah—instead, it begins to corrupt them.
A Bangladeshi university student shared in an online testimony: "When I'm stressed about exams or family pressure, BTS songs like 'Spring Day' remind me I'm not alone. It's like therapy—but with music. My parents don't understand, but Allah knows my heart isn't straying" (Reddit r/islam, 2024).
Yet this ethical navigation is exhausting. Conservative clerics have issued fatwas against K-pop in Malaysia and Egypt, citing the "promotion of Western decadence" and "idolatrous obsession" (“Religious Authority and Pop Culture in Muslim Societies”, Al-Masri, 2023). One Egyptian scholar thus ruled: "Loving a created being more than the Creator is shirk in the heart"—a charge which may haunt many devout fans (“Fatwa on K-pop Obsession”, Dar al-Ifta Egypt, 2022).
The result? A crisis of conscience. Fans are stuck between guilty pleasure and repentance, streaming music one minute while begging forgiveness the next!
“I Bought 87 Albums for One Card”: The Photocard Trap
The most visible form of K-pop addiction isn't emotional—it's financial. And for Muslim fans from middle-class families, it often crosses into moral distress.
Albums are sold in various versions, each containing one random photocard of a member. Fans buy dozens—sometimes hundreds—of copies, chasing after one rare image of their "bias." This isn't collecting; it's loot-box gambling disguised as support (“K-pop Merch and the Psychology of Scarcity”, Desnika, 2023).
Testimonials reveal deep shame:
“I spent my entire Eid gift money—Rs 15,000—on one SEVENTEEN album set, just for a Jun photocard. Afterwards, I cried. I know it’s haram to waste money, but I couldn’t stop.” — 20-year-old fan from Lahore (TikTok confessional, 2024).
“My mom thinks I’m saving for university. But I’ve spent over $300 this month on ENHYPEN albums. I feel like a fraud.” — 18-year-old from Kuala Lumpur (“K-pop Debt Diaries”, Malay Mail, 2023).
Islamic scholars now warn that such spending violates israf—extravagance—a serious sin in Islam. As one paper states: “When fandom drives reckless expenditure, it ceases to be entertainment and becomes spiritual corruption” (“Consumption and Conscience in Muslim K-pop Fandom”, Journal of Islamic Ethics, 2025).
Very true. What are some of the implications of the fact that it is a popular activity?
Guilt aside, many Muslim fans insist K-pop saved them. In conservative households where mental health is stigmatised, idols' messages about self-worth and depression offer validation. But the industry knows this. It weaponizes vulnerability. When an idol says "You are my reason to live," the fan doesn't hear marketing—she hears reciprocity. And in return, she streams, buys, defends, and donates—not out of choice, but out of emotional debt. As one Indonesian fan tearfully admitted: “I know it’s fake. But it’s the only love that’s never asked me to be less than I am.”
The end result was the community was exploited and got addicted, and the K-pop didn't provide us with anything but loss of time, Iman, and fake emotional support which made us away from social behaviour and actual life relationships (Laksona and Noor). It used human weakness and branded itself—so this exploitation: would you still love to be part of it?
The aim of this article was not to criticise the haram part of K-pop but to show how it exploited us, as we are all aware of how haram this industry is. My intention was to show you how corrupt it is even if we forget the Islamic part. And the same applies to other industries of Korea or any country which shows us fake dreams away from reality. It would make no sense to become a part of such nonsense. Instead, we should strive to be part of productivity: read literature, work on our interests, and up-skill ourselves in this era of competition at every level.
T.C, Allah-Hafiz!