KISS OF LIFE’s Julie now directly apologizes for racist livestream, which predictably doesn’t seem to have helped much

Following KISS OF LIFE’s apologies for their quite frankly insane Black and Latino cosplay stream, in a rare turn of events, things have actually gotten worse for a K-pop group. They’ve continued to face backlash, notably a cancellation of a KCON LA 2025 appearance, in large part due to the outrage the organizers faced.

While people have also pointed out that the group’s most recent release didn’t do well, that’s not the litmus test, in my opinion. That was more of a fansong type of thing that likely was to buy them more time in hopes that their next full-fledged comeback would be better received, and with that coming up, member Julie once again apologized to fans, explaining that the group has reflected on their actions, educated themselves, and learned how to do better in the future. Notably, she did specifically address the Black and Latino communities

julie from kiss of life addressed what happened during her birthday live. pic.twitter.com/4XqZpxqSPZ

Don’t think this has improved things significantly, and probably nothing will at this point, as I don’t think any words in a statement or whatever is gonna do it.

The discourse around this has also been interesting, as I kinda agree and disagree with points being made. I acknowledge there are other groups in K-pop history who have done things just as bad or worse with less consequences, and that it’s likely if they were men and/or from the Big 4 companies, they wouldn’t be so adversely impacted. That’s just how it is, as some groups are almost too big to fail no matter what. However, unfortunately for them, things don’t happen in a vacuum. They did this at arguably one of the worst times following a string of anti-Black K-pop incidents that already had people calling out the industry, and the very reason it has led them to be so impacted is because they built a large and diverse international fanbase through doing retro music popularized by Black artists therefore appealing to an audience that were most likely to be offended by their minstrel-esque stream.

So I dunno, it sorta is what it is for them. Maybe if they release another viral bop it’ll all be over sooner than later, though judging by the reactions and that their audience doesn’t seem to want to make them go viral anymore, it seems like they have to accept that they’re probably on a long road back to building up trust again, if they ever do.