To the girls at the B1A4 concert

By admin-s On Jan 13, 2015

This was not some empty room, a quiet park where you were doing something hidden. You were in front of your friends, maybe even your parents, and you did not, as some try to make out, shame your religion, your race, or yourselves in any way with a bit of bashfulness, giggling and a hug.

An older woman

Dear girls,

I’ve been reading with some bemusement and a lot of horror the comments and actions sparked by your being hugged and kissed by members of the K-pop group B1A4. I now have varicose veins and the odd strand of white hair. But, unlike some dinosaurs, I think I remember what it was to be young, and that ear-tingling flush of excitement of having a crush on someone – particularly an unattainable pop idol.

When Tommy Page came to town in the 1990s, we were not old enough to attend the concert but my cousin and I dialed and redialed and redialed the Radio 4 hotline the entire time the call-in was on, in hopes of getting through and speaking to him. We dialled for an hour after it ended. “Maybe he’s still there, he might pick it up for fun, you never know!” Such are the fevered hopes and dreams of the young.

People might say such dreams are a waste of time and worthless but here I am to point out that, in your old age, they may well make you smile and remember to be kind. So I know.

I watched the video. I was like you. And you are nothing like what the hormonal comments on social media or opportunist politicians make of you. As if any of them could really know you from this one snapshot of five minutes in your life. They might as well be farting in the wind.

I saw girls who were bashful, excited and – in stark contrast to that ridiculous and lurid word “molested” on that sly video title – chaste.

Those hugs were friendly, maybe a bit excited. And yes I am that terrible thing – “liberal”. But this was not some empty room, a quiet park where you were doing something hidden. You were in front of your friends, maybe even your parents, and you did not, as some try to make out, shame your religion, your race, or yourselves in any way with a bit of bashfulness, giggling and a hug.

Hugs and kisses in the open are not our culture, it is true. But in certain circumstances they are what they are: friendly gestures from another culture. Would our prime minister shy from embracing a Middle Eastern man if he were another head of state and protocol called for it? I doubt it. So why all this noise? Sadly many social media comments on this incident only point to racist, misogynist and homophobic tendencies our society would deal well to address long before bothering about you.