While Koreans do believe that top celebrities like BTS should still carry out the mandatory military service required of all male citizens, there are reasons why some netizens feel that if some of the older members were to enlist in the next few years, they would face a variety of difficulties.
Netizens look at the struggles that top star G-Dragon faced during his military service and bring to light some alarming examples:
1. Stealing belongings like underwear
2. Crowding in the cramped shower to get a glimpse of a top star showering
3. Uploading an 'observation diary' of the star, listing out where freckles are located, what medication they take, etc and spreading the information without consent online
4. Wasting time trying to watch the top star eat meals, until lieutenants are forced to order people not to look at the star
5. Consistent photographing and filming without consent
6. Civilians paying soldiers visits and demanding to see the star
7. Illegally posing as official military accounts on SNS
8. The military physician even revealing the star's medical records without consent
9. The press constantly digging for private information
Many netizens showed their concerns that such harassments could easily happen again to top stars like BTS, and commented,
"Dang, this worries me."
"Wow, GD had a really hard time too huh."
"Are they crazy? How rude can they be?"
"It makes me so mad imagining some young, ignorant boys boasting that they went to the military with BTS, they showered together and stuff..."
"GD's case was literally the worst case possible though... a lot of other idols actually say that they enjoyed taking a break to go to the military so maybe BTS will too."
"I heard people harassed Kang Dong Won pretty bad in the military too."
"OMG yeah GD's case was literally so terrible... how can people act like they're watching some monkey show around a person."
"If you touch my boys!!!"
"This better not happen, unless they want to see a full-on war between the military and ARMY."
What do you think of the concerns raised?
And when the military tried to do something to protect GD, he got accused of getting special privileges...