In The News: Department of Sociology

NBC News

Prosecutors say Kyle Rittenhouse, armed with a semi-automatic rifle, killed two people and injured one on the streets of Kenosha, Wisconsin, when he opened fire on Aug. 25 during protests over the police shooting of Jacob Blake.

Wall Street Journal

The K-pop group’s English music video attracts more than 101 million views on the streaming platform within 24 hours.

KNPR News

Southern Nevada, like much of the country, is struggling to come to terms with racial justice. The death of George Floyd was followed by dozens of protests in the streets of Las Vegas.

Refinery 29

On 24th March 2015, Germanwings flight 9525 headed to Dusseldorf, Germany crashed into the French Alps, killing all 150 people on board. Thousands around the world flooded social media to express their shock and grief, sending the hashtag #Germanwings to the No.1 trending spot on Twitter worldwide. Less than 24 hours after the crash, international sensation One Direction announced on Facebook that Zayn Malik was leaving the group after five years.

Reuters

How the South Korean band’s fanbase – known as ARMY – raised over $1 million for the Black Lives Matter movement, mostly in just one day.

Week

A whole generation have been “infantilised” and left without “self-sufficiency and intellectual independence” as a result of their parents’ failure to enforce boundaries, according to a new book by a leading sociology professor.

Al Jazeera America

Amid Black Lives Matter protests in the United States, K-pop fans are being hailed as a new force in politics and social justice.

NPR

2020 is weird. There’s just no getting around it. Few would have believed that fans of Korean popular music were going to be a driving force behind fighting police brutality and white supremacy following the George Floyd protests. But that’s exactly what happened. Fans of the popular music genre are using their knowledge of online platforms to rally support for political causes and solicit donations.

Forbes

The signs are that activism like that around Black Lives Matter is on the rise among Korean pop fans.

New York Times

After claiming some credit for the fizzling of President Trump’s rally in Oklahoma, the online armies of Korean pop music listeners are feeling prepared and empowered.

Wired

THE BOOGALOO BOIS dress in Hawaiian shirts, stitch igloo patches on their clothes and bags, and spend their days slinging pro-gun memes back and forth on Reddit, Discord, and Facebook. They have also been linked to a plot to spark unrest at George Floyd protests in Las Vegas with firebombs, and to the deaths of two law enforcement officers in the Bay Area.

The Ringer

After shutting down a Dallas Police Department app and donating more than $1 million to the Black Lives Matter movement, it’s clear that K-pop fans are a legitimate force to be reckoned with. But this shouldn’t exactly be a surprise—fervent fan bases have always been particularly equipped to force change.