written by Jageunsi

As a kid, I would often think of purple as just another word for the color violet. But growing up, I took art classes that say that in color theory, purple is associated with wealth and royalty, since the purple dye of the ancient world was considered expensive and rare. I was also taught as a Christian that purple was a symbol for repentance and humility. And with all these meanings in my head, I thought that maybe, okay, that was enough meaning for me.

But now, since becoming a fan of BTS, I was exposed to yet another significant symbolism of this color. Be it fate or mere coincidence, purple has become such an integral part of the identity of BTS and ARMY that it has become synonymous to their existence. At BTS’s 3rd Muster event when Taehyung said, “Purple is the last color of the rainbow. Purple means I will trust and love you for a long time” and gave life to a statement that would make a mark on the world—“I purple you”—I realized that this would soon change my perspective. Purple was not just used in lieu of the word love; for me it also stood for trust and more importantly, understanding.

Being an ARMY for about 5 years now, I have learned through BTS that there are plenty of ways to look at the world. It should not be black or white—it should not always be either a fiery red or a calm blue, because sometimes what the world really needs is an understanding purple.

O, RUL82?

The common train of thought when people fall down the rabbit hole of becoming a fan of BTS usually is “I regret not stanning them earlier,” but I soon figured that as cliché as it may sound, you meet people in your life when you need them the most. That was the case for me when I was introduced to BTS. I got into them when I was adjusting to a new environment and trying to make friends in this school I transferred to. I was in this unfamiliar city, for the first time by myself, and I needed to establish relations with others, or else I wouldn’t survive studying there.

I was never into K-Pop before BTS. In fact, I was actually prejudiced in my opinion about them then, thinking that as someone who doesn’t really speak Korean, it doesn’t make sense for me to listen to their music. But I wanted to talk to someone—I wanted friends. Fortunately, the people around me then were K-Pop fans, and despite my biased thinking against K-Pop, I decided to give it a chance, just to have a common ground with these peers. I was recommended a plethora of other groups (my friends were in different fandoms), but what really piqued my interest was BTS. No one forced me to watch anything about them, no one bombarded me with their content, but strangely enough I found myself trying to get to know them more. At first, I was enticed by their visuals and performance, but as I went deeper into learning about them, I was amazed by their lyricism. Their words seemed to resonate so much to me at that time, especially since I was trying to figure out if I was really on the right path in life.

It’s so ironic how I didn’t want to listen to them before because I felt that there was no point since I don’t speak Korean, but I got invested in them while trying to understand what they were saying. Had I been open to this earlier in my life, had I overcome 1-inch barriers early on, I would have been exposed to them and many other horizons. BTS helped open my eyes to more worlds that I wouldn’t even dare look at back then. What sets BTS apart from others, at least in my case, was that their messages go beyond language and cultural barriers. Their words have some kind of power that makes me think deeply about society and myself, and just life in general. It’s difficult to dub things as universal, but with BTS, their messages come and transcend boundaries because they speak about realities that are felt across a diverse demographic.

So I dare say this: that I was never late in knowing them, I met them, and that time became my most beautiful moment in life.

To All the Youngsters Without Dreams

What made me stay with them for as long as I have, is because they say things that I need to hear. They not only speak about dreaming and striving towards that dream, but also not having any dreams, and giving up on them. Rarely do I see people talk about this because in reality, people do not like reality, and in my case, I was someone who was baffled at the thought of people having dreams—because I didn’t have any for myself. I was someone just going by what others told me to do and was scared to commit to such a burdening goal of painstakingly going through hardships to get to it, else I would end up in a pit of disappointment if I didn’t achieve it. For as long as I remember, people around me have propagated this belief that one should have a dream, that one should dream in order to be “someone” in this society.

But with BTS, it was different. Yes, they speak about going after one’s dreams, but they also say that it’s okay to not have any. They eradicated the grandiose concept of dreams I had in my mind that always pressured me and made me realize that dreams can be in the littlest of things. That while it requires courage to chase after them, it also is commendable to muster up the courage to give up on them. This assurance that someone out there is able to understand how scary the word dream is for me, is what sealed the deal for me in becoming their fan. BTS’s songs showed me things from various lenses and how things can be different, but also the same. While I learned to understand the world through them, I also learned to understand myself. That in fact I wasn’t alone with these thoughts—that I too can dream by my own standards. That my own happiness can be in the smallest things, and that it wasn’t supposed to be a goal I strived towards but something I can feel even in the process of going there.

We Are Bulletproof

It astonishes me too, that as a fandom dedicated to BTS, ARMY has always been an active community that voices out their opinions and expresses them more often than not, as a collective. I know that of course there shouldn’t be any thoughts about viewing ARMY as this monolithic entity, but a majority of the people I’ve encountered not only share interests in the group’s music, but they also stand beside the core values BTS have—which was such a wonderful and eye-opening concept to me when I first started to consider myself an ARMY. Here I say that I believe in the power of naming and giving meaning. The rationale for BTS’s names (1) “to block out stereotypes, criticisms, and expectations that are aimed on adolescents like bullets, actively working to defend and preserve the value and ideals of today’s youth” and (2) "symbolizes youth who don’t settle for their current reality and instead open the door and go forward to achieve growth” made me realize that these statements have become so embedded into the fandom and BTS themselves that we really try to live by these words. And while processing these words into our lives, not only do I understand others and myself, but I’ve also come to an understanding that there is a world beyond the sphere that I live in, and that my identity as a fan is not separate from my identity in the different roles I have in society. That there are overlaps and that ultimately, everything connects.

In my journey of discovering and getting to know BTS, while I do gush about their visuals or show-stopping performances, it is their words and how they project themselves as humans (despite being held up on such a high pedestal), that inspire me to become a better version of myself, for myself, others, and in a broader sense, society. Moving forward, I will continue on this road that BTS paved for me and as a (adorable) representative of the youth alongside them, I am adamant on making my goal to paint the world purple—an understanding purple.

This essay was chosen as one of the winners of the first BTS Essay contest hosted by The BTS Effect. Find out more here.

References

Chang, Justin. “Commentary: 'The 1-Inch-Tall Barrier of Subtitles': Bong Joon Ho Rightly Calls out Hollywood Myopia.” Chicago Tribune, January 7, 2020. https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/movies/ct-ent-subtitles-parasite-0109-20200107-dchcnhgj7nhl5fp4qlcnqgv6uy-story.html.

Herman, Tamar. “BTS Extends Identity to Mean 'Beyond the Scene'.” Billboard, October 3, 2018. https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/k-town/7857156/bts-beyond-the-scene-name-change.

Trabasso, Giovanna. “BTS Is Tackling Problems That Are Taboo.” Affinity Magazine, May 29, 2016. http://affinitymagazine.us/2016/05/29/its-about-time-you-know-why-bts-is-trending/.

Williams, Janice. “Find out What BTS Star Kim Taehyung's Phrase, ‘I Purple You," Means.” Newsweek, August 9, 2019. https://www.newsweek.com/bts-kim-taehyung-purple-meaning-1453501.

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