What is a Sasaeng?

Since the sasaengs are at the heart of the debates these last days, I told myself that the moment was well chosen to dust off this subject in order to return to the phenomenon of 'sasaengs fans', and the differences - sometimes slight - that there are between some of them and normal fans.

The expression "fan sasaeng" is a term that describes stalker fans, these obsessive fans who are ready to do anything to approach their favorite star. This can happen in a number of ways, from spinning in the car to trespassing in a group dorm, but many sasaeng fans also have much more normal behavior, which makes some more difficult to distinguish than others.

Because yes, if we mainly retain from the sasaeng fans the gloomy stories that we hear about girls sending bloody letters to their idols, most of the sasaeng fans do not have such thorough behavior and are therefore harder to pin down .

Likewise, while people often believe that sasaeng fans are only girls of about ten years looking for the love of their oppa, the truth is that many sasaengs are adults, men and women alike, and even sometimes married and with a family.

Maybe they were normal fans at first, but one day they turned to the obsessional side, and now they too often exceed the limits of the acceptable in the pursuit of their favorite stars.

Find out what the idol in question will do the next day, try to get personal information about it, send them letters written in blood, call the idol in the middle of the night, follow him / her innocently. after seeing him / her on the street, taking a picture of him / her outside of official events, trying to enter his / her life or contacting him / her by different means… All these behaviors are relatively different, but they designate all sasaengs fans.

Besides, to stay in France, and when K-Pop groups come to our place, people who track down idols, who find their hotels and go there, or who jostle them and seek - by force - to take photos with them at the airport are just as sasaengs.

From an international point of view, K-Pop fans tend to say that a "sasaeng fan" is not a fan, a concept that we could also discuss at length.

Because a sasaeng fan is above all a fan, except that he intrudes on the privacy of the person he admires. And this is where the difference is played between the normal fan who prefers to let his idols live their life, and the sasaeng fan who wants to be part of it or at least to enter it.

However, it is difficult for agencies to have a clear position vis-à-vis Sasaeng fans, knowing that behavior differs according to the individual. In general, only extreme cases are expelled from fandoms with a ban on participating in future group events.

If it is indeed easy for companies to exclude from the fandom of fans who clearly go beyond the limits, it is more difficult for them to hunt sasaeng fans, especially since they represent money.

indeed, sasaeng fans don't hesitate to buy a lot of albums when their favorite bands make comebacks, often just to be able to attend the fansigns of the bands in question. However, it becomes unhealthy when the same fan passes four times in the same session in front of his favorite group only to be able to touch - again and again - the hands of his idols.

But for many agencies, how can you deprive yourself of fans who can boost the sales of an album?

For this reason - unfortunately - it is often necessary to wait for a sasaeng fan to go to very extreme behavior before action is taken.

So make no mistake, sasaeng fans are sometimes not that different from you and me, with the difference that their love for their favorite idol is truly an obsession.