Does cancel culture work in other parts of the world?

Immediately after the backlash, the video was deleted, and they posted an apology. However, this wasn’t enough, and they still lost followers on their YouTube channel.

Instead of following the typical Korean route of apologies—which often consists of a handwritten note followed by an announcement of a hiatus or retirement from the industry—they decided to reduce the impact of their actions by making a donation and partnering with the region to promote it. 

This created  a complete turnaround to their original video. Some  of the content uploaded since then includes a series of videos, one featuring the local leader of the city, and the rest showcasing all the good qualities of the area, as well as  multiple Instagram posts with pictures taken while they where in the area recording.

This action received a positive response from Korean netizens, with some comments expressing a preference for this type of apology since they say this type of action shows sincere regret for their actions.

If we analyze more in-depth we can get to the conclusion that this is one of the cases where we confuse “cancel culture” with being held accountable, since their response was directly tied to their wrongdoings, and there wasn’t a massive movement to make them lose their platform.

This case, in particular, leaves us with so much to reflect on and learn from.

It seems that our obsession with being “the moral police” and trying to punish people has created this toxic environment in social media where we don’t give people space to grow. 

At the same time, it offers  an excuse for celebrities to not accept their mistakes and keep repeating them – making them “immune” to being held accountable because “that’s just their personality”.

But it also shows that public figures can respond to criticism more maturely if they decide to. Instead of just offering apologies, they can take concrete actions and make amends that can lead to more positive outcomes.