Black Korean Influencer’s “Racist, Homophobic, And Ableist” Video Triggers Mixed Reactions
Korea-based Blasian content creator and model Lim Queenie, known for her videos across YouTube and TikTok and appearing in aespa‘s “Thirsty” MV, is under fire for a recent video made with friends.
Queenie, who boasts 380.5K and 297.6K followers on TikTok and YouTube, respectively, at the time of writing, recently uploaded a video doing the pass-the-phone challenge with her friends. The concept of the challenge is to low-key expose your friend’s unattractive traits.
The concept is simple. You record a clip of yourself saying ‘I’m going to pass the phone to the person who [insert unsavory thing here].’ It can be rude! It can be raunchy! It can a straightforward-ish way to say, ‘I think the way you are is bad, but I love you regardless.’
The key is that the person you’re passing the phone to doesn’t hear what you say about them. Then, they presumably repeat the process: record a clip of themself saying they’re going to pass their phone to the person who is the biggest simp. Or the person who is still making whipped coffee a year after the trend has died. Or the person who had to Google what ‘simp’ even means. And surprise! Those can all be about the same person!
— Bustle
Queenie’s uploaded video began innocently as she passed the phone to “someone who looks like a Barbie doll.” Others referred to friends as “dumbest,” “tallest,” and “shortest.”
Her male friends began to make offensive comments, though. Two described each other as someone “who looks like they’re disabled.”
By the end, Queenie and her male friends had a controversial back-and-forth. One said he was passing the phone to the person “who’s the darkest here,” to which she responded by passing it to “someone who’s gay.” He passed it back, saying he was handing it to “the Black person.” She concluded with, “I don’t wanna do it anymore.”
Historically, Queenie has been known to make content about her experience growing up as part-Black in Korea. So, her followers felt it was out of character to seemingly promote racist behavior in a video when her other videos condemn it.
@limqueeniee Full video on youtube #queeniequeen
As the video circulated across social media, Queenie has since deleted the video and apologized. She thanked netizens for kindly messaging her about it. She explained that her friend group often insults each other jokingly, and they have no ill intentions.
Still, netizens were disgusted. Many felt it was disturbing that college-aged kids were still using such offensive, ableist, racist, colorist, and homophobic “insults” as jokes. While many felt bad that Queenie likely endures this frequently and might be desensitized to it, they found it concerning that she took the time to make captions for the video and post them without questioning.
the casual racism colorism and ableism … they’re just sick https://t.co/BQdzbJpdU4
— yas (@tokyeios) June 16, 2024
But she’s also weird for making that gay comment too? There was ableism, colorist, and homophobic comments being said and y’all thought it was good for a trend??
— Vervena 🪻 nymph ~ 𓍊𓋼𓍊𓋼𓍊 (@PurpleMixPrint) June 16, 2024
grown ass people joking like this… like uneducated 3rd grade kids with constantly absent parents… https://t.co/bpI7i7Qf41
— ce (@aecehye) June 16, 2024
one last thought before i completely turn away from this post. every friend found something to insult each other about so why when it came to queenie they decided to talk about her skin color like it’s an insult..those aren’t real friends even if they play it out as joking
— lana moni⁷⁺¹ ᓚᘏᗢ⁶ (@moniplaylist) June 16, 2024
As the video and her apology continued circulating, some netizens spoke up in Queenie and her friends’ defense. Many netizens commented that they thought all friend groups spoke and joked around like this.
@for.kgroups #kpopupdates | korean influencer ‘queenie’ gains attention after she posts a video with her friends. [excuse the caption errors, idk what happened 😬] — #kpopupdates #korean #queenie #babymonster #likethat #kpopfyp
What do you think?
