Fifth-Gen Girl Group Comes Under Fire For Allegedly Using aespa’s Karina For Marketing

The controversial fifth-gen girl group QWER has come under fire for its questionable marketing strategy.

On December 9, a viral post on the Korean forum Nate Pann criticized QWER’s “viral marketing tactic” for allegedly using aespa member Karina to draw attention. The OP (original poster) compiled various headlines and articles published both on Korean media platforms as well as community sites, all of which compared Karina with QWER member Chodan.

The headlines came largely in three different varieties: one that simply put Karina and Chodan in the same frame, one that compared the two idols’ beauty, and finally, one that outright mentioned Chodan as having defeated the aespa member in terms of beauty.

Headline 1: “Karina and Chodan next to her”

Headline 2: “Karina and Chodan’s picture together.”

Headline: “Karina vs. Chodan- who won?”

Headline 1: “Chodan beats Karina”

Headline 2: “Chodan not affected by Karina”

Headline 3: “QWER’s Chodan defeats all girl groups with her face”

Apart from these posts, the OP also compiled several copy-pasted comments under community posts that needlessly insulted Karina and brought up Chodan as the younger and better counterpart of her.

The post has garnered over 120,000 views at the time of writing, with most netizens criticizing QWER’s marketing ploy.

• “They used a similar method during their “Fake Idol” era. They made it seem like feminists were terrorizing the company. Men bashed the ‘terrorists,’ but it turned out to be just viral marketing. Ugh, this is why QWER gets criticized.”
• “‘That company’ is friendly to QWER haha.”
• “Even comparing them is a big insult to Karina, LOL. Aespa fans= ordinary citizens, QWER fans= discarded incels.”
• “Logically, it’s Karina’s loss to even be associated with Chodan, so… It’s obviously viral marketing, haha. It’s to increase mentions of Chodan.”

This isn’t the first time QWER’s marketing strategy has been questioned by netizens. Previously, the group became a hot topic after their album poster got defaced at a mall right before their comeback. Read more about it here.