Professionally known as RM (Kim Nam Joon), member of the popular South Korean band ‘BTS’, has landed himself in hot waters.
The singer has been facing several backlashes after he shared a snapshot from his Spotify playlist featuring Frank Ocean’s track ‘Bad Religion’. This seemingly ‘normal’ Instagram Story post has ignited significant criticism against the South Korean musician due to the song’s offensive and “Islamophobic” lyrics.
The prevailing sentiment is that RM has unintentionally stirred up concerns of memorializing a global narrative of Islamophobia by casually sharing a song with such controversial content.
Meanwhile, the controversial song Bad Religion was released in 2012 as part of Frank Ocean’s debut studio album Channel Orange. The lyrics of the song compared unrequited love to religion, implying that unreciprocated love is similar to a ‘bad religion’.
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The lyrics included the lines If it brings me to my knees, it’s a bad religion. Oh, this unrequited love. To me, it’s nothing but a one-man cult. These lyrics could be offensive to those who have strong religious convictions and are sensitive to religious references in entertainment.
However, the lyrics that have particularly sparked offense among Muslims involved an Arabic phrase Allahu Akbar, used in praise or remembrance of God.
Ocean incorporated the phrase twice in the song, which many Muslims perceived as inappropriate usage. He employed the praise, translating to ‘Allah is the greatest’, in a context that may be considered disrespectful. The lyrics read, He said ‘Allahu Akbar’; I told him ‘Don’t curse me.’
Although the song has been in circulation for over a decade, it has only now triggered controversy. Amidst the disapproval and hurt expressed by many members of the BTS fanbase, known as the BTS Army , some are willing to extend the benefit of doubt to RM, given his advocacy for the UNICEF.
