The other day, a song came up on my playlist that I hadn't heard for a while: "Gangnam Style." When the song smashed its way across the Pacific in 2012, it became the first YouTube video to hit 1 billion views thanks to its catchy visuals and charismatic singer, Psy. (It later became the first to hit 2 billion views and, as of this writing, is well on its way to 6 billion.)
The notion that Americans could be so captured by South Korean entertainment was a novelty 13 years ago. But that notion has itself long since been smashed.
In 2020, the Korean film "Parasite" made history as the first non-English language film to win the Oscar for best picture. South Korean culture has become so ubiquitous that English-speaking YouTube personalities like ASMR Glow make parodies about K-dramas. In 2021, "Squid Game" season 1 became the most popular TV show on Netflix, while just this year, KPop Demon Hunters became the No. 1 movie on the platform, catching the attention of Saturday Night Live.
While Korean companies like Samsung and LG have long created the devices on which Americans consume entertainment, it's fun that they're now making the entertainment itself.
One of the companies leading this explosion of South Korean influence is HYBE, a Seoul-based music company worth almost $2 billion USD. Groups they manage regularly sweep Asian touring charts, showing the tiny Korean peninsula can out-muscle Japan and China in the bid for the continent's ears and eyeballs.
So why is the Korean government harassing its owner?
Korean entrepreneur Bang Si-Hyuk created HYBE's predecessor, Big Hit, 20 years ago, and became big with K-pop bands like 8Eight and 2AM. After years of growth and expansion into related entertainment fields, Big Hit rebranded as HYBE in 2021. The good news for HYBE is its success didn't go unnoticed: that same year, it was named one of Time Magazine's 100 most influential companies.
The bad news is also that its success didn't go unnoticed.
Bang has been the target of lawfare by the Korean government, with allegations of fraud in the company's 2020 IPO on the KOPSI, Seoul's answer to the NYSE. In July 2025, police raided HYBE headquarters in July 2025 with unprecedented 24-hour search warrants, and Bang has been dragged into police interrogations now five times, one of them for more than 14 hours. To many, this level of harassment draws an eerie comparison to the Biden Administration's corrupt weaponization of law enforcement against President Trump, notably the raid on his Mar-a-Lago residence.
One of the people who has drawn this comparison is Trump himself, who weighed in on the abuse in August, posting on Truth Social, "WHAT IS GOING ON IN SOUTH KOREA? Seems like a Purge or Revolution. We can't have that and do business there. I am seeing the new President today at the White House. Thank you for your attention to this matter!!!"
Although HYBE executives have promised to fully respond to allegations against the company, due process doesn't seem as important as raiding its coffers. "It may take some time, but we will fully explain that the listing at the time was carried out in compliance with laws and regulations," they told The Korea Times.
With so much volatility in the world right now, it's terrifying to see this level of banana republic-style abuse in South Korea, the 15th largest economy in the world and one of America's staunchest allies in the Pacific Rim. This year, South Korea has seen a martial law crisis, an impeachment, a rocky transition of power, and accusations of human rights abuses. It's not new to see accusations of corruption within the South Korean government, which many see as a subsidiary of Samsung.
Beyond that, South Korea's economy is itself a weird amalgamation of capitalism and feudalism, with dynastic chaebols running the country and driving its terrifying, dystopic income disparities. On the global stage, the idea that a South Korean entrepreneur could be attacked for being too successful broadcasts instability that could scare away foreign relationships and investment.
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, newly elected this summer on a campaign of reform, needs to bring an end to the lawfare against Bang. That wouldn't fix all the peninsula's problems, but if Lee can't bring an end to this nonsense, one wonders if he can fix any of Korea's problems. When K-pop comes up on my playlist, I don't want to have to wonder if the people behind it have been thrown in jail for being too successful.