since the release of âcandy scarâ iâve found that a very strong sense of dread settles in the bottom of my stomach every time i see a post pointing out how, despite everything, you gotta admitâmizi did look really hot in all those marketing adverts. itâs like the point of the entire music video flew so far over some peopleâs heads it mustâve entered the stratosphere. (tw: SA mention âŹď¸)
mizi is in a highly abusive relationship with both her management company and the kpop industry as a whole. over the course of the mv, we see the light slowly begin to leave her eyes as she sells more and more of her soul away to her career. with every new advert she is wearing less clothing, and by the end of it theyâve got her in a bikini posing suggestively with half-naked men, the light in her eyes absolutely nonexistent by this point.
i feel like thereâs an important point to this mv that a lot of people donât seem to be picking up on: mizi is a lesbian. she is exclusively attracted to women, andâi cannot stress this enoughâbiologically unable to feel attraction towards men. therefore, mizi is physically incapable of wholeheartedly consenting to the suggestive and borderline sexual advertisements her company has her do with men.
this may come off as a more extreme interpretation of the events of the mv (many of which i recognize were purposely left vague), but i believe, for all intents and purposes, that mizi is forcing herself to endure non-consensual acts of a sexual nature with those male actors, i.e., experiencing a discreet form of SA. and, by taking a closer look at the gradual perversion of her as campaigns, you can find some fairly unsubtle visual evidence of this.
the first few are definitely suggestive, but arguably still tame in comparison to what she endures later on, evidenced by the light in her eyes in these scenes. over time, sheâs forced to expose more and more of her body, and the light certainly begins to dwindleâhowever, we donât see it completely nonexistent until she begins to advertise with men. up to that point, sheâd learned to make herself numb to the degrading nature of her work, but they were still just solo adverts. as a lesbian, i think the point in the mv at which men become involved in her ads marks a pretty significant jump in the amount of inner turmoil sheâs having to undergo behind the shiny kpop idol mask.
now, not only is she essentially selling her body to millions of people worldwide, but sheâs also being coerced into unwillingly performing heterosexuality with men she otherwise never would have laid a finger on. to me, the very strong sense of lack of consent & bodily autonomy from this part of the mv forward serves to add an even darker, more depraved level of horror to an already plenty disturbing story.
all that to say: i just find it in pretty poor taste for fans to feel comfortable essentially slotting themselves directly into the roles of all the creepy men in hers and suaâs crowd post-infection. to further sexualize her body, even as the story strongly suggests the theme of dubious consent/SA underpinning every new advertisement, comes off to me as a pretty blatant insult to the message vivinos was trying to convey here. a message that was practically handed to the audience on a silver platter in comparison with alien stage. like, this shit is not covert, you guys.
but thatâs just my interpretation as a lesbian alnst fan! some may disagree, but one thing iâve known to be consistently true about vivinos is that she does not do coincidences, and not even the tiniest details in her work are safe from becoming a devastating metaphor or allegory. so, when that woman decides alien stage in fact wasnât a clear enough metaphor for the rampant mental/physical/sexual abuse and mistreatment idols face at the hands of the kpop industry⌠i sit my ass down and listen.
