Trigger warning: Suicide and Online Bullying  

Over the years, South Korea’s entertainment industry has lost many young performers, highlighting the mental health burden on its glamorous stars who are called ‘idols’. The country is notorious for its intensely competitive entertainment industry and many young stars have been subject to merciless online trolling. 

Here are five of South Korea’s young idols whose death turned the spotlight on the pressures of stardom. 

1. Song Yoo-jung 

Image credit: Instagram/u_jjooung

Song Yoo-Jung left fans shocked and devastated after she passed away on January 23, 2021. Her agency, Sublime Artist, did not confirm the cause of the death. Jung was only 26. 

She was known for her roles in Golden Rainbow, School 2017, Make Your Wish, iKon’s Goodbye Road MV, Standing Egg’s Friend to Lover, and NIve’s How Do I. Song also featured in a popular web series in 2019 called Dear My Name and appeared in commercials for popular brands like Estée Lauder and Baskin-Robbins. 

2. Choi Jin-ri AKA Sulli 

Image credit: Instagram/jelly_jilli

Sulli, who was previously a member of f(x), left the girl group in 2015 to focus on her acting career. The star, who had more than five million followers on Instagram, took her own life in 2019 after complaining about the cyberbullying she faced upon joining a feminist campaign which emphasised on going ‘braless’. 

The C-Word podcast series by Luminary has an episode titled ‘Sulli’ which extensively discusses the controversies that surrounded her life and choices, and the high rate of suicides that mar the K-pop world. 

3. Goo Hara 

Image credit: Instagram/koohara__

Goo Hara, 28, was found dead in her home just six weeks after Sulli’s suicide. She had  posted the word ‘Goodbye’ on her Instagram. 

Highlighting the tremendous pressure of K-pop stardom and the public scrutiny that comes along, Goo had said, “Public entertainers like myself don’t have it easy — we have our private lives more scrutinized than anyone else and we suffer the kind of pain we cannot even discuss with our family and friends.” previously, Goo had survived a suicide attempt after it became public that her boyfriend had threatened to leak their sex tape. 

4. Cha In-ha

Image credit: Instagram/chainha_715

Within a few days of Goo Hara’s death by suicide, actor Cha In-ha was found dead in his home in Seoul. Cha, whose real name is Lee Jae-ho, made his film debut in 2017 and was previously a member of the five-member boy band Surprise U. 

The cause of his death was never disclosed and there weren’t any reports of him being subjected to online bullying on the scale other stars had to endure. Cha starred in Temperature of Love, The Banker and Clean with Passion for Now. 

5. Jonghyun 

Image credit: Instagram/jonghyun.948

The lead vocalist of the Korean boy band SHINee for nine years, Kim Jong-hyun or Jonghyun took his own life at the age of 27 in 2017. A note by Jonghyun, that was made public a day after his death, read: “I am broken from inside. The depression that gnawed on me slowly has finally engulfed me entirely.” 

According to several reports, what added to the shock over his death was that the star appeared to be “happy” at public appearances only days before his death. He was one of South Korean entertainment industry’s most promising stars. 

Lead image credit: Instagram/jelly_jilli, Instagram/u_jjooung, Instagram/chainha_715