At the Allegiant Stadium for the Las Vegas stop of BTS’s Arirang tour in May of 2026, I am a single figure in a crowd of 60,000. I watch color-shifting lightsticks create the illusion of a massive constellation around the stars we’re here to see. At the center of the stadium is a 360-degree stage with Jumbotrons ready to spotlight seven members of a mega-viral, record-shattering music group beloved across global generations.

For more than two hours, BTS performs songs from their highly anticipated latest album after a four-year hiatus, during which the band’s members fulfilled their mandatory service with the Republic of Korea Army. The setlist is interspersed with crowd-pleasing hits from their decade-spanning discography, but the time that’s elapsed since their breakout has only improved their stage presence. Pyrotechnics hiss with flames that reach the highest seats, and dozens of dancers stage picturesque moments with swaths of fabric that parachute around the boys as if the entire arena has been swept into a shared dream.

I’m at the concert more by chance than choice after being offered a ticket, and I admittedly arrive in a state of indifference. I was wary of what I thought BTS represented: art engineered for maximum profit to feed the machine of celebrity worship and deliver a simulation of intimacy.

Then, something shifts. I stop analyzing. And with each passing minute, I fall deeper into fascination. The screams of the audience are electric, the joy contagious. Never have I been to a show of this scale where I see another Asian person in every direction I look. There’s a distinct sense of camaraderie and collectivism, a feeling of community anchored by a shared passion.

Two weeks later, I’m waking up and falling asleep to videos of RM, Suga, J-Hope, Jungkook, Jin, V, and Jimin. Especially Jimin. While documenting my induction into the fanbase, lovingly dubbed the “ARMY,” my DMs are flooded with BTS-lovers who welcome me with hot tips: “You’ve gotta watch their livestreams and RUN BTS episodes.” “Jimin and Jungkook have a show called Are You Sure?! on Disney+.” “There’s a saying that BTS finds you when you need them most.” The group’s exceptional skills as dancers and singers speak for themselves, but I’m more enamored with the ways they interact with each other. Beyond music, BTS (under the direction of HYBE Corporation) is selling us something many struggle to find in our daily lives: meaningful friendship, consistent effort toward a shared dream, repair after conflict, interdependent care, and mutual belonging.

My sudden fandom comes as a surprise to me. As a Korean American whose sonic taste was shaped by Atlanta and Houston rap in the early 2000s, very few K-pop artists have caught my respect and attention. There’s much to be unpacked about cultural authenticity, hyper-consumerism, and the labor exploitation it takes to generate mass, sustained attention. Take, for example, RM’s ad-lib in the opening of “Body to Body”—What you need, twin?—and a line repeated by multiple members in the chorus of “2.0”: Why this baseline slappin’ so rude? K-pop’s popularity raises plenty of difficult questions, including: where is the line between appropriation, homage, and appreciation, of Black culture in particular? What happens when a culture is packaged into art and marketed en masse, detached from its story of origin? What collective good comes from this exposure, what harm comes from it?

Complexities aside, the global success of Korean pop stars and mixed-language songs represent a phenomenal evolution in our collective attention. What was once considered a niche specific to an East Asian peninsula as large as Ohio is now embraced across multiple oceans and continents. Growing up, I distanced myself from my umma’s noticeable accent and my Korean name. I was embarrassed at having to explain the smell of freshly tossed kimchi and fermented soybeans to non-Asian friends when they’d come over, quick to dismiss the hours of labor my halmuhnee poured into maintaining traditions that kept her connected to Korea after migrating to Georgia. Now, there are people who get surgery to make their eyes look more like the Korean celebrities they love (yikes), and I had to blink a few times when a white woman in a hanbok appeared on my feed (confused, but not mad). The world is increasingly interconnected, and so are our influences.

Coming from a country with a history of occupation, suppression, and hardship, there’s profound symbolism in the way BTS has garnered worldwide appeal while also boldly representing themes specific to Korean identity and values. Aside from a member or two, most still speak in their native language for interviews and appearances. Even the album name Arirang is the title of a 600-year-old Korean folk anthem born from colonial resistance.

I understand that the mesmerizing looks, impeccable synchronization, and knee-buckling charisma of BTS is the manufactured product of a calculated method that molds people through years of extreme training and strategy. Interviews, variety shows, and behind-the-scenes clips are accented with playful editing, animated sound effects, and endearing moments of vulnerability that make the group feel like seven of your newest best friends. As Euny Hong noted in The Paris Review, “K-pop star training is an education of the whole person.”

This rigorous approach to stardom has earned BTS a fiercely loyal fanbase, and in a world wrecked by isolation, cynicism, and individualism, the magnetism of BTS may have less to do with the group’s seven extraordinary performers and more to do with the possibilities they represent. Despite our disillusionment, intimacy is still something we yearn for, still something we want, even when we’re not willing to admit it. I find hope in this. Yes, there are dangers to fandom and fantasy, but obsession—when activated responsibly—is a chance to exercise our imagination. Beyond romantic escapism, within fandom is an opportunity to rehearse our capacity for connection and belonging.

The unique passion of BTS’s ARMY points to the grand truth that we are all entangled, our impact on each other universal and inescapable. The unabashed affection and familial comfort between RM, Suga, J-Hope, Jungkook, Jin, V, and Jimin remind us that even in our most desperate times, we still have the potential to generate hope by simply being there for each other.