K-pop star faced backlash for wearing 'vintage' Confederate flag shirt. His label apologized.

[Coventina]

K-pop artist Mark Lee’s record label, Upper Room, issued an apology Tuesday after public criticism erupted over photographs showing the singer wearing a t-shirt featuring a Confederate flag.

The 26-year-old rapper and singer debuted in 2016, and transitioned to a solo career in April 2025 after departing from K-pop boyband groups NCT 127 and NCT Dream, Complex reported..

In a statement posted Tuesday on his label’s Instagram Story, the label apologized and explained that the garment Lee wore to a fan event was chosen as a vintage wardrobe item, according to Complex.

“The garment was selected solely as a vintage wardrobe item. However, upon recognizing the historical significance and sensitivity associated with the symbol displayed on the t-shirt, we took measures to ensure that it would not be visible in any official content,” the label wrote in the statement.

https://www.nj.com/entertainment/2026/06/k-pop-star-faced-backlash-for-wearing-confederate-flag-shirt-his-label-apologized.html

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He's a K-pop star, but he was BORN and RAISED in CANADA!
So, I'm not buying that he didn't know the Confederate flag was offensive to Black Americans (and right-minded non-Black Americans!).

And he's a rapper?!?!?!
Way to culturally appropriate and steal from those you demean!!

[Deuxcents]

1. What a bull💩 statement from the record company..and they think we're accepting it?

[Haggard Celine]

2. People wear symbols that

they don't know the meaning of all the time. While it would be unbelievable that someone around here wouldn't know the meaning of that symbol, I can see someone from western Canada, for instance, being ignorant about it. I just looked it up, and he was born in Toronto, but grew up in Vancouver. He moved to South Korea in 2012. I think he's probably not that aware of American history. He knows there was once slavery here, probably, but isn't that knowledgable about it otherwise. He grew up with different history classes from ours.

[Skittles]

4. yeah, like nazi tattoos

how can a person be expected to know everything

[Celerity]

3. Asia's disturbing embrace of "Nazi chic" is prompting a nonprofit to teach Holocaust history

It’s a dismaying yet recurring phenomenon that takes place in disparate Asian countries: young people, not known for sympathizing with far-right groups, playing with Nazi imagery in highly public settings.

https://qz.com/928440/asias-disturbing-embrace-of-nazi-chic-is-prompting-a-nonprofit-to-teach-holocaust-history



It’s a dismaying yet recurring phenomenon that takes place in disparate Asian countries: young people, not known for sympathizing with far-right groups, playing with Nazi imagery in highly public settings.





Examples abound. Last December a school in Taiwan staged a Hitler-themed parade for its anniversary celebration, leading to the principal’s resignation. A few weeks earlier, Sony Music apologized after one of its girl bands performed in Nazi-looking outfits. Two years before that a girl group in South Korea showed up in similar fashion. Thailand, India, and Indonesia have had their share of Nazi-themed bars, parades, and performances. The list is long and repetitive—and disconcerting.





It isn’t just the region’s youngsters who fail to appreciate the Holocaust’s gravity. In Hong Kong last month, after a court verdict condemned seven policemen to jail terms for beating a pro-democracy protester in 2014, their colleagues staged a demonstration during which one of them said that they were being “persecuted like the Jews in Germany,” to other demonstrators’ cheers. The German and Israeli diplomatic missions condemned the comparison, and a half-hearted apology ensued.



A mission to educate

For the past six years, the Hong Kong Holocaust and Tolerance Centre, the only organization of its kind in Asia, has used education to counter the recurring use of “Nazi chic.” “The optimist in me wants to think that this happens just out of ignorance, and that the comparison with something more familiar helps,” says co-founder April Kaminsky. With that in mind the center also teaches about regional tragedies like the Nanjing Massacre in China during World War II and the “killing fields” in Cambodia under the rule of Pol Pot. “That makes the topic quite relevant to the region.”

snip

[sarisataka]

5. This should be interesting

How far will the benefit of the doubt extend...