If anyone is into popular music, they know that the Grammys are one of the biggest music awards in the U.S. Many artists are always vying for that prestigious award and receiving one is a high honor among those in the music business.
But what many don’t know is that instead of going by a voting system, the Grammy committee, which is made up of over 10,000 musicians, producers, songwriters, and others not only pay a fee to be part of this committee, but the voting process takes a long time and there’s many hurdles that the people who are nominated have to go through to be able to win.
However, there are clear signs of issues with this. Many artists who may deserve to win, don’t. BTS, the first Korean boy group to be nominated for a Grammy for their song “Dynamite” received over 900 million views on YouTube in just 9 months. The winner of that same category Ariana Grande and Lady Gaga’s song, “Rain On Me” has only received 200 million views. Furthermore, BTS’ song has charted at no.1 on the billboard music charts for 24 consecutive weeks, while Ariana and Lady Gaga’s song never hit no.1.
As a fan of music, it hurts to see a group or artist who deserves to win be cheated of their award. Of course, Rain On Me is an excellent song and Ariana Grande and Lady Gaga are both talented, but I feel like the person/group who wins a category should win based on things like views, album sales, and charting. It makes me wonder, as a fan, what they are basing their wins or nominations off of.
On March, 14th 2021, the famous hashtag #Scammys2021 reemerged on Twitter. Last year the term was started by K-pop fans outraged that BTS didn’t receive a nomination. This year the same hashtag started to trend again because K-pop fans knew something was up.
K-pop and non-Kpop fans have reason to be upset. Besides the fact that BTS is the biggest boy group in the world, it’s suspicious that the only time BTS gets nominated for a Grammy is when they release their first and only all English song. Not to mention, the Grammys has shown to be racist towards POC artists in the past.
Artists like Tyler, the Creator, The Weeknd, Nicki Minaj, and others have called out the Grammys for their blatant racial bias, and the night of the Grammys, BTS posted a video showing their disappointment in being snubbed. J-hope, the main rapper and dancer of the group is seen falling out of his chair with his reaction, Jimin and V, the vocalists, show blank expressions and frowns in disbelief. Overall, you could tell from watching the video that they couldn’t believe what they were seeing.
There is one silver lining to BTS getting snubbed, not only did it grab the attention of both Kpop and non-Kpop fans on many formats of social media, BTS also got to perform at the Grammys for the first time, which is a big achievement for the Korean boy group.
There is no doubt that there is definitely racial bias within the Grammy committee, but seeing a foreign group perform on a major award show provides a bit of hope that perhaps they will win in the next year. For now, the Grammys are still the Scammys.
