Members of P-pop boy group SB19 Stell Ajero and Pablo Nase took to social media to address the recent online strife between A’TIN (fandom name of SB19) and Philippine volleyball fans.
The issue stemmed after Filipino volleyball player Cherry Ann “Sisi” Rondina received backlash online after she claimed to not know the boy group during the Independence Day celebration in South Korea on Sunday, June 9.
Rondina, along with some Alas Pilipinas (Philippines Women’s National Volleyball Team) members, were asked which performance they were looking forward to.
“SB19 daw po,” she responded before adding, “Bhie, Starbucks lang alam ko.”
Rondina later clarified on Instagram that she simply wasn’t familiar with SB19.
“Personally hindi ko talaga sila kilala… hindi ko alam ba. Sorry po talaga. I’m really sorry,” she said.
Fans of both parties then continued their exchange on X (formerly Twitter), with some calling out the boy group’s fans’ ‘entitlement’, and some saying those people don’t represent A’TINs as a whole.
“Sisi went on live just to apologize to these people? Who are you? Again, who are you? I don't hate the artists, but this so-called fandom needs to be called out for being so arrogant and thinking everyone should know their idols,” a user wrote.
One of the comments read, “Those few people don’t represent the whole fandom as we A'tin generally don’t tolerate this kind of behavior even SB19… But still, we’re very sorry for what happened.”
Meanwhile, on a separate tweet from another user, Stell replied, “I personally don’t tolerate this kind of behavior. Stop this.”
Pablo then released a statement on the platform, reminding the fans to acknowledge that not everyone knows about them and that there’s no reason to drag their fellow Filipinos.
“Sana lagi [niyong] tatandaan kung bakit ‘ATIN’ ang pangalan ng fandom natin. We share our [victories]! ATIN lahat ‘to!
“Respect and acknowledge na hindi lahat ng tao, aware or kilala ang grupo namin. Hindi rin sa lahat ng oras, everyone will hold a favorable opinion of us. That’s fine!
“There's no reason to spread hate, disrespect or drag down our fellow Filipinos.” he wrote.
(Photos: Instagram/ @officialsb19 and @cherryann.rondina)
Atin ‘to lahat! pic.twitter.com/XsjUpgj5Jz
— PABLO (@imszmc) June 9, 2024