Name: Aisyah Restu Damayanti

NIM: 03020321042
Class: Argumentative Writing A
Words: 582
Pop Culture and Its Dangerous to People
There are three reasons why pop culture is dangerous for people and national identity.
First, pop culture could change people’s behaviours. As we know that pop culture was
brought from many different countries around the world, so they all have different
perceptions according to their own culture. Sometimes, the culture that they brought has
different manners to the national identity. Thus, it could change people’s perception and
behaviour. Rafique and Khan (2022) stated that culture is a compilation of traditions,
standards, life dimensions, beliefs, and social bargains which are given by people and
influenced an individual’s behaviour and the way of understanding other’s behaviours.
Second, pop culture can lead to people’s addiction and fanatism which it is dangerous for the
national identity. When people already addicted to a culture, they will only think that they are
the most right. “He felt that he was the one who was the most straight and right. This
fanatical nature is bad for someone [….] Fanaticism is an understanding or behaviour that
shows excessive interest in something” (Fibrianto et al., 2020). The last, pop culture could
be the reason why someone forgets their national identity. Fibrianto et al. (2020) also stated
that since the arrival of the Korean boyband and girl band to Indonesia in 2012, enthusiasm
from the community were very massive. This event surely has impacted the fading of
Indonesian culture. Finally, people who are more into pop culture than their own culture will
be experienced behavioural changing and addiction. Furthermore, they might forget about
their national identity.
Research might argue that pop culture could bring happiness and make people easily
ride out their life problems. Wiana (2013) explained that a study has adopted and viewed pop
culture as a positive expression for people to survive their life and pop culture is a
manifestation of industrialization. Although that statement is true in some conditions, it is
defeated by the fact that pop culture could ruin teenagers' life tranquillity, especially for those
who do not really aware of their real-life performance. Pop culture may give good
entertainment to people’s lives, but it is only temporary and can lead to addiction. For
instance, young people nowadays are more interested in K-Pop culture than other pop culture,
which is good but at a different point, it could be a detriment for them. Those who love K-
Pop too much might struggle to separate their fun time and their real-life activities. Therefore,
they will experience a decline in life performance and productivity. Rola and Canayong
(2019) said “Undeniably, it is obvious that these teens lack the discipline in the proper usage
of this technology since they cannot control themselves from browsing the net. This is a
manifestation of their anxiety when it comes to social media.” Moreover, teenagers who
addicted to K-Pop might experience Fear of Missing Out or FOMO. FOMO is a guilty and
worry feeling to miss out on the trend information on social media. However, FOMO is not a
good habit and even caused a mental disorder. As Elhai et al., (2021) explained, “Subsequent
investigations have assessed whether FOMO influences negative affectivity, such as
depression and anxiety, or whether negative affectivity influences FOMO.” With all of this
reason, not all of side of pop culture is fine for our culture and can cause some negative
effects. Therefore, people who are interested in pop culture or kind of them should be aware
of their time management and can filter out what good things that they can receive.
References:
Elhai, J. D., Yang, H., & Montag, C. (2021). Fear of missing out (Fomo): Overview,
theoretical underpinnings, and literature review on relations with severity of negative
affectivity and problematic technology use. Brazilian Journal of Psychiatry, 43(2), 203–
209. https://doi.org/10.1590/1516-4446-2020-0870
Fibrianto, A. S., Asrori, M. I., Mahardiansyah, D., Anggraini, L. M., Lailani, A. T. ., Azizah,
S. N., & Trianjaya, A. (2020). Analysis of globalization phenomena: forms of K-Pop
cultural fanaticism among students (case study of sociology student at Universitas
Negeri Malang). 404(Icossei 2019), 319–324.
https://doi.org/10.2991/assehr.k.200214.058
Rafique, S., & Khan, M. H. (2022). A critical analysis of pop culture and media. VII, 13.
https://doi.org/10.31703/grr.2022(VII-I).17
Rola, Canayong, N. J. (2019). Social Media Influences to Teenagers. International Journal of
Research Science & Management, 6(6), 38–48. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3260717
Wiana, W. (2013). Popular Culture and This Phenomenon in The Culture of Dressed/Fashion.
Publication of Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, December.