Why do people hate tablo

Whoever had typed the information made the error. The conspiracy theorists online dismissed all this as simply part of the conspiracy. Lee's efforts to answer their questions were turned into evidence of how far he was willing to go to defend his false identity. Part of their suspicion stemmed from the fact that Lee is not actually a Korean citizen.

When he was 8, his family had moved to Canada; he became a Canadian citizen when he was That meant he was exempt from compulsory military service, even while his two Epik High bandmates were drafted. Many forum commenters interpreted this as yet another example of how Lee had gamed the system.

The doubters scored what they believed was a major victory when they discovered a man on Facebook named Daniel Lee who got a degree from Stanford in This Daniel Lee lived in Wisconsin and worked as a mechanical engineer.

Tablo, they claimed, had stolen his identity. In the registrar's office, Black fielded a series of emails about this allegation. The truth: Two Daniel Lees received Stanford degrees in One got a BA and master's in English and became a rapper in Korea; the other got a master's in mechanical engineering and works at a product design firm in Wisconsin.

Black repeatedly confirmed that Daniel Lee the English major was a graduate in good standing but that only seemed to create more agitation. Some emailed to question Black's integrity, suggesting that he was colluding with Lee. Black got angry.

Lee continued to fight back. On August 5, , he released his Canadian citizenship certificate to the press. To his astonishment, he was promptly sued by four anonymous Koreans who charged him with forgery. Korean media widely reported the suit, which only served to further sow doubt about Lee's identity among the general population. Gossip-oriented celebrity sites pored over every detail of the charges; the mainstream press even covered the case.

The fact that Stanford had officially confirmed Lee's diploma did not seem to check the flow of articles. By midsummer, Lee's travails had become one of the biggest news stories in the country. Sean Lim, '01, MA '02, had a front-row seat to the drama. He was a morning news anchor for Arirang, an English-language network in Korea, and watched with horror as the story dominated the summer news. It was a surreal experience because he knew Lee wasn't lying: The two were friends from Stanford.

In fact, Lim could count himself as one of Lee's oldest fans. He lived with Lee in Okada, and was an enthusiastic member of the audience at the small dorm events Lee's first hip-hop group, 4n Objectz, played.

So when people started to question Lee's background, Lim told everyone he could that Lee was a Stanford graduate. Lim asked the group to issue a statement in Korean vouching for Lee. He felt that part of the problem was that all of the evidence in support of Lee was in English and was coming from Stanford, an overseas source.

Maybe if a trusted Korean organization such as the local alumni association took action, it would come in a form that ordinary Koreans could appreciate.

According to Woo, Chung wanted to do something publicly to support Lee but alums in Korea warned him not to. These alums had never met Lee—he'd never attended an association meeting—so many felt that they couldn't be sure that he was who he said he was. They were afraid that their reputation as Stanford alumni in Korea would be tarnished if they erroneously vouched for the rapper.

Instead Chung sent an email to members urging them to take individual action on Lee's behalf. It would be up to each member to decide whether or not to do anything. Lim was furious. It was an understandable fear. The online mob wanted blood, and anybody who stood up against them could incur their wrath. Lim himself admits he struggled with the decision to help.

He had a job in broadcasting and relied on public goodwill. He could endanger his career if he spoke out. Lim met with his old friend at an out-of-the-way coffee shop in July. Lee looked exhausted and said he hadn't been sleeping. He was depressed and his emotions were getting the better of him. Only months earlier, he had played sold-out concerts and was besieged by requests for autographs on the street. Now, he had to sneak around just to meet a friend.

Lim realized there was no choice: He had to do something. He started emailing friends from Lee's days at Stanford and, collectively, 22 of them formed a Facebook page in support of Lee.

Although the Korean press reported that Lee's Stanford friends were rallying around him, TaJinYo members refused to believe it was real. Kang Han, '02, a friend from Lee's freshman year and the first to post on the Facebook site, received threats even though he lived in Los Angeles. Another peppered him with emailed insults and called him a liar. In Korea, Lim received a call from the prosecutor investigating the charges against Lee. He was asked to come to the division headquarters in Seoul and bring his Stanford diploma.

When he arrived, an investigator took the diploma and held it up to the light to determine if it was a forgery. The investigator looked at him without smiling and told him he was going to send the document over to the forensics department to test the paper. When the attacks on Tablo began in the spring of , Ki Yeon Sung received more than emails requesting that she investigate Lee.

She was a seasoned producer with a show called PD Note, something akin to 60 Minutes in Korea, and explored topics such as politics, organized crime and corruption. Celebrity gossip wasn't her beat so she ignored the requests. The situation changed when the attacks grew to include anybody who offered evidence that supported Lee. Reporters and their managers who published stories disputing TaiJinYo claims about Lee were flooded with outraged emails, calls and demands for the reporter's resignation.

Nobody wanted to be threatened so, according to Sung, reporters stopped adequately questioning the validity of the claims. As the story became one of the top news items in the country that summer, she saw that the mob was have a chilling effect on the coverage. That's when it became something worth worrying about. Not that Sung necessarily believed Lee.

It did seem unusual to her that Lee had accomplished so much, so fast, and she could understand how people might have doubts. All behind the face of the forum, of course. Finally, a challenge was brought forward by a news program in Korea: Tablo, go to Stanford in person with a camera crew in tow and prove you really got your degrees there. He said yes, of course, to try and make all of this stop. He went in person.

He got his transcript confirmed by the registrar on camera. He hadn't lied. He'd gotten both. Of his degrees from Stanford in three and a half years, and hadn't cheated. He was just that good. Tablo filed lawsuits against eleven of the most vicious and vocal members of the forum. Their true identities wet revealed as part of the court procedures, and one of the members even resisted their arrest warrants because they believed they hadn't done anything illegal.

Over time, Tablo dropped charges against two of them for compassionate reasons. The rest ended up serving jail time, and by now are free or on probation. Tablo's obviously doing much better now. His family is awesome, Epik High is now under YG and is still getting international love for then such they make, 12 years after they started.

Things really are better now, and Tablo really just is that smart. And that's it! Of course it didn't just end that suddenly and tidily. The lawsuits went on for about three years. But it's all concluded now.

I feel like this was a post that would be helpful to people, so hopefully it has been. Sorry it was so long, I tried to be as concise as possible and not leave anything important out. If you feel like you're missing out on any information about Tablo himself, I made an info post about him a few days ago called Why You Should Love Tablo!

Just pop over to my profile to find it :blush:. Wow, poor Tablo. As a fairly new fan to Epik High, I had no idea this ever happened. Now I just respect them even more. This website saves cookies to your browser in order to improve your online experience and show you personalized content.

Read our Privacy Policy and Cookie Policy to get more information and learn how to set up your preferences. With that said, let's get started. For Tablo, the world seems like a pretty great place to be. So what, though? And vice versa. So being versed in both allows my emotions to have a much larger playing field.

Also, the sheer number of cultures I've had the blessing to be acquainted with has stretched out my sensibilities, I'm sure. Many musicians have told me that being on tour is a conflicting experience for them, because they love performing live, but they also miss being home. How do you feel being on the road? I do miss home during tours. We all do. Our North American tour hits 17 cities and lasts more than a month. My wife and daughter are my best friends.

A month is a long time to be away from your best friends. But I also deeply love performing for our fans. It's always going to be conflicting, yes, but what a blessed thing to be conflicted about. Our tours are usually back-to-back shows, so it's not easy, but we make maximum effort to do so. We don't really do tourist things, but we love to roam. On our tour four years ago, we were in Seattle after a show and just wandering around.

We somehow ended up at a "Star Wars" costume exhibit that was at the same place as a Nirvana exhibit. This just made so much sense to us. We spent like the whole day there.