On May 8, 2024, the media outlet Vogue published an article titled Everything You Need to Know About Stray Kids, the South Korean Band Selling Out Tours Around the World, following the group's debut at the Met Gala (May 6).
The article went viral among the STAYs (Stray Kids' fandom name) for all the wrong reasons. It started by providing a brief introduction about the eight members of the group, which included former member Woojin, who is no longer a part of the group. They also allegedly mixed up the members, whom they called Hyunjin as Seungmin and Seungmin as Felix.
Soon, the alleged mixup and mentions from the article went viral on social media as fans felt disappointed. While some stated that they did not have to add Woojin due to his departure, others felt that there was nothing wrong in citing a former member's name as they were only writing history. Meanwhile, the alleged mixup of members also invited backlash from fans.
"i don’t even stan but wtf? this is messy asf", an X user said.
Netizens felt there was no need to add former member Woojin's name to the article, and they requested the outlet to remove his name and rectify their article accordingly. The fandom also asked them to fix the alleged mixup of the members.
"He left, he hurt the group and should not be associated with them in any way anymore. stray kids has been eight longer than he was there so yes, this is serious to me at least and to other stays," an user reacted.
"Can you also fix this? it's Hyunjin (L) and Seungmin (R) and remove the part about the ex-member, he is not relevant to this article," a fan commented.
"when everyone gonna get that STRAY KIDS = 8 AND 8 IS FATE, stop mention him, he is a soloist!! PLS RESPECT KIDS," another user reacted.
Meanwhile, some users found nothing wrong in the alleged mention and mixup of the Stray Kids members. They thought that the journalist was mentioning about the history of the group and stated:
"They were just explaining the history of the group. Although not really necessary to mention him, it's not that big of a deal. Regardless of how anyone feels about him, he is part of the history of Stray Kids and always will be," a fan reacted.
"I get why yall are upset the met gala article mentions woojin but at the same time the whole point of the article is to introduce the group to people that don't know them so mentioning stuff like that is important to help people not be confused when they search them up," another user added.
"Listen, what I'm gonna say MIGHR sound shocking so I'll try to simplify it for you. Skz at debut = 9, Skz 2019 = 9 - 1, Skz now = 8. He was part of their history as a group, so when some is going talk about their history, he is going to be brought up BECAUSE he was a part of that," said another user reacted.
STAYs allegedly hacked website of a photographer accused of passing disrespectful comments against Stray Kids at Met Gala
On May 6, 2024, Stray Kids emerged as the first K-pop group to grace the fashion event, Met Gala. Soon, videos of the eight members posing at the Met Gala red carpet went viral on social media, where fans observed the alleged racist comments passed by the reporters and photographers present at the event.
The fandom stated that photographers allegedly asked them to do certain poses, passing comments about their facial expressions, including "I've never seen such unemotional faces," "Let's do it with feeling," "I will just take a headshot of each of you how about that," and others. They felt that the photographers carried a disrespectful tone and mocked the members intentionally.
Soon, the fans found out the identity of the photographers reported to have passed the disrespectful comments against the Stray Kids. Among the identified individuals, photographer Sean Zanni was one of them. His website was allegedly hacked on May 9, 2024, and when an individual opened it, the following words, #ApologizeToStrayKids, were visible on screen.
Stray Kids is gearing up to release their collaborative track with Charlie Puth, Lose My Breath on May 10, 2024.