The host of the radio show compares BTS to the Covid-19 virus
Bavarian radio Bayern 3 found itself in hot water after its host Matthias Matuschik was accused of passing racist remarks to K-pop boy band BTS.
Matuschik wrongly drew parallels to the band and the Covid-19 virus describing them as "some [expletive] virus that hopefully there will be a vaccine for soon as well."
His comments came after he listened to the band’s cover of Coldplay’s Fix You.
"These little [expletive] brag about the fact they covered 'Fix You' from Coldplay, this is blasphemy," he said. "For this you will be vacationing in North Korea for the next 20 years!"
The comments were not received well by Army fans who in turn took to Twitter with hashtags like #Bayern3Apologize and #Bayern3Racist while also calling out the host for his insensitive comments, who in turn did not acknowledge his mistake.
"You can't accuse me of xenophobia. I have a car from South Korea. I have the coolest car ever," he commented.
While the station admitted that their presenter took it too far, they defended the idea that the host is eligible to express their opinion "clearly, openly and unvarnished".
"It is the character of this show and also of the presenter to express his opinion clearly, openly and unvarnished," the station said in a statement.
"In this case, he overshot the mark in his choice of words in an attempt to present his opinion in an ironically exaggerated manner and with exaggeratedly feigned excitement, and thus hurt the feelings of the BTS fans. But, as he assured us, this was in no way his intention. He only wanted to express his displeasure about the above-mentioned cover version."