Singer Ryu Philip and Mina, a married couple, addressed rumors of discord with sister-in-law Park Suji and personally responded to criticism directed at them.
On the 2nd, a video titled "To clarify misunderstandings and questions about Suji noona, I speak with difficulty" was uploaded to the 'Philmi Couple' channel. In the video, Ryu Philip responded to the question "Why haven't we seen Suji lately?" by saying, "We can't force Suji noona to do something she doesn't want to do. You can't force a person. She lost weight down to 80kg, so she might look healthier and better, but I thought that could be far from happiness. Many people misunderstood and Suji noona said she wanted to stop. So we reached a situation where we could no longer proceed. Suji noona told me she didn't want to exercise. You all know we provided a lot of support up to now. But you can't control someone who says they dislike it. If someone says it's painful and they dislike it, how could we force it," he said, indicating that the diet help was stopped at her own request.
He said, "Still, our goal was for Suji noona to diet in a healthy way, and she did reach a healthy state. Asking her to push further to 70 or 60kg would be like treating her as our slave. I think she had reached a satisfactory level. When I first saw Suji noona at 150kg, I felt her life was at risk, so we started thinking we'd help her get to a safe range. It's not like we abandoned Suji noona. The person who provided full support was Ms. Mina, and I was in the position of receiving help from Ms. Mina. I am very, very grateful to Ms. Mina, who gave wholehearted support because she helped my family. From my perspective, I thought it was a really good thing to do, but in the end it turned out not to be. The ending feels a bit awkward, and when I hear things like she wasn't happy and she struggled, I had nothing to say. What I said was, 'Okay, live happily,'" he confessed.
He went on to explain why he hadn't shared updates: "I was struggling too, so I couldn't call her home. I wanted to wrap things up quickly but I couldn't. It's hard for me to see her face too. In any case, I supported Suji noona almost like crazy for about a year for her good, right? But the result turned out like this, so it's hard for me too. So Suji noona runs her YouTube channel alone and posts updates on Instagram, and she said she would do it by herself. I told her to do it alone. I said I would no longer help; I tried to help until the end, but she even said, 'There's no need to help.' Then there's no reason for me to be with Suji noona anymore. Even if I want to help, it reached a point where I can't, so I think it's better not to mention Suji noona anymore. Our relationship with Suji noona has ended," he drew a line.
Ryu Philip also added in the video, "Many comments were recently posted due to misunderstandings about Suji noona, such as whether we fought or why we didn't help, and there were many misunderstanding comments about Ms. Mina, so we talked about it on a live broadcast for the first time. Suji noona said she would be independent and is personally active on social media. If you are curious about Suji noona's recent condition, you can find her on Instagram and YouTube," he added.
Afterward, Ryu Philip and Mina replied directly to netizens' comments on the video to clarify misunderstandings. One fan said, "It wasn't that she hated exercise, but it was hard to live a life of the same control every day," and Ryu Philip and Mina said, "We didn't meet every day; we met two to three times a week and taught her exercise together. There was no controlling. She's not a biological sister; she's a sister-in-law. If you exercise alone, you don't know the method and you tend not to go. So she paid a lot for personal training. Because we were worried it would be hard to diet while working, we had her quit her job and paid her more than her previous salary, and we filmed videos to help make her an influencer so she could earn a lot in the future, posting them on her Instagram almost every day. Editing takes a long time, so it's a bit disheartening," they revealed.
Another fan said, "If they truly wanted to help, they would have helped without turning the diet into content. Broadcasting that itself is pressure," and Ryu Philip and Mina responded, "Many fans who supported her emerged, and she liked that. Her original dream was to be an actor, but she said her dream changed to being an influencer. We made videos to make her famous as an influencer so she could earn a lot and be happy, posting them on her Instagram every day, and now she has nearly 40,000 followers. Now that she posts videos and communicates on her own, even if she gains some weight, she seems able to maintain it. We also support her now that she wants to diet comfortably by herself," they said.
On the opinion that "Isn't she getting too many hateful comments? If she's going to be criticized anyway and the video content itself is income, it might be better for Suji to just create her own channel," they explained, "Ms. Mina received more hateful comments. The content revenue isn't large, but we paid her more than her salary. We helped Suji noona earn money by managing and editing her Instagram and posting for her, and in less than a year she reached about 40,000 followers. Now that she does it alone, it doesn't increase much. We wanted to help her reach over 100,000 followers, so it's a bit disappointing and disheartening," they explained.
In response to a comment suggesting, "I think Suji's mental state was crushed by hateful comments, so she stopped exposing herself to the media," they said, "I don't think that's the case. She is posting videos on her personal Instagram and YouTube and interacting through comments; if she disliked attention, she wouldn't do social media. And her dream shifted from being an actor to being an influencer. Please support her a lot," they explained.
In particular, when some speculated that the reason for cutting ties was "revenue distribution issues" and criticized, "Stop trying to profit from Suji's diet videos," Ryu Philip and Mina repeatedly emphasized, "Suji has not received separate advertising offers yet. The revenue from posted videos is small, and we paid her more than that monthly. Suji also said that if she succeeds as an influencer, which is her dream, she will definitely repay us," they stressed. They added, "Ms. Mina helped and supported both her biological sibling and her sister-in-law, and she is someone who finds happiness when her family works hard and does well; she has no greed for money. We didn't help because of revenue, and while working with Suji, our video revenue decreased to one-third," and explained, "Editing, adding subtitles, and writing posts takes more than three hours every day for the person who uploads. To boost Suji's Instagram, we posted and managed her account daily. Because of that, we didn't have time to film and edit our own videos, so we posted what we filmed with Suji. Before collaborating with Suji, our subscriber count exceeded 500,000, but perhaps because of the algorithm, subscribers barely increased over a year."
Some also pointed out that Ryu Philip's remarks in the video seemed somewhat "to speak ill of noona." Regarding that, he said, "I said those things while speaking, but we're family, so we'll still see each other. We weren't originally people who met often. When we helped noona, she seemed to feel pressured and dieted extremely. From the start, we thought noona's max weight of 80kg was acceptable, so we didn't push and told her to lose weight slowly and not starve. If she does it alone, the burden is lighter, so I think she'll do well slowly," and added, "Many people posted misunderstandings like saying we hoped and then fought, so we just shared simple information. We can't go into more detail."
Meanwhile, Park Suji, who is Ryu Philip's sister and Mina's sister-in-law, attracted attention after losing weight from 150kg to 78kg with Mina's help. She successfully underwent her hernia surgery after the diet, but recently reported she had stopped dieting due to burnout. However, amid an outpouring of support she announced she would resume dieting, and on the 3rd she said, "I will publicly share my fasting body weight whether I gain or lose," and "Day 1 from today," verifying a scale reading of 108.05kg.
[Photo] OSEN DB, SNS, Philmi Couple
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