I recently seen so many news about Lucas, and I thought maybe people would like to know a little on K-Pop idols that come from Hong Kong, and hence this post! I'll go over their popularity / reputation in Hong Kong, and what people generally think about their schools! Of course, take everything here with a grain of salt! I'm basing everything here off Wikipedia/K-Profiles my own perspective/things that I've seen! Also, I don't represent everyone in Hong Kong so please don't take something from my post and say 'Hong Kong people think that blah blah blah...'

If there is anything you would like me to translate from Chinese (with a little more accuracy than the translations out there), I'd be more than happy to do that too! You could send it in my DMs or in the comment below ^^

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Background information in Hong Kong schools:elk

For subsidy or government schools, we have a ranking system (unofficial, but is widely used) where we divide secondary schools (Grade 7-12) into 3 Bandings. Band 1-3, and more specifically Band 1A-3C. Band 1A schools are the most top, elite schools in Hong Kong, followed by Band 1B, 1C, and then Band 2A, and so on, while Band 3C is the lowest tier.

I personally don't enjoy labelling each school group as 'top students' or 'bad students', but it's very, very common that Band 3 students are labelled to be more likely to engage in fights, alcohol, smoking, and other inappropriate behavior. It is also known for people at those schools to be a part of gangs, etc. A lot of people actually went to those schools because their grades don't meet the higher standards (or are just extremely unlucky in the school allocation), but since some people in those schools engage in inappropriate behaviors, they've pretty much been labelled as those people.

While this ranking is not official, and can vary from different websites, it's mostly reflected on their public exam (DSE) results, and the university entrance rate.

For private schools, there is not much information about them, as they occupy quite a small amount of schools in Hong Kong, but are usually perceived as schools for people that are extremely rich, and their parents can afford around 10,000 USD tutoring fee per year.

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NCT / WayV — Lucas

Lucas studied in TWGHs Yow Kam Yuen College (東華三院邱金元中學), a subsidy school located in Sha Tin (somewhere near where he lived). It is a Band 3C school. He was rumored to be a popular student at school, and has a lot of close selfies with female friends. He has a pretty good reputation in Hong Kong among K-Pop fans before the scandal. However, he has an extremely bad reputation among people who actually know him, and many in Hong Kong have heard about his wrong-doings. (His hand-written apology is a textbook sample of an apology letter, by the way.)

LOONA — ViVi

ViVi studied in Catholic Ming Yuen Secondary School (天主教鳴遠中學), a subsidy school located in Tsueng Kwan O. It is a Band 3B school. Despite it being a Band 3 school, it's reputation is pretty alright in Hong Kong. ViVi also has a pretty good reputation among Hong Kong K-Pop fans.

CLC - Elkie

Elkie was a child singer under TVB (Hong Kong's largest television broadcast service provider), and has appeared in some dramas. Elkie attended Carmel Pak U Secondary School (迦密柏雨中學), and is a Band 1A school. It is a top choice for many students in the area. Elkie had a great reputation among Hong Kong K-Pop fans due to her beauty. However, her image dropped drastically in Hong Kong due to her termination of contract with Cube (see below for explanation) and her collab with The Untamed Boys.

GOT7 - Jackson

Jackson studied in American International School. It is one of the top international schools in Hong Kong. Jackson used to study in subsidy primary schools (until Grade 2), but when his teacher thought that he had ADHD, they suggested his parents to transfer him to an international school. Even though Jackson's parents came from a relatively richer background, the school fees were so expensive that her mother only ate bread daily (he mentioned it himself on a show). His reputation in Hong Kong before the protests was a top-tier celebrity, but dropped drastically after the protests started (see below for explanation).

Seven O'Clock — Andy

Some people may be interested about Andy, but there's not a lot of information about him, and not a lot of people know him in Hong Kong. It is known that he currently studied in Toronto. Unfortunately, the group disbanded.

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Political Issues in Hong Kong that lead to drastic image drops for idols:

(While it's okay to feel that some rules/things are stupid, please don't be xenophobic! /g)

During the Hong Kong protests, many idols spoke up about supporting the Hong Kong Police, and most of the idols on the list (if I remember correctly, every spoke up besides Andy and ViVi) spoke up on the issue.

In China, the internet culture is pretty intense. Basically, if a person did something wrong (that is related to the country's reputation), and you're not attacking them or cancelling them, you'll be deemed 'a treason to the country' by netizens. If a person don't speak up about an issue (e.g. XinJiang cotton), the person disagrees with the issue. And once you've done something wrong as a celebrity, you basically cannot recover to your previous status. Here are some examples:

- Fan BingBing, a top actress in the country, was arrested for tax fraud a few years ago. Currently active in the industry, but is nowhere near her popularity back then

- Zhang ZheHan, a new rising star in the industry, started gaining popularity a few months ago due to an airing drama. Photos of him visiting Yasukuni Shrine resurfaced on the internet. His name was removed from the drama he aired in, his socials were locked, and all his brand deals (I believe there was 21/24/26) were dropped within 4 hours since the news resurfaced.

- Yu Yan, a member of THE9. Videos of her swearing and doing inappropriate things resurfaced. Her shots were blurred and she was absent from THE9 activities ever since due to 'health reasons'.

There are tons of people with potential in China. If you can't meet their standards, other people can. That's basically the rule in the Chinese entertainment industry.

Anyway, back to the protest thing. Here's the thing, most idols there target the Chinese market, and it is a way larger market than Hong Kong (way more profitable too). Some people from Hong Kong thinks that as a HongKonger, they should support Hong Kong people too. However, due to company reasons or whatsover, idols don't support HongKongers vocally because they will be cancelled right away. The entire group (and very likely the entire company) will be banned from aired/broadcasted from Chinese platforms, and more extreme actions would come. The company would also suffer from a bad reputation in China. The Chinese market is a huge market, and it occupies a significant portion of many group's sales. On contrary, Hong Kong only has merely less than 8 Million people. There is no way our market compares to the Chinese market.

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Why Jackson got hate in Hong Kong

- He's extremely active in the Mainland China entertainment industry

- People think that he posts way too much Pro-CCP content (none other idols do that)

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Why Elkie got hate in Hong Kong

- She appealed with a Beijing Law Firm, and people started to spread rumors about her.

- To add on about Elkie, she openly has said she supports CCP multiple times in various ways. She also admitted her stepfather is part of the HK police force and vlogs mainly in Mandarin as well. (comment by u/smtcl)

Will edit if there's anything wrong! ^^

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Edit #1: Spelling

Edit #2: Elkie Comment