Boy band stars bring out maternal instincts
Print Edition
LIANG Shanshan considers herself a mother of two: one child is her biological son, the other is a 16-year-old Chinese teen pop star she has never met.
She is a “mother fan” and part of a group of women in their mid-20s to 60s whose maternal instincts are set off by China’s boy band sensation TFBoys (The Fighting Boys).
The band has won millions of Chinese followers since their 2013 debut, rapidly amassing a following ardent enough to buy a giant ad in New York’s Times Square for a band member’s birthday.
Liang says her feelings are no fleeting fancy. Just like a real mother, her devotion to TFBoys’ singer Roy Wang (Wang Yuan) is unwavering.
“Our fandom isn’t shallow,” she says, adding: “I intend to follow him through his entire career.”
While younger fans are attracted to the teenagers’ boyish good looks, Liang and her friends are drawn to their cherubic personas and wholesome values, with songs that explore the trials of growing up (“Practise Book for Youth,” “Imperfect Kid”).
Some, like 24-year-old Yang Andan, even make annual pilgrimages to Wang’s hometown of Chongqing in China’s southwest.
“The more I learn about Wang, the more I like him,” Yang said.
Liang’s family has embraced her fandom. Her 4-year-old refers to TFBoys as his “big brothers,” and her husband accompanies her to concerts to see Wang, describing him as their “kid.”
Nearly a quarter of TFBoys fans are at least 30 — double the band members’ ages, according to a Sina survey.
In some cases the obsession with TFBoys is a symptom of empty nest syndrome, said Anthony Fung, a Chinese University of Hong Kong professor who studies pop culture.
“The older fans may have kids who are grown up, so now they’re looking for someone else to be at the center of their attention,” he said.
Affluent Chinese women, many of whom have only one child to spoil thanks to decades of the one-child policy, are more than happy to splash out on their celebrity children.
To celebrate the birthday of TFBoys member Jackson Yi (Yiyang Qianxi) in November, fans flew a cake-shaped hot air balloon over New York and held a party on a cruise ship in Shanghai.
A recent university graduate who works at a Beijing-based Internet company, Yang said she has learned a lot from the singer nearly 10 years her junior.
Every year, she gathers with fans in Chongqing to coat the streets with TFBoys posters in celebration of Wang’s birthday, spending several sleepless nights on enormous decorations.
“Every time I see him I feel like I haven’t seen enough,” Yang said. “But my heart hurts thinking about how hard he works. I hope he’ll have more time to rest.”
Wang also works with several charities and represented China this year at the United Nations Youth Forum in New York.
Yang and Liang, who addressed each other by their fan aliases (“Mushroom” and “Goldfish,” respectively), both vowed to remain loyal to Wang, whom they firmly believe is more talented and a better person than the other TFBoys.
Even when her childlike icon is a child no more, Liang said — in an echo of a TFBoys song — they can indulge in the “very joyful process of growing up together.”
Like young people everywhere, however, TFBoys’ more traditional teenybopper fans are not always happy to share their idols with people of their parents’ generation. “A girl at one of the concerts said my husband was too old to be there,” Liang said.
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