💜 NEW! This episode has been transcribed and translated into Italian by Karina A. Ferracci. Click here for the PDF.

Joining us for the 18th edition of our special Quarantine Series is CEO of the BTS ARMY Help Center, Carla Postma-Slabbekoorn in the Netherlands.

A married mother of two, she works in finance as a mortgage specialist and devotes her spare time to supporting and encouraging fellow members of the BTS ARMY through the worldwide efforts of the ARMY Help Center.

For the listeners who are not familiar with BTS, they are currently the most popular musical group in the world. They performed at this year’s Grammy Awards where they were nominated for Best Pop Duo or Group Performance, two of their latest singles reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and in December of last year TIME Magazine named them their 2020 Entertainer of the Year.

BTS officially stands for Bangtan Sonyeondan, which translates to Bulletproof Boy Scouts. In 2017, they changed the official acronym to Beyond The Scene, protecting youths from prejudice. The name signifies the group’s desire to block out stereotypes, criticisms and expectations that aim at adolescents like bullets. Fans of BTS are known as ARMY, which stands for Adorable Representative M.C. for Youth.

Listeners of this podcast will recall that in 2019 we began a series of episodes with Jungian analyst Murray Stein in Zürich, Switzerland. It was when his book, Jung’s Map of the Soul, was trending on Twitter as the title of BTS’ new album, Map of the Soul: Persona was announced. Dr. Stein has joined us for seven episodes of Speaking of Jung where we’ve discussed his book in Ep. 42, Jung’s concept of the persona in Ep. 44, the shadow in Ep. 53 and the ego in Ep. 54, BTS’ follow-up album Map of the Soul: 7 in Ep. 55, their Japanese album Map of the Soul: The Journey in Ep. 67, and their latest album BE in Ep. 77. Links to those episodes and Dr. Stein’s new books about BTS, published in collaboration with Chiron Publications, can be found on Speaking of Jung’s BTS page.

The BTS ARMY Help Center, or AHC as it’s called, was founded in 2018 when the original founder became aware of the pressure that ARMY was under. With the iHeartMusic Awards show being one of the many awards ceremonies that require massive online voting, ARMY dedicated every bit of their time in order to finish the daily voting quota, and some of them even gave up their sleep in doing so. This obviously has an effect on someone’s mental health and signs that some ARMY were stressed about this emerged on social media.

Inspired by BTS’ messages of self-love and radical kindness, an idea grew. It was to create an account with a small group of volunteers from around the world, preferably with a background in psychology or counseling, to try to take away a bit of the worries and stress from ARMY. AHC opened up their DMs and ARMY found them fast. So fast that the team of 10 people quickly grew to a large and diverse group of volunteers (currently 200+) from all around the world. With a team of dedicated members working together, AHC allowed the fandom to grow closer than ever, by sharing their happiness, fears and worries, not to forget the everlasting enthusiasm they have for BTS in whichever language they feel comfortable in.

AHC’s mission is: “To provide a listening ear to those (ARMY) who need one, without providing therapy and to educate (ARMY) about mental health related issues.” In January 2020, AHC partnered up with Crisis Text Line (a text-based hotline) further expanding their service to ARMY in need.

The ARMY Help Center has 20 official Twitter accounts and an Instagram account (DMs are only open on Twitter for now). They are looking into expanding their services to Facebook, TikTok and email, and are currently in the process of training new volunteers to help with the goals they’ve set out for themselves. They are also working on creating a website.

On top of this community is a management team led by our guest today, Carla Postma-Slabbekoorn who serves as CEO. Other members of the management team are: Tiffany Helton (USA) - HR Manager, Deborah Koningferander (Ireland) - CFO, Rupal Kaura (India) - Psychology Manager, Tanzila Khan (India) - Content Manager, Esmee el Mansari (Morocco) - Project Manager, Sharon Mailangkay (Indonesia) - Public Relations and Account Manager Indonesia, and Laura Devis Torres (Spain) - Public Relations and Account Manager Spanish. In December 2020 it was estimated that over all the accounts of AHC they received 30,000 Direct Messages.

This interview was recorded on Wednesday, May 12, 2021. It’s 01:14:55 long and 63 MB. You can listen to it right here in your browser or download it directly to your computer. It’s also available on on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, TuneIn, Spotify, iHeartRadio, and on Amazon Music.

You can also listen to this episode on your Amazon Echo device. Simply say, “Alexa, play Speaking of Jung on Apple Podcasts (or on TuneIn).” Just be sure to pronounce Jung with a hard J.

SHOW NOTES

Butter New single coming May 21 from BTS

Speaking of Jung, Ep. 9 Laura’s visit with Dr. Stein in Zürich, Nov. 25, 2015

Speaking of Jung’s BTS Page Links to episodes and books with Dr. Stein

BTS x AHC x JUNG Promo video on YouTube, April 2019 (sound on!)

BTS (방탄소년단) ‘ON’ Kinetic Manifesto Film: Come Prima Dance video for the lead single from Map of the Soul 7, Feb. 21, 2020

BTS (방탄소년단) ‘ON’ Official MV Music video for the lead single from Map of the Soul 7, Feb. 27, 2020

CBS Sunday Morning 8-minute segment on BTS, Apr. 23, 2019

BTS: Boy with Luv (Live) Saturday Night Live, Apr. 14, 2019

BTS: Mic Drop (Live) Saturday Night Live, Apr. 14, 2019

BTS Translations by wisha

Doolset Lyrics BTS lyrics in English

BTS-TRANS/BANGTANSUBS Translation and subbing team dedicated to BTS.

BTS (방탄소년단) ‘MIC Drop (Steve Aoki Remix)’ Official MV Music video for the new version of Mic Drop, Nov. 24, 2017

Go (Go, G0) by BTS English lyrics

‘The Last’ by Agust D English lyrics

‘The Last’ by Agust D Stream on Spotify

BTS’ speech to the United Nations UNICEF, Sept. 24, 2018

Kim Namjoon’s ‘Endment’ Facebook video

Here Are 7 Lessons Kim Namjoon Has Taught Us by Jazmin Williams, The Honey POP, Sept. 11, 2020

BTS (방탄소년단) ‘Old Town Road’ Live Performance with Lil Nas X and more @ GRAMMYs 2020 Group performance, Jan. 27, 2020

BTS (방탄소년단) ‘Dynamite’ @ 63rd GRAMMY Awards Show Performance as Grammy nominees, Apr. 21, 2021

BTS (방탄소년단) Black Swan Perf. + ON + Life Goes On + Dynamite @ 2020 MMA Best performance of ‘Black Swan,’ Dec. 6, 2020

RUN BTS on VLive and Weverse

INTERVIEWS WITH CARLA POSTMA-SLABBEKOORN

BTS ARMY: Inside the Fandom The Cultural Frontline, BBC World Radio, Jan. 11, 2021

Hallyu Il with Army Help Center Admin Carla Postma-Slabbekorn Magic 92.3 CEBU, Feb. 23, 2020

Live with Carla Before the BTS Concert in Paris Laura’s video interview with Carla a few hours before the start of the BTS concert at Stade de France, Jun. 7, 2019

BOOKS

Jung’s Map of the Soul: An Introduction by Murray Stein, Ph.D., Jungian analyst

Map of the Soul – Persona: Our Many Faces ~ Vol. 1 ~ Includes a transcription of Ep. 44 ~ paperback editions available in Chinese, English, Korean, and Spanish ~ also available in Kindle and Audible

Map of the Soul – Shadow: Our Hidden Self ~ Vol. 2 ~ Includes a transcription of Ep. 53 ~ also available in Kindle

Map of the Soul – Ego: I Am ~ Vol. 3 ~ Includes a transcription of Ep. 54 ~ also available in Kindle

Map of the Soul – 7: Persona, Shadow & Ego in the World of BTS ~ Beyond summarizing the three volumes on Persona, Shadow and Ego in the Map of the Soul series, this latest book explores the entire BTS album, start to finish, revealing profound insights into the collective psyche of BTS. Also available in Kindle and Audible.