Antiviolence nonprofit suspends BTS leader RM from role-model list after Chris Brown photo

A U.S.-registered volunteer-run nonprofit that campaigns to end violence against women has indefinitely suspended BTS leader RM from its list of male role models after the singer shared a photo with Chris Brown.

"Effective today, we are indefinitely suspending RM from our list of male role models," The Pixel Project said in a statement released Wednesday.

The male role model list is the nonprofit's own honor roll listing and is not an official title or an award. The Pixel Project put RM on the honor roll in 2024.

The suspension comes a week after RM and fellow member J-Hope attended Brown and Usher's Toronto concert on Aug. 12. J-Hope posted videos from Brown's set on Instagram, and Brown later uploaded a backstage photo with the two BTS members.

Some fans criticized RM and J-Hope for attending and posting photos with Brown, a singer with a record of violence. Brown pleaded guilty to assaulting his then-girlfriend Rihanna in 2009, when he was sentenced to five years of probation and 180 days of community labor. Brown also pleaded guilty to affray and assault over a 2023 attack at a London nightclub.

"The Pixel Project had been waiting for RM to issue a public statement of acknowledgment regarding the Chris Brown concert before we responded to this controversy," the nonprofit said. "It has been a week of silence on RM's part, and that silence is deafening."

Others, however, said RM's suspension was nothing more than a performative gesture by an activist website.

The nonprofit originally praised RM for actively taking women and gender studies classes, amongst other reasons, when it announced the list on Dec. 4, 2024.

BTS is scheduled to perform at the same Rogers Stadium in Toronto on Saturday and Sunday, where RM and J-Hope watched Brown and Usher's concert earlier this month.