CL Is Leading "Time 100" Poll, VICE Magazine Explains Why

Mar 29, 2015

VICE magazine shares their take on why 2NE1’s CL is currently dominating the “TIME 100: The Most Influential People in the World in 2015″ reader’s poll, leading in first place with 11 percentage of votes, more than double of any of the other candidates, including Taylor Swift, Barack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, and Pope Francis, have recorded.

In an article entitled “Who Is CL and Why Is She Leading the Vote for the TIME 100?” Madeleine Lee of VICE writes, “What’s surprising about this is not so much the sheer number of votes—international K-pop fans are excellent at voter mobilization—as the fact that CL is there to be voted for at all. She is the third Korean pop star to be nominated for the Time 100 and the only Korean on this year’s list who isn’t the head of a single-party republic.”

Indeed, when CL’s inclusion on the list of nominees was announced, there were some perplexed voices among the large crowd of supporters.

Madeleine Lee mentions CL’s imminent U.S. debut and highlights her many accomplishments thus far, as part of 2NE1 and as a solo artist, “In 2012, they became the first Korean female pop act to do a solo tour of the US. ‘Crush’ set American Billboard’s record for highest-charting K-pop album, and last summer, their 2011 smash hit ‘I Am the Best’ soundtracked an English-language Microsoft commercial—still sung entirely in Korean.”

She continues, saying that CL is the one among 2NE1 members who could make an American career work. “She’s already had a few rap solo tracks throughout 2NE1’s career, ‘The Baddest Female’and ‘MTBD,’” and mentions CL’s multilingual abilities, and her childhood spent moving between France, Korea, and Japan, which resulted in an open-mindedness to different cultures.

But Madeleine Lee gingerly notes that the poll results don’t necessarily carry over to the final list of 100, which is in the end, a decision made by the editors of Time. “Neither does it guarantee you a place in the American market: Rain won the poll three times, but he has made no attempt to cross over since ‘Ninja Assassin.’”

Meanwhile, voting for the “TIME 100” will close on April 10, and the winner will be announced on April 13. The official “TIME 100” list for 2015 will be revealed on April 16.

Who have you voted for on the poll?