In the July/August issue of Stanford Magazine, Daniel Lee (a.k.a. Tablo of the group Epik High) details his struggle against last year’s claims that he had lied about his Stanford education.

After allegations of other celebrities who forged their education history were proven true, Korean netizens began to question whether Daniel could have indeed attained a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree in English at Stanford within only 3 ½ years.

An online forum titled “We Request the Truth from Tablo,” or more widely known as TaJinYo, led the witch-hunt to prove that Daniel had lied. Conspiracy theories ranged from Daniel paying off school officials to lie about his degree, to him assuming another Stanford graduate’s identity (also named Daniel Lee).

Even after Stanford registrar Thomas Black confirmed Daniel’s Stanford degree, Koreans still doubted. Any evidence that emerged as proof of Daniel’s credibility was quickly dismissed. Daniel, his family, and all of his supporters found themselves at the receiving end of violent threats.

Daniel began to feel hopeless as more Koreans began to vocally oppose him: “I was doing everything they had asked and it was never good enough. That’s when I realized that they weren’t looking for answers, they just wanted to destroy me.”

In order to defend his reputation, Daniel agreed to do a MBC television special titled “Tablo Goes to Stanford” that would document his return to Stanford. Daniel acquired his transcript in person to which Black definitively verified that the name on Daniel’s passport indeed matched the name on the official school transcript.

Even with this moment of clear confirmation, Daniel felt no relief:

The people who are doing this to me will never stop. They just won’t believe me no matter what I do…Honestly, I’m damaged. And I don’t know if I’ll ever be better.

To read the full article, click here.

[Photo of Tablo: Timothy Archibald/Stanford Magazine; screenshot of "Tablo Goes to Stanford": MBC]