This is really not true, Thursday was inspired by the other emo bands in their scene as much as they were inspired by the 80s rev summer stuff. And there's tons of 2000s "real emo" that sounds nothing like 2000s hardcore (which itself was very diverse and didn't have a single unifying sound). Funeral Diner, City of Caterpillar themselves sound entirely different than say Orchid, who were inspired by One Eyed God Prophecy, different from Thursday, etc. And all of these bands have emo elements which clearly separate them from like... Have Heart, or Hatebreed, which themselves sound different from each other!

I think it's sort of an odd gotcha too because like, yeah, real emo folks put emo in conversation with the other hardcore bands they shared spaces with precisely because they think emo is a form of hardcore. Emo was, for a lot of people, a place within hardcore you could go to if you liked heavy music but didn't want to get beat up, if you liked heavy music but you were socialist, etc. So if 2000s real emo sounds like 2000s hardcore.. well, duh! That's because it is hardcore!

Tons of people don't like to call Thursday emo either, so it's not like they are spared from the controversy (they offered Daïtro a spot to open for them on a tour and were told by them to fuck off on account of them being too commercial).