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Post by Jaymz on Dec 7, 2013 13:58:42 GMT
This was slightly touched on elsewhere so I thought I bring it up here.
While I understand the cultures are different I never understood the sexualization of young girls in anime.
Does it not get the proper discussion it should here in North America for no reason other than it is "cartoons" because I know if they did so on live action tv that chaos would ensue.
Thoughts?
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 7, 2013 23:05:46 GMT
Really? You're really asking this? Art thou blind?
The same damn stuff happens here in America ALL THE GODDAMN TIME. This is not some quirk of Japanese culture or something like that. Every culture does it to some extent, and it invariably is reflected in their popular media.
Cast your mind back a few years to when Britney Spears first made it onto the music scene. She was an underage girl in very heavily sexualized music videos, in outfits like the stereotypical "sexy catholic schoolgirl" or a skintight latex catsuit. The general public ate that shit up, and she made a fortune on it. The same goes for practically every other young pop star... and not just recently, or only the girls either. Hell, look at how half of the male population fetishized the Olsen twins when they were in their teens... or, more recently, the girl who played Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter movies. I'm sure if I did a little digging I could find plenty of other examples going back decades. The best example of all might just be that the "sexy schoolgirl" is such a common, standard fetish as to have become a literal cliche both here in North America and abroad.
Does anime do it? Yes. Does the media here in America do it? Yes. Is it acceptable? No... really it's a little creepy, but at least Japan's trying to discourage its more blatant applications. Record labels and so on here in the US prefer to use "jailbait" as a draw.
Let's not kid ourselves here... when Colonel Wolfe brought it up, he was just looking for an outlet to express how butthurt he is over Macross being both more successful than Robotech and also the only part of Robotech that matters a damn. He's also assuming the art he bitched about is an underage girl instead of a petite adult woman... the latter being relatively consistent with the art style of the period. If he wants to see anime actually sexualizing preteens he can always go read This is Animation: Southern Cross... that book has tons.
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Post by Jaymz on Dec 8, 2013 0:02:49 GMT
Let me rephrase then, young girls as in preteen and younger.
I get that they are using "jailbait", especially pop stars. The question still stands though, does it get proper discussion? At least as it pertains to anime?
And to be honest I don;t care why CW brought it up elsewhere. It seems to be a topic worth discussing separately.
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 8, 2013 0:27:39 GMT
Let me rephrase then, young girls as in preteen and younger. I get that they are using "jailbait", especially pop stars. The question still stands though, does it get proper discussion? At least as it pertains to anime? Really, that's a bone that's been so thoroughly chewed that there's nothing left of it. Just as in America, that sort of thing is generally borderline illegal, subject to legislation, and seen as deviant in the extreme. Here or there, if you're into that kind of thing, even if it's just drawings, you're seen as a borderline sex offender and shunned appropriately. That's why that sort of thing is a grey market commodity sold on the sly... usually as self-published works distributed anonymously over the net. Believe me, if you think Japan is some kind of sexually liberal fetish paradise, you got another thing coming. They are, if anything, a lot more uptight about anything relating to sex than we are in America. Part of that is actually censorship laws we foisted on them at the end of World War II. Just like here, that uptightness results in a niche entertainment industry that caters to those repressed folks... an industry that is subject to strict regulatory legislation. It's been the subject of intense debate over there... so much so that even the notoriously long-winded politicians are sick to death of talking about it.
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Post by Jaymz on Dec 8, 2013 0:31:11 GMT
So then how does it get into the various shows then? Is it because it is anime and not live action?
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 8, 2013 0:41:14 GMT
So then how does it get into the various shows then? Is it because it is anime and not live action? Name a show? I can't think of a recent example of this... except perhaps Needless, where it was a petite 16 year old dressing in rather immature/cutesy fashion, and the one character who had shown any interest was summarily beaten senseless twice and condemned (in the episode itself) as a sick-minded deviant for it. (There was another character in the same series who also has the loli look without actually being one... though that character was very blatant about really being a 100 year old cyborg with a manifestly filthy mind.) About the only thing I can think of on this front are the occasional case of an alien/magical being/etc. having the appearance of a teenage girl but actually being X many hundreds or thousands of years old... such as Neju Na Melmas from Tenchi Muyo GXP or "girlycard" from the Hellsing prequel.
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Post by Jaymz on Dec 8, 2013 0:47:40 GMT
I am speaking in general about it getting into any shows. Not specific shows. You know me, I watch mecha anime and that's about it for the most part. LOL
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 8, 2013 1:04:13 GMT
I am speaking in general about it getting into any shows. Not specific shows. You know me, I watch mecha anime and that's about it for the most part. LOL Generally speaking... it doesn't get into shows, because that would actually be illegal. The anime industry is a place where you can't even show someone smoking unless they're at least 20*. You may, on occasion, see characters who look younger than they are, but there's usually some effort to establish their actual age as being older... and/or an in-series condemnation of any characters who actually do have a lolita complex (e.g. Adam Blade in Needless, who is summarily beaten up TWICE in one episode for having an interest in a 16+ year old girl who is just petite). I asked you to cite a specific show because I honestly cannot think of a single example of what you're talking about here. *Sanji from One Piece had his age set at 20 for precisely this reason.
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Post by Jaymz on Dec 8, 2013 1:06:17 GMT
That's good to know then.
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Post by yilbber on Dec 14, 2013 10:39:04 GMT
there's anime that cover all variations of the girl perversion. even having gone so far as Adults who appear in the body of Pre teens Who are perverts. It's just the way morals have shifted. if you don't like it, Don't use it, but realize you might as well give up. For example: The animes: Scientific Railgun, Index, Feature both Lolitas, lolicons, perverts, and Little Shiva Characters.
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 14, 2013 23:06:50 GMT
there's anime that cover all variations of the girl perversion. even having gone so far as Adults who appear in the body of Pre teens Who are perverts. It's just the way morals have shifted. if you don't like it, Don't use it, but realize you might as well give up. For example: The animes: Scientific Railgun, Index, Feature both Lolitas, lolicons, perverts, and Little Shiva Characters. Well, there's the thing... s'long as studio has established, in the show, that the character is an adult, it's somewhere between A-OK and a gray area. To a certain extent, it's understandable, as there are petite women and the goth-lolita fashion trend IS a (cult) thing over there. You do get petite women who look younger than they actually are, no matter where you are in the world. If you're marketing the show to a teenage audience, you're more often than not going to throw in something to appeal to your average teenager... and we all know entirely too well where the minds of most teenagers so often dwell, having once been teens in the not-too-distant past. Generally speaking, though, you'll find that anime that indulge in that kind of thing are fairly rare... and getting rarer in light of tightening regulations on that sort of thing. Direct-to-video has looser regulations, so what little of it there is has largely migrated there. The only title that really indulges in that sort of thing I've actually seen is ToLoveru: Darkness... and that, according to its creator anyway, is the industry thumbing its collective nose at the Tokyo gov't passing a (very blatantly ignored) law prohibiting the depiction of underage characters doing anything illegal. (I don't entirely buy his explanation, but it does account for the very extreme way his manga series has massively ramped up its fanservice starting at the very first volume following the passing of said law.) Even then, that series portrays people who are perverts, lolicons, and what have you as incredibly foul and the target of entirely-justifiable disgust and comically-excessive amounts of violent retribution. There's far more stuff out there that's bereft of that particular problem than there is stuff that glories in it... If you want a good, clean comedy, I highly recommend this past season's series Servant X Service... which is about a civil servant with a ridiculous name who joins the MHLW to get revenge on the civil servant who let her parents name her that.
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Shini
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Post by Shini on Dec 14, 2013 23:35:14 GMT
Death Note, Dragonball , chick from street fighter, FLCL. These are just a couple that have sexualized teen girls. There are also tons that have older guys with way younger guys.
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Shini
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Post by Shini on Dec 15, 2013 0:08:14 GMT
Oh and the whole they can't show people smoking under the age of twenty is bullshit. Yusuke in Yu Yu Hakusho is 14 and smokes, also in FLCL Mama Meme (however it's spelled) smokes. If that kind of shit wasn't permitted we also wouldn't have so much Shonen Ai and Yaoi out there. What about all the hentai out there that is mainstream?
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Post by yilbber on Dec 15, 2013 2:15:52 GMT
in japan most of the new bans are new, they did not apply to shows that feature that sort of thing extensively. Those are mostly Christian and christian trade groups (from AUS and US) trying to change japan.
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Shini
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Post by Shini on Dec 15, 2013 2:51:16 GMT
in japan most of the new bans are new, they did not apply to shows that feature that sort of thing extensively. Those are mostly Christian and christian trade groups (from AUS and US) trying to change japan. Except there is plenty of Yaoi and Shonen Ai coming out still in both anime and manga.
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 15, 2013 4:05:56 GMT
Death Note, Dragonball , chick from street fighter, FLCL. These are just a couple that have sexualized teen girls. There are also tons that have older guys with way younger guys. Nice job not reading the thread, eh? The subject was preteens, not teens... because sexualizing teenage characters and all manner of other squicky stuff happens in media no matter where you are. It's not something unique to Japan. Heck, even stuff as wholesome as Harry Potter has instances of explicit and implicit rape (the latter is the implied gangrape of an unpopular teacher by an entire herd of centaurs, no less), and has no shortage of innuendo and a fair amount of sexualizing Hermione in the movie posters... what with their incessant enlargment of the actress's breasts via photoshop. American audiences and producers sexualize teen actresses and singers all the time... the Olsen twins, Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera, and so on. Oh and the whole they can't show people smoking under the age of twenty is bullshit. Yusuke in Yu Yu Hakusho is 14 and smokes, also in FLCL Mama Meme (however it's spelled) smokes. If that kind of shit wasn't permitted we also wouldn't have so much Shonen Ai and Yaoi out there. What about all the hentai out there that is mainstream? The restrictions are relatively new, as you would know if you had bothered to read the thread... and both Yu Yu Hakusho and FLCL predate them. Manga is also not subject to the same restrictions, which is why Sanji from One Piece is 19 in the manga but 20 for purposes of the animation. As far as shonen ai and shoujo ai... that's not considered that taboo over there the way it is here in the rather homophobic US of A. You might consider it indecent, but that's your entirely natural cultural bias talking. Hentai is not mainstream, and quite frankly is mostly made up of direct-sale self-published works on the print front, and is subject to entirely different sets of stringent restrictions that have been in place for decades. It's an almost entirely separate industry. The animation side is no different... and of course, that material is only sold to adults. It's not like a kid can wander into their local Lawson and walk out with a dirty anime. Stores are even encouraged to report students who try to their schools. in japan most of the new bans are new, they did not apply to shows that feature that sort of thing extensively. Those are mostly Christian and christian trade groups (from AUS and US) trying to change japan. Except there is plenty of Yaoi and Shonen Ai coming out still in both anime and manga. Sure... because yaoi (sexually explicit guy-on-guy) is porn, and thus is subject to a separate set of restrictions. Doujinshi are exactly as the word implies... self-published works, meaning the author is not submitting his work for editorial review (though is still bound by the censorship laws). They can get away with a lot more that way, though again that material can only legally be sold to 18+. Shounen ai (boys love) is non-pornographic in nature, and while it's not a subject you'd find more than a niche audience for, it isn't really considered to be "sick and wrong" the way lolicon is. The same goes for shoujo ai. (This should not come as a terrible surprise when you consider that there have been several periods in the history of Japan where various forms of homosexuality were considered more or less perfectly normal and acceptable.)
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Post by damianmagecraft on Dec 15, 2013 5:43:15 GMT
Death Note, Dragonball , chick from street fighter, FLCL. These are just a couple that have sexualized teen girls. There are also tons that have older guys with way younger guys. Nice job not reading the thread, eh? The subject was preteens, not teens... because sexualizing teenage characters and all manner of other squicky stuff happens in media no matter where you are. It's not something unique to Japan. Heck, even stuff as wholesome as Harry Potter has instances of explicit and implicit rape (the latter is the implied gangrape of an unpopular teacher by an entire herd of centaurs, no less), and has no shortage of innuendo and a fair amount of sexualizing Hermione in the movie posters... what with their incessant enlargment of the actress's breasts via photoshop. American audiences and producers sexualize teen actresses and singers all the time... the Olsen twins, Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera, and so on. Oh and the whole they can't show people smoking under the age of twenty is bullshit. Yusuke in Yu Yu Hakusho is 14 and smokes, also in FLCL Mama Meme (however it's spelled) smokes. If that kind of shit wasn't permitted we also wouldn't have so much Shonen Ai and Yaoi out there. What about all the hentai out there that is mainstream? The restrictions are relatively new, as you would know if you had bothered to read the thread... and both Yu Yu Hakusho and FLCL predate them. Manga is also not subject to the same restrictions, which is why Sanji from One Piece is 19 in the manga but 20 for purposes of the animation. As far as shonen ai and shoujo ai... that's not considered that taboo over there the way it is here in the rather homophobic US of A. You might consider it indecent, but that's your entirely natural cultural bias talking. Hentai is not mainstream, and quite frankly is mostly made up of direct-sale self-published works on the print front, and is subject to entirely different sets of stringent restrictions that have been in place for decades. It's an almost entirely separate industry. The animation side is no different... and of course, that material is only sold to adults. It's not like a kid can wander into their local Lawson and walk out with a dirty anime. Stores are even encouraged to report students who try to their schools. Except there is plenty of Yaoi and Shonen Ai coming out still in both anime and manga. Sure... because yaoi (sexually explicit guy-on-guy) is porn, and thus is subject to a separate set of restrictions. Doujinshi are exactly as the word implies... self-published works, meaning the author is not submitting his work for editorial review (though is still bound by the censorship laws). They can get away with a lot more that way, though again that material can only legally be sold to 18+. Shounen ai (boys love) is non-pornographic in nature, and while it's not a subject you'd find more than a niche audience for, it isn't really considered to be "sick and wrong" the way lolicon is. The same goes for shoujo ai. (This should not come as a terrible surprise when you consider that there have been several periods in the history of Japan where various forms of homosexuality were considered more or less perfectly normal and acceptable.) Dude!... Rude much?
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 15, 2013 7:21:28 GMT
No, just blunt and to the point. If you're gonna chime in late to a discussion, you should at least sit down and make sure that you're talking about the same thing that the other contributors are, that you're not calling bullshit on a very well-publicized fact, and that you actually understand the subject and the relevant context thereof. Zero for three on that post that I replied to, sadly enough. This sort of thing, which is a real problem facing the industry, does get more than slightly exaggerated by people who don't really have the cultural context to understand that 1. They're complaining about a very small crosssection of the industry's output (usually failing to note that the anime and anime porn industries are largely separate), and 2. That other cultures have different standards for what is acceptable and what is not. Is lolicon considered acceptable in Japan? Absolutely not. They'll stigmatize the hell out of anyone they find out has an interest that runs along those lines... the same as we would here. On the other hand, material like shounen or shoujo ai that would be considered obscene here is far less so to them due to their having a different and more tolerant attitude towards homosexuality or bisexuality which has roots in their historical traditions (even those most of the time outside those genres gay characters are in the comic relief category most of the time).
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Post by ninjabunny on Dec 15, 2013 10:48:31 GMT
Your full of bull shit mike. Shounen ai is not porn learn your terms. Again yusaka is 14 smoking in that anime destroying your no one under 20 smoking. Hentai is very mainstream in japan three of my battlefield clan mates are natural born Japanese ( and yes they live in japan) they will tell you the same thing.
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Post by ninjabunny on Dec 15, 2013 10:53:32 GMT
What we see here and know about anime here in the states is just a small sliver of the truth and the amounts they have. Your argument from some authoritive stand point is failing, you are arguing with several people that have strong international ties to japan. Next time you act like a douchbag make sure the people can't just turn on their play station and talk to their 16, 19 and 22 year old clan mates about the laws of japan.
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Shini
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Post by Shini on Dec 15, 2013 14:22:16 GMT
Where in my post am I saying I am biased against Yaoi and Shounen Ai?
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Post by ninjabunny on Dec 15, 2013 20:13:32 GMT
Edit as this morning I was half asleep so I will recant my shonen ai comment. I missed the part about it in your post.
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Post by ninjabunny on Dec 15, 2013 20:17:48 GMT
Edit as this morning I was half asleep so I will recant my shonen ai comment. I missed the part about it in your post.
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 15, 2013 22:06:04 GMT
Your full of bull shit mike. Shounen ai is not porn learn your terms. Again yusaka is 14 smoking in that anime destroying your no one under 20 smoking. Hentai is very mainstream in japan three of my battlefield clan mates are natural born Japanese ( and yes they live in japan) they will tell you the same thing. Ah, I see we have another one whose reading comprehension skills are on the deficient side. Let me take a moment to correct your breathtaking ignorance, so you too may stand enlightened. First, the shounen ai genre of media is separated from yaoi pretty much exclusively by the fact that its content is NOT sexually explicit. You'd know that much even from just reading Wikipedia. Yaoi's focus is on the actual sexual activity, shounen ai (lit. "Boys love", in Japanese) does not feature explicit sexual activity (though its presence may be implied) and instead focuses on the romance and relationship aspects of the characters. Second, had you bothered to do literally any fact-checking before opening your mouth and deftly inserting your foot, you would've realized that your complaint here is complete and utter garbage to anyone who has any concept of the linearity of time. Yu Yu Hakusho was released between 1992 and 1994, while those laws in question (the Youth Healthy Development Ordinance of 2010) didn't come into effect until fully 16 years after Yu Yu Hakusho went off the air. Do you understand that? This law wasn't implemented by someone with an effing time machine... it won't magically go back in time and change the content of TV shows from a decade and a half before it was passed! Third, while it's true that hentai is certainly more mainstream in Japan than it is here, it's not nearly as mainstream as good old fashioned conventional porn in Japan. It's the sort of thing that's normally reserved for specialty stores, while you can find regular dirty movies more easily over there. Fourth, what do I care that some people you don't know and have never actually met claim they're from Japan? Your breathtaking ignorance here shows you're either lying about knowing them or being lied to by them. What we see here and know about anime here in the states is just a small sliver of the truth and the amounts they have. Your argument from some authoritive stand point is failing, you are arguing with several people that have strong international ties to japan. Next time you act like a douchbag make sure the people can't just turn on their play station and talk to their 16, 19 and 22 year old clan mates about the laws of japan. The first true thing you've said so far... yes, American audiences only see a small cross-section of the Japanese anime industry. Surprisingly enough, the few among us who are bilingual, take frequent trips to Japan, translate Japanese anime industry publications as a hobby, and catch Japanese TV via streaming broadcast just might be getting a better picture of the situation than some random jerkoff who claims he plays Battlefield with "Japanese" kids. Do us all a favor and get some athlete's foot cream for your tongue, okay?
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Post by Jaymz on Dec 15, 2013 22:15:02 GMT
Mike, I will remind you that I have pointed out (one of the few rules I have posted for these forums) I would like people to be respectful to each other. Now unless Bunny there wants to make an issue of your post I won't be doing anything other than this reminder.
Otherwise both of you are welcome to debate the relative merits of each others side. Just try to keep the out and out name calling/insulting to minimum please. We are adults after all. Let's behave like it and not like many over on another set of forums tend to do.
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 15, 2013 22:24:41 GMT
Mike, I will remind you that I have pointed out (one of the few rules I have posted for these forums) I would like people to be respectful to each other. Now unless Bunny there wants to make an issue of your post I won't be doing anything other than this reminder. Otherwise both of you are welcome to debate the relative merits of each others side. Just try to keep the out and out name calling/insulting to minimum please. We are adults after all. Let's behave like it and not like many over on another set of forums tend to do. There's no "side" here, man... whether or not it's offensive is an opinion, to be sure, and I can respect that. What's NOT a matter of opinion is that the law in question, the Youth Healthy Development ordinance of 2010, does exist and DOES regulate anime, manga, and other images except for real-life photography that can be categorized as: - Sexually stimulating
- Encouraging of cruelty
- Depictions that may encourage or compel criminal behavior or suicide
- Unjustifiably glorifying certain sexual or pseudo-sexual acts, and criminal behavior
- Disruptive to the social order
The problem is that certain trollish folk are citing shows from 15 years before the law went into effect and trying to claim that's proof that the law is a fiction... an argument that holds water slightly less well than a colander.
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Shini
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Post by Shini on Dec 15, 2013 22:37:20 GMT
Mike, I will remind you that I have pointed out (one of the few rules I have posted for these forums) I would like people to be respectful to each other. Now unless Bunny there wants to make an issue of your post I won't be doing anything other than this reminder. Otherwise both of you are welcome to debate the relative merits of each others side. Just try to keep the out and out name calling/insulting to minimum please. We are adults after all. Let's behave like it and not like many over on another set of forums tend to do. There's no "side" here, man... whether or not it's offensive is an opinion, to be sure, and I can respect that. What's NOT a matter of opinion is that the law in question, the Youth Healthy Development ordinance of 2010, does exist and DOES regulate anime, manga, and other images except for real-life photography that can be categorized as: - Sexually stimulating
- Encouraging of cruelty
- Depictions that may encourage or compel criminal behavior or suicide
- Unjustifiably glorifying certain sexual or pseudo-sexual acts, and criminal behavior
- Disruptive to the social order
The problem is that certain trollish folk are citing shows from 15 years before the law went into effect and trying to claim that's proof that the law is a fiction... an argument that holds water slightly less well than a colander. Except there is still anime and manga that comes out depicting all of that.
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Post by MacrossMike on Dec 15, 2013 22:55:34 GMT
Except there is still anime and manga that comes out depicting all of that. Not to put too fine a point on it, but haven't I already pointed out that the ordinance's restrictions vary depending on the type of media and audience? It's pretty much the same approach taken by broadcast censors and FCC here in the US, where the level of permissible content varies depending on the program's venue, its audience, and its time slot, among other factors. Broadcast anime has the tightest restrictions, though said restrictions get looser the later at night the show is to be aired... just like American TV. The shows the industry produces for direct-to-video sale are subject to less stringent requirements, but often have an age restriction attached if there is explicit content therein, kind of like what game stores are supposed to do with ESRB ratings. Manga has relatively loose restraints as well, though (as in America) violence seems to get a great deal less restriction than sexual content or other forms of criminal behavior (like drug abuse). Video games are subject to pretty stringent restriction, mainly because there's already an enforcement scheme similar to the ESRB ratings (but, in my experience, rather more detail-rich) in place with required age checks. The law also places a certain amount of authority for its enforcement in the hands of the publishers, and not all of them have chosen to enforce it as stringently as its authors no doubt hoped. Shows that are at 1 in the morning for a high school audience are naturally going to be subject to less stringent restrictions than shows that are marketed to the grade school kids. That's why you end up with disparities like the one I mentioned before, where Sanji from One Piece can smoke despite being a year too young back in the manga, while the rather more sanitized version in the anime had to revise his age upwards to 20 so he could legally smoke, therefore making the fact that he smokes in a kid's show a non-issue. One of the major things the ordinance was trying to crack down on, other than sexually explicit material, was titles that glorify juvenile delinquent behavior like underage smoking, gang violence, etc. EDIT: If the time slot given in these old issues of Newtype is correct, Yu Yu Hakusho would've almost certainly had to remove Yusuke's smoking habit in light of how early it aired and Yusuke's status as a junior high school student.
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Post by Jaymz on Dec 15, 2013 23:48:06 GMT
Reported post has been dealt with.
I say again. Can we please act like the adults we are without resorting to the name calling and insults. I am sure we see enough that on the other forum most of frequent.
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Post by yilbber on Dec 16, 2013 4:03:44 GMT
Yeah. We All know that the future of Japanese limits is all fukuba porn.
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