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The Fall 2012 Anime Preview Guide

It frustrates me that on a forum where boobs can inspire eleven billion pages of moral outrage, something that seems a lot more clearly wrong on the same general grounds is getting strangely marginal traction and was hardly mentioned in the previews. I'm not asking for an army of activists out in high dudgeon, but some show of conviction and better counter-arguments than so many words saying, "pffffft," would be nice.

To me, it suggests something potentially very worrisome about Japanese culture.

Surrender Artist wrote:

It frustrates me that on a forum where boobs can inspire eleven billion pages of moral outrage, something that seems a lot more clearly wrong on the same general grounds is getting strangely marginal traction and was hardly mentioned in the previews. I'm not asking for an army of activists out in high dudgeon, but some show of conviction and better counter-arguments than so many words saying, "pffffft," would be nice.

It certainly doesn't surprise me at all.

Raging against fanservice and boobs is easy, and doesn't require any particular self examination.

Rape culture? Thats hard.

But it just one more molehill on a mountain of molehills. Each time this comes up it makes it a little harder to convince storytellers not to do it.

Going to quote my response to it from page 6:

GokuMew2 wrote:

I asked my [Japanese] co-worker about it and she immediately knew I was talking about Tonari no Kaibutsu kun. Her explanation is that Haru really did mean "rape" literally, but that's because he doesn't know how to interact with people and a lot of knowledge that he has is mistaken, as I think we've already seen from just the first episode. So while Haru meant it literally, I don't think it means that he was really doing to rape Shizuku. ...Does that make sense??

irishninja sums it up nicely.

irishninja wrote:

But it just one more molehill on a mountain of molehills. Each time this comes up it makes it a little harder to convince storytellers not to do it.

What convinces storytellers not to not do it are the sales. These books, mangas or novels, sell like hotcakes. Many of the shojo bestsellers are much worse than My Little Monster in terms of unhealthy relationship portrayal. A lot of girls do want to read these stories, as incomprehensible as that may be.

I'm getting a mixed impression of From the New World, which is more or less what I expected. Despite a sort of coolly brooding feel, but what the feel surrounds isn't quite alluring; nothing about 'school for psychics' quite lights my fire. It sounds a little enticing, but without anything to really guarantee that the enticement will pay off. If I had less trouble 'dropping' things, I'd probably dive right in. I'll probably watch it anyway, but not without some ritual equivocation first.

Cecilthedarkknight_234 wrote:

Fencedude5609 wrote: Mohawk52 wrote: Did I mention that faggot balls are a popular delicacy in Wales as well? I've had them. They're quite tasty. Taste like pork. Faggots and mash cooked til they're piping hot. Mmmmmmm I could sink my teeth into a pair and mash right now. Christ, thats disgustingly offensive that you think this is at all relevant. But you have to admit it's pretty damn funny.

I certainly do not, because it wasn't. I have a pretty dark, black-hearted sense of humor too, but that doesn't exempt me from having some sense of conscience about what I find so damned amusing. Mohawk52's approach ended up as distressingly juvenile and crass. It's not necessary to accept the specific criticism to treat the subject with some decency and as though they come from a sincere, worthwhile place about a serious subject.

Jokes about rape are treacherous ground; some people are absolutists, but others think that they can be accepted if handled with care. I didn't laugh at Mohawk52's replies because they resorted to trying to dismiss the criticisms and trivialize the subject and when confronted, he doubled down with a witless sideswipe at homosexuals playing on some dialectal differences that I stopped finding amusing some time around the age of fourteen. I've laughed at some rape jokes (Examples courtesy of Louis CK and by George Carlin) and I'm a touch ambivalent, but when comedy is dark rather than joyful, it has to pick its targets and how is strikes them carefully, otherwise it ends up somewhere closer to baffling at best or hateful at worst.

It frustrates me that on a forum where boobs can inspire eleven billion pages of moral outrage, something that seems a lot more clearly wrong on the same general grounds is getting strangely marginal traction and was hardly mentioned in the previews. I'm not asking for an army of activists out in high dudgeon, but some show of conviction and better counter-arguments than so many words saying, "pffffft," would be nice.

It's not as though it's impossible to respond to the criticisms with a modicum of decency; one of the people whom Fencedude cited endorsed the tone and civility of this reply.

GokuMew2 wrote:

While it may be surprising to hear the line for foreigners, for Japanese people they understand the context of it so it doesn't cause as much brow raising.

To me, it suggests something potentially very worrisome about Japanese culture.

As if some throwaway line is somehow promoting "rape" culture. Again mountain out of a molehill.

animehermit wrote:

As if some throwaway line is somehow promoting "rape" culture. Again mountain out of a molehill.

NO!

The line isn't the issue. The line is just a catalyst, its what made everything else visible.

And what everything else is that?

animehermit wrote:

And what everything else is that?

*points at the article he posted*

That.

I even made this same point in its comments.

*Points to the criticism of said blog post.*

spoiler[Dumps the soda on her head.]

animehermit wrote:

*Points to the criticism of said blog post.*

Ok, and? The author of that post even directs you to another post that makes much the same point.

The fact that there is criticism of a point does not render the point invalid, it means there are multiple points of view on the subject.

I don't agree with the rebuttal post (obviously), and I'm not interested in regurgitating points that have already been made by a better writer than I.