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NEWS: Wall Street Journal Criticizes Use of Anime to Promote

hmmm i say that there doesnt seem to be anything wrong with the use of anime for promotion.....i mean if they want to fight it saying that it has too much bad content and all, so many things in the U.S. have about the same or worst things than it. Anime right now, using it in this way might a huge promotional success.

It should amuse me that people are responding to a badly researched letter to the editor with even more badly developed political commentary--but it doesn't. I actually find myself more annoyed than anything at the simplicity of various responses. Clearly people misunderstand how the WSJ works (Ms. Bosker is not an employee of the WSJ) and have no idea how to actually analyze this article. This article has absolutely nothing to do with a conservative/liberal dichotomy--it could just as easily have appeared in the New York Times. I suspect that it didn't because Ms. Bosker was a fellow at an economics journal, and the WSJ has more of an economics grounding than does the NYT.

First, it seems as though people don't even know what Ms. Bosker is arguing for and against. What is her thesis? Japan shouldn't use anime and manga as promotional tools because 1. they contain sexual content; 2. they give a negative view of Japanese life; 3. they can be perceived as propaganda; and 4. they are niche products that appeal only to children. What is NOT Ms. Bosker's thesis? Japan is evil, the Japanese are bad people, anime and manga are bad, if you watch anime you must be a child rapist, etc. All of those things which are apparently insulting half of American anime fandom are not actually her thesis--she's writing solely on the benefit to the Japanese government of using anime and manga.

Now that I've defined her thesis, I can attack or support the foundations for her thesis. Frankly, I think her facts are horribly researched and badly expressed. "Perhaps the biggest problem is the highly sexualized nature of the form, which can be exceptionally seedy, if not illegal," she insists, as if the medium of anime itself is only composed of one pornographic genre. Her statement makes it appear that since ALL anime is at least subtly pornographic, any anime used by the Japanese government will also be pornographic. However, she simply fails to address (or even to see?) the fact that anime is not a genre, it's a medium of expression. With that in mind, WHY would the Japanese government choose to use pornographic materials to advertise itself? She implies that they are doing just that, but her only example is the government cracking down on pornographic manga, not promoting it or using it to promote itself.

Second, I think she has taken her interview subjects too seriously. She suggests that the strict nature of Japanese culture may turn people off by using one quote as an example. However, it is unclear from her writing whether she posits that manga artists are purposely disparaging their country or that a realistic view of Japanese culture will by it's very nature turn people off. If the latter case is what she believes, then her view appears to be that only fictionalized accounts of Japanese life will draw people in. Once again, we see Ms. Bosker's inability to acknowledge that not all anime and/or manga is the same. Anime is a fictional medium--there are not REALLY giant robots in Tokyo, nor are there space colonies or gateways to other worlds. However, those things appear in anime or manga just as often as a view of Japanese society as strict and conformist. Her analysis of the "negative images of daily life" concentrates on a view slice of life series without considering how fantasy plays in. Also, she ignores the fact that perhaps these are real images from Japanese life--would she prefer that manga artists lie? Than why not exalt mecha and fantasy anime as lies?

This brings me to the propaganda argument, where Ms. Bosker credits the absurd Chinese suggestion that manga and anime are made with the purpose of indoctrination. She does have a point that even if manga is NOT intended this way, people may still take this view--once the art leaves the artist's hands, misinterpretation is always possible. However, she ignores the obvious counter to this argument: the Japanese government neither writes the manga nor pays the artists to do so. Sure, there are some explicitly government-created manga and anime series--but I don't think that's what Ms. Bosker refers to in this article, so I'll put that aside. So, it may indeed be true that the notoriously censorious Chinese government feels threatened by Japanese media exports like anime and manga. Ms. Bosker fails to analyze whether this is a valid position, and if any other countries without the same relationship are likely to share it. All she offers is a dubious statement from a GMU professor (unfortunately, I am sad to say, my current institution--thankfully, I am not on main campus, where this misguided person teaches), which seems to imply that if Japan is too aggressive with the anime and manga, people will start to assume that anime and manga are written on behalf of the government (that is, after all, what "government propaganda" means). I don't see how government support of an art form will make people believe that the art form represents government interests. Further, what interests are there? Well, promoting tourism and Japanese products seems to be the big one here--hardly a nefarious goal.

Finally, she's really not off the mark by pinopointing anime and manga as niche products. Sorry folks, they are. People think we are weird, that can't be denied. Whether or not you think that you personally are weird is up to you. I know I am. However, Ms. Bosker is incredibly mistaken by discounting advertising directed at teens and youth. In twenty years, who will be responsible for international trade and politics? That's right, today's youth. I think it's actually quite smart to direct promotional materials at people early, in the hopes that one day they will be in a position to travel to Japan or forge economic ties, or something equally useful. Without an exposure to anime and manga, I wouldn't have spent this year's spring break in Tokyo--and trust me, they got a good amount of my money while I was there. And that's just now! What about in twenty years when I have a steady job in the legal field? The amount my family and I spend in Japan can only increase, and without anime and manga introducing me to Japan, that money would be channeled elsewhere.

In closing, this is a fairly uninformed article, and I really hope Ms. Bosker didn't try to write her thesis on this subject--and if she did, with such generalizations and bad scholarship, she ought to fail. I don't know if she has an "anti-anime" agenda, but that's not even the topic of her piece. She writes solely on whether or not anime and manga are useful marketing tools for the Japanese government. She concludes that no, they aren't, basing her opinion on faulty data and weak analysis. It really is not a very good article, but you're all attacking it from the wrong angle. I refuse to take seriously the arguments of individuals who see big evil conspiracies in letters to the editor.

Hey, I have the college edjoocayshuns, too! I can use the Googles and Wikipedias! Can I write an article for the WSJ, as well?

I've seen few episodes of Sailor Moon, so I know what I'm talking about.

Thank you, contessa. I was starting to wonder if the summary was truly accurate, or if people had read a completely different article.

Honestly, if it were propaganda in the first place, it would be overall positive. Representing a horrid culture? Sure, like that really explains the meme, "If only Japan were real." Rolling Eyes

Not to mention, we pretty much have an otaku exodus going around -- Japan's getting good tourism out of this in the least.

And I heartily agree -- China is paranoid censorshipland and probably called American microwaves a threatening form of propaganda at some point.

la_contessa:

Interesting article, but true. Who here still acknowledges Japan's role in WW2? Sometimes, I forget -- while I enjoy my good 2-3 hours of anime (whenever I get in the mood to watch some). While on the same boat as Germany, both countries had spent their last 50 years cleaning up those bad war images. Heck, even the French still get bashed for their tendency to surrender. Laughing

Us americans always know better then them silly Japanese what they should be doing.

Last edited by KyuuA4 on Fri Aug 31, 2007 5:05 pm; edited 1 time in total

my god i never thought Zac's warnings would turn out to be true
but seriously its not fair that they went after loli manga that will doubtfully ever be licensed instead of all the Yaoi titles already here in America

but i do agree with what Madeleine Rosca said about how anime and manga portrays Japan because frankly that would be disappointing for anyone who wants to visit Japan (which has been my dream since i saw the third TMNT movie when I was four)

Japanese propaganda? No, this article is American Propaganda! Due to the narrow mind of some greedy journalist with a weird last name, she is singlehandedly bringing about an uproar from the anime market. She is trying to crash the market by advertising that anime is mainly about pornagraphic hentai. She is showing people who aren't anime fans, or supporters that all it is is just animated pornography.

It is people like her that make the world a horrible place to live. At first glance at that article, I can tell that it has nothing to do with Japanese giving themselves a better image in the world. Of course that is what she "states" but isn't it obvious that she is doing it because she just wants to stur up problems with something SHE doesn't like?

What she is basically proposing is going to make parents who read the article boycott the market. She is trying to promote censor ship, which is why I hate how much the government is going down the drain more and more everyday. It isn't about freedom any more. The US government today is "Do everything we can to hinder, chain down, and enslave the public using every single loophole the constitution created" it is sickening.

What she apparently doesn't know, is that it isn't Japan that are the ones that are forcing this stuff on us. In fact, more than half the time it is the US that wants what Japan has, and Japan is in a position to share it or not share it. Online petitions, emails to US animation companies, and many other things started by the public are reasons why many animes exist in the first place! It has only recently grown to a point where these companies such as FUNimatin, ADV, and the like, know what the fans want, and are able to give it to the fans because of what they like, nothing more. They simply like it. No one is being "poisoned" by Japanese culture.

It is people like whats-her-name article writer that make the world a horrible place to live. Why can't people just peacefully accept society instead of changing small things that don't affect them because they don't like it. People like here are the ones who would repaint an entire wall because someone accidentally got a small dirty hand print on it.

EDIT:
And FURTHERMORE! They used an image of Full Metal Panic!! Grrr Mad

ignorant! ignorant! ignorant!

When someone haven't even done their research throughly, when someone do not know a thing (or just the surface) of the subject that he/ she is commenting on, this person don't even have the right to criticize the subject.

sabriyan:

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Forum - View topicNEWS: Wall Street Journal Criticizes Use of Anime to Promote

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NEWS: Wall Street Journal Criticizes Use of Anime to Promote