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INTEREST: Psychiatrist Suggests Link Between Sexual Offenses and Moe Characters


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Sunny milk



Joined: 22 Jan 2014
Posts: 695
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 2:34 am Reply with quote
Damn it, if this is true, then I must be a real nutcase, having left dozens of villages without a single virgin maiden left behind my back.
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manapear



Joined: 02 May 2014
Posts: 1524
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 3:02 am Reply with quote
Lol, I can only imagine what has erupted in this thread, but I don't feel like throwing up in my mouth tonight, so I ain't gonna read.

She isn't entirely wrong though. There are plenty of people that can easily draw a line in their own mind, and some aware enough to realize how problematic these sexualized and ubiquitous images of young, female characters are; but when you normalize imagery like that, it will have a negative effect. That officials admit the mascots won't be eye-catching unless they're sensual/sexy is gross and a problem. I would have this problem if they were young boys too; frankly, I don't mind people relying a bit on sex to sell something, but it's disturbing and a huge problem when it's with (seemingly) underage characters, and it's obnoxious that people rely on female characters almost exclusively. (Especially when male characters/imagery are obviously bankable too, and gender fluid/non-binary characters are rare.)

It's a sad trend that common across the world, but some places are trying to crack down on it in certain ways (though some industries still stick to it too tight). I'm not surprised her article was met with negativity, but it's sad that people get defensive instead of actually trying to understand the point or take a moment of (self) reflection.
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Sunny milk



Joined: 22 Jan 2014
Posts: 695
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 4:20 am Reply with quote
Since my post got deleted, I'll just say that you are wrong, manapear, the statistics prove that not having this kind of alternative is far worse, so anyone who cares enough to do some research should know that this is an uneducated opinion.
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SilverTalon01



Joined: 02 Apr 2012
Posts: 2401
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 4:35 am Reply with quote
manapear wrote:
That officials admit the mascots won't be eye-catching unless they're sensual/sexy is gross and a problem. I would have this problem if they were young boys too; frankly, I don't mind people relying a bit on sex to sell something, but it's disturbing and a huge problem when it's with (seemingly) underage characters, and it's obnoxious that people rely on female characters almost exclusively.


Well seeing as how you are a self confessed one of those people that will just ignore everything you don't like and stay in your bubble, I'm not sure why I'm going to bother...

According to this article itself, the mascot that person was most likely referring to isn't a seemingly underage character. You can have a problem with sexualized legal age people if you want, but I think there is a better place to start with that crusade than some mascot. Seems like you just got baited by that pink haired girl ANN used which isn't actually from the sources they cited.
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jirg1901



Joined: 03 Jun 2014
Posts: 150
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 4:54 am Reply with quote
Even if these moe characters are somewhat underage they would be less sexualized than non-fictional Japanese teenagers and a somewhat frivolous target.
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Kruszer



Joined: 19 Nov 2004
Posts: 7981
Location: Minnesota, USA
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 6:08 am Reply with quote
What a bunch of crap, I thought psychiatrists were supposed to be smart. Laughing
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Eigengrau



Joined: 09 May 2015
Posts: 104
Location: Belgium
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 7:17 am Reply with quote
First of all, I’m not going to claim any moral high ground. I’ve looked at some dodgy material, even drawn some myself. But I would need to actually read the article in full before I dismiss it out of hand.
As far as I can judge now from what is presented here on ANN, my main problem is that its proclamations at this time rest only on the autyhority of the proclaimer. The article itself is a column, an opinion piece. In and of itself, a statement like “sexualized moe images may lead to an increase in sexual assault” is perfectly acceptable in a column. After all, these are just platforms for launching the writer’s personal opinions and beliefs. The problem lies in the profession of the writer, in this case a psychiatrist. If the writer had been an actor or singer, people would just have said “well, that’s your opinion”, agreed or disagreed, and moved on. However, the writer being a psychiatrist lends more credence to her words, which is undeserved if it is just an untested hypothesis.
However, it would be another matter if she linked actual studies in the article, or even if she clearly presented it as a possible hypothesis which deserves further study. Then I would probably agree. Also, from what I can gather, she isn’t talking about simplistic “monkey say monkey do” behaviour, such as “I have seen violent film X so now I will automatically perform violent action Y”, she is talking about the process of normalization, which is far more complex and deals with far less direct cause-and-effect relationships.
So as it stands now, the article seems to be highly problematic, but I am unwilling to dismiss its entire content out of hand. I tend not to agree with it, but I am unwilling to dismiss it entirely as I’m not certain to what pecercentage my disagreement stems from actual facts or personal beliefs. And I am equally uncertain if our defensiveness is based on facts or beliefs.
As a thought experiment, ask yourself this. Let’s say that one day we have undeniable, factual evidence (I know, I know, for argument’s sake, just roll with it) that a small percentage, perhaps one in 10000 cases, of violent or sexual crimes, are directly or even partially caused by your favourite type of entertainment. That the criminal in question would not have perpetrated his/her act if (s)he had not partaken of that type of entertainment. Would you at that point still defend it?
It’s a hypothetical in which I don’t believe myself, but which I always keep in mind when facing such opinions. It provides me with no answers at all, but it does help me to question my own beliefs constantly.

Also, I find it quite distressing that we’re all so quick to come to the defense of fictional characters, but are ready to dismiss actual human beings facing hardship als “parasites” or even “invaders”. We’re still a long way off from sorting out our priorities.
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Guilhem



Joined: 14 Jun 2004
Posts: 181
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 7:44 am Reply with quote
Everything was said in the very first post of this thread: ANN just seems to suffer from a lack of audience – nothing new here...
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butahime



Joined: 11 Apr 2015
Posts: 3
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 8:56 am Reply with quote
Spend two hours on /a/ and try to argue that moe characters, pedophilia, and the normalization of sexual violence have nothing to do with each other. More likely the causation is reversed though; moe characters are popular because Japan is already the kind of society where this stuff is normal. Not that the West is all that much better ofc
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kameoosama



Joined: 05 Jan 2006
Posts: 48
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 9:23 am Reply with quote
Eigengrau wrote:

However, it would be another matter if she linked actual studies in the article, or even if she clearly presented it as a possible hypothesis which deserves further study. Then I would probably agree.


Yeah, she's definitely talking about the potential causes of normalization, which makes a proper study a monumental undertaking, and even the results of that study would be open to interpretation because it would be about differences in ideas and beliefs correlated with exposure to moe with enough information to control for other vectors of cultural influence, not necessarily "sexual assault rates on children went up or down since moe became a thing" which could be influenced by a bunch of other factors.

Which, if I was going to add my own thoughts into this, I think that at least in the west we already live in a society where the very concept of femininity is so hypersexualized that just the term 'girl' confers a certain amount of sexual objectification and availability. What this means is that the effect of moe culture on this is probably lost in the background radiation of all the other cultural signifiers that just come with female gender roles at any age. I also think there's a really huge gap between moe culture in otaku circles which is highly sexualized, and how this is perceived when we're talking about stuff leaking into common culture where the hypersexualized aspects may not automatically transfer over. What I'm slightly more "worried" about is just how moe has had a hand in redefining what people think is sexy (and by 'worried' I don't mean it's good or bad, just really potentially interesting.) I think it's built a paradigm where adorable is sexy and just about anything can be adorable, and so just about everything is probably someone's fetish.
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zensunni



Joined: 05 Mar 2010
Posts: 1291
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 9:32 am Reply with quote
Having done graduate level research in psychology, granted, it was a different area of psychology, but I knew many people who were on in the social/personality side of things, this type of research is not even particularly germane to her field if she is a psychiatrist/clinical psychologist. This would be the purview of social/personality psychology. Granted, there is some overlap.

However, I find it incredibly offensive that someone who obviously has training in psychology would spout off about this type of topic, lending an air of authority to the opinions because of the letters that appear after her name, with absolutely NO clinical or experimental evidence to back up her statements is practically criminally negligent! Scientists have a responsibility to NOT go around making statements that could be taken as fact when there is no research to back it up!

law240 wrote:
I agree I was in High School anime club the adviser for the club found everyone of the girls in every show attractive his catch phrase was "I'd hit that" pretty it was the only reason he agree to watch over us

That is a problem with the teacher, not the characters. Frankly, the fact that a creep like that is teaching in any school worries me far more than any media depiction of a fictional character ever would!
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Brutannica



Joined: 18 Mar 2007
Posts: 256
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 9:50 am Reply with quote
SilverTalon01 wrote:

And after actually clicking on the link to the other article, where did this significantly younger pink haired girl even come from? It isn't in the japanese sources linked at the bottom as far as I can tell. If the article itself suggests a link to Megu Aoshima, why not use a picture of her? Or at least a girl of a similar appearance instead of a substantially younger looking girl.


Thanks for pointing this out. I forgot to source the image. This has been corrected.
She's Cocorobo, a robotic vacuum cleaner with a moe alter ego.
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TarsTarkas



Joined: 20 Dec 2007
Posts: 5821
Location: Virginia, United States
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 11:06 am Reply with quote
manapear wrote:
I'm not surprised her article was met with negativity, but it's sad that people get defensive instead of actually trying to understand the point or take a moment of (self) reflection.


It is met with negativity, because it is fear mongering.

The arguments used can be used against any other activity or media, that someone wants to attack.

Just because a small percentage of people are weak-minded and/or mentally disturbed, doesn't mean the rest of society has to pay for their evils.

It is met with negativity, because at least here in the United States we are already seeing the effects of this fear mongering social engineering.
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EricJ2



Joined: 01 Feb 2014
Posts: 4016
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 11:42 am Reply with quote
TarsTarkas wrote:
It is met with negativity, because it is fear mongering.
The arguments used can be used against any other activity or media, that someone wants to attack.

It is met with negativity, because at least here in the United States we are already seeing the effects of this fear mongering social engineering.


Not the least of which over here is the current flap over negatively-doctored Planned Parenthood footage, within a suspiciously similar time frame over the Republicans' fight to defund it out of existence with the public's hoped-for approval.

Substitute mainstream Japanese, and anime fans being linked with the "idle hands" NEET menace, and it's not too much of a leap. Rolling Eyes
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Daemonblue



Joined: 05 Jul 2006
Posts: 701
PostPosted: Fri Oct 09, 2015 11:56 am Reply with quote
SilverTalon01 wrote:

I don't think I'd call that a little girl. Probably closer to "young woman" than "little girl." I mean she looks 16-20 or so to me.


IIRC she is supposed to be 16.

Anyway, Hitchens Razor comes into play here. As it states:
Quote:
What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.


She has no evidence to back her claims, so there's no point arguing against her claims. She's no better than the psychiatrists that labeled not agreeing with them a mental illness, see below.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oppositional_defiant_disorder#Signs_and_symptoms
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