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Chicks On Anime - Best Friends Forever

I agree that throughout the show they are friends but afterwards? It's clear that they chose each other over anyone else.

Anime World Order wrote:

I sometimes wonder if the current majority of the anime viewing audience is willing to accept the concept of friendship at all. Pretty much every single one of the guys I encounter who watch Maria-sama ga Miteru do so because they're obsessed with lesbians (having never seen the show, I understand there are only a few "actual" with the rest "perceived"), and a very large, very substantial percentage of the female anime viewing audience (or at least, the ones that post online) will very adamantly stand up to the INDISPUTABLE FACT that [place any two male characters here] are TOTALLY doing it. I don't accept that this mindset is to be expected when a fanbase is largely comprised of those CRAZY hormonal teenagers since the exact same mentality extends all the way through to fans in their 20s, 30s, and up. Nor do I accept that it's inevitable for people to think about "the next step" for every single character relationship they see. Was it always this way? Were there large quantities of people 20 years ago arguing that Lupin the Third and Jigen must "clearly" be lovers? Back when I was watching the original Bubblegum Crisis OAVs in the early 90s, I never really heard anyone seriously advocate the notion of "Priss is a lesbian," but nowadays that's one of the first things I ever hear anyone who ever watched that show say about her. It's possible that I missed the memo where "friendship" suddenly became a synonym for "sexual tension" or something for a lot of people. Or that I'm just forgetting. Perhaps my perceived rise of this line of thought is brought on by the fact that modern anime/manga creators are all too aware of their otaku fanbase now, and are glad to cater to them. They know exactly what type of doujinshi sells the most at Comiket and what sorts of fanfiction/fanart people create. So when they set out to create relationships, they deliberately add in this sort of are they/aren't they ambiguity so the fans who zero in on things like that are free to fantasize about whatever they want them to be. NANA is a perfect example of this.

My hat is off to you, sir, for a very well written post. My thoughts are exactly the same as yours on this subject. Whatever happened to friendship?? Apparently it's not enough that we have entire genres about gay/lesbian relationships, but these days we have to drag characters from shows that have nothing to do with yuri/yaoi into the "OMG they're totally doing it!" category. It's enough to make you sick.

I truly wonder what the root cause of this behavior is. Are anime fans as a whole just that desperate to see gay relationships that they have to turn fictional friendships into homoerotic sex fests?? Whatever the case, I find it quite disturbing and more than a little obnoxious.

Firstly, I think gays/lesbians are just soooo much more accepted in today's world (at least where I live), whereas if you think about 15-20 years ago, you had to wear a suit to go see an AIDS patient- not that this necessarily shows prejudice, it just shows how far we've come.

First, rainbowcourage... please don't quote huge chunks of text. Make an effort to edit your quotation down to the point you are responding to.

rainbowcourage wrote:

Firstly, I think gays/lesbians are just soooo much more accepted in today's world (at least where I live), whereas if you think about 15-20 years ago, you had to wear a suit to go see an AIDS patient- not that this necessarily shows prejudice, it just shows how far we've come.

Speaking as a medical historian... I'd like to know what "suit" you are referring to? A biohazard suit? That hasn't ever been an issue for AIDS, you know. The comparatively low level of transmissibility of the virus was evident from the start. It's actually fairly hard to get AIDS, unless you are vigorously trying. Then again, many people devote quite a bit of vigor to that particular transmission vector.

- abunai

musouka wrote:

SongstressCela wrote: Really? No concrete conclusions about pretty much the Very First Yuri Couple ever? You think yuri started with Utena? Oh dear...

Nah, but it's pretty much the first thing most people jump to when they think about modern anime and yuri pairings. Either that or Uranus and Neptune.

EDIT: it looks like even in 1985 people still thought that drinking communion wine could transmit AIDS (it's kind a long link, though, if I could condense the text for you I would...)

I'm also a wife and new mother...

Thanks again Chicks on Anime. Great topic, my favorite so far.

Or, say, The Rose of Versailles, which came out over 10 years before Sailor Moon did, and almost 20 years before Utena did. And that's just one example of a well-known yuri couple that came waaaaaaaaaaaaay before Sailor Moon or Utena.

What yuri couple would that be, pray tell? Because in the RoV I watched, the only thing that could concretely be termed yuri was Rosalie's aborted precrush on Oscar--and she ended up in a relationship with a man. Every woman was in love with a man.

Oniisama e, on the other hand...

...a running theme in the show is that friendship *is* everything. And that's *not* a bad thing, like you somehow perceived it to be.

Strong female friendships can conquer all the problems in the world.

...we'd run out of things to talk about.

Lots of Riyoko Ikeda's works have yuri undertones, even if true relationships don't develop.

While Oscar eventually fell in love with a man, she came across as asexual for a long time

while every girl and her mom seemed to crush on her, including Rosalie, Marie Antoinette and who knows how many court ladies.

Yuri themes are definitely more prominent in Claudine and Oniisama e, for sure, but I'd argue they're there in RoV, as well.

kadian1364 wrote:

As misogynistic a lot of westerners perceive Japanese culture, some of their cultural products really aren't as bad as most of our stuff...In regards to anime, I see a lot of the reverse effect; female characters are capable of a multitude of roles, relationships, and personal growth, while I perceive male ones to be somewhat stale and predictably structured.

Absolutely, and I was kind of hoping this would come up more in the article. I find the way some aspects of Japanese society are turned upside down in anime to be rather interesting. The idea that a society which is so restrictive toward women would have so many strong female roles in anime is both confusing and intriguing and it's something I've long wondered about. Maybe we can hear more about that in a future article.

I. Ages for legal purposes

Article 2 - Definitions

For the purpose of this Law, a 'child' means a person under the age of 18 years.

Age of majority

The Article 3 of the Japanese Civil Code states that the age of majority is twenty (20) years old.

Age of consent for sexual activity

The Article 177 of the Penal Code puts the age of consent for sexual activity at thirteen (13) years.

Age of consent for marriage

Articles 731 and 737 of the Civil Code provides that the age of consent for marriage is eighteen (18) years for men, and sixteen (16) for women.

But when a minor wants to get married, he or she needs the consent of his or her parents.

IV. Child prostitution

Article 2 - Definitions

For the purpose of the Law, 'child prostitution' means the act of performing sexual intercourse, etc. (i.e. sexual intercourse an act similar to sexual intercourse, or an act for the purpose of satisfying one’s sexual curiosity, of touching genital organs, etc. (i.e. genital organs, anus and nipples; the same shall apply hereinafter) of a child or of making a child touch one’s genital organs, etc.; the same shall apply hereinafter) with a child in return for giving, or promising to give, a remuneration to any of the persons listed below:

i. the child;

ii. the person who acts as an intermediary in sexual intercourse, etc. with the child;

iii. the protector of the child (i.e. a person who exercises parental power over the child or who is the guardian or suchlike and who is taking actual care of the child; the same shall apply hereinafter) or a person who has placed the child under his or her supervision.

Article 4 - Child Prostitution

A person who commits child prostitution shall be punished with imprisonment with labor for not more than three years or a fine of not more than one million yen.

Article 5 - Inter-mediation of Child Prostitution

1. A person who acts as an intermediary in child prostitution shall be punished with imprisonment with labor for not more than three years or a fine not exceeding three million yen.

2. A person who, as his or her business, acts as an intermediary in child prostitution shall be punished with imprisonment with labor for not more than five years and a fine not exceeding five million yen.

Article 6 - Solicitation - Solicitation of Child Prostitution

1. A person who solicits another person to commit child prostitution for the purpose of inter-mediating in child prostitution shall be punished with imprisonment with labor for not more than three years or a fine not exceeding three million yen.

2. A person who, as his or her business, solicits another person to commit child prostitution for the purpose mentioned in the preceding paragraph shall be punished with imprisonment with labor for not more than five years and a fine not exceeding five million yen.

Article 8 - Trade, etc. in Children for the Purpose of Child Prostitution, and Suchlike

1. A person who buys or sells a child for the purpose of making the child be a party to sexual intercourse, etc. in child prostitution, or for the purpose of producing child pornography by depicting any of the poses provided for in items (i) to (iii) of paragraph 3 of Article 2 shall be punished with imprisonment with labor for not less than one year and not more than ten years.

2. A Japanese national who, for any of the purposes mentioned in the preceding paragraph, transports a child, who has been abducted, kidnapped, sold or bought in a foreign country, out of that country shall be punished with imprisonment with labor for a limited term of not less than two years.

3. Attempts of the crimes mentioned in the two preceding paragraphs shall be punished.

This doesn't detract from Bamboo's original point in any way, since all of these titles are from the mid-70s.

Quote:

This doesn't detract from Bamboo's original point in any way, since all of these titles are from the mid-70s.

True, and it also doesn't detract from the completely missed "Nah" at the beginning of my post, making Bamboo's own reply completely unneeded as I clearly stated I knew they weren't the first.

It also doesn't detract from having missed the "most" in my post as well. If you can find me the average anime fan that is going to think of anime in the 70s, let alone yuri anime, my metaphorical hat goes off to you.