Is Anime racist?

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

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It certainly will take time but as long as the initial interest in other cultures is there, there is hope for incorporating say, Brazilian immigrants (I heard that there are a large amount of immigrants from brazil working as domestic workers in houses) and Chinese, Korean and Indian people as well. It is as you say though that people are kind of keeping other cultures at a distance.

It certainly is odd how some Japanese people can become the eastern version of a weeaboo and love American stuff but the grass will seem greener on the other side so.

As for the history part, the Burakumin and uchi/soto were the only things I was fully aware of though I do remember my parents taking me to Nanjing and talking about what happened there. I wonder what it would take for a social mechanism to be in place. It took decades for the civil rights movement to stop the lack of rights for black and minority people and we still have issues as we see with Ferguson. I doubt other countries would be able to pressure since I heard the Abe administration is very insular and nationalistic. What do you suggest could be implemented

 

[BrokenTinker]

Yes and no, some are, some aren't. Some authors are xenophobic nationalists while others (especially among the younger crowd) are more open. It varies. Japanese culture tend to be monolithic and VERY resistant to change (which can rightly be categorize as xenophobic in those cases). This can be seen in the various government sponsor campaign to do X, Y, Z (like the "Stay Cool" campaign after companies were asked to lower than electric consumption after the nuclear shutdowns and during rolling brownouts/scheduled blackouts) throughout the years. They still have a relatively conservative mindset and have still have certain expectations in gender roles. For example, women were (and still are to a certain extent) expected to be able to cook in the family kitchen, but not in certain types in restaurant (they've a saying that roughly say women should never be in a professional kitchen).

They also have a two-faced attitude in regards to how they speak, they will say things to appeal to the accepted norm even when they personally don't believe it. This isn't a criticism as much as a fact for life for them (this survey was done by the NHK iirc), especially when it comes to business dealings.

They have one of the biggest gap between individuals and a culture since they take the separation of private life and work life pretty seriously (been relaxing for a long while, but it's still there). Do some of them have superiority complex? Hell yeah, but that's true for all cultures. Does that make them racist, not necessary (but they ARE highly susceptible to perceived stereotypes). The average japanese would be nervous talking to certain foreigners (but I'll be damned if they don't at least try to be helpful in most cases, especially among the professions like station workers and cops). The same is true for producers of anime. They are limited by their own experiences, and sometimes, they just make shit up while other times they do so much research that it would make a native of the culture they are trying to portray drop their jaw in the accuracy or completely flabbergasted that they didn't know that about their own cultures (just look that anime about bath, roman baths vs japanese bath, and the level of details involved).

With your statement about the separation of private and public life and the two-faced attitude, you are refering to Uchi/Soto and Honne/tataeme I assume.

Japan is a very collectivist culture that can be very closed off at the same time also seems to express interest in other cultures. Shows like Index and Problem Children love to pull different myths and religions and reinterpret them in fascinating ways.

As for Thermae Romae, I find it intriguing that they did the research for it like the time period, the emperor in charge, the technologies of the day and more. The amount of time they put into research seems to vary greatly. Even Eva for all it's butchering of Christianity did some research on what each angel represented and tried to match them to the design and scene.

Yep, I would just confuse people if I just use the proper terms though :3 And yeah, it's highly dependent on the author. Look at Silver Spoon, it's well researched with input by actual farmers. Then you've the crash mecha scifi thing that have no connection to reality. You've stuff like Black Lagoon while at the same time you've things like eh... shoot, I forgot them name, pretty much the romanticized, honourable Yakuza.

And they LOVE taking things from outside and "make it their own", religions, arts, cuisines, war, manufacturing, you name it, they will take it and incorporate it. Their dominate white-collar employment policy is an adopted, extreme version of an US economists from the 40's/50's. Sometimes they make a bastardize idea that doesn't float, other times they do it so right that the originating culture goes WTF (just go ask a portuguese/brazilian what they think of tempura xP)

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

So my question is,is Anime racist?

(just a random thought for today I thought was worth discussing with my betters, and no I do not understand grammar)


In my opinion it?s not inherently racist as to be racist there really has to be negative concepts at paly, though while not inherent it can and has been done. Since Anime is Japanese who tend to be polite xenophobists it makes the content at times woefully stereotypical. But even so do stereotypes that are not inherently negative equal racism? Even if in these days if it bleeds its racist/sexist/negative/unfair?

As someone who has lived in Japan for nearly 8 years no - yes and no.

Japan has been a closed society for a long time. Even now, outside of certain parts of the biggest cities foreigners are a rarity and non-white non-asian foreigners extremely so.

It's not so much 'racist' - at least in terms of westerners/africans (there is still a very ugly vein of hate regarding some other asian nations).

It's more... 'inexperienced' in that they just don't know too much about other races and cultures. Oh you get the occasional very racist looking character (anyone remember Mr. Popo from DBZ?) but I doubt it's done with a lot of malice.

I remember when RE5 was just coming out and I had been here for a year or so. There was a lot of hubbub about the game being 'racist' because you played as a white soldier who walked through a traditional African village gunning down infected natives. I had a long chat with my students about it and they hadn't even really thought about it. They also said something like 'should they have made some of the natives white?'.

Some people out here are ignorant. A very few are prejudiced (but then it's mostly against either China, Korea or America). There are one or two straight up nutjobs...but we have those too in the West. Overall I've never felt the culture to be 'racist' in a meanspirited way and at it's worst it's just ignorant - and in many cases influenced by negative experiences with the small number of foreigners people have had contact with. I and the majority of my friends have experienced almost nothing but good natured ignorance and genuine curiosity, aside from the occasional group of young males who have been drinking and are looking to pick a fight.

On a funnier note, three years ago I got my female high school students at an all girls school to draw up a list of the most attractive western actors they could think of.
#1 was Will Smith.

Take that as you will.

Even with my ineptitude with words and reading I love posts like these!! Thank you for your thoughts!

 

[irishda]

Cultures tend to misrepresent other cultures all the time, especially those they have little contact with. For instance, many Americans think African cities built by indigenous people are no better than mud huts, rather than the towering skyscrapers many large African cities have.

Japanese culture is therefore especially problematic due to both its heavily homogenous population (where about 98% identify as Yamato) and it's isolationism against foreign cultures. Hell, even the UN has commented on racism and xenophobia in Japanese society.

Short answer: Yes, but only because Japanese culture itself tends towards racism/xenophobia. It's not to say other countries don't have the same problem, but it seems more prevalent in Japanese culture.

 

[Mrkillhappy]

As a whole I would say no, however as many in this thread have pointed out Japan doesn't exactly have the best idea of other cultures. I would say that some of this has to do with the long period of isolationism throughout Japanese history not to mention that historically at least from what I learned in an Asian cultural history course I had a few years back as well as the fact that they had a high view of themselves(which was not uncommon for most nations at that time period)/xenophobic view of other cultures. As for modern Japan though I have been told by friends of mine that have taken trips to Japan that many of them are interested in western culture as well as other non Japanese cultures but also don't understand much of it and are often only exposed to western media as an example so they understand us through a very unrealistic viewpoint.

 

[cojo965]

Anime is a medium, and a medium can almost never be inherently racist, that is like saying all reality TV is racist. Is some content racist? Sure, but the same can be said about any type of content. There have been plenty of games with racist content but that does not mean all games are.

Exactly. Saying "anime is racist" makes about as much sense as saying, "Watercolor painting is racist."

If someone wants to do a thoughtful analysis of racist tropes in anime, be my guest. There's probably a goldmine of data in there.

Since Anime is Japanese who tend to be polite xenophobists it makes the content at times woefully stereotypical.

Japanese culture is xenophobic.

Neither of these statements are strictly accurate and Mad as a Hatter's statement is both inaccurate and racist itself.

There are definitely xenophobic people in Japan and expressions of that xenophobia in Japanese culture. Believe me, I liver here, I have to deal with it. But other people in Japan are also remarkably interested in other cultures and very positive about other cultures. Japan's the only place I've ever been where I've found a bar that gives 5% discounts to foreign patrons because they want to attract more Japanese business by making their customer base seem more cosmopolitan and diverse. What I'm saying is it's a mixed bag, and trying to analyze anime's racism as a "yes/no" question rather than a nuanced discussion of positive and negative portrayals within anime is going to be a waste of time because a "yes/no" answer is never going to be accurate enough to be meaningful.

Instead of answering "yes, it's racist" or "no, it's not". I'd rather see people put up examples of depictions and describe them. That would even be more interesting to other readers, because I'm sure there are others here like me who haven't watched much anime in the last 10 years and aren't caught up on what the state of the industry is.

Damn it I wanted to make a joke about that typo but couldn't come up with anything.

As a non-anime viewer I cannot comment here. HOWEVER! There is one moment in Godzilla Final Wars that is kinda topical.


No that first scene in New York was not added in by America Godzilla King of the Monsters style, that was in the original movie. Is it bad? Maybe but I found it too funny to care.

 

[NoeL]

Not that I agree with Mad as a Hatter, but I've got to defend him on this one. Japanese culture can be xenophobic even if there are prominent individuals that are exceptions. "Culture" reflects the commonly held beliefs of the area, and if it's common for Japanese people to be xenophobic and have that reflected in their culture then it's fair to say that Japanese culture is xenophobic. If Miyazaki recognises it in the industry and speaks out against it, him being Japanese and part of Japanese culture doesn't invalidate the argument.

That is a different argument. "Japanese culture is xenophobic" is an absolute statement; "Can be xenophobic" is not.

It's not a different argument at all. Again, I'm not saying I agree, but saying "Japanese culture is xenophobic" isn't the same as saying "All Japanese are xenophobic". You argued "Japanese culture is xenophobic" is a false statement because Miyazaki isn't xenophobic, and that's a bit of a non sequitur.

 

[Silvanus]

It's not a different argument at all. Again, I'm not saying I agree, but saying "Japanese culture is xenophobic" isn't the same as saying "All Japanese are xenophobic". You argued "Japanese culture is xenophobic" is a false statement because Miyazaki isn't xenophobic, and that's a bit of a non sequitur.

My point was more that there are figures and elements of Japanese culture that are not xenophobic, not just that Miyazaki isn't. He was just an example.

The statement "Japanese culture is xenophobic" refers to Japanese culture as a whole, as an entirety. It is an absolute. Examples of where this is untrue are a perfectly valid counter-argument. Similarly, if somebody were to say "humans have hair", examples of people without hair are perfectly admissible counter-evidence. If somebody said "books are written by men", examples of books written by women would be perfectly admissible counter-evidence. We would not simply assume that those statements only applied to some people, or some books. If that were true they would not have been stated as absolutes, without qualification.

 

[NoeL]

My point was more that there are figures and elements of Japanese culture that are not xenophobic, not just that Miyazaki isn't. He was just an example.

I think you could have made that point better.

The statement "Japanese culture is xenophobic" refers to Japanese culture as a whole, as an entirety. It is an absolute. Examples of where this is untrue are a perfectly valid counter-argument. Similarly, if somebody were to say "humans have hair", examples of people without hair are perfectly admissible counter-evidence. If somebody said "books are written by men", examples of books written by women would be perfectly admissible counter-evidence. We would not simply assume that those statements only applied to some people, or some books. If that were true they would not have been stated as absolutes, without qualification.

This is just pedantry though. No one in their right mind would disagree with the statement "humans have hair" despite there being exceptions. They would disagree with the statement "all humans have hair" but without that qualifier the sentence typically reads as "a substantial majority of humans have hair". That's also why people WOULD disagree with the statement "books are written by men" - not because it's an absolute claim that's false, but because even as a generalisation it's false.

The statement "Japanese culture is xenophobic" reads, in English, as "a substantial majority of Japanese culture is xenophobic" or "Japanese culture is xenophobic in general". Taken literally, yes it's a statement of absolutes. Taken colloquially (which is the context of this forum thread), it's not.

 

[rorychief]

I think it definitely can be. I was shown a few episodes of samurai champloo recently by a friend, they were mid season episodes and throughout he was catching me up. At one point I had to ask where the show was set because so many japanese women seemed to have korean or chinese husbands, and lots of working class people ie. farmers, guards looked korean/chinese. I was wondering if there was a historic reason for this and if the show was trying to establish its setting by showing the influx of immigrants that perhaps happened during the edo period, i think it was called.
My friend had no idea what I was talking about of course, the show was set in Japan and these were all Japanese characters. It was just that all the ignorant, selfish or petty character had brown/yellow skin, slanted eyes and round faces, while the wise, noble and cool tempered characters were all pale, wide eyed and slender featured.
Maybe it was just those few episodes that this was so prevalent, but I remember really believing it was supposed to be a plot point regarding the ethnic make up of the country, and the fact that one race seemed to have all the crappy jobs and so more often resorted to crime, and so more often had to be killed by law abiding good guys. I began trying to track and pay attention to it as though racial tensions would be an important factor to future conflict, and so it was particularly disappointing to learn it was all just a visual shorthand for who was good and evil.
Ethereal grace elves of repressed emotion vs. chinky buck-tooth jaundice-orcs.

 

[Silvanus]

I think you could have made that point better.

To be honest, that's fair. I should have done.

This is just pedantry though. No one in their right mind would disagree with the statement "humans have hair" despite there being exceptions. They would disagree with the statement "all humans have hair" but without that qualifier the sentence typically reads as "a substantial majority of humans have hair". That's also why people WOULD disagree with the statement "books are written by men" - not because it's an absolute claim that's false, but because even as a generalisation it's false.

The statement "Japanese culture is xenophobic" reads, in English, as "a substantial majority of Japanese culture is xenophobic" or "Japanese culture is xenophobic in general". Taken literally, yes it's a statement of absolutes. Taken colloquially (which is the context of this forum thread), it's not.

Well, I think this comes down to how such statements are commonly used. When people employ stereotypes about other cultures, they very often do make sweeping statements and unfair generalisations. When people talk about entire cultures, they usually aren't paying due attention to the differences within those cultures.

Perhaps I jumped the gun, though. I'm happy to concede I may have been having a bit of a kneejerk reaction.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

You just have to follow this rule of thumb: It's only considered "racist" or "racial" if Caucasian do it.

Kind of fascinating though, the difference in tone between this thread and any of the "games are sexist" threads that popped up.

I am quite happy it did not turn into a flame war, but the mods have been alot more interactive with the forum as a whole so I think most of the unintelligent trolls have been done away with. A shame I could have worded things better might have been an even better thread but I fail at words most of the time. ><

 

[SacremPyrobolum]

Yes, it can be. And it's hilarious when it is.

Spoiler

Unfortunately, it rarely gets a chance to be. Japanese high schools are not very diverse.

 

[SUPA FRANKY]

Yes, it can be. And it's hilarious when it is.

Spoiler

Unfortunately, it rarely gets a chance to be. Japanese high schools are not very diverse.

Not really sure about the context, but she looks like she is practicing the fashion subculture known as Gyaru. It involves a deep tan.

 

[SacremPyrobolum]

Yes, it can be. And it's hilarious when it is.

Spoiler

Unfortunately, it rarely gets a chance to be. Japanese high schools are not very diverse.

Not really sure about the context, but she looks like she is practicing the fashion subculture known as Gyaru. It involves a deep tan.

Unfortunately, this was the best video I could get of it. The whole scene is about that girl explaining to the other how she wants to be a "soul sister" to attract boyfriends.

 

[Hectix777]

Not really, though that's a pretty broad topic. Obviously there's some xenophobia in Japanese culture, but that's fairly normal. The Japanese may dislike the South Koreans, but there are elements of American culture that dislike Hispanics. Japanese WW2 vets may dislike Americans, but there are American vets who feel the same about them. As a whole I would say no, at least not intentionally. Obviously they have a more homogenized society, but I haven't seen anything in anime that shows a clear dislike of other races. The worst I've seen are some of their old fashioned depictions of black culture, but they don't have the history of persecution we have, so they don't necessarily see certain images as racist in the same way we would.

You could make a stronger case for sexism, though even this only represents certain parts of the culture. The same can be found in aspects of American society (like in some comics). Miyazaki is the biggest feminist around.

One thing to note about anime is the fact that there are more characters of differing sexualities and ethnicities in an anime (like Black Lagoon or Hunter x Hunter) than most prime time sitcoms.

A nation whose diversity (at least in terms of residential foreigners) is 1.6% somehow manages to have more diverse character casts than a nation whose entire history is written around diversity.