Is Persona 4's Kanji Gay or Not?

Ignawesome

New member
Mar 12, 2010
5
0
0
Ok, people, are you really serious?

It's obvious that he is not gay. You just have to play until 3/4 of the game

Spoilers:

He's in love with Naoto. At first, Naoto present himself as a male. Kanji inmediately falls for him, thus creating his confusion about being gay or not. He ONLY likes Naoto.
Buut then, when we rescue Naoto from inside the TV, we find out that she is actually a girl!
So, Kanji was never gay, he just liked a girl who pretended to be a guy (she didn't even look like a guy, i thought she was a girl until they said otherwise)
So, Kanji's Shadow was overreacting because he really thought that Naoto was a male.
I'd say Kanji is Naoto-sexual or heterosexual but Naoto is his "it's ok if it's you"
Meaning that he'd like her even if he was really a guy.

End of spoilers
 

Altorin

Jack of No Trades
May 16, 2008
6,976
0
0
I got that he was very very afraid that we was gay, because he was sexually attracted to Naoto.. So he was conflicted, so his level shows off this conflict, and his phantom self embraces that in him which he is conflicted, just like all of the other characters in the game.

But Naoto was a girl in disguise. And he was still in love with her, so he wasn't gay, his body was just not falling for Naoto's lies as much as his brain was.
 

Ignawesome

New member
Mar 12, 2010
5
0
0
Altorin said:
I got that he was very very afraid that we was gay, because he was sexually attracted to Naoto.. So he was conflicted, so his level shows off this conflict, and his phantom self embraces that in him which he is conflicted, just like all of the other characters in the game.

But Naoto was a girl in disguise. And he was still in love with her, so he wasn't gay, his body was just not falling for Naoto's lies as much as his brain was.
Exactly my point... wasn't this obvious for everyone else?
 

Jamie Morton

New member
Apr 9, 2010
6
0
0
Ignawesome said:
Ok, people, are you really serious?

It's obvious that he is not gay. You just have to play until 3/4 of the game

Spoilers:

He's in love with Naoto. At first, Naoto present himself as a male. Kanji inmediately falls for him, thus creating his confusion about being gay or not. He ONLY likes Naoto.
Buut then, when we rescue Naoto from inside the TV, we find out that she is actually a girl!
So, Kanji was never gay, he just liked a girl who pretended to be a guy (she didn't even look like a guy, i thought she was a girl until they said otherwise)
So, Kanji's Shadow was overreacting because he really thought that Naoto was a male.
I'd say Kanji is Naoto-sexual or heterosexual but Naoto is his "it's ok if it's you"
Meaning that he'd like her even if he was really a guy.

End of spoilers
But kanji falls for the masculine side of Naoto. Although it was really obvious from the biggining that Naoto was female but nobody realises this until quite far through the game(and after kanji falls for her).

Kanji's shadow represents both his desires but also Kanji's fear of nobody liking him for who he truly is. The shadow might not be saying that he is gay but instead that his hobbies and likes were seen by others to be gay and unmanly.
 

cathcart

New member
Aug 7, 2012
1
0
0
Sorry to comment on such an old thread, but I found this while googling the issue (Kanji being gay or not). I really have to second Ignawesome and others. I don't understand all the praise for Persona 4 as a progressive game with regards to its treatment of homosexuality.

As a gay guy I've even been tempted to stop playing several times because frankly the game keeps pissing me off (which is unfortunate, because I liked Persona 3, and Persona 4 is like Persona 4 except better in almost every single regard). Basically Kanji is afraid of being gay, is made of fun for being gay (seriously, NO ONE in the game ever says "Dude, you know it's okay to be gay, right? Chill!" Instead they're scared of being in a tent with Kanji - because if you're a man then a gay guy will obviously rape you when you're not looking), and gets fucking nosebleeds (sign of sexual arousal in anime) when seeing girls in bikinis.
And in the end his love interest turns out to be a girl! Hooray! Phew! Not gay! Let's celebrate!

Btw, I've lived in Japan for several years and have quite a few friends who are gay and Japanese and let me tell you that "scholar of Japanese culture" (whatever that means) Dr. Antonia Levi is full of shit. I'd assume (without much basis, obviously) that she's one of those foreigners who doesn't really speak Japanese all that well and doesn't have any Japanese friends, so to her everything is strange and foreign.

To say that Japanese people magically think completely different from everyone else is pure exoticization. Whatever Dr. Levi says, you're not magically "gay and straight at the same time" in Japan. Guys will call each other gay as an insult just like in other countries and if they think you might be gay you'll suffer the same fate as Kanji. Persona 4 is a terrible game in that respect, because it teaches kids who might be struggling with their sexuality that the happy end would not be accepting who they are (in a meaningful way and not the ATLUS "I've punched my gay side in the face" way) but turning out straight after all.

Persona 4 isn't "more subtle" because it's "Japanese," it's simply relatively backwards in its treatment of homosexuality. This is what a comparable game would've looked like in the US a few decades ago. It's not more subtle, it's just more cowardly because the developers were scared of alienating homophobic players.

Sorry, just had to get that off my chest.