In the defence of the Anime Girl (important)

Qmeri

Did you know that anime has gone further in sexual equality than any other major form of entertainment? While we all know the highly sexualized appearance of the anime girls, we don't usually penetrate deeper and see the truth. The otakus have accepted the female as the dominant sex in both power and economy. And why wouldn't they? Who wouldn't accept a dominant anime girl arriving on her white mecha horse to save yourself and put your life in order? No? Then your life probably is in order.

But the truth is that one of the most usual anime girl characters is a driven, dominant and both socially and physically strong female. And it isn't just a bluff where in between lines the men actually dominate and end up saving the day. Take Akame ga kill! for example - a generic shounen anime. Made for boys, but in its story the women are mostly the important players in everything relevant to the world. The anime ends with the lead women fighting each other and the main guy just being killed off without almost any drama or consequences. None of this was to make any points - it was just a generic anime for otaku boys.

The equality of anime girls is even seen in the male characters of many generic anime. The dominant women have their male servants to do their secretary work and the male leads often justify their closeness to the female leads by being great cooks and good with animals and children and other household stuff.

But why do many feminists seem to hate anime? I think it's because anime doesn't even try to make its dominant female characters relatable to western women. They are often almost copies of certain driven and dominant male characters with certain female sexual traits put in. They don't have the uncertainties and fears nor interests many females can relate to.

But isn't this what the feminists want? To encourage women to have goals of power like men? To teach men to accept women as possible dominant entities? It seems like very few feminists have seen anime and realized the huge potential it has. It has brought an unforced way for many males to see female equality and even dominance as a desirable thing.

ps. a very important topic - no cancer to defile it, please

Streetlight

"Feminists"? Name at least two who have written and published on this.

Qmeri

↪StreetlightX

"Feminists"? Name at least two who have written and published on this. — StreetlightX

I can't since the main point of this text is about feminism ignoring the advances anime has made. I only said that feminists seem to hate anime since about 95% of the people I know who represent themselves as feminists are very negative towards anime irregardless of whether they have watched any meaningful amount of anime. I know a couple of self portrayed feminists who do like anime. So, not a big enough sample size to say anything serious... That's why I published this in "the lounge".

Actually... sorry about the feminism part... wasn't thinking it trough and just concentrating on my personal experiences with the issue... not too cool or philosophical.

But I'm sure I could find an endless number of articles which put feminist values against whatever the writer thinks of anime since I have randomly encountered dozens of them in my life. Can't demonstrate this though since I'm not being serious enough with this to do the ground work.

So, I might be wrong about feminist reactions about this issue, but my main point stands true: Anime has made female social, intellectual and physical strengths and superiority normal and desirable for relatively weird reasons and this has not been widely acknowledged.

Michael

Perhaps the issue (if there is one) is that a lot of the women in anime seem to be overly sexualised school girls designed to appeal to a young male audience.

Although I'll admit my knowledge of anime is very limited. Maybe the good ones just aren't as prominent on the internet as the fan service ones.

Maw

This is hilarious

Saphsin

I guess I'm one of the few here who knows something about the subject.

There are "strong" women in anime. This goes way back to even Studio Ghibli, Miyazaki intentionally made brave girls as the main protagonists of his films. Strong & Intelligent women are fashionable even in the highly sexualized series, a lot of the strongest characters are attractive women. It's noticeably different from a lot of Western fiction, where there are also strong female characters, but they're usually not the dominant ones. That doesn't mean there's nothing sexist about anime, I mean a big chunk of the industry is wrapped around exciting the fantasies of guys. I don't think it's entirely a bad thing, like violent video games. Women also have their own shoujo series in anime. It should be recognized and thought over though, and you should be able to separate reality from fiction.

Qmeri

↪Michael

Perhaps the issue (if there is one) is that a lot of the women in anime seem to be overly sexualised school girls designed to appeal to a young male audience.

Although I'll admit my knowledge of anime is very limited. Maybe the good ones just aren't as prominent on the internet as the fan service ones. — Michael

The main point of the text is that most people have this exact false impression about anime. Even in most of the "bad ones", the sexualized anime schoolgirls are often highly driven, intelligent, powerful and dominant.

I can understand why this is since the target audience and the highly sexualized outer appearance are the obvious things known by most people. And because it is somewhat unintuitive that the target audience of young guys have naturally started to adore the strength and dominance of their fantasy anime girls over the dominance of the relatable male characters.

But it seems to be a natural development since it was never forced in any way and if anything has been fought against. We have accepted the female adoration of male strength and dominance over them as a natural thing in many circumstances. Anime has proven that the opposite is also true in many circumstances.

Michael

The main point of the text is that most people have this exact false impression about anime. Even in most of the "bad ones", the sexualized anime schoolgirls are often highly driven, intelligent, powerful and dominant. — Qmeri

How is it a false impression if it's true? My point is that even if they're "highly driven, intelligent, powerful and dominant", the fact that they're also sexualised school girls designed to appeal to a male audience would explain why feminists take issue with it (assuming they do as you suggest).

Consider if men were portrayed as highly driven, intelligent, powerful and dominant, but also as rapists. Despite their positive qualities, I'd take issue with how men are being portrayed.

Qmeri

↪Michael

How is it a false impression if it's true? My point is that even if they're "highly driven, intelligent, powerful and dominant", the fact that they're also sexualised school girls designed to appeal to a male audience would explain why feminists take issue with it (assuming they do as you suggest).

Consider if men were portrayed as highly driven, intelligent, powerful and dominant, but also as rapists. Despite their positive qualities, I'd take issue with how men are being portrayed. — Michael

If "highly sexualized schoolgirls" is the general impression one has about anime girls, it is a false impression. If that impression is acknowledged as a couple of common properties of many anime girls that do not represent the whole picture, I have no problem with it.

It is the same as if someone had the impression that video games are violent. It is largely true as a single property but false as a general impression about the subject.

Also, anime schoolgirls do not represent all women as anything since anime has a lot of other female characters that are not at all sexualized or anything else. And comparing the representation of schoolgirls as sexually desireable and the representation of men generally as rapists is pretty ridiculous.

If representing young females as sexually desireable is somehow sexist, then it is not a particular problem of anime, since practically all common forms of entertainment do it a lot. The text didn't say anime isn't sexist in any way - it just pointed out that anime has gone in certain important ways further in female equality than other major forms of entertainment. And that this has not been widely acknowledged.

In the defence of the Anime Girl (important)

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