Poll: Case Study of Japanese Media: Fetishes as Character Basis for Personality and Abilities

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Abstract: the personal theory is that Fetishes are used as a massive portion of not just looks but also personalities and abilities

After a recent thread on "Sexualization Done Right" in which I referenced Makato Nanaya from Blazblue and had two people reply that A) the character list is like reading a fetish list and B) that the Japanese seem to use character tropes as characterization itself.

As such, I would like to do a small case study on the portion of mass media I love. Below will be three images, one from Blazblue, one from RWBY, and one from Captain Earth. I will then provide a small data file on their abilities, powers, and the (alleged) fetish inspiration.

Spoiler: Rachel Alucard of Blazblue

Fetish: Vampire Gothic Lolita
Abilities: control of familiars to defend (never actually gets hit), generate lighting rods, and she herself controls the wind
Personality: Formal and Condescending towards those lower then her, an overseer of events and who can alter them with manipulation of others

Spoiler: Ruby Rose of RWBY

Fetish: "Adorkable" badass girl
Abilites: high endurence to 50 cal. recoil, flash step, combination scythe/sniper enabling all ranges to be covered, some battle intuition
Personality: Socially awkward and insecure, "bubbly", innocent

Spoiler: Akari Yomatsuri of Captain Earth

Fetish: Manic Pixie Dream Girl
Abilties: hacking abilities to the point of intercepting air force securities and ability to counter viruses
Personality: Somewhat snarky around her father, has a verbal tick of "Logical, logical", loves to tease and have fun with friends but can be blunt and serious during situations

An addendum to the case study is that if people wish to post arguments or counter arguments, please do so, I will admit by extreme bias and that maybe it's a matter of perspective. In addition, Ruby was picked because, while the show is American, it uses anime tropes fully and it could serve as an experiment in how distance from the original culture could dilute the "effect"

Edit: due to the poll cutting off words, Option 1 was meant to read "it's true with no significant statistical deviation" while Option 5 was meant to read "it's false with no significant statistical deviation"

Edit 2: it seems that the phenomena I was noting was not the use of fetishes but tropes and stereotypes and that it seems to be widely used in anime

The question then becomes how to use tropes without being lazy and making vapid self-insert protagonists and token female characters (yeah, I really hate harem and fanserice shows)

 

[Relish in Chaos]

I don't get what you're trying to say here. That Japanese anime and video games...like to make characters out of fetishes? If so, that's as obvious as the greenness of grass. Not to mention Western media does that too, with stuff like "the girl next door".

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

I don't get what you're trying to see here. That Japanese anime and video games...like to make characters out of fetishes? If so, that's as obvious as the greenness of grass. Not to mention Western anime does that too, with stuff like "the girl next door".

I suppose the better question is what is the extent in which this type of "fetish characterization" is used in both Japanese and American games and anime. In addition, I would like examples in which characters are not made with fetishes in mind.

 

[Relish in Chaos]

Nope, sorry. Still don't get it. Maybe it's because I haven't read that "Sexualisation Done Right" thread you were referring to, but...yeah, it's done to a considerable extent. I can't tell you anything about statistics, especially when so many people differ on opinion when it comes whether or not a character's appearance is fetishised, and/or how much that affects their personality (and abilities too, according to you).

If you're asking for examples of sexualised characters who weren't made with fetishes in mind...well, there are hundreds, even thousands. Supergirl, for instance.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Nope, sorry. Still don't get it. Maybe it's because I haven't read that "Sexualisation Done Right" thread you were referring to, but...yeah, it's done to a considerable extent. I can't tell you anything about statistics, especially when so many people differ on opinion when it comes whether or not a character's appearance is fetishised, and/or how much that affects their personality (and abilities too, according to you).

If you're asking for examples of sexualised characters who weren't made with fetishes in mind...well, there are hundreds, even thousands. Supergirl, for instance.

I see, then the question is, why the shortcut of using a fetish? I used a Blazblue charcter for reference but truth is that that game's entire roster is based on fetishes: cat girls, bishonen, innocent but dumb, robots, and various others

And that's the sad part about it, some characters are likable but a part of me also knows "this is not realistic and may be systematic of something"

Let me put this into context, Until I saw your post, I wasn't going to post because the person I would use as a reference is very debatable

Spoiler: Makoto Nanaya of Blazblue

Spoiler: Makoto out of combat

In game and supplemental side material, Makoto has been characterized as very upbeat with a deadpan streak around some people (cough, Kagura, cough), Extremely devoted to her friends, Smart enough to get into military academy on scholarship, strong enough to compete with an entire cast of insanely powerful people, and strong-willed enough to avoid losing her mind after being thrown into the void.

Issue is that I left out one thing that I think makes her somewhat popular in the fanfic community: she has been portrayed as a bisexual. Don't misunderstand, bisexuality is fine but a part of me is constantly thinking "my god, this is fetish bait" so i'm left between a rock and a hard place. One half says "this character is fun, lovable, and has a backstory that intrigues me", the other half is like "do I like this character for or despite of her kemonomini and underboob".

I really do not like this conversation because it can be so hard to justify why we like something but if we do, we may be seen as perverts

a bit off topic, but i think it's hilarious that going through the blazblue character roster is like reading off a list of geek fetishes

*puts on red striped carny suit*
step right up! step right up! we got all the girls and boys for your girls and boys needs! we got your:
hot vampire boys
vampire girls
lolis
shotas
pretty blonde boys
cat girls
big furry
small furry
petanko girls
transgendered girls
beef cake with only chest exposed always
robot girls
tentacle monsters
we even have the hulk!
yes sir, you wont find a better deal anywhere else! you dont want them! you need and we got themq! step right up to arcsys's blazblue emporium!

this is the post from the aforementioned forum

edit: it could possibly be a matter of perspective and bias that I think that fetish is used far too often as a sole character basis

 

[Antonymy]

Without having actual hard data about frequency of occurrence for each trope, we can't really say anything about statistical deviation, or statistical anything for that matter.

 

[L. Declis]

Oh boy, a chance to post this:


But to put it bluntly, I don't quite understand what you're trying to even say here. Your attempt to write up a case study is a mess to read and you've chosen what, 3 girls as your sample to test on?

If you want to do this, do it properly, write it up, submit it as a journal. Or it's just more anecdotal evidence that you yourself have admitted to being biased to.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Oh boy, a chance to post this:


But to put it bluntly, I don't quite understand what you're trying to even say here. Your attempt to write up a case study is a mess to read and you've chosen what, 3 girls as your sample to test on?

If you want to do this, do it properly, write it up, submit it as a journal. Or it's just more anecdotal evidence that you yourself have admitted to being biased to.

Perhaps you are right that I shouldn't have called it a case study; my bad, at the point of writing, I wanted to use academic writing for some unknown reason

It's just that, the more I watch anime or play Japanese games, the more I notice the fetishes and little fanserivce things meant for otaku and I'm starting to become unsettled by it.

A part of me likes these characters but a part of me also knows that they are partially based on shallow fetishes or are otherwise just meant to pander to the more instinctual parts of the human consciousness. To put it in other words, you can like a character because of a feeling of "wanting to protect her" or "be her boyfriend" but the writing, personality, and other things that go to make a fully fledged character may be absent or highly flawed and I get the uneasy feeling of "I shouldn't like this character but I do even if it fail all criteria for being a good charcter"

 

[Darth Rosenberg]

Stats be damned, this is teh internetz!!
...ahem.

It's tricky to assess the culture you're a part of, so it's especially tricky to do so with an otherwise alien culture. From an outsiders perspective, they do seem to have plenty of well defined subcultures where fetish-as-character design appears to be accepted, and embraced. If you're not versed in genre specificity, then they're impossible to sympathise with or engage with.

Rachel Alucard's maybe not the best example, though. She conforms to certain design tropes, but is she representative as a character itself? She happens to be my favourite character in BlazBlueCS, btw - one of the wittiest and best written characters in a generally superbly written game. She isn't sexualised, so there's a case to be made for her being a subversion of the more objectifying ends of the loli-goth aesthetic.

This thread could veer torwards a discussion about sexualisation in Japanese pop-culture and society, which is a clusterfuck of a minefield...

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Stats be damned, this is teh internetz!!
...ahem.

It's tricky to assess the culture you're a part of, so it's especially tricky to do so with an otherwise alien culture. From an outsiders perspective, they do seem to have plenty of well defined subcultures where fetish-as-character design appears to be accepted, and embraced. If you're not versed in genre specificity, then they're impossible to sympathise with or engage with.

Rachel Alucard's maybe not the best example, though. She conforms to certain design tropes, but is she representative as a character itself? She happens to be my favourite character in BlazBlueCS, btw - one of the wittiest and best written characters in a generally superbly written game. She isn't sexualised, so there's a case to be made for her being a subversion of the more objectifying ends of the loli-goth aesthetic.

This thread could veer torwards a discussion about sexualisation in Japanese pop-culture and society, which is a clusterfuck of a minefield...

Perhaps I should have used Makoto, Noel, Litchi or Bullet as the Blazblue representative

And if the thread does veer into that minefield, we might as well go head on. It's time that we have a good discussion between American and Japanese pop culture and how sex is viewed in each media in combination with the culture at large

 

[Darth Rosenberg]

Perhaps I should have used Makoto, Noel, Litchi or Bullet as the Blazblue representative

Frustratingly, Chronopantasma never made it to 360, so I can't say anything about Bullet. There's perhaps a case to be made for Makoto just being an equivalent to the sexualised elf female in Western fantasy? In that they could have similar cultural currency within their given genre/s (as such, there can be good and bad expressions of that idea).

...the thing about BlazBlue is that maybe it's not the best example to use at all anyway. There's the superficial designs of a character, then its depiction in-game or in a film/TV show. Many of Blaz's designs are eye-rollingly sexualised, but within the game you have subversive wit and then the chibi epilogues which break the fourth wall, and pretty much mock everything about the game. As over-serious as the central [incomprehensible] plot is, in general it has a great self-aware humour to it.

And if the thread does veer into that minefield, we might as well go head on. It's time that we have a good discussion between American and Japanese pop culture and how sex is viewed in each media in combination with the culture at large

The thing is, it's not possible to really do that purposefully with our own (I'm speaking as a Brit) culture, so it's beyond most peoples analytical faculties to do so cross-cultural.

 

[Gigano]

Well, archetypes and genre staples exist everywhere.

They're sometimes very noticeable and pronounced in anime, in that not seldom its approach to storytelling is "bigger is better". While less overtly expressed, they of course exist in western culture as well, with equally firm connotations of sexual prowess and behavior; "The muscular jock", "The blonde bimbo", "The femme fatale", and so forth.

Some of these archetypes/traits originate from fetishes and pornography - hentai/eroge staples have certainly left their mark on anime - but mostly it's probably that fetishes spring up around them, once they become sufficiently popular and ingrained in ordinary culture.

Also, anime and manga - being possible to make with fairly low production costs - can cater to considerably more niche audiences than can live action productions, and remain profitable. So that's probably also why you see all the less mainstream and thus much more noticeable fetishistic stuff spliced into it. You really only need to plop in a character with no relation to or bearing on the plot for such fanservice.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Perhaps I should have used Makoto, Noel, Litchi or Bullet as the Blazblue representative

Frustratingly, Chronopantasma never made it to 360, so I can't say anything about Bullet. There's perhaps a case to be made for Makoto just being an equivalent to the sexualised elf female in Western fantasy? In that they could have similar cultural currency within their given genre/s (as such, there can be good and bad expressions of that idea).

...the thing about BlazBlue is that maybe it's not the best example to use at all anyway. There's the superficial designs of a character, then its depiction in-game or in a film/TV show. Many of Blaz's designs are eye-rollingly sexualised, but within the game you have subversive wit and then the chibi epilogues which break the fourth wall, and pretty much mock everything about the game. As over-serious as the central [incomprehensible] plot is, in general it has a great self-aware humour to it.

And if the thread does veer into that minefield, we might as well go head on. It's time that we have a good discussion between American and Japanese pop culture and how sex is viewed in each media in combination with the culture at large

The thing is, it's not possible to really do that purposefully with our own (I'm speaking as a Brit) culture, so it's beyond most peoples analytical faculties to do so cross-cultural.

Perhaps Blazblue may be more self aware but I have a feeling games like Hyperdemension Neptunia or Senran Kagura are doing the sexuality for the simple titilation of NEET and Otaku.

while it may beyond most people to be cross cultural, the fact that the internet spans different cultures in combination with differing life experiences may provide a small microcosum for our use

Edit: I can tell you this about Bullet: she is extremely socially inept but a high battle minded individual. The uniform holds sentimental value and she has been characterized as a tomboy(of course, that does not prevent Litchi from dressing her up)

 

[Hagi]

I don't really think those are fetishes.

I mean way I see it a fetish is a particular sort of generally considered 'deviant' sexual attraction or behavior that you happen to be into. Like say serious bondage would be a fetish, not something most people are into, definitely generally considered deviant and something that sexually excites some people.

What you've listed are just stereotypes really. They don't even seem sexual at all. They're just stereotypes.

 

[Relish in Chaos]

Nope, sorry. Still don't get it. Maybe it's because I haven't read that "Sexualisation Done Right" thread you were referring to, but...yeah, it's done to a considerable extent. I can't tell you anything about statistics, especially when so many people differ on opinion when it comes whether or not a character's appearance is fetishised, and/or how much that affects their personality (and abilities too, according to you).

If you're asking for examples of sexualised characters who weren't made with fetishes in mind...well, there are hundreds, even thousands. Supergirl, for instance.

I see, then the question is, why the shortcut of using a fetish? I used a Blazblue charcter for reference but truth is that that game's entire roster is based on fetishes: cat girls, bishonen, innocent but dumb, robots, and various others

To me, the answer is clear: lazy writing. And I found, unsurprisingly, after a quick search that BlazBlue is a fighting game series; a genre known for having some of the most simplistic characters in games not built for deep story and characterisation anyway.

Even in the most famous fighting game series, Street Fighter, you only get a handful of characters with more personality outside of their nationality or gimmick (e.g. off the top of my head: Gen, Guile, Abel).

A part of me likes these characters but a part of me also knows that they are partially based on shallow fetishes or are otherwise just meant to pander to the more instinctual parts of the human consciousness. To put it in other words, you can like a character because of a feeling of "wanting to protect her" or "be her boyfriend" but the writing, personality, and other things that go to make a fully fledged character may be absent or highly flawed and I get the uneasy feeling of "I shouldn't like this character but I do even if it fail all criteria for being a good charcter"

There's nothing wrong with liking a shallow character, not to mention "criteria" for a good character is subjective.

You will never stop designers creating characters for a singular purpose, whether it be them being badass and nothing else, or inspiring a desire to "be her boyfriend", 'cos that's the market. Maybe a niche market, but a market nonetheless. You got good characters, you got bad characters, and you got in between.

Not to mention, you?re judging a different culture based on the standards of your own. In Sociology, we call that ?Ethnocentrism?. In Japan, most of them don?t bat an eyelid at stuff like that. Whether that?s right or wrong?well, I don?t know, because I?ve never been to Japan nor am I an expert on things like that. It?s much more efficient to analyse our own culture, since we do the same thing, just in a somewhat different way. For instance, people are still blowing their tops over comic book sexualisation (even though comics haven?t been relevant in the US in, like, a decade).

 

[Darth Rosenberg]

Perhaps Blazblue may be more self aware but I have a feeling games like Hyperdemension Neptunia or Senran Kagura are doing the sexuality for the simple titilation of NEET and Otaku.

I've not played Senran Kagura, but I've heard - from a reliable review source, as well as a savvy female gamer - that the characters are well written. Whether they transcend the work's obviously fetishistic objectification is another subjective matter, and one that I can't comment on as I've only seen brief clips of the game in action.

It seems the Japanese are far more tolerant of exploitation, and niche subcultures (who hyper-define all kinds of tropes and conventions), especially in pop culture. Why that is, I have absolutely no idea. Any anime or manga fans who can shed any light on that?

What you've listed are just stereotypes really. They don't even seem sexual at all. They're just stereotypes.

If anything, they are representative of tropes and caricatures, not stereotypes (if Rachel Alucard is a stereotype, then I - and Science, probably - want to meet those people who generated it).

 

[Hagi]

What you've listed are just stereotypes really. They don't even seem sexual at all. They're just stereotypes.

If anything, they are representative of tropes and caricatures, not stereotypes (if Rachel Alucard is a stereotype, then I - and Science, probably - want to meet those people who generated it).

Caricature would probably be a rather more accurate description.

Impression she raises in me is the spoiled rich girl stereotype. But rather more extreme with vampirism instead of aristocracy and an even more extreme attire instead of vogue high fashion.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Nope, sorry. Still don't get it. Maybe it's because I haven't read that "Sexualisation Done Right" thread you were referring to, but...yeah, it's done to a considerable extent. I can't tell you anything about statistics, especially when so many people differ on opinion when it comes whether or not a character's appearance is fetishised, and/or how much that affects their personality (and abilities too, according to you).

If you're asking for examples of sexualised characters who weren't made with fetishes in mind...well, there are hundreds, even thousands. Supergirl, for instance.

I see, then the question is, why the shortcut of using a fetish? I used a Blazblue charcter for reference but truth is that that game's entire roster is based on fetishes: cat girls, bishonen, innocent but dumb, robots, and various others

To me, the answer is clear: lazy writing. And I found, unsurprisingly, after a quick search that BlazBlue is a fighting game series; a genre known for having some of the most simplistic characters in a game not built for deep story and characterisation anyway.

Even in the most famous fighting game series, Street Fighter, you only get a handful of characters with more personality outside of their nationality or gimmick (e.g. off the top of my head: Gen, Guile, Abel).

A part of me likes these characters but a part of me also knows that they are partially based on shallow fetishes or are otherwise just meant to pander to the more instinctual parts of the human consciousness. To put it in other words, you can like a character because of a feeling of "wanting to protect her" or "be her boyfriend" but the writing, personality, and other things that go to make a fully fledged character may be absent or highly flawed and I get the uneasy feeling of "I shouldn't like this character but I do even if it fail all criteria for being a good charcter"

There's nothing wrong with liking a shallow character, not to mention "criteria" for a good character is subjective.

You will never stop designers creating characters for a singular purpose, whether it be them being badass and nothing else, or inspiring a desire to "be her boyfriend", 'cos that's the market. Maybe a niche market, but a market nonetheless. You got good characters, you got bad characters, and you got in between.

Not to mention, you?re judging a different culture based on the standards of your own. In Sociology, we call that ?Ethnocentrism?. In Japan, most of them don?t bat an eyelid at stuff like that. Whether that?s right or wrong?well, I don?t know, because I?ve never been to Japan nor am I an expert on things like that. It?s much more efficient to analyse our own culture, since we do the same thing, just in a somewhat different way. For instance, people are still blowing their tops over comic book sexualisation (even though comics haven?t been relevant in the US in, like, a decade).

While I will normally agree with you, Blazblue was actually marketed with an extensive story mode to the point that the latest one has a 30 hour campaign that is not just individual stories. The story is unfortunately highly impenetrable with time loops and alternative selves so I probably can't convince you. Darth Rosenberg can talk a bit more probably

As for liking characters with singular purposes, fine I can but don't look at me when it leads to more fanservice crap with no artistic merit; i'm sure even anime fans would find the emergence of brocon/siscon stuff like "Recently my sister is Unusual" as unsettling

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Perhaps Blazblue may be more self aware but I have a feeling games like Hyperdemension Neptunia or Senran Kagura are doing the sexuality for the simple titilation of NEET and Otaku.

I've not played Senran Kagura, but I've heard - from a reliable review source, as well as a savvy female gamer - that the characters are well written. Whether they transcend the work's obviously fetishistic objectification is another subjective matter, and one that I can't comment on as I've only seen brief clips of the game in action.

It seems the Japanese are far more tolerant of exploitation, and niche subcultures (who hyper-define all kinds of tropes and conventions), especially in pop culture. Why that is, I have absolutely no idea. Any anime or manga fans who can shed any light on that?

What you've listed are just stereotypes really. They don't even seem sexual at all. They're just stereotypes.

If anything, they are representative of tropes and caricatures, not stereotypes (if Rachel Alucard is a stereotype, then I - and Science, probably - want to meet those people who generated it).

I personally find it odd that a country predominantly known for extremely conservative behavior when it comes to sex and how women are supposed to be (gender issues in Japan are a bigger issue) would produce so much of the world's fetish bait and eye-candy. There is only so much that can be explained by the change in sexual attitudes during the Meiji era(before the US came in, there were a bit more liberal, hell the panties obsession can be blamed on us since they didn't really wear underwear as we know it before then). I suppose a possible theory could be that, due to changing gender roles in Japan combined with an increase in people who are not having sex or wanting a relationship, that a market opened for "waifu bait"

 

[Chaos Isaac]

While most characters are tended to be easily filed into corresponding stereotypes or whatever word, phrase you want to use. It does seem that from Japan, it tends to lean more into fetishistic stereotypes instead of character, if that sentence made any sense.

Then again, there are many moments where that's completely wrong, but it feels as a rule of thumb, it's not.