If anime culture were a religion, Tokyo’s Akihabara district would be its holiest site. With all the maid cafes, manga shops and cute “moe” cartoon girls plastered everywhere, Akihabara is usually a must for visitors to Japan interested in all things geek. However, Chinese netizens recently argued (on a site that hosts pirated Japanese anime nonetheless) that the geek mecca is actually really boring and Japan is using anime to make other countries think it is cool and beautiful. Sharpen your claws and join us after the jump for more.
On the Chinese video hosting site, a netizen started the critical thread by saying that after watching a lot of anime, they concluded that “the Japan portrayed in anime is not the same as the real one. They’ve made the anime Japan much prettier.”
While the netizens were watching their free anime of questionable legal status, they said all the cute girls, cool guys and beautiful cityscapes tricked them into believing that all of Japan was like a scene from their favorite cartoon. Others then added to the conversation with stories about their own visit or a friend’s trip to Japan. Among the many complaints were:
There are not so many good-looking people… They don’t look like they do in anime.
A lot of girls have daikon (thick, giant radish-like) legs.
Akihabara is really not that interesting of a place, and maid cafes are not that cool.
Some netizens also said that there was too much raw food in Japanese cuisine and that the earthquakes make it a hard place to get sleep. Most of them blamed anime for not presenting Japan more “realistically,” but it did not seem that any netizen put forward any ideas to work a character’s lack of sleep from earthquakes into a plot line, which we think really needs to happen.
Japanese response to the thread was predictable: confusion mixed in with some anger. Most were simply perplexed that the Chinese anime-watchers could not distinguish cartoons from real life. It seemed obvious to them that Japanese anime would be much more colorful, vibrant and showy than reality.
There is no human being that could possibly look like an anime character. duh
But why would you go looking for pretty girls in Akihabara??!
So should we start criticizing Kung Fu movies for their inaccuracies?
I’m pretty sure the Chinese Communist Party tries to “beautify” Chinese history.
“Zing” on that last one…
Some Japanese netizens wondered if this thread was just a chance for some good ol’ fashioned “anti-Japan hatefest.” What do you think? Did the Chinese netizens get it wrong or do they have a point about Japan’s “revision” of itself through anime?
Source: Hachimakikou
Image: Wikipedia