If you ever had a conversation with a friend/peer/family member that becomes deep and heavy, you might be tempted to say something that might tell them to “chin up.” But in reality, it may not be the best thing to say because they may not necessarily want advice.
I know I’ve done this, but over the years, I realized that the best lesson is to be quiet and just listen.
Like this classic conversation from the early days of Tite Kubo’s BLEACH, where Rukia Kuchiki and Ichigo Kurosaki have a short conversation regarding circumstances surrounding the death of Ichigo’s mother (which is much better done in the manga compared to the anime).
Rukia says the right thing because she admits that she doesn’t know the situation well enough to come up with the right things to say. And she says the magic words that she’ll wait and that she’ll listen when the time came.
We say we don’t judge others, but our own expectations of other people say otherwise. It’s tough, I’ll admit that. However, think of it this way. We’re all the same. We all want to be heard by others without fear. Why deny that opportunity to someone else who needs a guiding voice in tough times? I wonder if it’s because people are taught to think only about themselves to survive in the modern world. Why waste time on other people?
I’ll tell you why. We need friends. We need help from people we may not necessarily know well. Everyone needs help to get around in life, whether anyone admits it or not. Listening the right way is a big part of making you the person you want to be because you get others to buy in to what you want to do. You don’t want to make any or many enemies.
People have gotten much better when they were listened to versus being given unsolicited advice. It creates that sense of community that humans thrive on. We were built on community.
Right now, there are people like you and me who just want someone to listen to them when they have serious concerns. They’re afraid of speaking up because of societal factors. You want to look good in front of others and for yourself, right? Let’s take those friendship lessons from manga and apply them for once. It’s a win-win for everyone.
Because listening could be the Bankai someone needs.
#IWILLLISTEN is a hashtag started by NAMI-NYC to get others to listen without judgement or advice to anyone afflicted with mental illness.
Ever since VIZ Media started publishing their own imprint of Weekly Shonen Jump in the United States, I started to notice how one particular section of the magazine began to get a bit more attention. It was the author comments found in every issue. In the Japanese Weekly Shonen Jump, the table of contents had all the titles listed along with their respective author’s comments for the week and this has been going for a very long time.
Their comments can range from topics such as daily life talk to hobbies to wacky accomplishments. Over the past couple of years, I see more and more shots of the comments online as a new issue of Shonen Jump comes out. I wonder about what kind of relationship fans want to have with the creators of series that play a role in one’s mental health.
When I think about comments, I sometimes feel a lot of them are unnecessary. As we all know, some people say some outrageous things that go beyond civil discourse and shouldn’t be said. Hence a lot of advice is given to ignore online comments or shut them down. However, commenting on a topic is a social experience. A lot of people want to be heard. Mangaka, for the most part, have a job where they may be isolated at times. They also may not be the most sociable. Yet mangaka are humans like you and I. Hence why author comments are a thing is because they want their readers who are also human to listen to them.
At the same time, fans want to have some kind of relationship with the mangaka and in a way, these comments help. They help to created a shared reality where both the reader and the mangaka are in the same playing field. I think we focus so much on differences that we forget that we’re all facing life to fulfill our basic needs and wants together.
Seeing the popularity of the Shonen Jump author comments reminds me of how much we need celebrities of any kind to keep us going. While being famous allows a celebrity to gain a microphone towards a large number of people, not every voice is of high quality. Though I suppose it all comes down to the power of prestige, a sense of reputation that’s mesmerizing to many. People tend to look to others with great knowledge and skills as worthy as warriors in a battlefield. Being able to copy or learn from someone with prestige is advantageous if that someone is flat-out amazing in what they do.
Prestige is a very human thing and has its place in psychological growth despite how deceptive it can be.
I will state that mangaka are the right kind of celebrities to follow (within reason, of course). They are very humble, civil, and kind. Mangaka bring a lot of life to others through their work and most important of all, acknowledge the importance of fans’ love of their work. Both sides can learn from each other. The competitiveness of the infamous Shonen Jump weekly ranking system, where fans place their favorite titles for the week through inserted surveys, is an indication of this. It’s a somewhat reciprocal system that goes both ways. Fans provide feedback, mangaka adjust accordingly, fans get rewarded, mangaka get rewarded if the process works well as intended. Most celebrity relationships, if not all, are very one-sided from the fan end.
So yeah, I will tell Eiichiro Oda, Hideaki Sorachi, Yoshihiro Togashi, Kohei Horikoshi, Yuki Tabata, Kaiu Shirai, Shun Saeki, Haruichi Furudate, and the rest of the Shonen Jump mangaka to keep on commenting away because we’re all Jumping towards the grand theme of friendship that unites us instead of divides us.
A year ago, one of my favorite anime/manga series, Noragami, went on hiatus. It’s finally coming back this month and the timing couldn’t have been perfect. I was about to give up the series earlier this year.
I can tell you that I’m a big Noragami fan. I have all 18 volumes of the manga & watched both seasons of the anime and the OVAs. I cosplayed Kazuma from the series. I loved Noragami for providing me an urban fantasy fix. However, I was worried that Volume 18 left off on a cliffhanger and the last chapter released in Japan before the hiatus was supposed to be the end of Volume 19. Volume 19 never got published last year (which I felt it should have been), though it will come out this summer.
I almost made the decision to get rid of all my Noragami volumes. This was because there was no news hinting its return as months went by. I didn’t realize the illness that Adachitoka had was serious. I also had the fear of having too much manga on my shelf that took up my time. Like the character himself, the Noragami manga felt like Yato, the heathen god that he is, barging in with a grin and taking advantage of my hospitality.
Series like Golden Kamuy and Tokyo Ghoul:re started to become permanent in my fixture. I adore both to a huge degree. Shueisha/VIZ Media manga always seemed to have a place on my life and shelf.
I was getting certain fixes that Noragami didn’t fulfill or made me forget the series existed. This passage from an article about the psychology of possessions seems to sum it up best for me.
“Yet there are many times when people willfully dispose of things. This often happens at a key juncture, such as when leaving student life behind, moving home, or during divorce, and can be experienced as a chance for a new start. Old belongings are shed like a carapace, fostering the emergence of a new identity. In the film Fight Club, the troubled character Tyler Durden sees the conflagration of his flat as liberating. ‘It’s only after you’ve lost everything that you’re free to do anything,’ he says.
“
I’m well-aware of what a hiatus means to many manga readers. Fans of series like Berserk, Hunter x Hunter, etc. have internalized the mangaka’s breaks as normal to cope. I also know supporting a manga gets tricky because you never know when mangaka decide to take a hiatus for various reasons or when the publisher decides to cancel the manga, such was the case with VIZ Media and Gintama years ago. Gintama not being published here in the U.S., while the anime will remain ongoing until the very end, still stings me.
At the same time, I felt guilty if I decided to throw away all of Noragami. The story grew on me. I met the editor at NYCC. Some of my favorite memories involved the series. I like how it actually takes a look at the effects of parenting when the parent-in-question has been hurt his whole life. When a series becomes a part of your identity, it becomes very difficult to pull away.
The growing uncertainty of Noragami’s fate was starting to take a small toll on me. You want things to finish. You hate feeling a sense of loss. But the fandom was still going strong as I saw some Noragami cosplayers at Anime NYC. How many of you wanted to stop following a series after a certain point where it felt like more pain than pleasure?
I wonder how Berserk and Hunter x Hunter fans handled all of the hiatuses over the years. You all have it rough.
But I realize that giving up doesn’t have to be permanent. A hiatus doesn’t mean forever. The beauty about reading manga and any other kind of hobby is that you can always go back to it. Time and what you do with it really allows things to heal.
The gods will always bless you as long as you keep an opportunistic eye open.
After what’s happened to 2 famous celebrities that to many people, are so well-off , I want to put these mental health resources out there because it’s tiring to hear people call anyone suffering labels that don’t encourage help.
Suicide Prevention Lifeline (please go this site ASAP if you know someone who is in danger of harming themselves. I know hotlines are 50-50, but it’s better than doing nothing)
Trevor Space (a very LGBTQ-friendly site regarding mental health)
The Road to Resilience (An excellent brochure on how to cope and adapt to life’s troubles as they come)
Terrible, Thanks for Asking (An amazing podcast with stories about regular people who go through all kinds of loss & grief that somehow ends up being very positive to hear.)
If you have any more links to share, you can send them to me. I do have more to say, but I’m a little on edge right now and need a bit of time to think about the role of fandom in mental health.
Take care of yourselves and learn to have that hard conversation with someone you know if they’re struggling with life. We all can do better for one’s life just like others have done for us.
“Our otaku bond is so important to us…that we’d never jeopardize it by falling in love, right!?”
I may not very well-versed in romance (though most people aren’t, I suppose), but there was something about a romantic comedy anime/manga that made me think about relationships with those who share the same interests as you. For most guys, they want their potential girlfriend to be like them (yet disdain those who “fake” their interests despite the possibility that those women were afraid to say anything in the past because of the overwhelming majority opinion against geek interests). Having a geek girlfriend was something I desired at one point. As Wotakoi: Love Is Hard for Otaku has shown me so far, I thought about how chemistry between people can be a recipe for disaster.
Wotakoi covers a couple of otaku named Hirotaka Nifuji and Narumi Momose, who decided to get into a relationship after running into each other at work. Both of them knew each other from childhood. Narumi had a history of bad relationships through the years. When she runs into Hirotaka, he convinces her to be with him, so that she wouldn’t face disappointment, fear, anxiety and more importantly, he can help with video game fetch quests and other otaku-related activities. Narumi accepts with no hesitation. The story covers their budding romance with support from a secondary otaku couple and a possible 3rd couple.
Reading Wotakoi makes you think about and appreciate the joys of being around people with similar interests to you. The couples spend time together going to places like Animate and Comiket. They also find the time to play video games together in person or online. It’s important to find friends to share your interests with, though what happens when love comes into the picture.
When Hirotaka and Narumi see each other at work the next day (they’re both coworkers), Narumi didn’t know to talk to Hirotaka. It became evident that once Hirotaka took his stance for Narumi, things became awkward. The other couple in the series and fellow coworkers as well, Hanako Koyanagi and Taro Kabakura, have been a couple since adolescence. Hanako and Kabakura get into a fight about their relationship in an early chapter of the series. They are known to fight all the time, but have never reached a breaking point. Hanako once cried to Narumi about the potential fragility of her relationship.
“When we’re together, I can’t help but wonder…am I really good enough for him? He shouldn’t settle for me just because it’s hard for otaku to date normal people. Like, I wonder if we’re only together because it’s easy to be with a fellow otaku.”
Kabakura does reassure Hanako that he loves her for more than just fandom-related reasons. Narumi, however, thinks about her past relationships going down the drain because she revealed that she was an otaku to them. Hirotaka tells Narumi that he loves her for who she is and he likes seeing her do things that make her happy. However, Hirotaka sometimes feels as if he’s not someone who can communicate their feelings with their partner in an effective manner when compared to Kabakura or Hanako.
The tension between Narumi and Hirotaka compared to Kabakura and Hanako reminds me of how much chemistry is overvalued and dangerous in a relationship. Sure, a spark helps get you going. It’s nice to share common ground, but Hirotaka’s “confession” to Narumi brings up a good point in that it takes more than spending time together and hobbies that make a relationship special. Relationships come down to how much you’re willing to sacrifice for your partner in a way that helps BOTH you and them.
Sparks flame out over time. They also jeopardize people’s feelings in relationships that may turn out to be bad overall. I had a friend who was divorced due to her ex-husband cheating on her during the marriage. When I asked my friend why she got with him, it was because she felt a spark. There were warning signs that her ex-husband wasn’t what it seemed, but she felt that chemistry was going to save the day. My friend internalized the cheating as something that can be solved with re-affirmed love. It took her ex-husband’s attempts for legal action to make my friend see the light.
Feeling sparks and craving chemistry mean you don’t feel the need to do anything for the relationship because everything will work out just like the romantic media we see. Chemistry is still important, but thinking of it as the penultimate solution to relationship problems will get you depressed in a hurry. In Wotakoi, Kabakura and Hanako have a great relationship despite their constant fighting. Both are willing to get genuine reactions from each other and reciprocate in kind.
So I will be blunt here: your love for (insert favorite series/characters) ain’t gonna save you when important issues like finances, housing, putting food on the table, and career planning need to be confronted. And your interests can change over time. I mean, I don’t feel compelled to watch as much anime as I did in the past despite my interest in manga still high.
I want to end this look at Wotakoi by focusing on the theme park date that both Hirotaka and Narumi go on around Volume 3 of the manga. It was somewhat unusual for both as they went to a place that wasn’t otaku-centered and decided to not discuss anything otaku-related there. During the date, Hirotaka begins to feel that the difference in life experiences between he and Narumi to be wide. Hirotaka isn’t a sociable person and mostly spends his free time playing games, while Narumi has dealt with people over the years since they last saw each other in middle school. When Hanako tells him it’s fine to take it slow and he sees that Narumi does have an interest in making him happy, Hirotaka feels content.
All of that reminds me of this article on geek dating. The gist of it was don’t date someone completely like you, ie. My Hero Academia fans shouldn’t date only fellow MHA fans. Find someone who is “different enough” (ie. MHA fans can try and date, I don’t know, Golden Kamuy fans), so they can stimulate you and make you see things from a new light. Most relationships don’t last unfortunately. It doesn’t mean that you can’t do the one thing that’s important in life - learn from those experiences to be a better person. That’s why it’s suggested that one should aim for some differences in a partner because life is all about handling diverse views and opinions.
(Maybe that’s why my parents (and other folks) have a strong marriage for 30+ years despite my mom being a mature, calm adult and my dad being angry and lazy. They had different personalities, but shared similar core values about life and wanted to be there for each other. Hm.)
That’s what I get from following Wotakoi. Hirotaka (the gamer), Narumi (the fujoshi), Hanako (the cosplayer/fujoshi), and Kabakura (bishojo lover & mainstream guy) are all willing to appreciate each other because the differences in their interests and personalities aren’t so wide that they ruin lives. They’re reasonable enough to the point where growth happens. Plus, no one is ever truly alike. There are studies stating that differences in couples can make the relationship strong.
Love really is hard for otaku though. Reading shojo manga won’t make it easier. If there’s one thing you get from Wotakoi, it’s that to be there for each other with genuine and mutual trust like a shonen protagonist has for their loved ones.
In an age where there’s a variety of jobs related to fandom that people can find and love, most of us who are fans ourselves and would love to work those jobs. One of the most common statements that guidance counselors/job experts throw out is to find our passion. Passion is what gets us by. Passion is what we need to be successful. While those statements are thrown out like mad, there’s some growing evidence that finding a passion for what we love doesn’t end well.
I want to talk about a study that came out that counters the effects of passion because I want to make sure that any of you anime/manga fans that want to use it for professional reasons become burned out or worse, disillusioned.
So this study on how much passion matters that I’m going to talk about focused on those who were told to find their passion in whatever they’re interested in. There were two sets of groups of students being tested. One had a fixed mindset, meaning they felt that things were destined to happened to them and they didn’t need to put much effort, while the other group had a growth mindset, the idea that they are always willing to learn and put up with the work to make things happen.
Both groups were put through multiple tests to see how much passion had an effect. It turns out anyone with the growth mindset got through the tests with less stress than those with the fixed mindset. Those with the fixed mindset flamed out when confronted with anything that was considered challenging in their eyes.
To put it bluntly and in the perspective of a shonen protagonist, you got to be willing to train yourself for an arc, maybe even longer, and then you may enjoy the work.
I worry about statements like “finding your passion” because they signify that you’re special and you deserve it. You don’t need to work hard once you find your passion. I remember hearing someone like Danny Choo talk about how they found their passion and that’s how they succeeded. But have they ever talked about how you need to be able to put up with a lot of personalities who have different opinions if you’re going down that route? Probably not, because not many people want to hear how hard certain things can be.
I have a passion for manga and psychology, but it didn’t start off smooth. There were rough edges. I used to enjoy only shonen manga for years before taking a chance with seinen and josei titles. It was this blog that helped me open my eyes to new titles. I wanted to put in the effort and more importantly, learn (the biggest key because effort for effort’s sake doesn’t go anywhere). Compare that to anime, where I thought I had a passion for watching it because I grew up on it. I had a point where I watched a bunch of anime every season for a couple of years, but I arguably had a fixed mindset for anime while having a growth mindset for manga.
The psychologists behind this new counter-passion study compared their findings to romance - if you feel like you’re destined to find the one true love to save you is only going to leave you in tears. Sounds like the plot of most generic shojo manga, doesn’t it?
If you’re interested in working with the anime and manga industries, you better be ready to handle watching/reading series you may not be interested in at all. If you can’t do that, can you really say that you’re passionate about anime/manga as a whole? It’s fine to say that you have an interest (because getting caught up in fandom rants isn’t attractive to professionals), so maybe it’s better to say that you’re passionate about a certain series instead of an entire medium.
At the same time, I do think that the growth mindset doesn’t apply to everyone. Most of us want to be told we’re special. If you think about the genius character archetypes, they don’t want to be compared to people who have to put in effort and are willing to learn. Yet over time as we see in certain series, those genius characters get put down a peg when they realize they can’t transfer their amazing talent in one area to other aspects in life.
Maybe we just have to change our mindsets when it comes to the meaning of work because life, not just our jobs, is work to begin with. Work is boring, yes, but it can be fun with the right perspective.
I’ll end this with a quote from a family service member in an article I read about the unrealistic expectations of finding a “perfect” romantic partner a la passion. This quote sums up the reality of it all.
“I’m not in love with my husband. I’m very fond of him.”
Accept all the qualities that your interests have to offer, even if they are bad, if you want to develop those interests into something better. If you’re not that passionate about something that you thought you were, don’t force yourself if you can’t bring that passion back. Finally, passion doesn’t just come out of nowhere. It builds when you’re doing something that feels worthwhile to you. The more you do something that’s enjoyable to you, the more you will grow to like it.
I think everyone needs an anime episode/manga chapter arc where passions are revealed to be a “hidden enemy” behind it all. That might be a fix of monumental growth that we can gush over in fandom squeals.
It didn’t feel that long, but one of the biggest manga hits of the 2010s’ ended last week. Tokyo Ghoul and its often-overwhelming cast of characters are now a part of modern manga history. While the ending did come a bit sudden and may not have pleased a lot of fans, I want to focus on one theme that Sui Ishida, the series’ creator, perhaps wanted to convey in the end and one that relates to the current generation of youth and young adults - the desire to help can go wrong.
Way back in the introduction of the series, our tragic hero, Ken Kaneki, decided to undergo combat training from his now-current wife, Touka Kirishima, when he witnessed CCG investigators take part in murdering the Ghoul mother of a innocent young Ghoul whose only crime was that she existed. He said that he was tired of being helpless. During the Anteiku raid arc in Volumes 13-14 of the original Tokyo Ghoul, Kaneki had to make a decision in whether to save the home that accepted him from the very start or run for his life. Kaneki chose the former despite the high possibility of death and a plea from his friend, Shu Tsukiyama. Kaneki told Tsukiyama that he was tired of being helpless. In the end, Kaneki ends up nearly dead at the hands of the CCG’s premier warrior, Kisho Arima and becomes a “new” character working for the CCG at the start of Tokyo Ghoul:re.
Throughout Tokyo Ghoul:re, Kaneki regains his sense of self, only to be manipulated into starting a catastrophe that would turn most of Tokyo’s citizens into ghouls. During a situation in the final arc where he is almost forced to leave a friend he made at the CCG, Kaneki becomes distraught and repeated that he hates being unable to do anything (though he does save them with no problem). Shortly afterwards, Kaneki reunites with his childhood friend who disappeared, Hideyoshi Nagachika. Hide’s fate was unknown after he ran into a deranged Kaneki in Volume 14 of the original Tokyo Ghoul. When Hide reveals what happened to him when they were last together, Kaneki makes another proclamation that he wants to do something to save Tokyo with the help of all his friends this time.
In the last chapter, Kaneki and Hide talk to each other. Kaneki ponders on how he should live his life given the fact that while things ended well for him, a lot of people are still suffering because of him. Kaneki was about to make another “I’ll keep fighting because I hate that I can’t do anything” statement, but Hide finishes it for him. There’s an inside joke about how many times Kaneki said it throughout the series.
Kaneki’s inner helplessness, in many ways, is a lot like how today’s modern adult might think. They are anxious, stressed and insecure about their role in life. They want to feel self-sufficient enough to the point where they aren’t a burden to others. At the same time, the stronger one becomes, the harder it might become to embrace their loved ones. It’s like when you go from a simple employee to a manager. You used to be best friends with your coworkers because you were all on the same level, but now that you have to supervise them, the relationship changes and it may not be for the best. A better example would be someone in a relationship/marriage whose life almost always revolves around work. They get promoted and gain more status, but their relationship/marriage becomes damaged over time due to the lack of meaningful time spent together at home.
The journey to gain strength in any way is often a lonely one, despite whatever help you get along the way. Being by yourself a lot can mean that you start to think to yourself many thoughts. They may be thoughts that you don’t want anyone to know. Solitude is great to discover what you want in life, but it’s not good when you doubt yourself a lot.
Kaneki’s childhood was filled with neglect and abuse. His mother died from overwork and his aunt never appreciated him as much as his mother did. However, it turns out that Kaneki’s mother abused him and that he repressed memories of her abuse as a defense mechanism. Kaneki only had Hide to rely on back then. Once he became a half-Ghoul hybrid and started to gain strength, Kaneki felt that he wanted to protect everything close to him. He began to develop a savior complex.
A savior complex is a condition where the person who has it feels that they are responsible for the lives of others. More often than not, the savior doesn’t care about their well-being and will do anything to gain the approval of others. Over time, readers see Kaneki lose control of his mind once something bad happens. His naivety and one-sided optimism causes him to have breakdowns over and over again.
When thinking about his life at the end, Kaneki makes a comment about wanting to be appreciated by anyone in one last inner world moment with the Ghoul that sparked everything, Rize Kamishiro. Rize confronted Kaneki about how his “selfless” actions turned out to hurt the people around him in the end. Kaneki rationalized his role as an important figure in Ghoul history to be good for the benefit of humanity, while not caring who he hurt in the process because it was for the sake of protecting Ghouls.
This reminds me of a previous post I wrote about passion and how it deludes someone. Having a purpose in life is a good thing, but if you’ve never built any resilience with the help of others, then any difficulty you can’t overcome starts to feel like a natural disaster.
The irony to all of this is that we all need to help each other at times. For most of history, teams and groups are what make accomplishments happen. We all kind of have a savior complex, so how do we make sure it doesn’t get out of hand? The easiest thing to do, as Tokyo Ghoul:re shows in its last grand sequence of events, is to trust and let people help you. Kaneki lets his allies help him and doesn’t question any of them unlike in previous occasions. Other people want to feel that they can do something important for someone in their lives, like you do. We’re more similar than you think.
Finally, I believe that finding meaning is more important than finding purpose. You don’t need to feel that you have to be a hero. Having a purpose is only one part of the grand picture. Find peace in the relationships you have with other people. Kaneki tells Rize that despite all the tragedy he’s faced in the series, he feels blessed that he got to develop wonderful relationships with the people he’s met in his life through those experiences. Those negative moments gave birth to positive moments, which gave Kaneki a sense of meaning and a renewed faith to do good things within reason.
Look at both the good and the bad in front of you and you might find the answer in-between. Only looking fully at one side causes a lot of stress that can’t help you function well. Embracing a part of both worlds, like Kaneki, can open you to a world that’s as beautiful as Sui Ishida’s art itself.
I want to say adieu to Sui Ishida and the Tokyo Ghoul universe. Things may have been hectic before the end, but the most important you did was to make the best of what you wanted to do. Tokyo Ghoul has made me think about my own desire to be important. Thank you and may you find joy in your future, even if it doesn’t mean drawing manga again.
What’s the first thing you can think of when it comes to angry young men? Maybe that they’re just being boys. Maybe they should be angry. Maybe they’re dangerous. Maybe that’s the norm for them. There’s one angry young man that’s been getting the hearts of anime and manga fans everywhere. I’m talking about the one and only Katsuki Bakugo from My Hero Academia. His personality has traits similar to boys with anger management problems, but it’s those traits that make Bakugo very human because we’re in a world where men get mixed messages on how to be a real man, much less a hero.
Bakugo is described to have a bad attitude among his peers and mentors. He grew up picking on the protagonist, Izuku “Deku” Midoriya, for years. Bakugo believes in his own strength to be a hero. He refuses to cooperate with other hero trainees unless it’s necessary. Bakugo is foul-mouthed, prideful, arrogant, rude, etc. The negative qualities never seem to end with him. Yet deep down, Bakugo wants to be like the most famous hero of them all, All Might - a hero who doesn’t back down from anyone and will win at any costs.
Bakugo’s psychological profile is one of an angry young man. They sometimes grew up without many friends. There’s a great sense of loneliness within them. They also don’t get taught how to express their emotions. The culture of masculinity tells young men to be strong because that’s what being a man is - never showing weakness. Early on in childhood, Bakugo picks on Deku for being weak. He chastises him repeatedly even when the latter even decides to help him one time. When Deku becomes a powerful hero through specific circumstances, Bakugo feels a sense of inferiority towards him because he always felt that he was stronger and better than him in everything.
There came a point in the story where the series’ mainstay villains, the League of Villains, kidnaps Bakugo in order to recruit him. Bakugo’s negative traits make him borderline evil. Bakugo, however, refuses to join the League. He even stands up to the group saying that he admires All Might more than them. Bakugo provides a different type of narrative that we don’t see hear enough of - that angry young men can be righteous at heart.
Bakugo wants to do good and understand life around him. This becomes very apparent in a very heated confrontation with Izuku that I wrote about a while back. The UA heroes went to rescue Bakugo, but it left him confused and wondering what he could’ve done to help All Might after the latter is forced to retire. Bakugo’s feelings were on full display during his latest fight with Deku. In a conversation between his mother Mitsuki Bakugo and the hero Shota Aizawa before the fight, Mitsuki, who’s also aggressive, reveals that much of her son’s aggression comes from the constant praise he got from people for everything he did when he was little.
Many young men lack meaning in their lives. In a sense, they want something to do that makes them feel appreciated. However, they are told to find the answers themselves. You can compare this to the lack of care towards young military soldiers who come back home and feel out of place. They’ve been told to win for their country, only to find that they may not be welcomed back with open arms.
Bakugo’s nature is to win over all his enemies. Combine that with his natural-born talent and all the constant praise to boost his self-esteem is a bad formula. It can create the bullying nature that we’re all trying to stamp out. Bakugo’s self-worth was based on his own perception to be the best hero that wins every time. I’m going to quote a line from a recent interview about how individualism goes wrong.
“On the one hand, putting all the focus on the individual as the locus of success can be a good thing because you’re saying to people, “You can do anything; you can change the world on your own two feet,” and that’s incredibly motivating.
But this is also a bad thing because we give ourselves too much credit for successes and too much blame for failures. The problem with individualism is that it ignores the fact that we’re social creatures, that we live and survive and succeed in tribes. We call ourselves failures, we call ourselves losers, and that’s the beginning of a descent into a range of dangerous mental health problems.”
This describes Bakugo in a nutshell. People unintentionally put him on a pedestal where he believes that being the best hero matters. When he falls and/or goes through reality checks, Bakugo freaks out over why he isn’t as strong as he thought.
Bakugo reminds me of many young folks (including myself) in growing individualist societies who were told they are “special” at a young age and it does harm in ways one doesn’t expect. They don’t learn how to handle conflict and build resilience. They always compare themselves to others to determine their worth. And it’s not their fault. These past 20 or so years have seen the push of self-esteem as a way to live a good life when in reality, it’s more of the result of a good life.
And speaking of a good life, Bakugo gets excellent teaching at UA High School. He begins to learn how to be less angry and appreciate friends who want to help him. His best moment during his time at UA High was when he tells a young kid who was arrogant like him that if you’re focused on looking down on others, you never face your own weaknesses. It helps that Bakugo has the support of Aizawa and All Might, two top heroes and mentors who always believed in him. Going through all kinds of experiences with loving guidance is making Bakugo a better person at using his emotional explosions at the right time.
That’s why I like Bakugo or should I say, how he grows as the series goes on. I find him to be a good case study on how to change a youth full of rage. Reading about Bakugo makes me realize that boys shouldn’t grow up to be emotionless beings because that goes against what it means to be human.
Why aren’t we investing enough in angry young men or making sure they process that anger in a healthy manner? Our future is going to be full of them as institutions continue to crumble. These men, like Bakugo, want to feel valued. I wonder if it’s because of how most people view anger as an issue that shouldn’t be touched. After all, emotions of that kind signal a sense of fear to stay away. Anger is “supposed” to lead to violence when that’s not true. It is a normal emotion that everyone feels and without anger, certain rights for people wouldn’t have been fought for. One reason I write this blog is because I’m angry that people don’t understand the importance of mental health. However, I know that anger is dangerous if I let it motivate me to get mad at every little thing out there.
Anger is never enough. That’s why we need to show and teach love to the young men who feel lost in today’s world. We have to know that deep down, they are human beings like you and I. Let’s ask young men how they are feeling. We can show that we’re not that much different from each other.
Bakugo was supposed to be a character that fans would hate, not top popularity polls. But it shows that maybe we can look past the hate and see young men like Bakugo for what they are - real people who can be heroes in their communities and not bound by systems designed to keep them down.
It was pretty much a nostalgia trip. I was reminded of why I loved the series back when it was huge in the U.S. a decade ago.
Watching the movie also reminded me of my 20′s, where I was very enthusiastic about anything I was into. BLEACH was a big part of my early adulthood. I loved the poems, character theme songs, zanpakuto, Tite Kubo’s art, etc.When you’re young, you tend to focus more on style than substance. You’re trying to figure things out while having a sense of freedom that starts to become constraining.
Next thing you know, people you knew back in the day start to gain accomplishments in their lives professionally and personally. When BLEACH was a thing, I was just chilling back and enjoying all the nerdy stuff. I didn’t seem to care about adulthood. BLEACH was a big part of me going “Yeah, I want to protect things important to me and have fun.” I once considered a former friend to be my Rukia.
I was still going through the early stages of my depression and had constant fights with my parents about my future. I went through a delayed adolescence. I felt my life was already set in stone and I didn’t need to put in a lot of effort.
In a strange way, I was basically BLEACH - wanting lots of style, but in the long-term, that style would bring me great harm. And it started to hit me slowly because I learned how hard life really was. I couldn’t be like Ichigo Kurosaki and will my way through. To this day, there are things that I wish I could have done differently.
Being in your 20′s is a tough experience. You are trying to get respect, but people still treat you like you’re nobody even if you put effort. A former co-worker of mine who celebrated her birthday with me said that she was glad to be 30. She said her 20′s were a tumultuous time for her. My sister also told me that she was glad that she’s in her 30′s.
I started to feel the same way myself being in the mid-30′s range. I’m starting to understand many things about life. I like being at an age range where I feel really responsible and wise. Although it’s been harder to make new friends, I managed to make a few over time. I also grew out of that pseudo-weeaboo phase I had during my 20′s.
So when I saw BLEACH and heard the crowd going nuts over fan-favorite characters like Uryu Ishida and Byakuya Kuchiki, I wonder how we can use that nostalgia to help us go forward. I’ve felt dumb for following BLEACH for a long time even though I knew the story wasn’t improving, but I’ve learned to acknowledge that the past is a part of me. If it wasn’t for BLEACH, I wouldn’t have gotten into Gintama, which would later get me more interested in other manga series beyond the popular ones. I know that some fans were in their teens when BLEACH was popular and they may have used it to move forward during their 20′s today.
The past serves a purpose - it provides a guideline to the future. We learn from our experiences to make better decisions going forward.
In a way, we have to make sense of our lives and anime/manga, no matter how old the series, is a medium that can help. If your nostalgic about certain anime/manga series, it’s cool with me if they helped you grow. It isn’t easy being a young adult.
There’s another thing I re-learned from watching the BLEACH movie and wanted to tell you all - it’s that getting protected by someone when you get older isn’t a bad thing.
This weekend made me wish we all had a Rukia Kuchiki available in our closets when we need her.
Since it’s time to go back to school for a lot of kids and young adults, I want to focus on a topic that’s still a concern today using a underrated comedy manga worth reading despite it ending a few years ago.
When it comes to anime and manga, you know your character is popular when they have two huge harrowing flashback arcs. The super-popular Usui “Switch” Kazuyoshi from Kenta Shinohara’s Sket Dance is an individual with two tragic paths that defined his life. The first involved the death of his younger brother while the 2nd dealt with his seclusion from society. I’m going to discuss the impact of the 2nd flashback arc, “Switch On” (Volumes 27-28, Chapters 241-251), and how it relates to seeing the bullying epidemic from a different point of view.
Switch’s path to redemption began when Yusuke “Bossun” Fujisaki and Onizuka “Himeko” Hime were looking for a third member to join their upcoming school club, the Sket Dan. While discussing the search for a new member, both were approached by a student who needed their help in finding someone who has been targeting random students via a forum website. The perpetrator was threatening them via e-mail to fight each other with the loser of the fight being shown all across the Internet. The Sket-Dan relied on Switch, who became a shut-in after the events of the 1st flashback arc, “Switch Off”, to help them find the culprit. They learned that the students being threatened were bullies and the culprit was a victim of one. This person knew about the bullies’ past misdeeds and used their actions as blackmail.
At first, the Sket Dan set up a trap to capture the administrator of the anti-bully website. However, they learned that the person they caught was a former admin of the site. The real culprit turned out to be Switch himself as he wanted to administer justice towards those who hurt others. After some violent altercations, Bossun manages to convince Switch to put his talents for good use by “opening” the door for him to going outside and live life once more.
With all the talk about bullying in today’s world, things aren’t so black and white. The story shows how there is so much grey in-between to complicate things. Bullies can be victims, while victims can be bullies. The bullies that Switch threatened all did terrible things to others. From selling scam tickets to using other students to boost their grades, why would they do such things?
Two key factors emerge when it comes to children becoming bullies - poor social problem-solving skills and poor academic skills. We also can’t forget about the environment of the school itself. There are times where bullying is encouraged because it signifies strength and character. School officials throw a blind eye to bullies because of this.
The student, Kenichi Katagiri, that approached the Sket-Dan in the first place was a former bully himself. His reasoning was that his parents kept pressuring to maintain his grades. At first, Katagiri wanted steal other students’ notes and then his harmful behavior grew as he didn’t face consequences until the emergence of the “punishment” forum website. He said his actions helped to relieve his stress.
Katagiri wasn’t able to talk to friends about his problems or reason with his parents over his academic life. And he paid the price for his actions towards his victims. However, Switch and the former admin of the website aren’t arguably any better.
Switch told Bossun that anyone who hurts others deserved to face punishment. His methods were more extreme as he was the person who came up with the “death fight” to ruin the lives of bullies. Switch noticed that the school that he and the Sket Dance cast went to, Kaimei High School, had instances of bullying that left victims in fear. He wanted to fight back in his own way. However, Switch’s actions would come back to haunt him as the former admin and all the victims of Switch’s justice decided to fight back.
Even good people become warped bullies. Something changes once people with honest intentions start to have the power to change things. They start to abuse it for reasons that benefit the self. For bullies and bully-victims (which Switch somewhat is, although he was more of victim of circumstances than bullying), their actions aim to protect the self from any negative emotions they begin to feel. They don’t feel compelled to reach out to others at all.
Bully-victims tend to have a very poor view about themselves. Switch held on to the idea that he deserved to be punished for causing the death of his brother in the past to the point that it created an inner conflict in his mind. Should I fight for justice? Am I right? Am I being ironic? Why haven’t I been punished for my own actions? The natural defense for Switch was to rationalize his actions and be stuck in a cycle of confirmation bias where he believed he was beyond help.
What I and many others can learn from the “Switch On” arc is that friendship matters in stopping bullying. Great friends will do what it takes to help each other, even if it means saying “no” to stop them from doing bad things. Punishment, discipline, etc can help in certain cases, but bullies are human beings that might need help in the worst way. The shaming that punishment does is label bullies in a way that they never feel compelled to become nice people. Why? Because they will naturally feel defensive and resentful. Bossun and Himeko went to great lengths to be friends with Switch. They saved Switch from getting punished by his victims and literally broke into Switch’s room to push him out of his self-guilt, with Bossun ending up taking all the hits from everyone to stop both sides from taking it out on each other.
The whole story’s a good lesson in how to prevent a cycle of bullying. Be careful about spouting justice, righteousness, judgement, punishment, etc. as those words can be triggers that can lead to something worse. It’s words like these that have encouraged a culture of shaming (especially online) where we really have no nuance or context about what happened and the outrage isn’t that much different than a bully’s. Bossun even asks“Is it okay for people to mercilessly attack the ‘bully’ without knowing who he really is?”
Anger will never defeat anger. Love that respects everyone’s boundaries will. I know it’s hard to say this, but bullies deserve that love because as Bossun once told Switch when they talked online, people can change if you give them the chance to. Far too often, not many people give those opportunities to change because anger is encouraged as the way to deal with conflict. Bullying has to be treated as a public health concern. There’s been community initiatives that treat violence in harsh communities as a disease and it’s done wonders for anyone who’s lived through violence as they start to see life beyond all the chaos.
We need to give bullies who want to change the chance to “Switch” on and believe they can be the protagonists that they can be.
Way before Inio Asano became one of the most recognized, loved and respected mangaka today with hits like Goodnight Punpun, Girl on the Shore, and Dead Dead Demon’s Dededede Destruction, he published a 2-volume series on a young adult couple trying to make something of their lives with music called Solanin. I wrote about the manga many years ago and enjoyed its take on what it means to have freedom as you get older.
To sum up Chapter 29 (the original manga ended in 28 chapters), Meiko Inoue, the female lead, is going through life in her ‘30s. She has a new boyfriend named Yuki and is pregnant with his child. Her best friend, Ai, is still around, while two of her former band mates, Kato and Billy, are still performing in shows. In the end of the chapter, Meiko comments about the period she went through with her then-boyfriend, Taneda Shingo, who was killed in an accident. She wonders about what she and her friends were trying to chase with their freedom in their ‘20s. Meiko then notes that while her life is now dull, she’s content with living her life as a future mother to the end.
The epilogue can be considered an ambiguous closure to a series that had a somewhat happy ending. Solanin’s ending had Meiko take over as band leader for Taneda’s band and pursue something bigger than herself. You can say that Meiko grew out of it in the epilogue. Or you can look at it this way - her priorities changed as she continued to age.
What’s fascinating about the Solanin epilogue is that Asano seems to take a play at the idea of a “true self.” The true self suggests that we are deep down, good people who want to do well in life and help others. During her ‘20s, Meiko kept wanting to find her passion in life. She wanted to look for her true self. The 2017-2018 version of Meiko is a lot more realistic about her aspirations. The Meiko in her ‘20s would look down on today’s Meiko or wouldn’t foresee her future in that way.
Meiko reminisces about why she went after the demon that was freedom in the past. What was the point if in the end, she would lose? We live in a time where a lot of young people have the freedom to choose what they want to be, yet ironically, we have rising rates of depression and anxiety among the youth. What Meiko seemed to have settled into was the idea that opportunities can be found in areas that may not be exciting to her at first. She found joy in being in the safety of a man who truly cares about her. Meiko developed a new passion - protecting the people she cares about.
Asano did an afterword about Solanin in the epilogue and talked about what the epilogue was trying to say - there’s no clear answers to life, we’re not always gonna achieve our dreams, and nothing lasts forever. However, all we can do is focus on the present and change ourselves as needed. I do think that Asano is trying to preach what it really means to be mindful. True mindfulness is looking beyond yourself. A lot of what’s mindfulness in the modern world is about relieving your own stress, when in terms of the Buddhist principles behind it, mindfulness is about being in touch with what you’re feeling at the moment (good or bad), noticing what’s around you, and not running away from those feelings/thoughts.
That’s how I sum up the new Meiko - she’s just become super-aware, feels somewhat crappy about how life has gone for her, navigated her thoughts, and made peace with those feelings by accepting them. As a result, she’s happy, according to the words of her best friend, Ai.
Meiko’s new path isn’t going to be liked by many and might be treated as “totally Asano (ie depressing, open-ended ending).” However, one can see it like this - even though loss will happen, one of the things that comes out of loss is meaningful connection with others. We may feel vulnerable, but we feel joyful when our negative experiences are shared and validated. Never forget that human beings were born to stick together in groups through tough times.
And that is a melody worth singing to the end of time~
If you ever filled out the International Anime Research Project Anime Surveys that came out every year since 2014, its head researcher did a presentation called “Anime Fan Psychology” at Animefest 2018 in Dallas this past month and a fan recorded the whole panel for users to see.
If you’re interested in what head researcher, Stephen Reysen, Ph.D had to say in the panel, here are some key takeaways from it.
- Anime fans are generally very young (18-24), go to college, and largely white males. - People who aren’t into anime don’t want to be around anime fans unless they have to be, but they note that anime fans can be very competent. - Anime fans aren’t usually extroverted, but they are open to new experiences. - Anime fans are obsessive about their shows and characters. - Anime fans can be very social towards other people (though it helps when they are around other anime fans). - The internet is still a major force in finding out about anime. - Anime fans felt that if they belonged, they felt distinct compared to others. - Autism is more prevalent in anime fans than other notable mental health disorders (mood, anxiety, ADHD). - Offline meet-ups (ie conventions) matter more in anime fandom than online conversations in feeling socially connected. - Anime fans are less sexist than most people.
This panel is worth a watch if you’re a psychology student or professional. There’s some notable food for thought when it comes to understanding anime fans and their place in the geek hemisphere. You get to see numbers that make sense when you think about it.
Like every series that involves basic psychology, the mind is a prime target in order to understand and help improve the well-being of those who need it.
For all the talk about manga sales over the past few years, we haven’t really had a totally new manga publisher break into the scene. It’s mostly been Viz Media, Kodansha Comics, Vertical Comics, Yen Press, Seven Seas, Dark Horse and a few others.
In comes the return of former Vertical Marketing Director and one of the most-respected manga experts out there, Ed Chavez, and his new manga publishing company, Denpa, which was announced at a fun otaku social gathering during Otakon 2018.
If you’re wondering why Denpa is a thing and in my opinion, is necessary, it’s because there’s a bigger audience for manga than just teenagers and we need to go to that audience as interest in manga becomes more steady.
I feel like there’s way too much focus on youth-friendly titles. In a couple of interviews with Forbes& ICv2, Ed talks about how a lot of the licensed-to-English manga titles are a bit too similar. So many titles for boys are action. So many titles for girls are about romance. There’s too many harem-friendly, fantasy titles. You name it - there seems to be little differentiation. Here are two quotes I pulled from each interview related to what I’m talking about regarding the U.S. market.
“After years of working in the industry, I came to the realization that the readership for manga has long felt that the manga that was being localized was generally very same-y. Most Shonen Jump titles have the same themes. Many shojo titles tend to follow familiar tropes. But manga isn’t like that.” (from ICv2)
“To be honest, this is more a question for the consumer than for us. For Denpa, our mission is to release some of the best works from within Japan’s comics scene. And that means creating a catalog that is more substantial than simply releasing action-heavy comics for boys and sexually-tinged fantasies where the lead character is teleported into orc/dragon-filled worlds.” (from Forbes)
As I pointed out in my post about the psychology of anime fans as reported by researchers, the audience for anime and manga tends to skew on the young side (18-24 as the oldest range). They also tend to be somewhat impatient and more importantly, they don’t have as much money as people would think. It can be difficult to sustain a business on that type of audience despite notable successes like Crunchyroll.
I’ve heard stories from friends who tell me about people in their ‘30s-’40s who are into anime or discovered anime fandom and wanted to be a part of it. I know the major audience of anime conventions are teens to young adults, but the old folks want to have fun too. I’ve seen elderly folks at cons in cosplay who enjoyed themselves. I wish the industries try harder to appeal to people past their ‘30s. A friend and I agreed that Crunchyroll should try to market more to that audience because they are the ones who have more purchasing power.
Sadly I know this isn’t always the case because a lot of anime and manga fans grow out of fandom past their early ‘20s. I knew a few and I couldn’t convince them to come back. Or they come back and just stick to the stuff they liked as teens.
“Q: From what I have read, baby boomers have all the money and are projected to live a very long time. So, why do you think that marketers ignore them?
A: In short, marketers ignore mature people because we hate them. All the ‘reasons’ for ignoring older people are bullshit. Ignoring mature people and obsessing over millennials is just narcissism disguised as strategy. It is marketing by selfie-stick.”
It’s thoughts like this (even though I’m not always fond of past generations) that make me appreciate Denpa and the initial lineup of manga they have out. Inside Mari is a good series for an older audience. PEZ looks great. And good grief, the classic gambling manga, Kaiji, is going to be in print thanks to Denpa! I really hope everyone gets a chance to check them out (and other titles they have in store) when they’re released.
Older folks who are tired of shonen and shojo want to feel respected and appreciated. We want to stand out in our own way too. I sometimes feel that young people are appreciated a bit too much because of “potential.” They can change things, but they often need the help of someone wiser beyond their years to do so. It takes both young and old to create a strong community, especially if the English markets want to be compared to the Japanese market or even places like France.
I also think this focus on “potential” makes youth feel machine-like in that they only exist to be achievers while they still have their edge or else they’re doomed forever. That sounds ageist to me.
Ed may be known to some fans as the “Vertical Inc. guy” due to his past accomplishments there. It’s unfair to call him that now, so let’s call him the one manga lover who is creating a wonderful transition for older manga readers to titles for those who want a taste for more savory and diverse options that show how aging is a beautiful thing when you let it be so.
21 years ago, a then-unknown anime director took the anime world by storm with an animated feature on the dangers of the cult of celebrity. It was a tour-de-force that showcased what happens when reality and imagination come together to create a horrific vision for anyone suffering its grasp. Satoshi Kon’s psychological horror classic Perfect Blue, which was re-released to audiences in American theaters on September 2018, is a film whose tale holds up today in a society obsessed with fame.
I won’t focus on the celebrity aspect of the film as many other recent articles have ventured into. Instead, I want to talk about the film’s usage of mental health with regards to certain specific disorders tied to its theme.
Warning: Heavy spoilers will be discussed here as I will go in-depth on certain incidents that happened.
Perfect Blue centers around a young woman named Mima Kirigoe and her road to becoming a mainstream actress in Tokyo. After performing in a idol group for some time, Mima announced to the media that she would become a full-fledged actress. However, this displeases many fans of her idol work and the movie’s beginning shows an anonymous fax sent to Mima, labeling her a “traitor.” Mima later discovers that there’s a blog with her name on it called “Mima’s Room.” The blog details every aspect of her life and what she does when not working as if Mima wrote it herself. At the same time, several murders involving Mima’s entourage happen around her while Mima begins to see a hallucination of her pop idol self taunting her in real life. Real life and fantasy go in and out throughout the film as Mima starts to wonder about her sanity. In the climax, it was revealed that her manager, Rumi Hidaka, was behind “Mima’s Room” and the murders. Rumi believes herself to be the real Mima and chastises Mima as a fake who’s in the way. A violent chase scene occurs and ends with the two of them in blood, but still breathing. In the end, Rumi is hospitalized and Mima achieves her dream of making it big, but it is unclear on whether Mima is considered to be mentally well.
I first saw Perfect Blue about 18 years ago and I still remember the Rumi revelation all too well. I thought she was jealous of Mima as I forgot almost everything else in the film at the time. But after seeing Perfect Blue again last week, her reveal as the true culprit is central to a theme involving Mima’s first acting role. Mima starred in a crime drama called Double Bind, where she portrayed a young woman with dissociative identity disorder (DID). The character had multiple personalities. Mima goes through some rough acting moments (including the filming a rape scene where she was the victim) and the film has you believe that her role became her real life. The character Mima portrayed switched to a personality which made her a murderer in order to suppress uncomfortable feelings. The people dying around Mima became a mirror image of the crime drama itself. Rumi becomes an unfortunate victim of DID herself as her “Mima” personality took over her psyche.
Hearing about dissociative identity disorder in Perfect Blue as a now full-fledged mental health enthusiast was a bit uncomfortable to me. It’s because of a 2017 film called “Split” that portrays a person with the disorder as a murderous individual. There was also this article I read about the stigma against anyone who has multiple personalities. Those with DID can’t talk about their condition to most people. If they did, their lives can change for the worst. Having depression or anxiety is nothing compared to living a life where you can’t remember what you did because of a sudden personality change and you’re trying to figure out what happened.
I just felt that the movie reminded me of what I still face sometimes when I talk about my depression and the suicidal tendencies I have to someone. I’m afraid of getting labeled crazy and dangerous. I don’t want to be locked up. Granted that times have changed since the year Perfect Blue originally debuted and mental health awareness is now a thing, I just hope that fans do understand that not everyone with multiple personalities is Rumi.
I also want to discuss another condition called folie a deux (French for “madness of two”), which is known as shared psychotic disorder. The concept behind it is that anyone with a psychological disorder can spread their beliefs and hallucinations onto someone else due to close proximity and vice versa. In Mima’s case, this seemed apparent with Rumi. Before the climax, Rumi would come check in on Mima often at work and at home. Rumi also helped set Mima up with getting her internet set up, which led to the discovery of “Mima’s Room.” If you go by the folie a deux concept, it can be used to hint that Rumi’s own mental instability leaked out to Mima after Mima’s announcement to the public to be more than a pop idol. That instability would became the basis for the pop idol Mima hallucination Mima sees throughout the movie. Rumi was the one person against Mima becoming an actress. She seemed unable to cope with her displeasure of Mima’s actions (there was a moment during the filming of the rape scene where she got up and left crying) and wanted to keep her preferred image of Mima intact. But as the more famous Mima grew, the delusions only kept getting worse for Rumi.
There haven’t been too many cases or studies of folie a deux as it is considered to be a very rare condition. However, there was a large case in India where 11 members of a family all killed themselves as part of a ritual this year. An article I found that talks about folie a deux hints at the possibility on why psychosis is shared is because of our (very human) desire to connect with one another. Although we talk about self-improvement, we’re reliant on other people for feedback and love to help improve ourselves. This seems to be case with families or communities that are built to be like families. Mima and Rumi had a familial-like bond that kept them going in the often-horrible world of making entertainment. We sometimes take on the characteristics and traits of the ones we love. There is a lot of horror that can come of this when it comes to cults and abusers. Think about how many abusers were victims of abuse growing up. Think about the brainwashing that cults do on its members. We all want to worship and be worshiped at the same time.
There was a interview with Satoshi Kon (which is up on YouTube) shown at the end of the remastered showing I went to where the interviewer asks Kon what message was the film trying to say to its viewers. Kon says that it’s best to look at the film as a story about losing reality. He goes on to say that there are times where you can’t tell whether things are real or fake. In the end, you can only rely on yourself to find a place where you belong. There will be bumps on the way, but if you’re able to go through them and learn more about the world around you, you might have the identity you want.
I thought about what Kon’s words meant in the scheme of mental health. A lot of folks with mental disorders have felt let down by people and with good reason. Their support system disregards their well-being as nothing serious to worry about. People who mean well say the wrong things to them. There’s a lot of discrimination from anyone who doesn’t understand their condition they face on a constant basis. I wonder if Mima was used as a proxy character that viewers live through to better understand the perspective of someone who suddenly experiences signs of a mental disorder. Rumi can be considered a proxy character as well as she’s an example of someone not taking Kon’s message to heart as she was started to become beyond help.
I do think that Perfect Blue portrays how the modern world affects mental health for the worst. Small communities with tight bonds all around are demolished for larger communities with people who are often alone together. The setting of Perfect Blue is one where citizens all walk around Tokyo, but live to gossip about one another with apathy. The movie covers the dilemma of surrender vs. autonomy when you need both to thrive. You can give yourself to those you love, but you must still be able to do your part in living life yourself. Mima and Rumi are both victims of the vicious modern conflict between being yourself and trying to fit in. This conflict destroys the intimacy that humans need and creates boundaries that can become self-delusions as you can see in the film. You can’t place sole blame on the individuals when conflicts like this happens because our cultures have played a role in such developments in the way they enforce norms on communities.
20 years later and Perfect Blue is still a disturbing reminder that feeling blue shouldn’t be the end of everything and it’s what many of us should remember and appreciate more - that feeling blue means you’re perfectly human.
This past weekend, I went to a youth mental health first aid training workshop in my area. It was part of a recent initiative from my city government to look out for those who have signs of mental illness. While there were many things I already know due to my constant readings on mental health and psychology, I learned a good amount of information on how to approach young people from the ages of 12 and 19, who are the most vulnerable to developing mental illnesses.
I want to talk about something that I never thought about until after the workshop and two articles I saw from Anime News Network that covered 2 stories containing mentions of suicide.
The first article was titled “Erotic Manga Artist Who Left Company Describes Poor Pay, Rejection.“ It focused on a manga artist wanting to end it all after going through so much stress from work and not getting paid well for his works. The artist in question tweeted about their troubles to the attention of the Japanese culture blog, Yaraon!,
The second article was titled “Russian Official Claims Link Between Anime and Child Suicide.” It talked about a Russian organization looking out for children’s interests in their own country and their claims that anime can cause a child to think about and attempt suicide. This organization talks about how anime romanticizes death to viewers.
Both ANN articles had a warning to readers that went like this:
“Warning: this story contains statements relating to thoughts of suicide. If you or a loved one is in the U.S. and in need of help, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255“
I’m starting to have mixed thoughts about this warning mostly because of my experiences in the youth mental health workshop I went to. Let me explain.
The topic of suicide was brought up during the end of the workshop and the instructor showed the class a video of a young man who attempted suicide at the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. The man described his mindset at the day he tried to kill himself. He wanted to die, but at the same time, he wanted to live. His father asked if he was okay and even suggested that he spent time with the man, but he said that it was okay. The young man went on his day until he went to the bridge. He was distraught beyond belief and made up his mind after a woman talked to him - only to ask him to take a picture of her. The man jumped, but realized he wanted to live so bad. He survived, but he broke a lot of bones in the process.
The man said something that made me think - he wished his dad asked the following questions - “Hey, are you having thoughts of suicide?” and “Are you thinking of killing yourself?” The man believed if he was asked those questions, he wouldn’t have jumped off because he would have felt comfortable talking about such a heavy subject due to the questions being normalized to a degree.
There is a huge myth that talking about suicide will encourage and lead to suicide. In reality, it doesn’t. When you talk about suicide with someone who has thoughts about it, you’re recognizing the pain in the other person. You’re giving them the validation that they really need. I’m not going to lie that it’s a tough subject to talk about because we’re not used to talking about death as a whole, but if you really want to help someone, you got to lower all expectations and try to talk down to their level.
It makes me realize a lot of suicides could be prevented if we were able to talk about death as easily as talking about our interests. Life is really stressful for many of us. Not only that, life is isolating so many people from the joy and meaning they want. I also think that more important than talking about death, we arm ourselves with resources to show anyone with mental illness that they can still thrive.
I get why sites like ANN and many others will give warnings about suicide mentions, but that doesn’t mean I’ll like those warnings. I also know that anime won’t always save fans’ lives. Anime and manga hasn’t always helped me. It took a great support system and outsiders with kindness to do so. That’s why at least now I want to point those fans somewhere to places where not only can they continue to enjoy being otaku, but enjoy living in a world where they get to do so.
I won’t leave anyone hanging, so here’s a document listing some great ways to start being there for someone with emotional pain, courtesy of The Scudder Intervention Services Foundation, an organization committed to suicide prevention.
Here’s another document, but for those who have emotional pain and want to know where to start on their own end after gaining hope from others.
I hope this helps everyone! Let me know if you have any feedback!
For many Tokyo Ghoulfans, one of the most iconic moments they can name on the top of their head is the moment in the original series where Ken Kaneki embraces his ghoul side and has his hair turned snow white after horrific torture at the hands of the ghoul Yamori. It brought new tension into a series filled with non-stop tension between ghouls and humans.
In a recent interview with the Yomiuri Shimbun (one of Japan’s most notable newspapers), Tokyo Ghoul creator Sui Ishida talks about the significance of the scene in his own life.
This is the part of the interview where Ishida elaborates on the kind of thinking he has after reflecting on the Yamori/Kaneki sequence.
“Kaneki speaks for others
Q: I feel sorry for Kaneki. He was born as a human being but changes into a being that can only survive on human flesh. It’s so tragic.
A: It was really hard to depict him when he was actually speaking for me. There’s a scene where Yamori, a sadistic ghoul, abducts and tortures Kaneki while telling him “the reason for all the bad things in the world is just the incompetence of the individual.” That phrase fascinates Kaneki. To be honest, there was a time when I agreed with that idea, thinking things like “people who are not happy are just not trying hard enough,” or “they’re just spoiled by their surroundings.”
Q: You’re talking about the “take responsibility for yourself” idea that’s been around for some time?
A: Yes. But such words definitely drive people into a corner, don’t they? For instance, I’m not producing my manga alone. I can do it because of my staff, the editors — people I can seek advice from. I just happen to be fortunate.
When I started writing the series, I took on all the burden and was really stressed. But then I realized self-pity isn’t cool at all. Kaneki is an irresponsible person, but I think our way of thinking synchronized when the story was coming to a close.”
Yamori’s line about how people have no one to blame for themselves for their problems rings true to many people who go through mental health problems. They’re told that their conditions are their faults. For me, I hated myself for being worthless, weak, and vulnerable. I also made a mistake in victim-blaming others who went through bad situations where they had a chance to get out of them earlier and didn’t make the decision to do so.
I’m not going say that we shouldn’t be responsible for all our actions. We all have to own up on our end with what we can do in the moment, but the world isn’t so kind. Why does the “take responsibility for yourself” idea continue to persist in cultures that value such beliefs?
Some psychologists suggest that the idea persists because people believe in a just world - a.k.a. the “just world” hypothesis. They want to believe the world is fair and that good things happen to those who put in effort. We deserve what we get, so to speak. In a way, this kind of thinking serves as a defense mechanism to help people who blame victims cope with the idea that bad stuff can happen to them too. The mind wants to come up with reasons to make sense of things. They don’t want to believe that they can be victims like they ones they complain about.
There’s more fascinating research on the subject of victim-blaming as it’s a natural response to the fear of having something terrible happen to you. The way we say things about a victim compared to what we say about outside forces that hurt them go a long way in whether victim-blaming is used as a way to get through our own insecurities.
I’m glad that Ishida brought up the fact that victim-blaming is such a judgmental idea that doesn’t take into perspective what the victim is going through. The fact that he admits how much help matters in a stressful job like the one he has is amazing. Many people are often reluctant to credit their support system for their success.
The brief talk about blame ties into some of the last lines Kaneki says in the end of Tokyo Ghoul:re as he says the world isn’t right or wrong; it just is. People in general struggle with the idea that the world simply just exists. It doesn’t care if we become rich. It doesn’t care if we lose everything. The world just looks on. Everyone is the same via the eyes of the planet.
Blame isn’t often just on one party. That perspective is lost on many. That’s why awareness and compassion towards people matter.
There’s a stigma on getting and/or asking for help. No one should be driven into corners as Ishida suggests. A big way to stop the blame game is to make it okay to ask for and accept help. Remember - we’ve all gotten help from peers/mentors to become independent and functional human beings. Getting help doesn’t mean you’re inferior. It means you’re willing to do what it takes to get better.
I hope his words in this particular interview help fans understand, a la Tokyo Ghoul’s theme of unity among people who are different, that there are wonderful people on the other side who truly want to help. And perhaps more importantly, if you want to help someone overcome their difficulties, it’s best to learn how to help the person themselves instead of waiting for them to ask.
Just to let everyone know that I’m now a certified Mental Health Aid First Aid responder for both Youth and Adults in the United States, though mostly in New York City.
My role will basically allow me to support someone developing a mental health problem or experiencing a mental health crisis. That doesn’t mean I’m a therapist/psychologist as I can’t diagnose people. All I can do is pick up on signs and symptoms.
What I also can do (which are still important) is to make sure the person and myself will be okay from suicide and/or harm, listen without judgement, reassure that I will stay by them and give them helpful information, point them to the right professional help, and encourage self-help and support from other people.
I realize how it takes a group of people to really help someone. One person can’t shoulder all the responsibility, yet I see them get all the blame for not being a one-man army to change someone’s life. It feels like small groups of people are phased out for large groups that don’t have a sense of connection with each other.
I’m not sure how much I can apply this training honestly, yet I’ve had some conversations online with readers and fans who poured their hearts out to me. I’m grateful to those people and it felt like talking to me helped give them relief. Now that I think about it, I may have done a better job than most in those situations since I’ve been through the worst of depression.
All I know is that a lot of us fuck up when it comes to talking to people about their problems sometimes. We can do better. I’m trying.
I won’t be able to help everyone. I’m not a My Hero Academia hero, but I want to let you all know that I’m here to listen and will always try to point you somewhere to get you proper help that you can go to.
If you are really interested in helping anyone (especially children) going through mental disorders, I highly recommend taking mental health first aid training. Although we will never be heroes to the public, even someone like All Might will say that we’re the real heroes.
This is a venture worth being first in more than beating up bad guys ever will.
4 years ago at New York Comic-Con, VIZ Media had a panel called “The Future of Weekly Shonen Jump.” At the time, the days of Naruto and BLEACH were about to come to an end. New hit titles like Assassination Classroom, Nisekoi and World Trigger were the rage even if their runs wouldn’t be lengthy (or become uncertain in the case of World Trigger). There was discussion about what would come for the magazine as international barriers continue to be broken and access to manga was becoming easier for overseas readers. One Japanese editor saying that they want to continue impressing global readers with stories they’ve never seen before.
All I can say today is that Shonen Jump’s as vibrant as ever and not just because it’s celebrating 50 years of publication. I look at today’s lineup of Weekly Shonen Jump titles and I think it’s one of the more diverse group of titles out there for a wide variety of readers.
This is a list of what’s being published (not counting anything that started publishing in 2018 or is on hiatus/published irregularly):
One Piece My Hero Academia Haikyuu!! Black Clover The Promised Neverland Food Wars: Shokugeki no Soma Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba We Never Learn Dr. Stone Hinomaru Zumo Yuuna and the Haunted Hot Springs
On the American version of Weekly Shonen Jump, you have titles like Blue Exorcist, One Punch-Man, Seraph of the End, and Yu-Gi-Oh! Arc V joining the fray.
This is an amazing time to be a Shonen Jump fan. There’s a good reason why it was voted the 2nd best manga magazine in the 2018 edition of Kono Manga ga Sugoi!, a magazine that takes a look at what manga is popular among Japanese readers nationwide. Shonen Jump right now has something for everyone. Mainstream hits, romantic comedies, suspense thrillers, fanservice, off-the-beat action titles - Jump has all of these.
What I like about the direction Jump is taking is the continued promotion of present titles that are unique. Although there is some usage of old tropes, there’s some new tricks involved. The Promised Neverland and Dr. Stone,2 of Jump’s popular unorthodox titles,have taken readers by storm with their unique takes on shonen storytelling.
Shueisha seems to focus on what they can do now with the manga titles they have. A lot of us focus so much on the past and/or future. We always wonder “What if..?”, “How/why did this..?”, etc. People want to make sense of things for the better. We want to be able to control life when we can’t. We make excuses because we’re afraid to fail. It just gets in the way of what we can do now.
There probably was a time where Jump went through a phase of uncertainty. After Naruto and BLEACH ended, there was some concern over what could be the next breakout mainstream hit in Jump. It took some time, but we finally have a successor in My Hero Academia (and Black Clover to a lesser degree). Jump saw the potential in My Hero Academia after seeing Kohei Horikoshi’s improvement over his previous short-lived failed series in Jump. The lesson is to notice the little moments in life and also seeing what can be done to address things that need attention.
That’s what I get from seeing Shueisha promoting current titles that are doing fun things with the shonen genre. They noticed what was taking off with today’s fans via their reader surveys and having the Shonen Jump editors work hard with their respective mangaka to create a more cohesive vision that benefits the mangaka. I’m not going to tell everyone to totally ignore the past and the future, but it’s important to keep your eyes in front of you. There are people who want to be loved and could use a friend. You might be acting in ways that worry others and they are letting you know that.
Give those moments attention because like Shonen Jump, they can help you leap towards victory for yourself and everyone around you.
Growing up as children, we’re led to believe that we can all get along with one another. Adults tell us to be kind towards others. As we get to adolescence, we start to separate into certain groups as we try to find ourselves. That period sets a tone in how we live the rest of our lives. We start to try to find a place/community where we belong. At the same time, inter-group conflict becomes an issue since outside sources can threaten the livelihood of communities important to us.
I’ve been reading Akiko Higashimura’s Princess Jellyfish and the relationship dynamic between its 2 main characters, Tsukimi Kurashita and Kuranosuke Koibuchi, have me ponder about and given me hope on whether 2 vastly different groups can create something magical together.
The premise behind Princess Jellyfish centers around Tsukimi’s life as a NEET (not educated, employed, or in training) otaku girl. She spends her time living with a group of female otaku just like her known as Amars at a place called Amamizukan in Tokyo. Amars follows a philosophy of sticking to your interests and not involving themselves with most of society in general, especially those who are stylish. Tsukimi enjoys her slow life until a chance encounter with a stylish lady takes her on a newfound journey of change. While noticing that a jellyfish at Tsukimi’s local fish store was about to die and Tsukimi being unable to warn a store employee due to social anxiety, the stylish lady helps her and brings the jellyfish to Amamizukan. The lady ends up staying over at Amamizukan for the night. Tsukimi then discovers that the lady is a man named Kuranosuke who likes to crossdress. The two become entangled in a wacky story involving fashion, romance, politics, and what it means to be a beautiful person.
The introduction of the story focuses on the contrast of the 2 worlds that Tsukimi and Kuranosuke inhabit - Tsukimi being a jellyfish otaku with a huge fear of social situations and Kuranosuke being the charismatic son of a well-known politician. Kuranosuke finds that the circles he hangs out in were obsessed with sex/fashion/music. He tells himself that Tsukimi’s jellyfish talk is more noteworthy. Tsukimi notices that Kuranosuke is someone she wants to try to be (but can’t due to self-hatred and fear of ostracism from Amars) - beautiful and confident. Tsukimi’s mother died while she was young and it had a great effect on her current way of living. Tsukimi admits that a part of her stopped after her mother’s death - her desire to move forward without fear. Kuranosuke’s presence renewed that desire.
There’s a popular psychological theory running around regarding intergroup relations and how to prevent conflict between them. It’s known as contact theory. The theory states that the more someone has in contact with someone very different from them, the less likely they become prejudiced towards them. You can apply to cases of diversity between races (whites vs. people of non-color). There’s also another theory called threat theory, which suggests the opposite - the more contact you have with someone different from you, the more you become wary of them.
In Princess Jellyfish, Amars warns its female residents to not interact with men, not be involved in romance, and not become fashionable. Tsukimi follows these notions to a huge degree as she is the youngest of the group. But due to Kuranosuke’s involvement in her life, she begins to question herself and Amars’ way of living. Kuranosuke found politics to be boring and grew up being ignored by his family while he was young (mostly due to being born from an affair). After having a hotpot meal with the ladies of Amars in his first interaction with them, he decides to take on the challenge of making them noticeable to society.
There came a point where Kuranosuke wanted to stop interacting with Amars after seeing Tsukimi being attracted to his older brother, Shu Koibuchi. Shu is noted to be very smart, but lacking in knowledge about romance. Kuranosuke decides to go back to his original lifestyle of partying, but when the ladies of Amars come after him one night in Shibuya and his stylish friends criticize them, he defends Amars by saying they’re his friends. Tsukimi wonders why Kuranosuke would consider a group of anxious women who are afraid of people “friends.”
I liked how Kuranosuke defended Amars after spending a great deal of time with them. Although they had some traits that irked him, Kuranosuke saw potential in them. Amars were real people with varied interests. All the girls Kuranosuke has ever met in his life were the same to him - all obsessed with popularity. Amars was very close-knit like a small family. That novel contact with a different world helped him see that even though it may not be coherent with what he thinks, that world is still a world worth being around and contributing to.
There was a new study that came out and explored more of the contact theory in general. It focused on diversity and how white people viewed people of color. With contact theory applied, the more contact with diverse folks, the less prejudiced white people were towards them. What the study found was that the effects of contact vary widely in certain settings. If both whites and POCs lived in small communities, contact does help reduce prejudice and whites would support immigration. But if they are living in large areas (ie cities), contact makes matters worse and whites start oppose immigration.
Reading reports on this study made me think about Kuranosuke and Amars because while their connection started in a large environment like Tokyo, it grew when they were together in Amamizukan, a small residence inside the big city. Tokyo is wide and otaku aren’t as greatly accepted as one would think. Kuranosuke’s friends, who have little contact with otaku and probably based their conceptions of them via mass media, joked at Amars’ fashion styles and one even asked Kuranosuke why he was hanging around with otaku, which pissed him off.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to imagine NEETs/otaku getting along with anyone involved in high-end fashion or even groups with extreme differences banding together in real life sometimes. I do can take one thing from the fun relationship between 2 different worlds in Princess Jellyfish - it’s that young people hold the key since they are more tolerant of different opinions and that we shouldn’t be too critical of them. This isn’t going to be easy because people change their minds about others all the time or we won’t change all that much.
I do think that establishing shared goals with one another and engaging on a level that calls for a mutual agreement towards something is a start to get rid of bias. Thanks to Kuranosuke, Tsukimi wanted to make jellyfish-themed dresses. Kuranosuke wanted his mother to wear a unique dress that he helped make. Both of these shared goals (the dresses) were part of something bigger - to save Amamizukan from being demolished at the hands of real estate developers (the mutual agreement and a big plot of the story).
Two worlds colliding doesn’t have to be destructive.Even after the initial destruction, we can always point out the next step - making creation that’s beautiful and never goes out of style.
Hey everyone, I know I haven’t been been on much lately. There’s just been a bunch of real-life stuff I had to deal with. It’s both exciting and nerve-wrecking.
I just want to let everyone know that in this time where we feel that we have to be doing something or get the word “lazy” thrown at us, it’s okay to take breaks.
All the productivity in the world doesn’t mean anything if you can’t handle terrible and serious situations when they hit you hard. Grief, loss, and sadness will all hit someone at some point.
We value productivity over presence and organization over chaotic messes. To be fair, moving forward does involve being productive and organized. But productivity doesn’t connect people like presence does. Having a set schedule of things to do almost always favors the self and not the family/friends who may need you when they go through unexpected pain.
Lately, I’ve been valuing my time offline a lot more than online. I like social media as much as anyone, but I haven’t really felt the need to talk about topics or share photos as much as I used to. I’m taking life as it is and what I see in my own eyes. There’s a group of birds I’ve been seeing at this vet hospital near my workplace. They all live in a window display for people to see. The birds are mostly senior citizens who can’t be a part of people’s homes. They warm my heart more than anime/manga characters or what I see online right now.
What I’m trying to say is limiting your social media usage can help you feel better. Social media is good to meet friends, but there’s just so much expression of opinions to the point where it just feels like most people want to shout something just for the sake of shouting (I’ve been guilty of this several times). I’m not sure how healthy that is for a society that needs to be reminded of common humanity. Someone once told me that if you see something you don’t like on the internet, just walk away. It’s fine to criticize, but I’m not sure social media is the best place to do that.
It might be best not to share everything. I’m not sure. I do think we need to change the way we criticize everything around us with notable exceptions (Nazis, politicians who aren’t doing their jobs to help the public, etc).
I’ve gotten to appreciate my family a bit more because I really don’t know how much time I have left with my parents. My sister and I have been getting along better after years of distance between us. There’s been family drama between my family and relatives over the past year and I realize how precious my time with them really is.
I’m still writing because I’m going to use this platform to build something bigger than myself. That’s what I want to do after taking some time off to see what’s going on around me outside of the internet. Relationships matter so much more than work and/or school.
“There is no shortage of good days. It is good lives that are hard to come by. A life of good days lived in the senses is not enough. The life of sensation is the life of greed; it requires more and more. The life of the spirit requires less and less; time is ample and its passage sweet. Who would call a day spent reading a good day? But a life spent reading — that is a good life. A day that closely resembles every other day of the past ten or twenty years does not suggest itself as a good one. But who would not call (Louis) Pasteur’s life a good one, or Thomas Mann’s?”
I want you to all live good lives without resorting to so much internet distractions. To me, that’ll not make only you a happier fan, but a happier person that can enjoy real life as much as online.
