CAA: Christian Anime Alliance

FONT=Garamond]hey all, I need help!

Every wednesday, my best frend and I attend a youth group, and last week we asked our pastor a question that had been bothering us for a long time. "Is anime "bad" and/or unethical?" Our pastor knew little or nothing about anime and asked us to bring him some info about it tonight. Can you guys help me find some info for tonight that I can print out and bring with me?
I really don't think all anime could be bad, especially because anime itself is only an art form, but I would feel better hearing it from my pastor, and our moms won't rest until he gives us a straight answer.

Thanks,
Jaela[/font]

Jaela wrote:FONT=Garamond]hey all, I need help!

Every wednesday, my best frend and I attend a youth group, and last week we asked our pastor a question that had been bothering us for a long time. "Is anime "bad" and/or unethical?" Our pastor knew little or nothing about anime and asked us to bring him some info about it tonight. Can you guys help me find some info for tonight that I can print out and bring with me?
I really don't think all anime could be bad, especially because anime itself is only an art form, but I would feel better hearing it from my pastor, and our moms won't rest until he gives us a straight answer.

Thanks,
Jaela[/font]

You can't say this kinda thing for an entire media like anime. Indeed some anime is very very bad and unethical. But some are good Speed Racer for example. Saying something like bad is like saying all white people are bad just because one of them did a bad thing. I hope I've made sense.

I agree with Ronin, this is like saying "Are movies bad?"

You can actually just type the word anime in and it will come up with a bizzillion things! I bet that'll work.

Kireihana wrote:I agree with Ronin, this is like saying "Are movies bad?"

YESH! Someone agress with me!

Thank you very much, that's helpful. But I may need more to convince my pastor. I totally agree with both of you, but I need more solid facts to give him. Please help me out.

That's sort of asking for solid facts for whether television is bad/good, though. Anime is far too wide a subject for those questions.

Does your pastor or do your parent(s) have specific reservations?

well, my parents are especially concerned with anime mentioning demons. I try to tell them that the Japanese mean something completely different by the word demon, but they don't seem convinced. My mom is also concerned that anime porn, or hentai even exists. Of couse I'd never watch that junk, but she's concernevd that it even just exists. How do I counter that?

The issue over demons in Japanese shows is heavily rooted in Shinto-ism. My favourite example here is Inu-Yasha, where Inu-Yasha is clearly half-demon, but he's not really a true demon in the Christian sense of the word, more like a monster. Likewise, the "oni" (another word variously translated as 'demon') in Urusei Yatsura, coincidentally by the same author, are the evil spirits of Japanese Shinto religion, but here they're shown off as nutty space aliens. This is a very cultural phenomenon that doesn't translate well into English (let alone to American culture). I'm not sure if that helped much, though, because a lot of that particular concept is really in the eye of the beholder.

There are some shows that have evil spirits in them, and even a few that butcher Western religion and have Satan as a character, however. I'm not talking about those shows, which I generally have reservations about (the Wish manga comes particularly to mind here; I'm not very fond of the liberties it takes).

Now, the easy part: yes, there is porn anime, but there's also porn movies, for that matter (and lots of sleazy stuff on TV). How do we deal with that? Simple -- we don't watch them! Saying all anime is hentai is like saying all movies are porno flicks: it's inaccurate. Unless someone doesn't watch all movies and all TV shows, it's inconsistent to state the same thing about all anime series and refuse to watch them also.

thanks, that helps alot. Theres something I'm confused about though. What is the difference between an "oni" as opposed to "youkai"? Or are they the same thing?

shooraijin wrote:Now, the easy part: yes, there is porn anime, but there's also porn movies, for that matter (and lots of sleazy stuff on TV). How do we deal with that? Simple -- we don't watch them! Saying all anime is hentai is like saying all movies are porno flicks: it's inaccurate. Unless someone doesn't watch all movies and all TV shows, it's inconsistent to state the same thing about all anime series and refuse to watch them also.

Ya took the word right outta my mouth Shooraijin-sama.

As to the Hentai issue and being concerned about it.
Umm... Normal film has the same issues. :-/ It concerns me that these exist as well...but twisted forms of all media exist whether it be web pages, books, film, animeted films, comics, television or poetry. So long as one avoids the content that is innappropriate and twisted one can enjoy the media. (This is the reason I mainly watch Cartoon Network on TV, and heavily research the books I read and the movies I watch.)

Anime and manga are both extremely wide spectrum media. There is a huge range in the content availiable for almost all interests and ages. There are also many anime that do not even involve supernatural occurances, such as Trigun, Prince of Tennis, Ruroni Kenshin, Cowboy Bebop Etc. There also is the issue of the Ogre/Monster to Demon translation, which is a choice made by the american Dub/sub people when they write the translations to the scripts. I't frankly does not bother me...if the term is taken as Ogre as it is meant, not really meaning demon. This could be best determined through research and possibly reviews in a Christian forum such as this one.

Is anime bad?

Why Yes it is…Wait! I mean No, not at all…Well, that is. Anime has had a bad ‘wrap’ because, for a number of years, the only anime that made its way into the US in large quantities was that of the sexual nature. This trait was quickly generalized by the American public and assumed to be present in every anime. However, as television can account for, you probably have been watching anime in one form or another since you were a wee little kid and never been exposed to the aforementioned versions. That is, if you watched much Tv at all. Who can forget shows like Voltron, or Starblazers?

Any way, in addition, (like was previously stated) anime, among other TV shows and movies, can be bad or good. Picking the right one is the important thing.

However, it may be pertinent to note that Webster’s Dictionary defines anime as: “A style of animation developed in Japan, characterized by stylized colorful art, futuristic settings, violence, and sex.â€

thanks you guys, that's awesome. Now I have some more voices backing up my opinion.

If you want, Jaela, forward your parents and/or your pastor here, and we'll be happy to clear up any questions they might have.

thank you Ashley, I'll do that ^^

Just one more voice agreeing with you, Jaela. If I say anymore, I'll just be repeating Shoobee. But, I'm with you. Anime does tend to get a bad rep...

Oni vs. yookai: no, they're not really the same. I've heard the difference stated that both can be translated "monster," but "oni" frequently gets translated as "demon" or "spirit" instead. I think that an oni is considered a spirit being and a yookai more of a physical monster, but I'm not good with my Shinto mythology.

If your mom wants to talk to another mom she can pm or email me. I've been here awhile and I've talked to other kid's moms here about anime. I also wrote some comments on a home school mom forum, if you'd like me to point her out to that site. I hope it works out for you.

This site, however, is a wonderful reference for all the things good about anime and Christians who enjoy this form of media.

I was going to say as well that this site serves as a good place to run questions about particular Anime.... while for the most part I can handle most things that I might find in a rented Anime, I generally only buy Animes that I've seen myself or have been basically green-lighted by the good people here.

The only thing I would caution is that whoever comes here should understand that just like the Church in general, we're a very diverse group, and not everyone has the same opinions on what is acceptable, generally however anything that's been given a green-light from the Mods/Admins should generally come up good with most people.

Jaela wrote:well, my parents are especially concerned with anime mentioning demons. I try to tell them that the Japanese mean something completely different by the word demon, but they don't seem convinced. My mom is also concerned that anime porn, or hentai even exists. Of couse I'd never watch that junk, but she's concernevd that it even just exists. How do I counter that?

Howdy Jaela,
Okay, concerning the hentai element of anime, we'll all confess there is alot of hentai anime and manga. It's a fact which we regret, but the fact that hentai exists is not any reason why we should discredit the entire art form. Afterall, there are many very innocent anime titles. Take for example-- Saint Tail. The story of a middle school girl who runs around righting wrong. VERY innocent. Another innocent anime is Hamtaro. Come on, what could be sinful about a secret club for hamsters to correct the problems of their beloved owners. There are also titles like the Super Book anime. From what I remember, Super Book told the story of this kid who traveled around in a floating observatory, traveling to various bible stories. Your pastor may even have seen this anime without knowing it. Now, they're probably going to say those are all for children, but you should bring up the Satoshi Kon movie "Millenium Actress". It's a very clean movie with 0 fanservice. (It does have a "spirit" in it. Not a demon. Sorta like a ghost I guess-- similar to Capser. 'Cept this one ain't so friendly)

As far as your mom being upset because hentai exists-- well, think about another medium of story telling(which is all anime is): movies. Now, there are all sort of erotic playboy, porn movies that you can buy. Just because porn movies exist doesn't mean that you shouldn't watch any of them. It just means you have to be careful what you watch-- as we should be with anything.

Erm, this may not be the BEST idea to consider, but maybe it may shed some light on the situation.

Find 1-2 Clean American Cartoon movies, Find 1-2 Anime movies.
Find 1 PG-13 (Careful tho) Cartoon Movies, find 1 Anime that's about the same.

It was said earlier that anime was comparable to movies from America. This would prove the point at least a little bit to your pastor, or to ANYONE, for that matter.

(Yeah, a lot of people at my school think that anime is just asian pron.)


(Typo is deliberate.)

I'll be repeating what everyone said if I were to express my full opinion, so I'll just leave an example that I read from another place which would describe the situation very well:

-start-

Soft p o r n anime is soft p o r n

Family anime is for all the family

Drama anime is drama

Comedy anime is comedy.

Seriously, anime is a medium, not a genre, and you should treat each title independently. That being said, there does seem to be a far more relaxed attitude to sex in anime than in American cartoons, even those aimed at kids. Look as Gash Bell, it's most definitely a kids show but still has a character who sings about groping boobs. And then there's that swimsuit episode of pokemon that never got translated.........

-end-

As to anime's leniency towards sex, I think there would be an entire caboodle of cultural/sociological factors influencing that.