COSMONAUTiCAL•net A Comforting World We All Aspire To
It's always easier to spot propaganda that you disagree with. Similarly, it is easier to find cultural values in entertainment originally intended for an audience that doesn't include you. It is easier to apply what Herman Grant writes about the normalizing effect of television, it is easier to see the way values and norms are "reinforc[ed], ligitimiz[ed] and normaliz[ed]" when those concepts and codes are not "normal" for you. I believe that his assertion that television "entertainment" is actually "propoganda" that functions to reinforce cultural norms and normalize a very specific set of desires is evident in all television, regardless of nationality or genre. Analyzing a Japanese animated cartoon about child superheroes is an exercise in identifying Japanese cultural values based on the way characters and situations are portrayed in the show.
The program examined in this paper is Otogi-Juushi Akazukin ("Fairy Musketeer Red Riding Hood"), known as Fairy Musketeers in the West. The title difference is an anomaly; usually Japanese entertainment emphasizes teamwork, while American entertainment is more likely to center around a single character, particularly in the fantasy realm of superheroes. The title aside, the content of the show does reinforce the importance of cooperation: it is with the help of her fellow musketeer Snow White that Red Riding Hood is able to defeat a lone, super powerful monster of the week. The message is twofold: first, by working together the group is can succeed, and second, by working alone the individual will be defeated. The emphasis on harmonious relations between people and the importance of the community over the individual is a cornerstone of Japanese culture.
It is the importance of the group that makes those outside of the group suspect in the Japanese mind. The "foreigners" in the series (the musketeers and their rivals) aren't just from another country: they're from another world, the alternate dimension Phandvale. They are easy to tell from the Japanese protagonists, Souta and Ringo, because of their outlandish clothing and unnatural hair and eye colors.
Actual foreigners from other countries in Erde (that is, our Earth) and people of color are nonexistent. Although Souta and Ringo are both Japanese, they are the racial majority and privileged group in Japan and would not be considered "people of color" in that context. The racial minority in Fairy Musketeers would be the visitors from Phandvale, who are all based on European mythology. (The Three Musketeers are Red Riding Hood, Snow White and Sleeping Beauty, and their enemies include Hansel, Gretel and Cinderella. The residents of Phandvale all have strangely colored hair and/or eyes, setting them apart as exotic and foreign compared to brown haired, brown eyed Souta and Ringo. Red Riding Hood, the leader of the Three Musketeers, looks the least outlandish; her hair is light brown and her eyes are blue, while Snow White's hair is blue and Sleeping Beauty's hair is pink.) The outsiders are strange, but super powerful. They are not all good or all evil, but the ones that conform to Japanese social norms (for example, the Three Musketeers, who work together) are the "good guys" and those who don't, who work alone or boss others around, are the "bad guys." The message viewers are getting is to work together.
All three of the musketeers are girls sent to protect the "Key to Erde," fourteen-year-old Souta. Although this message is empowering for girls on one level in that we have three girls with magical powers and fighting skills sent to protect the normal human boy, there are problematic undertones. First is the idea of female subservience and male inheritance. Although the musketeers are all skilled and powerful, they must use their powers to serve and protect a human boy, who although he has not displayed any magical powers beyond limited precognition and gardening skills, is the important one. It's him that the prophecy is about, not Red Riding Hood, Snow White or Sleeping Beauty, despite their superior skills. This ideal of proper female behavior is underscored by Souta's human friend Ringo. Every morning, she goes to Souta's house, wakes him up and makes him breakfast because his mother is dead and his father rarely leaves work. She is the mundane counterpart of the Three Musketeers; her role is more traditionally feminine in that it is domestic, but ultimately all four of the "good" female characters serve and protect the boy. The human girl is the one doing the domestic work, and as she is the one young female viewers without magical powers are most likely to identify with, she is also the one that they are implicitly encouraged to emulate. Fighting monsters with magical attacks and giant scissors isn't an option in the real world, but cooking for and looking after males is expected for a good wife in Japan (and wife is still the expected vocation and career for Japanese women).
Gendered modes of speech are also enforced. Japanese has a number of first person pronouns for use by people of different genders and ages. The feminine Snow White, who has long curly hair and a cute dress, uses watakushi, a very polite feminine pronoun to refer to oneself. Souta uses boku, which is reserved for boys and men; at fourteen, he is asserting his masculinity (instead of using the gender neutral watashi), but politely. Val, the blue wolf companion of Red Riding Hood, uses ore, a very gruff, "manly" personal pronoun, fitting with his rough-and-tumble demeanor. The gendered use of language is reinforced by the way the characters speak about themselves and to others. It would be unheard of for Red Riding Hood to use ore, or even boku (though that is changing), and likewise Souta would never refer to himself as watakushi outside of very specific, humble situations.
The lesson in gendered speech is not just for the young Japanese viewers the show was created for, but for foreigners and language learners watching it. Japanese language instruction usually teaches the gender-neutral watashi; by viewing Japanese anime, foreigner who is currently learning the language learns what pronouns they are allowed to use (in my case as, watashi and watakushi) and what other pronouns say about the people using them.
Viewers do not always automatically or only identify with characters that are the same race and gender as themselves. This is how Japanese audiences can identify with Red Riding Hood and American audiences can identify with Ringo, or how female viewers might identify with Souta, who is the most sympathetic character so far. His mother passed away a long time ago and he rarely sees his workaholic father, a common character in Japanese society, where there's a word specifically for death by overwork: karoushi. He loves his son, but is too busy working to provide for him for them to spend much time together. He could probably afford to take a few days off if he was willing to live in a smaller place, however, as Souta's home is a two story house in (or just outside of) Tokyo. Real estate prices are astronomical, so this is not a small detail: Souta is clearly placed in the upper class if his family is wealthy enough to own a house in the biggest and most expensive metropolis in the world. Living in Tokyo is an unrealistic dream for most Japanese citizens; living in a two-story house within easy commuting distance from Harajuku is all but unheard of. This is presented as normal and desirable, but not without drawbacks, as Souta misses his workaholic father, who is too busy to care for his son. Working class or poor characters are nonexistent in the squeaky clean cartoon world of Fairy Musketeers, where all of the children are well fed, well dressed and well taken care of - if not by the adults then by each other.
This being a children's television show, moral and gender lines are very clearly drawn. There are no moral grey areas and everyone fits comfortably into the gender binary. This makes a show like Fairy Musketeers a prime target for analysis, because children's shows especially, both at home and abroad, are often little more than glorified propaganda, teaching children how to behave and what to believe based on their position in society in relation to the glorified middle, as represented by the wealthy characters racial majority who don't break the gender binary. Although a common criticism of anime fans outside of Japan is that they base too much of their understanding of Japanese society on anime, there's a lot too be learned if you look beneath the surface of mysterious transfer students and magical schoolgirls; on the surface, it gives an incorrect impression of Japanese society for the sake of "entertainment," but a look at the message reveals a lot about the actual culture. Just like American cartoons and television shows. Children's television is always educational, even when it's not about learning letters and numbers.