#and three. it addresses both being trans and nonbinary within japanese society

[sekaicards]

hey whats Stars Align

hello. 'Stars Align' is a 2019, 12 episode anime about, among a lot of other things, soft tennis. one of its main characters is yuu asuka, a character who is explicitly non cis.

weirdly, i've been seeing a lot of criticism popping up for copal's handling of the recent mizuki event especially on the topic of their gender. i have also seen both prior to and after the release of the event people not so subtly implying that as a japanese company they have no knowledge about being trans or non-binary or any other sort of non cis identity. or that it would be "more realistic" for ena to have not known about trans people or reacted poorly to the news.

western perspectives of gender and being trans do not apply everywhere, of course, but to suggest that a complete lack of knowledge and a more unknowing/bigoted reaction to such news would be more inherent to and make more sense from a character on account of them being from a non-western culture doesn't exactly sit right with me for a number of reason i'm sure you can figure out.

japanese people are capable of understanding being queer. this should not be a novel concept. and if it is to you, try to think about why.