#asianwashing

[le--fruitcake]

Salutations, sire! I was so taken by the milk of the word that I simply had to ask for more wisdom. I was curious to hear more of your opinions on Japanese characters being played by people who aren't Japanese, as I'm not very sure the extent of that issue.

Ah, my vassal returns! Delighted to hear thou wast taken in by mine ramblings. Welcome back, and pray rest thyself. To thy right, thou shalt find the finest refreshments and chilled drinks. Pray enjoy.

Allow me to preface this by saying: I am a white man. I am not an expert on Japanese culture, but I do know a decent amount about the samurai and a little bit about how Edo period Japan worked up until the 1800s or so, when the Black Ships arrived from the West.

I really don’t like the way Hollywood tends to cast any Asian person for roles that are specific to certain ethnicities. It gives me the impression they think Asian people are interchangeable, that Asia has one single culture, and not many individual cultures, each with their own histories and peoples and legends.

I am not the first person to talk about this, and Asian people have spoken on the subject as well. I really liked this article, which says many of the same things I think, and this one, which mentions the term “Asian-washing,” which is an interesting way to put it. I think they’re worth a read— after you finish reading this (or not. I’m not your dad).

This is not anything against the actors who play these roles, simply an observance of the tendencies of the agencies by which they were cast.

Read that last paragraph again, O Ye who Piss on the Poor.

Alright, now to the meat and potatoes, as it were.

Many times, whether in movies, books, games, or TV shows, there are characters that are either Japanese or that world’s equivalent, if it is a fantasy world like the one Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time takes place in. Some of these fantasy characters hail from the east, carry gracefully curving blades, wear their glossy, straight black hair in a topknot, and have a strong sense of duty and honor— some of the more common stereotypes for a 士 (samurai). Perhaps the character is a spy and assassin, trained in every kind of combat known to mankind, poisons, stealth, et cetera— your average 忍 (Shinobi, ninja. Technically, “ninja” would be 忍者, with 忍 being “endurance”, lit. a blade and a heart, and 者 being person) stereotype. Many times, in the medias I consume, I notice that these types of characters are often portrayed (in live action) or voiced by (in animation) other Asian people, and rarely actual Japanese people.

For example, in the aforementioned Wheel of Time, Lan Mandragoran hails from Shienar in the Borderlands, an area heavily inspired by Japan and Japanese culture, including lacquer armor, hot springs, and a focus on honor, loyalty, and combat— the tenets of 武士道 (bushidō, lit. “the path of the warrior”). Lan was, if you ask me, inspired in part by Toshirō Mifune, a very famous actor who was in many of Akira Kurosawa’s samurai movies from the 1960s, including Yōjimbō, Seven Samurai, Sanjuro, and many others. In the live-action show that came out in 2021, Lan is portrayed by Daniel Henney, who is Korean.

Another example, also from Wheel of Time, is the character Amaresu, wielding her Sword of the Sun. Japanese mythology fans and people who played Ōkami alike can easily draw the connection between her and 天照 (Amaterasu, lit. “Heavenly Illumination”], the Japanese goddess of the sun. However, despite the blatant reference to an actual Japanese mythological figure, the woman who depicts her in the show is Vietnamese (as best as I can tell— PLEASE correct me if I am wrong.)— Hélène Tran. She plays a very minor role overall, but it’s still dishonest to the character and disrespectful the Goddess Herself to depict Her as an ethnicity She is not.

Gennosuke Murakami, the rhinoceros bounty hunter from Samurai Rabbit: The Usagi Chronicles, is voiced by Aleks Le, who is Vietnamese-American. I don’t blame Stan Sakai for this, and to be fair, very few of the English Samurai Rabbit cast is actually Japanese. Kitsune is voiced by Shelby Rabara, a Filipino woman; Auntie is voiced by Sumalee Montano, a Filipino-Thai woman; and Lord Kogane is voiced by ProZD/SungWon Cho, who is, as you likely know, a Korean-American.

In The Old Guard, which you should watch if you haven’t seen it already, the character Quýnh is the only one of the titular Old Guard who is not in the comics. The reason for this is the actress Veronica Ngô, a Vietnamese woman, was cast for the role of Noriko— the actual character from the comics, who is Japanese, as the name implies. However, to her credit, she protested, and said she was Vietnamese, not Japanese. The director of The Old Guard reached out to see if they could accommodate that. They changed the character to Quýnh instead, and we went along our merry way.

In the 2008 movie Speed Racer, both the side character Taejo Togokhan and his sister Horuko Togokhan seem to be intended to be vaguely Japanese, but neither are played by Japanese actors, and look nothing like people who came from the same country, and much less the same woman. Taejo is played by Rain, a Korean man, and Horuko is played by Yu Nan, a Chinese woman. No matter what the intended ethnicity was here, the fact that two people from different countries were cast as siblings is baffling to me.

In the 2005 movie Memoirs of a Geisha (芸者, female entertainer, lit. “technique/art/craft person”. A common misconception with geisha is that they are prostitutes; this is not true. They are dancers, performers, that kind of thing, though Iwasaki-san says there were some women who did sleep with their clients, though she says this “happens in any field”), three Chinese women were cast for the three leading roles. It is important to understand that, during the 1920s-1940s, the era in which the film takes place, Japan kidnapped thousands of Chinese and Korean women and forced them into sexual slavery for the Japanese soldiers. Now, everyone disliked this. China and Japan both gave the movie negative reviews, and the movie ended up being banned in China due to multiple reasons, including the fact that they saw it as wrong that Chinese women played Japanese geisha. Japan didn’t like it because it did not accurately represent geisha, and, for many, the fact that Chinese women were cast to play characters in a role that is uniquely Japanese.

In addition, the actual geisha who interviewed with the author, Mineko Iwasaki, and to whose life several of the experiences of the main character directly parallel, didn’t like the movie or the book, saying that it inaccurately portrayed the geisha lifestyle. She also says the author, Arthur Golden, said he would keep her involvement confidential, but he went on to credit her in the book’s acknowledgment and in interviews.

There is a whole rabbit hole about this movie and book in particular, but I’ll leave you with this article for further reading, if you are interested.

Splinter, specifically the Splinter in TMNT: Mutant Mayhem, is voiced by Jackie Chan. There are several things wrong with this— for starters, Jackie Chan is Chinese, and for seconds, there is no connection between Mutant Mayhem Splinter and Hamato Yoshi (the man that either owned Splinter when he was a rat or becomes Splinter himself), with this version of the rat master having grown up fully in the streets of New York. If anything, he should have a heavy New York accent, but instead, Seth Rogen decided Jackie Chan should voice him. This, I blame squarely on Seth Rogen and/or whoever he hired to pick the cast. The 1987 and 2003 shows had white men voicing him, and the 1990s movies had a Black man voice him, who are obviously not Japanese, but this essay is more so about Asian people who are not Japanese playing Japanese characters. The 2012 series has a Korean man (Hoon Lee) voice him, though he has decent Japanese pronunciation. In Rise, he is played by Eric Bauza, who is Filipino. None of these men are Japanese! However, there is one Splinter who was voiced by a Japanese man...

...Which leads me to the next part of this essay. Characters who are Japanese, and actually played by Japanese people! Hooray!

In the 2007 TMNT movie, Splinter is voiced by Mako— yes, that Mako, the same one who voiced Uncle Iroh. Mako was Japanese-American. In the 1990 TMNT movie, Shredder was played by an actual Japanese man, James Saito, but was replaced for the sequel by François Chau, a man of Chinese and Vietnamese descent. Both Shredders were voiced by David McCharen, a Japanese-American man (if Turtlepedia is to be believed. Seriously, it has the only information I can find on his ethnicity, though his IMDB page says he was born in Japan).

Also in Samurai Rabbit, Yūichi is voiced by Darren Barnet, whose mother was a Swede of Japanese descent. Chizu was voiced by Mallory Low, who is Japanese-, Chinese-, Filipino-, and Hawaiian-American. Miyamoto Usagi was voiced by Yuki Matsuzaki, who did an amazing job, and actually voiced Usagi in the 2012 TMNT crossover several years prior! He also voices Usagi in the TMNT beat-’em-up game, TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge, in which Usagi is a DLC character, and the best $8 I ever spent.

In Pacific Rim, the character Mako Mori was played by Rinko Kikuchi, a Japanese woman. I haven’t seen this movie, but I want to.

I am not the first person to talk about this issue, and I hope I am not the last. I am going to reiterate, for Ye who Piss on the Poor, that this essay is in no way intended to do anything except point out some the specific characters who were played by people who do not match the ethnicity of the character they are playing, and the fact that this tends to happen a lot to Asian characters. I mention Japanese characters specifically because A) that is what Mr. Tehmhachi asked me about and B) that is what I notice, given that I tend to consume Japanese/Japan-inspired medias because I am 歴男.

I am in absolutely no way saying any of these actresses or actors shouldn’t have played the roles. I am only lamenting the fact that so many times, casting agencies or Hollywood or whoever see Asian people as a conglomerate, instead of a variety of richly cultured peoples that deserve accurate representation. I believe any and all characters should be played by people who match the intended ethnicity.

...And that’s all I have to say. Sorry this took so long, I wanted to make sure all my information was as correct as I could get it. For further reading on the topic of casting the wrong ethnicity for the Asian character, there are some articles you can read here and here.

[bixels]

Man I hope everyone playing with that new AI art app for funny memes and jokes doesn’t accidentally normalize the production of AI art and desensitize people into becoming users!

[kindlespark]

messy oisin doodles bc i can’t stop thinking about howl’s human design for him. (tattoos were inspired by chinese porcelain and irish celtic designs like the triquetra!)

[rametarin]

For those just tuning in

Yeah this thing called, “afrocentrist historical revisionism” is a thing, and has been at least in the US since I’ve been alive.

They’ll do shit like appropriate the history of a place and tell you that the REAL TRUE history is they, “were started by and created by black people.” Black meaning those of sub-saharan African skin tones and hair. Which miraculously all winds up being a politically and socially homogenuous “blackness” despite the fact that misc. black African populations are more different from each other than any given European is from one another, thus making the regional and tribal differences further apart and thus there’s not any one ‘black people’, if you wanna get right down to it.

But the point was to politicize ‘blackness’ into its own unified political and social party, since the 50s and 60s, that went hand and hand with a kind of Nazi-like mythology. That some ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT barnstorming black mathematicians were actually the first ones to use sailboats to go around the world, teaching the local inhabitants to bathe and do math and distributing sweet potatoes before miraculously destroying all evidence of their oceanfaring civilizations and disappearing. Likely because of a nefarious huwite man plot.

Anyway. They’ll say, “Egypt is in Africa. The Greeks just stole True Egyptian history, which is rightfully black.” And then proceed to take credit for the whole thing being a black invention. And they’ll absolutely believe it.

They also believe similar shit about China being established first by black people and being, “Asianwashed,” and they believe similar bullshit about the original Native Americans being black Africans that migrated.

It isn’t just about some “western European white/black social construct dichotomy,” as they’ll blame it on. It’s quite literally more similar to the historical and mythological revisionism of the Nazis and their attempts to create a national identity. Which brings me to the next bit they did.

They appropriated Islam and founded the Nation of Islam. Which is an afrocentrist supremacist take on Islam, using Islam as a sacred mythology for said black African origins.

And then there’s the Black Hebrew Israelites, whom saw Judaism, went, “but wait, WE’RE the original and supreme Chosen people of earth!” and then decided that the original, true Hebrews were African Black people that some Semites killed off or outbred and took up their mantle.

So yeah it’s no surprise that group, tied so intimately like a garage add-on to Woke, would show up on Netflix with a black Cleopatra.

[aprofessionalwithoutstandards]

All the tf2 characters deserve dark eyes this is because I am asianwashing them. Soldier is Chinese american. To me.

So truesies me too except I'm Hispanicwashing them. I know you can be Hispanic and have light eyes but I do not care :heart:

[vaas]

brandon lee didnt literally die so you could keep making the crow white. im gonna fucking kill you too if you dont asianwash that man right now.

[oxtori]

i thought u ws asian but from yr picrew post ig ur asianwashin :/

h

how am i asianwashing

its literally a picrew of ME what i look like how am i huh ? 😦

[akephalosxx]

racebending

I for some reason stumble over alot of racebending lately and also over alot of racebending hate ... in both directions.

I saw people claiming it’s blackface if you make a character black.

I saw people claiming that it’s racist to make a character white. …

And I am just sitting here wondering where the issue is and why there so many people being hypocrites.

I never was a big fan of either race or gender bending but I don’t really give a shit if people do it. I mean yeah it can be fun to redesign a character.

But I think you either go full way or no way.

Either all directions are okay or none are.

People are allowed to make white characters black, asian or alien or plants or whatever they want. They also are allowed to make black or asian (or alien or plants XD) characters white. It’s not racist and it is not a political message. If you do it because of politics and “my diversity” you are an idiot. Diversity isn’t just skin color or “race” and a character who already is established like .. for example … Rapunzel (the disney version) still stays Rapunzel. If you make changes on her look, you also have to make changes on her surroundings as well (if you don’t do it just for the fun that is but if you want to hammer diversity). (If you take normal rapunzel you can do whatever because duh it’s a fairy tale it can be set anywhere in the world)

What I mean by that is that it simply doesn’t make sense to make a character that is originally planted in surroundings that are black or white or asian or whatever (especially if it plays in the past) a different race. It’s different if the story or character is from America (where you have everything) and so yeah sure make peter parker black I don’t care. Could very much be. Whatever.

But making Thor black makes as much sense as making moana white.

If you do it then do it right and change everything. (Again that just goes if you try be pandering and political so … basically you make an AU for the original. There is no issues with that.) Just don’t change a character and scream “Now she looks better” “my diversity” “representation”. It just doesn’t make any sense whatsoever.

And for the art.

Learn color theory and don’t hate on people because they didn’t shade the character how you wanted.

Oh no … you made her white … even though actually didn’t but I want to be an asshole for no reason. What is shading and light? Never heard of that … freedom in art? NAH that is not a thing! Do it as I say because that is the only way and if you don’t you are a racist!

Seriously I am intrigued to make a blog where I just race bend all the characters and see what kind of backlash I get. Because that probably is fucking hilarious.

Rant over

[drewlover]

.

[amykate96]

Ok, I'm having a mini rant here.

So at the end of this year, the Fullmetal alchemist film comes out, which I’m hella excited for (because MY SONS) but also, hella nervous for, cause let’s face it, live action films of manga/anime traditionally have a reputation for being… well… shit.

But one comment that’s coming up a lot it “Omg this is Asian-washing”. and obviously this goes with the whitewashing of the death note series on Netfilx as well. 

But one the one thing that pisses me right off with comments like these on live action films/ shows based on something like a book, manga, anime (whatever one came first) is that, THEY ARE THE ORIGINAL SOURCE!!! 

ANYTHING AFTER IT IS A VARIATION. 

In the case of the death note series, I can’t remember where (I will try and find it), but I remember reading an article about how a lot of Japanese people didn’t get why a lot of westerners were so pissed off about the whitewashing. Because there’s so many “Asian” live action versions, you can watch one of them. Or better yet, read the manga or watch the anime.

Same goes with FMA, you want to watch a mainly European descended bunch of characters? Go support the original work and read the manga. A countrys’ film industry is allowed to create their own variation of an original piece of work, that’s a creators choice. Also to get the cast you want to accurately represent the characters, you’d need to find white people to play European roles, but who can also speak fluent Japanese with a Japanese accent. which is possible, but the budgets on these films are never really high. And even if you did get that, there will still be people complaining that the films “too white”.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that whitewashing is acceptable, not in the slightest. but these aren’t massive Hollywood block-buster films which an entire generation is going to look up to. If anything, I never have high expectations of how these films turn out. Past examples are proof of that.

but creators choice is valid. it may not always be the right one, but it’s still their choice, not yours. I’ll probably re-read this later and regret how I’ve said half of this, so I’m sorry. I’m just having a winge.

[damnfandomproblems]

The fact that people will get upset when someone whitewashes a black or Asian character, but they don't get upset when people blackwash or asianwash white/asian characters baffles me. It's literally double standards. Racebending is not okay in any situation in my opinion!

[mylesdemonadvice]

i have been thinking about this allllll day whitewashing is awful and blackwashing doesnt exist but asian hate does like whens the last time youve seen a white character drawn as black ive seen 1 ever and it was Batman and it was great but why are 99% of "raceswaps" or whatever theyre called done to asian characters, ive never seen fucking "asianwashing" either What is this trend

[apopcornkernel]

I JUST SAW SOMEONE SAY BIRDS OF PREY!CASSANDRA CAIN WAS ASIANWASHED?????????? AS IF CASS WAS NOT ASIAN IN THE FIRST PLACE????????????????????????????

[lmanberg]

Do you have a problem with white ccs being drawn with darker skin and ethnic features in fanart too or is it my Asian ass being weird? Like, it's not really as bad as blackwashing, asianwashing etc cuz the artists know they'll get in trouble and stuff, but it's obvious enough to see and nobody seems to be talking about it.

I think it’s weird to change a real persons race. If you wanna draw c!Sapnap as black because you’re black and you like him, yeah go for it! But if you’re white/you’re drawing a real person, that’s when it gets weird imo

[blake-wukong]

You know, I understand that whitewashing characters is wrong & problematic & if you don’t understand, google is free.

Blackwashing isn’t problematic because when black people make fanart of their favorite white characters it’s only natural that they want them to look like them so of course they draw them black & it also makes up for the lack of representation.

But blackwashing does become a problematic thing to do which you depict other characters of color, such as Asian, Latinx, or Native American, as black. Because like whitewashing, you’re erasing our representation, that we hardly get in media, as well. The same applies to Latinwashing & Asianwashing. (If those are even a thing) This really isn’t up for debate.

[old-old-veryold-blog]

*If you needed another reason to hate TikTok. Look at this whitewashing (Asianwashing?) bs