#but i believe it is just the representation of sakura's pov being left behind by every adult in his life

[beanghostprincess]

I have seen a wild amount of people complaining about the context of Wind Breaker and how "unrealistic" it is for the characters to go to school but without any teachers or adults being shown or protecting them and... First of all, realism is not what you're going to find reading a Shonen and if you want a full-on high school experience, read another manga. It is very common to skip those details as a writer because they are not interesting in the slightest and they have confirmed multiple times that all of their grades are awful, so you won't get a silly little arc about them studying, because they directly don't. To say it is "unrealistic" is to ask for boring, pointless, plotless occurrences in a Shonen manga about fighting. Are people even hearing themselves when they complain?

But it's not only from a writer's perspective skipping what's unimportant that justifies the lack of teachers and responsible adults, but the plot itself. At first, it is confusing, but I think you only have to look a bit deeper into the cultural context of the story to understand why there aren't teachers/adults shown.

I'm around chapter 100, so I am not sure this gets explained further in the manga, but my theory as to why they behave this way is pretty simple, honestly: They are poor and in ruins, and adults with the power to change things do not care about them. Easy as that.

Whether it is real or just an exaggeration of what's actually going on, it has been shown countless times (especially in Umemiya's backstory, explaining directly how authorities don't care about the kids or anybody, really) that the whole city is made for outcasts and left to rot by the government. It is not some apocalyptic bullshit, it is stuff that happens every goddamn day in real life. They go to school but they aren't shown studying and the place itself is a mess. We only see Umemiya running the school but it is confirmed that there's staff and somebody grading them somehow, despite never being shown studying or doing anything other than patrolling. But they have shown us that the city used to be extremely problematic and chaotic and only recently have things started to change for the better. Most villains and even main characters are orphans and live on their own. There's a whole arc about a group of kids being left to rot in poverty without any means to study or live a normal life. Even our main character lives on his own in a horrendous apartment. Like--

I believe you have to be blind to not see that, if this isn't just literally some people turning their backs against poor kids in a place in ruins, it is at least an exaggeration of these things happening in real life. Because they could have classes and teachers and everything you want in the manga to make it more realistic, but this is, after all, from the perspective of teenagers who can't rely on anybody but themselves. There's only so much a teacher can do, and we know most of them do nothing for these kids. So if it is "unrealistic" perhaps you aren't aware of what damn hyperboles and metaphors are, but this is from the students' points of view, and when you live in a place like this, it doesn't matter how many teachers there are or police, because they won't help. So they are directly erased from the story to be replaced with Sakura's point of view of Umemiya running the whole place.

So I think that instead of looking for realistic interpretations of their high school experience, perhaps you should empathize a little with the actual real high school experiences of people like them.

[cyclone5000]

I was inspired to ask you this question because of the ccs content you've been reblogging (love that show btw). So as far as I know Japan is not a very gay friendly country, certainly not as friendly as some people believe. The MalexMale and FemalexFemale content is marketed to specific groups and usually shows them in ways that are kind of demeaning, like having one of the males being touched against his will (like full blown raped in some cases) by his future lover. (to be continued)

So my question is, how come Sailor Moon and Card Captor Sakura were able to get away with showing Gay couples in their shows (and well developed, healthy gay couples at that) back in the 90s? It was censored in America but Japan didn’t seem to have a problem with it, and as far as I know both shows were mainstream shows in Japan and marketed to large groups, not like Yuri and Yaoi normally are. Is it just cause they were side characters? Any chance you know the answer to this question?

uhhhh tbh I don’t know if there is a right answer to this…I’m unsure if I’m the one who can provide one at least. 

I’m not that well versed in this kind of stuff. And I’ll be honest, I’m little confused by this ask…I’ll answer it as best as I can. But, I’m just gonna tell you right off the bat that  this is 100% my speculation. Don’t take this as a serious answer :x 

With the way this kind of question is worded…it sounds like you’re comparing the same sex couples in SM and CCS to yaoi and yuri genres? And if that’s the case…well…your answer is right there… you’re basically comparing magical girl anime to pornography….

I mean, don’t get me wrong. Japan is definitely not an LGBT friendly place. But, the adult industry is all about fantasizing to the point of fetish-sizing. It is purposely formulaic. Why? Because a kink is marginally easier to sell than a person. And this is something that can be applied to international adult markets. Ever notice how there are several categories on porn sites, but no real variety within the category’s content?  Yeah that’s no coincidence. Adult entertainment is not about reinventing the wheel, they follow the patterns that are known to work.

Yaoi and Yuri definitely are applied this notion. I think the fact that it’s animanga further allows readers to detach it from reality. Like in the case with the yaoi genre, a huge premise behind it’s creation is ‘forbidden romance’ and its after effects. Caste systems, falling in ‘love’ with someone who you can’t have, power dynamics, the whole ‘i’m not gay but you did this one thing to me and now i can’t forget how incredible it made me feel and so i’m confused until this story reaches a conclusion’–all of this and more get cranked out to the extreme because it sells this romanticized POV of Taboo. 

It’s kind of a no brainer to see how incredibly inaccurate these genres are at depicting actual same sex relationships. But the whole point of the genre is…well not to. I’m not saying that it’s a good thing or anything. (I think a major issue within the adult industry and pornographic material is how unregulated it is in favor of it turning out a profit. Studies have show that people wind up believing what porn shows because of their lack of sex education…but adult industries don’t feel pressured to cared about that really…which does have a negative impact…lol i wrote a paper about this once).

I know bc of the nature of the Internet and stuff, Yaoi/Yuri is often lumped together with regular mlm and wlw love stories. Yes, you’ll find some sense of similarities on how sexual these stories can be. But I think there there is a major difference in yaoi vs shonen ai or yuri vs shoujo ai. And that difference boils down what kind of story the author wants to tell. And what kind of impression the author wants to leave in their reader’s minds. 

Which I’ll transition to SM and CCS now. These series had a specific story in mind, and in order to tell that story; the author(s) made conscious decisions to have characters and couples to display it. I don’t think that they ‘got away’ with anything. In the case with these two shows, in order to display themes and other elements of their fictional verse, they created gay characters to illustrate them in ways the other cast members couldn’t.  The gay and lesbian characters/moments weren’t just added in without consideration. They were an integral part to the plot. They had purpose. And with that in mind, they were created.  The reason why they are good and healthy depictions of relationships is because of the actual format of the genre. These are magical girl stories. The priority is telling a good story. I don’t think they were just token characters, they were woven into the plot extremely well. And if you have a well written character, that’s gonna have a way better impact than a ill written one. 

There was a lot of effort and care put into both of these series. That’s why they left a strong impact that’s still prevalent today. I don’t know too much about Japanese culture and stuff. Under my assumption, I don’t think they are focused on LGBT representation. It was the 90′s. It was rare to find anyone that pushed for proper representation right, hell it’s still rare in present day!  But even if it’s not a primary acceptance for the culture as a whole, for one reason or another, it was impertinent  to the authors. That’s why they made them, that’s why they were weaved into the story. Japan is known for its subtlety. These characters were homosexual, but it was quiet. No one was blunt about it at least. These could be factors of why it was broadcasted as widely as it was. idk for sure, but my gut does tell me that it was a  positive if anyone did oppose of it. 

Like, with SM, I couldn’t tell you what Takeuchi had in mind while conceiving the story…If I’m not mistaken. I believed she made the first ark and was pretty okay with it. But when she gained popularity she was asked to create more, and thus made four more SM series. If the publishing company is asking her to continue her story…chances are they’re gonna let her draw/write what she wants. SM was already a running series by the time Haruka and Michiru came about. That whole ark was specifically about the talismans they held. Takeuchi might have had her own reasons for writing a romance between them, but I personally don’t know what they are. If that’s what she wanted though, that’s what she was gonna do. If the story is good enough to pull in sales and readers, then it’s okay. I can’t remember if there was a big uproar about it. I don’t think there was at least. 

CCS is a little different seeing as it was created by CLAMP and a different publisher. CLAMP in of itself have always been kinda progressive. I mean, within this series alone…one of the big themes is love and memory. Specifically how those two things are so different person to person. I know that tumblr and other social media likes to comment about the gay couples in the show (I don’t blame them lol), but sometimes it’s easy to forget some of the…not so easy to accept romances in the show. There were a lot of romantic feelings between students and teachers. Most of them having a large age difference between them. There were some things that crossed over family lines too. Their push for risky romance, did not stop at just same-sex couples. It was all across the board. CLAMP has always been one of those authors teams that pushed ‘there are many versions of love and just bc you don’t like it doesn’t mean it shouldn’t exist’ mindset. Even if people didn’t agree with the message, it didn’t stop or deter them from their success. And again…I feel like if I was a publisher…and I had a material for long running success…I’d take it lol. CCS had a lot of promise. 

Hell, look at YO/I rn. The author was always straightforward about Victor and Yuuri being a couple. And they got it through to completion. Why? Because the story was good enough to win people over. I know that sounds like a simple answer to such a complicated issue (it’s really hard getting variety and representation in animanga) but if the team believes in a project, and there is promise in its creation…there is history of studios caving in and allowing it to get created. And this isn’t just for gay love stories. It goes for a bunch of different things…like, look up how Cowboy Bebop’s concept got created! It makes me laugh every time i think about it XD That is like a prime example of someone getting to make what they want and the result being outstanding. all bc the publisher didn’t care so long as they got one thing correct.

BUT I don’t know for sure. It’s not like I’m able to find direct interviews with the authors of SM and CCS. I don’t know what they were actually thinking when creating their stories. Or why they specifically designed the characters the way they did. 

But the same sex couples in these series will almost always be better than say other stories in the yaoi/yuri genres. And that’s just simply due to writing. The authors made characters to fit within their worlds. They didn’t just create characters that had slight variations of the same exaggerated animanga tropes. 

It’s kinda sad when I think about it. mlm stories are being catered to the female gaze while wlw stories are being created for men….why? bc according to publisher, those are the demographics that will purchase these works…I don’t think that’s necessarily true. I think that a lot of people have their preferences and types–but no one is gonna reject a truly good story! lol, even if there are gems within the same sex genres, make so mistake. They can be really hard to find.

I’m not Japanese. Hell I’m Indian-American. That’s like the double opposite of Japanese LOL. For SM and CCS, I don’t know what are the priorities for these publishing studios were. I’m just guessing that it’s success/numbers and thus they allowed for the story to take flow naturally. I don’t know for sure though. I could be completely wrong here. I’d urge you to try and find the answer elsewhere, I’m actually not like a super-fan about these kinds of shows :x hell I don’t really read yaoi or yuri anymore…

but I hope this at least created some kind of stepping stone for you to seek out the proper answer to your question. ^^’ sorry I wasn’t more help.