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everythingsinred · 11 months

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Family and the Institution of Alice Academy

Was thinking about this ever since someone (I forgot specifically who, sorry) posed a question like this in the GA discord, asking about (I think) Natsume's extended family or something like that. It was a really interesting concept that I've been thinking a lot about since it was brought up, so here are the thoughts I've accumulated. I'll try to be concise but I have a LOT of thoughts and my brain is messy.

My general opinion at the end of all this thinking I did is that I don't think Academy students typically have very close familial ties after graduating.

I think the most apparent reason for that would be that students are expected to graduate when they are twenty years old. Our main four are exceptions to the rule, coming to the Academy pretty late in life. Most children are taken early, as toddlers or even babies. Natsume, Ruka, and Hotaru's families did all they could to avoid Academy scouting. Mikan was entirely accidental--if she had never met Hotaru, she might have never even found out she was an Alice to begin with. That being said, most kids were separated from their families at a very young age, only to be allowed to reunite with them once they're already adults. For many students, they've been away from their parents for close to two decades.

On top of that, the Academy doesn't allow visitations or phone calls and severely restricts letter communications. Only one child from each class is allowed to return home for one week each year, and that one week does not do much to make up for all the time spent at school.

My point is that by the time students are allowed to see their families again, that familial bond has already been severed, for all intents and purposes. That feeling of closeness and protection no longer exists. Students will feel more closeness and connection to their classmates and even to their teachers than to their parents or siblings, and as a result, I can imagine many graduates not even bothering to visit their families.

While I was pondering this, I made the connection between Academy students and the real life example of a similar situation with Janissaries from the Ottoman Empire. Basically, Janissaries were children stolen from the subjugated people under Ottoman rule. They were taken for the purpose of a "child levy", also known as a "blood tax." Some children were even willingly given by their families due to the possibility of socially advancing, and because the children were promised first class status (sound familiar?). Essentially the children were taken, forced to comply with Ottoman standards and traditions (including forced conversions and circumcisions), and then trained for military service. These soldiers would actually end up being incredibly loyal and efficient, despite likely never seeing their families again.

(Edit: forced circumcisions are particularly heinous when you consider that the children were typically at least 10 years old at the time they were taken.... so.... uh.... not pleasant.... But also interesting that the Janissaries were typically much older than the Alice children at the time of being taken.)

That level of separation doesn't endear ties; it severs them. These Janissaries--very often forcefully taken from their families--ended up growing up with very little connection to their parents or siblings. The feeling of belonging to their previous communities was gone. Absence does not always make the heart grow fonder. This was done as a means of creating a strong military force but also to disillusion subjugated communities and tear away their hope. Their children could always be taken; their communities could always be crushed, even without the use of physical force. It's a very effective tool to oppress a group of people.

(There's actually a lot of similarities between Academy children and Janissaries beside the separation of children from their families. They were also paid for their service and were high ranking; the Academy students are given an allowance and many of them, despite being stolen from their families, have a sense of superiority over non-Alices. They feel like they are treasures, and are of higher value and rank. Additionally, Academy students, especially in the DA class, are highly trained and efficient child soldiers, much like the Janissaries. Janissaries are actually a super interesting historical topic and are worth looking into!)

We can even see the effect of this distance when Yuka escapes the Academy and runs away to her family. Yuka was essentially sold to the Academy, with her parents trading her in exchange for money and status. She was very young, far too young to really understand that her parents had abandoned her. As a result, she romanticized her bond with them, and the longer she was separated from them, the more that bond became fantastical. She made many attempts to escape the school to reunite with her parents and she fantasized about seeing them again. When she finally is able to, it's nothing like she imagined. They're cold, and unfamiliar. They don't recognize her. She doesn't know her brothers. They're related, but there's no real connection.

"I shouldn't have come here."

Yuka's is an extreme example, but I'm sure she's not an exception. For most Academy students, the almost 20 years of separation from their parents would be too much to ignore. They would not recognize each other, or be close. I'm sure many parents did not sell their children like Yuka's family did, but the bond between child and family had not been nurtured the way it should have been, resulting in coldness and distance.

Because of that, I doubt most students even bother seeking their families out, or even if they do, it's to visit a few times before starting a new life with a career. That familial bond, now broken, is difficult to repair. The connections people often feel with their families or hometowns is something Academy students instead feel with each other. They are all Alices, all in the same boat together. That feeling of superiority that many kids feel means they view each other as on the same level, and I'm sure that could interfere with family connection as well.

Thus, I don't think there's many multigenerational Alice families out there with close bonds. I don't think families like Natsume's have strong ties with grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins. Even the sibling bonds at the Academy are stunted, with the Imai and Shouda siblings being the prime examples of that.

The Imai siblings have a significant age difference, yes, but additionally the Imai parents had a very different approach to Hotaru after seeing what happened with Subaru. They refused to hand her over as easily, wanting to show her important things in life and build happy memories for as long as they could. Even when Hotaru does enter the school, it's more than six months before she even comes across her brother, since the high school and elementary school are not integrated with each other and they do not belong to the same ability class. Similarly, the Shouda siblings are in different ability classes but they have a much smaller age gap. Despite this, Sumire refers to her brother very respectfully, indicating that there isn't a particular closeness.

The Imais fight against this divide, and put in genuine effort into rebuilding their relationship, but it's a difficult process, and one they struggle to admit to for a long time and for various reasons. Familial closeness is not encouraged, not even within the Academy.

(Though Natsume's bond with Aoi is exploited and the school does rely on him caring for her to take advantage of him, but ultimately he is kept from seeing her. Thus, that bond is also severed despite being exploited.)

Additionally, it would make sense to me if many Alice graduates decided to, upon having children, avoid scouting, like Natsume's parents did, and thus ended up moving around a lot to escape Academy notice. Moving around like that and laying low means that you're not going to be hosting huge family reunions or inviting relatives over often, even if all the other points were moot.

Finally, I think all this creates further obstacles for Yuka's wish to "have a family." At some point she says that, for normal people, the desire to settle down with someone and start a family is a pretty modest goal, but for Alices it's almost impossible. Escaping from the school, or even graduating, is a struggle. And you can have a kid, but it's likely that child will be taken from you, just as you were taken, and by the time the child graduates, they will have no connection with you. Wanting to be a potential grandparent, for example, might seem like a definite impossibility, since being a real parent is impossible.

It's even more proof that the Academy exists as an institution to subjugate and undermine Alices, as children and then as parents. Ultimately, an Alice never has control, not as a child and not even as an adult. The pain doesn't end once you've graduated; in fact, it never does.

#gakuen alice #ga #my meta #ga meta #azumi yuka #hyuuga natsume #alice academy #yes there are kids who lose their alices and thus leave early #i think those kids might find more luck reestablishing familial bonds #also there seem to be a few powerful and intergenerational families within the alice system #but those families seem rather to be in control of the school... theyd be the puppetmasters essentially #and thus might not be as victimized as normal families like natsume's.... he clearly has no power or control in the alice world AT ALL.#so yes i think those big and powerful families are exceptionally rare and thus not as relevant to this post #theyre not 'subjugated' like most other alice families are... idk how else to phrase that #feel free to hmu with ur thoughts on this topic! its super fascinating to me as yet another example of the academys many atrocities #and one i hadnt even properly thought of to this degree until recently!#its so very fun to discover and consider new aspects of ga lore or implications in the story! i love it so much!#i just cant see myself ever getting tired of analyzing this manga #i didnt actually narrow in on any one character but yuka seems to be the best example of my points so i focus on her the most #if u want we can talk abt other characters and families and discuss how the academy affected those bonds!#what an interesting concept.... im having a blast thinking abt all this rn

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dalermessi · 1 year

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On August 6th, 1936, Josep Sunyol made a mistake that cost him his life. The Republican president of FC Barcelona, a proud Catalan, was executed by Nationalist forces in the midst of the Spanish Civil War, after saluting troops he mistakenly identified as part of the Republican resistance by yelling, “Viva la República,” (Camino, 2014). The assassination of Sunyol symbolized the beginning of an oppressive era where regional cultures were restrained in Spain, particularly the autonomous community of Catalonia. The most publicly admired and respected representation of Catalanism, Futbol Club Barcelona, colloquially known as Barça, faced countless hardships during the fascist dictatorship of Francisco Franco from 1939 to 1975. The club rapidly became one of the only ways the Catalan people could freely express themselves and fight against Franco, especially by playing the team that became the face of the regime, Real Madrid. In the present day, Barça continues to symbolize hope and freedom for Catalonians. Amid the rise of Francoist Spain in the mid-1900s, escalating tensions between Catalan club FC Barcelona and centralist Real Madrid transformed their rivalry into a political product representing the struggles of the Catalan people, illustrating how football transcends the limits of sport to reach social and political issues, particularly through the ambience of stadiums.

Throughout Spain, football stadiums became an essential place of solace for oppressed fans, where they were free to speak out on the issues that plagued their lives. People could openly express their identities in the stands, as matches between teams of different regions often represented a conflict larger than the game itself. One example of Catalonians using football for this purpose dates back to the pre-Franco era, when “the Spanish national anthem was played to a chorus of boos before a match at Les Corts, FC Barcelona’s stadium in 1925” (O’Brien, 2013). Even prior to Catalonians being officially repressed under Franco, it was clear that they valued their regional identity more strongly than their national one.

As the dictatorship grew stronger, regional teams like FC Barcelona faced the brunt of the nationalist policies. In promoting a unified Spain, the regime heavily cracked down on aspects of localized culture. The Catalan language, in all forms, was banned in public, and only Castilian Spanish was permitted (Shobe, 2008). An order passed in 1941 required that the Catalan name of “Futbol Club Barcelona” be renamed to the Spanish “Club de Fútbol de Barcelona” (Kassimeris, 2012). The Catalan senyera flag was also banned, and so the senyera in FC Barcelona’s coat of arms was replaced with the newly created flag representing the fascist state (Shobe 2008). Under the severe Castilization of their environment, the people of Catalonia were being stripped of their identities right in front of their eyes. With essentially no power, the Catalan people “threw their cultural pride into Barça. At a Barça match, people could shout in Catalan and sing traditional songs when they could do it nowhere else” (Shobe, 2008). Inside the stadium was where it was openly acceptable to oppose the restrictions of the regime and where liberation felt most realistic.

On the other side of the country, Real Madrid was thriving as the favorite club of the regime. Franco believed the Spanish national team was not gaining enough traction internationally, as they did not qualify for the World Cup multiple times in a row and performed poorly the years they did. Fortunately for him, “the image of the Spanish national team was blurred by the prevalence and success of Real Madrid in European Football from 1956,” effectively thrusting the club into the international spotlight (Goig, 2007). Real Madrid won five consecutive European Cups from 1956 to 1960, and their recognition both in and out of Spain surged with each victory (Quiroga, 2015). The relationship between the team and the regime was undoubtedly symbiotic. Real Madrid portrayed a positive image of the dictatorship to international audiences, while Franco gave them his full-fledged support and funds. In the 1960s, as television ownership grew across the country, Real Madrid was the most broadcasted team (O’Brien, 2013). The increased public exposure to the club acted as justification for the actions of the fascist regime, because people started paying more attention to football than to the government. Supporters of Real Madrid, known as madridistas, had no idea what was happening politically behind closed doors, nor did they seem to care.

The matches between FC Barcelona and Real Madrid, termed el clásico, were expectedly controversial. Spanish media outlets moved quickly to polarize the two sides, with newly-created “Marca” pushing for Real Madrid and the dictatorship, while “El Mundo Deportivo” supported FC Barcelona and ultimately the oppressed people of Catalonia (O’Brien, 2013). The politicization of the sporting rivals is seen best in a famed clásico played in June 1943, the second leg of a knockout round in the Spanish Cup. FC Barcelona had won the first game 3-0 and were on track to advance to the next round, until police officials entered the Catalan locker room before the game. Flash forward a few hours, and Real Madrid won the game with a score of 11 to 1 (Shobe, 2008). The interference by the Francoist police no doubt played a significant role in Barça losing so severely. While it is not known what exactly was told to the Barcelona players in the locker room, it can be inferred that they were threatened to purposefully lose the game, otherwise, they could lose their lives.

As the dictator fell ill, FC Barcelona worked to reverse the impacts of his policies and reclaim their Catalan identity. During the 1973-1974 season, they shed the Spanish name of “Club de Fútbol de Barcelona” and went back to the Catalan version it currently holds (Shobe, 2008). Additionally, in 1975, the club switched the official language back to Catalan, thus once again proudly representing the people of Catalonia (Quiroga, 2015). After Franco’s death, the effects of the regime collapsing were felt immediately in stadiums across the country. One clásico played just a month after Franco’s death in 1975 experienced the largest public emergence of senyera flags since the Civil War, and in Basque Country, a similarly tyrannized region of Spain, a game between two local teams “witnessed the spectacle of both captains carrying the Basque flag on to the pitch before the game” in early 1976 (O’Brien, 2013). Events that would have been inconceivable just months earlier were now reality, as stadiums reflected the transition back to a more accepting nation.

These bold representations of cultural unity at football games did not cease in the years after Franco. In fact, they have grown stronger in the 21st century. In the 2009 Spanish Cup final between Basque side Athletic Club de Bilbao and FC Barcelona, the crowd vehemently booed King Juan Carlos I and the Spanish national anthem before kickoff (Ortega, 2015). Decades later, supporters have not forgotten the unjust treatment they were put through and are still vocal about it during matches. A fan of Celta de Vigo, situated in once-repressed Galicia, proclaimed that “On going to a match we never forget Galician prisoners, repression, the secular subjection of Galicia... Spain limits the ways in which we can fight, so football is a way of voicing our demands�� (Spaaij & Viñas, 2013). While fans of teams in marginalized regions use every opportunity they can to bring light to the maltreatment and discrimination of their pasts, for the most part, Real Madrid supporters do not follow the same path. In 2010, when Real Madrid beat FC Barcelona 1-0 in the Spanish Cup final, a large group of madridistas gathered in downtown Madrid, carrying Spanish flags while cheering “I’m a Spaniard, Spaniard, Spaniard” (Ortega, 2015). It is incredibly telling that in choosing to reaffirm their national identity rather than regional, madridistas see themselves as representing the entire country. As Franco’s Spanish Nationalist movement saw its triumph over Republican forces as a victory for Spain, madridistas still see a Real Madrid victory over a formerly oppressed team as a win for the whole nation.

In 2017, Catalonia became the forefront of global news as violence broke out amidst an independence referendum. On October 1st, the autonomous community conducted a vote regarding whether Catalonia should declare independence from the Kingdom of Spain, and the regional government announced that out of 2.25 million votes, about 90% were in favor of separating (Dewan, Clarke, & Cotovio, 2017). Unfortunately, the vote was heavily obstructed by the Madrid government. National forces were sent in from the capital, “fir[ing] rubber bullets at protesters and voters trying to take part in the referendum, and us[ing] batons to beat them back,” injuring around 900 people (Dewan et al., 2017). Predictably, FC Barcelona is often utilized to discuss and promote Catalonian independence, such as in 2010 when a banner declaring that “Catalonia is not Spain” was displayed during a game against English club Arsenal (O’Brien, 2013). When the central government began plans to thwart voting earlier in September of 2017, Barça decided to speak out. The club released a statement on Twitter, expressing that “FC Barcelona...remain[s] faithful to its historic commitment to the defense of the nation, to democracy, to freedom of speech, and to self-determination...FC Barcelona...will continue to support the will of the majority of Catalan people” (FC Barcelona, 2017). In openly showing support towards Catalan citizens’ voting rights and the independence referendum, Barça effectively bridges the gap between sports and politics. This is a two-way street: FC Barcelona stands up for their adherents, just as fans turn to the club to escape injustice time and time again. Coincidentally, Barça had a game scheduled the same day as the vote, which was played behind closed doors in order to eliminate the possibility of violence erupting in the crowd. The opposing team, Las Palmas, wore “special uniforms emblazoned with the Spanish flag,” something very out of the ordinary (Minder & Barry, 2017). Such a display could not tell a more pointed message.

The Franco dictatorship shaped the future of Spanish football forever, with Real Madrid and FC Barcelona at the forefront of the action. Real Madrid’s consistent success found them gaining the trust of the regime, which showcased the club’s victories as a positive interpretation of the fascist dictatorship itself. The desire of a unified, homogeneous Spanish state fueled regional tension, especially in Catalonia. Despite having their language and flag taken away, the Catalan people sought comfort in the stadium of FC Barcelona, where they could freely sing and speak and cheer for their team. In the decades after Franco, FC Barcelona has captivated audiences across Spain and the globe, cementing the club’s status as the most powerful cultural institution of Catalonia. “When the team took the field against FC Valencia in February 2012, nine players from the starting 11 emerged from the club’s Cantera System” (O’Brien, 2013), illustrating the importance Barça places on homegrown players. By providing unmatched talent bred exclusively in the club’s own youth academy, FC Barcelona is ensuring that they are conveying the best image of Catalanism to the rest of the world. As the Catalan struggle for independence continues, Barça was, is, and will continue to be a significant characteristic of the identities of millions of Catalonians. FC Barcelona represented hope in a time where its people needed it the most, and it is still the most influential institution in Catalonia to this day. The club and region are inextricably intertwined, as best seen in the passionate cheer: “Visca el Barça i visca Catalunya” - long live FC Barcelona and long live Catalonia.

References

Camino, M. (2014). ‘Red Fury’: Historical memory and Spanish football. Memory Studies,7(4), 500-512. doi:10.1177/1750698014531594

Dewan, A., Clarke, H., & Cotovio, V. (2017, October 02). Catalonia referendum: What just happened? CNN. Retrieved from https://www.cnn.com/2017/10/02/europe/catalonia- independence-referendum-explainer/index.html

Goig, R. L. (2007). Identity, nation‐state and football in Spain. the evolution of nationalist feelings in Spanish Football. Soccer & Society,9(1), 56-63. doi:10.1080/14660970701616738

FC Barcelona, @FCBarcelona. (20 September, 2017). Communique - Attached Image. [Twitter post]. Retrived from https://twitter.com/FCBarcelona/status/910462298908708864

Kassimeris, C. (2012). Franco, the popular game and ethnocentric conduct in modern Spanish football. Soccer & Society,13(4), 555-569. doi:10.1080/14660970.2012.677228

Minder, R., & Barry, E. (2017, October 01). Catalonia's Independence Vote Descends Into Chaos and Clashes. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/01/ world/europe/catalonia-independence-referendum.html

O’Brien, J. (2013). ‘El Clasico’ and the demise of tradition in Spanish club football: Perspectives on shifting patterns of cultural identity. Ethnicity and Race in Association Football, 25-40. doi:10.4324/9781315094304-3

Ortega, V. R. (2015). Soccer, nationalism and the media in contemporary Spanish society: La Roja, Real Madrid & FC Barcelona. Soccer & Society,17(4), 628-643. doi:10.1080/14660970.2015.1067793

Quiroga, A. (2015). Spanish Fury: Football and National Identities under Franco. European History Quarterly,45(3), 506-529. doi:10.1177/0265691415587686

Shobe, H. (2008). Place, identity and football: Catalonia, Catalanisme and Football Club Barcelona, 1899–1975. National Identities, 10(3), 329-343. doi:10.1080/14608940802249965

Spaaij, R., & Viñas, C. (2013). Political ideology and activism in football fan culture in Spain: A view from the far left. Soccer & Society, 14(2), 183-200. doi:10.1080/14660970.2013.776467

#just in case anyone forgot :)#fc barcelona #fcb #football #this is just one of my two or three essays on this topic lmfao #i think this is my most recent one from 2018 for my social and historical perspectives of sport class in 2nd year of undergrad #i miss when i used to fight people on here by just copy pasting paragraphs of this and the other papers. lol #that whole point about stadiums isn't really relevant to this particular incident/conversation (i think) and tbh idk why i included it #maybe one of the papers had some really good info about it that i couldn't ignore

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cryptidmomochi · 4 months

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did you know?

the insistence by commentary creators on treating children the same way as adults has caused ridiculous amounts of harm.

over and over i would see drama about various artists, and so many of them were just kids. some of them were younger than me, but i didnt know that. i thought they were all much older than me, because that's how they were treated.

"oh this person was a groomer" they were a child. if a child is exhibiting groomer-like tendencies, they don't just get that out of nowhere.

"oh this person pretended to have mental illness or s/h for attention" that is not a thing that normal people do. you look stupid when you say that. just because someone is doing something "for attention" doesn't mean nothing's actually wrong.

"this kid was racist" im from an extremely white, quite cishet, and very able-bodied town (or, at the very least, the town is inaccessible enough that you just don't see that many disabled people, who knows). sometimes you learn bigoted rhetoric, then have to unlearn it. sometimes you say stupid shit because other people around you say that exact stupid shit. kids in particular do not always know better. just because theyre 16 doesn't mean they're exempt from being stupid.

like.

can we stop hatemobbing fucking children. i have at least lingered online for almost 10 years. kids are one of the most likely groups to get harassed, often by adults. im glad i never developed a sizeable following before i turned 18. i wouldnt have been able to handle it either.

but im just shouting to the void, really. commentary creators dont fucking learn. they just hop onto the next bandwagon and ignore it.

do you ever wonder why so many commentary types keep getting into trouble? hopeless peaches, creepshow, daftpina, turkey tom, omnia, prison mate luke, im sure i could think of more given the time and given a little bit more research to track down some old creators i used to watch. good people don't go online and talk about kids like they should be killed. the art commentary community as a whole is rife with toxicity, seemingly always searching for small prey nobody's heard of. I remember a very long time ago there was a "drama" because an artist on deviantart didn't want their art being favourited (they misunderstood what it did) and that was a big enough deal to start making videos about. playlists upon playlists preying on kids being stupid.

if not kids, then any other vulnerable group will do just fine, too. if you remember the "tumblr art style", youll know it had a few main "characteristics"; ambiguous race, hairy legs, character depictions that weren't conventionally attractive, bandaids, s/h scars, drawing the characters with different body types, depictions of mental illnesses and disorders, the works. the "tumblr art style" was, in reality, a dogwhistle. it wasn't about the art. it was about the fact that it wasnt a white, cishet, able-bodied, neurotypical man or woman. that was a topic for a few years. "the problem with the tumblr art style", "tumblr art style cringe", i only knew of tumblr from those types of videos when i was in middle school.

commentary rarely if ever cares about justice. its just another dime in their wallet, and if they have to harass kids to get it, well, that's just fine.

#ive on and off watched commentary videos for years.#birdie's recent apology has also left me with a few thoughts yknow #i can think of SEVERAL kids that were labelled as groomers #who were in reality being groomed themselves #or were otherwise surrounded by dangerous and harmful behaviour #i hate the refusal to see kids as kids #'oh well they should just know ebtter theyre old enough'#as if they have any real experience with the world #shit like this is why i have an extremely dicey relationship with whether or not kids should be allowed online #i wouldnt have most of my friends if i wasnt allowed online as a kid #but its undeniably hurt me too #and im scared to think what wouldve happened if id had the kind of presence some of these other kids had #because the internet LOVES to scream and bitch and moan at autistic kids in particular #the minute people realise youre disabled you become an easy target for mockery #anyway #cw grooming mention #muffle #ive watched people forget that this shit has happened #people treat it like tiktok invented this problem #but they havent #these are old wounds that the internet refuses to let scab over #ive tried to grow a presence for years so that id have enough people interested in my art to commission me #ive had accounts since i was 13 #ive had beef with people. people have stolen my characters #people have lied about me.#and its a good thing none of that was in the hands of the wrong people.#this is such an important topic to me. its so important it makes me sick.#these situations are why internet safety matters so much.

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