Canned Dogs reports, and follows up. Japan has a history of delaying or canceling anime broadcasts due to sensitive political events; the most notable I can think of off hand being the roadshow delay of the Cowboy Bebop movie and the delay of the broadcast of the original Full Metal Panic TV series (by a whole season) due to the terrorist attacks on September 11th, 2001. While one might not think that the isolated case of a psychopathic girl murdering her father with an axe quite rises to the level of an international terrorist conspiracy, this is Japan, where all news is local and tabloid sensationalism is the journalistic norm. We’ll be lucky if Higurashi and School Days’ broadcast schedules are the only two casualties of this blossoming 2D culture witch hunt. (no more)
| All | Media | Hobby | Ero (18+) | Site |
I still say Potemayo is next for cancellation. I mean, one of those little shorties has a scythe, and that’s PRACTICALLY an axe, amirite? ;)
Madness! This is MADNESS!
gia: Haha, i didn’t think about that until now — and there’s only one episode left of Potemayo..
;__;
It’s just a situation where there’s more to lose from appearing ghoulish than there is from not airing niche programming in the dead of night.
You seem to be documenting some sort of sea change in the way Japan handles its 2D culture, Shingo. Got something big in mind?
>>lostdog
My main purpose at this point is to raise awareness. I don’t think there’s a concerted effort to crack down on 2D media that’s at the source of this, but as its presence is increasingly felt in mainstream Japanese society it’s going to need strong support to keep from becoming a scapegoat for social ills (in the way the games industry has in the US).
I don’t think there’s much the international fan community can do to affect events on the ground in Japan, but I’ve been mulling over some options. If anything comes of the mulling it’ll certainly show up here.
PS. R.I.P. Potemayo ;_;
Tuesday, September 18, 2007 at 14:55 EDT
KYOTO — A 16-year-old girl was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of killing her father, a police officer, at their home in Kyotanabe, police said. The girl, a vocational school student, was quoted as telling investigators, “I killed my dad because I did not like him,” referring to her 45-year-old father, who was found lying on his bed earlier in the day with gashes to his neck from a hand ax.
The wife of the officer called police at around 4:40 a.m., saying, “My husband killed himself.” After police arrived, the girl admitted to killing her father. Police said the girl, covered with blood, was dazed, and was with her mother and 19-year-old sister in the living room. Her mother and sister were sleeping at the time of the attack, police said. “He was an excellent officer,” Toshiaki Okano, deputy chief of the Minami Police Station, said of the victim. “I have never heard that he had any troubles.”
>>Isochroma
It was a terrible, tragic crime. I don’t want to condone or belittle the fact that an insane and wrongheaded act was perpetrated, and the girl should bear responsibility for her actions.
That said, I believe the trigger-hair voluntary censorship of media perceived to have even the most remote anecdotal connection to a crime is irresponsible, and a dangerous erosion of free speech. A simple announcement of suspension without further clarification is tacit admission of a causative link between the crime and the tv show, one which has not been scientifically proven and should not be allowed to gain hold in the court of public opinion.
If broadcast of the program is being temporarily delayed out of sensitivity and respect for the family’s grief, that is one thing; if so, I think that motivation should be clearly stated on the program’s official site. Simply pulling it from the air without an explanation furthers the agenda of no one other than media reactionaries eager to find a simple answer to very complex social problems, and answer that I believe ultimately lies in the psychosis of individuals and not the effect of a cartoon show on a sane and rational mind.
THEY KILLED HANYUU? NOES NOT HANYUU ;-;
> Shingo
http://www.mainichi-msn.co.jp/entertainment/manga/news/20070921mog00m200003000c.html
The station was probably the one decided it, not the producers. Hence the lag. Higurashi’s site should be updated with it soon.
I don’t think it’s that suspect that it was cancelled. If some show here in the US was about to air an episode where a guy blows up a school and then columbine or virginia tech happened, it would probably not be aired.
Going by that, it seems more likely that they were cancelled because it would have been somewhat tasteless and not because anyone thinks the show made her do it.
>>DJnerate
Yeah, the stations have been deciding independently not to air the show. I should’ve been more specific on that point, but I do think it would help if the responsible party (regardless of who it is) would clearly spell out the motivation for the pull.
>>dogtato
If the US pulled shows with violent crime off the air every time a violent crime was committed somewhere in the country the broadcast schedule would look like Swiss cheese. All the time. I suppose it’s possible that an isolated murder in Japan is the equivalent of someone gunning down 20-30 people in a school in the US in terms of shock value, but in the case of Higurashi they suspended airing an episode that didn’t even contain any violence.
I can’t think of a much clearer sign that the TV stations were reacting to the perception that the show had influenced the killer, rather than out of the sensitivity of the subject matter or concern for the victims.
[…] a nice […]
> Shingo
The station did state the reason for the pull, as stated in the linked article. I assume that the delay between broadcast and statement was because they could only release the statement the next working day.
Well, Japan is actually a pretty small country, and with most of the population limiting their interest to to domestic affairs, such incidents causing these kind of reactions might not be too much of a stretch after all. Pulling the episode without violence was probably a kneejerk reaction though. I doubt that the station actually bothered watching the episode in question.
I’m not too sure that they’re actually making the connection between the show and the murder. There probably aren’t any other shows featuring axes and violence to be compared with, really. I really can’t see this as a clear sign unless they announce that they found some manga she had read and come up with some hogwash `violence and otaku’ theory.
>>DJnerate
As mentioned in the original post, all news in Japan is local. I agree with you that this sort of tragedy is precisely the thing that does cause a stir in the country (as well it should), but it’s the prevalence of the “put a band-aid on the specific perceived cause” backlash that I find troubling. Of course this isn’t a phenomenon limited to Japan; it’s much easier to enact legislation following a tragedy than to take preventative steps beforehand or to address the complex social roots of the problem.
I don’t think the broadcasters are deliberately making a connection between the show and the murder, but the action of pulling the show implies a correlation regardless of stated intent. The networks are obviously picking their battles with an eye to sound business sense, but it would be nice if one of them had the balls to stick to principle and air the show anyway, along with a statement to the effect that free speech is important, media does not cause crime, and a notice to sensitive viewers that they might want to change the channel.
I know that’s a pipe dream, but hey, hallucination is good every once and awhile. :V
http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/national/news/20070924p2a00m0na009000c.html
15-year old boy attacks father with axe. Here we go again…
> Shingo
Well, I agree with free speech, but Japan isn’t exactly a haven for it. It may be written by law, but social pressure against anything outside the norm is extremely strong. If the government does decide to crack down hard on the lack of censorship, I doubt there’s much we can do. “We want freedom to draw gratuitous sexual scenes” is what the average Japanese person would probably see it as.
Coming from a country with extreme censorship and morality laws, I know how bad it can get if the government intervenes. Wouldn’t self-censorship be a better option in this case? Apparently censorship has been getting lighter and lighter in the previous years, so might not this be temporary turbulence, a `correction’?
>>DJnerate
Yup, looks like another nice boat in the making. Sigh.
You are certainly correct on both of the points you raise. I feel I addressed them both at least tangentially here; to recap/clarify, there is no doubt that protests for free speech originating from pornographers will be seen to have a specific agenda. As such, arguments for free speech will have to be specifically grounded outside chants of “give us prurience or give us death”.
Regardless of arguments for free speech, I agree with your observation that on sum Japanese place a relatively low value on that particular right. Given this the most effective thing the industry can do is act preemptively to censor things that don’t matter (bigger mosaic/black bars? no big deal) and to clearly demarcate adult items and start carding kids among other steps.
So yeah, we basically agree. I don’t want to get into this discussion in the comments section of this particular post, but I think it’s a conversation worth having.