First of all, I must confess that the final part of the Naoki Urasawa interview is way behind schedule. The truth is that I'd actually lost the magazine I was translating from after I put it in a "safe place" while house cleaning.
The good news is that I've found it and have continued work.
Sorry, everyone, it'll be a couple more weeks before it's ready.
In the meantime, I am very pleased to announce that a French site and a Polish site will be running translations of my translation.
I'll talk more about that next time (and I'll try to finish my work and fix any mistakes so you guys can finish your work!)
Also, for those that asked, I will be translating excerpts from the Eiichirō Oda/Takehiko Inoue talk next.
In other news, although talk has died down, I'm still a little stunned at being verbally stoned and burned at the stake by people for speaking out against illustrated child porn. While thankfully not censored (it is my blog, after all), I was censured harshly for not towing the line on censorship.
While I expected most people in the "manga/anime" community to disagree with me and present counter arguments, which I was actually looking forward to discussing, I didn't expect 100% criticism, nor did I expect it'd be so mean-spirited and unreasonable (i.e. people who linked what I wrote to homophobia and racism). Not all of it was mean, but all of it seemed to want to paint me as an irrational, right-wing, bigot. I'll agree with the irrational part sometimes, and I did admit I got a little riled up, but the others accusations launched at me were as irrational themselves as they were ignorant and mean-spirited.
At first I was guilty of was getting as emotional as the people who decided that I hold a host of other prejudices that I don't, but even after I took a step back, and toned down and clarified my argument, I think most would still say I'm channeling Fredric Wertham at best. Some may even mistakenly see my toned down statements as me wavering on an unstable platform. Quite the contrary. In fact, because I feel just as strongly now as I ever have. The only difference is that I've learned two things.
One; Know your audience! When you even breath the word censorship to comic book people, no matter what the reason, you have to know that you have just stepped into a never-ending, side-scrolling beat 'em up game. It's you versus everyone and there's no turning back. Even if someone out there agrees with you, they won't speak up lest they be labeled all kinds of things they are not, and targeted for criticism and insults by the community mob, too. With apologies to the many good and level-headed people who did not agree with me, peer pressure and bullying has that effect on open debate and tends to render it one-sided.
Two; When a someone makes a crazy accusation, or criticizes you for something you didn't even say, don't go off the rails and pursue that idiot into the hole in they shot their accusations from. You'll just end up dragging your entire argument down as you sink to their level and end up digging your own hole, which you’ll have to either apologize for or keep digging.
Ironically, by actually removing some built-in censorship from my blog software to facilitate debate on this issue, and avoid having people's opinions eaten by the spam filter monster, in the end I got insults and hits from porn sites, some of which specialize in the type of cartoons I was speaking out against, and little else (although I was shown when I was getting too riled up and going off the tracks with my own argument, and for that I am grateful).
Someone did point out that I could do a lot worse than being overzealous in wanting to protect children, but based on the general reaction it seems that I’m also not far from sinking to the level of common bigots. I'm still not sure how that happened.
Look, I'm not trying to be the Catcher in the Rye over here, and I am far from being an activist, but I do sympathize with the idea of wanting to protect innocence. The irony of the fact that the book I just referred to was one of the most widely taught at the same time as being one of the most widely censored books in American history (Canada, too, I might add) is not lost on me either.
But while people were still fighting bitterly over whether kids should be exposed to that and other books because of adult themes and curse words, I was begging my mom to buy issues of "Elektra: Assassin" for me because the comic store would sell me them. I added that little anecdote for all the people who made the lame "1984" remarks to me, because in 1986 I was reading Frank Miller (Thanks, Mom!).
Anyway, We are now reduced to arguing over whether or not kids should be portrayed in sex cartoons. No one gives a shit about Holden anymore, that stuff is tame now. Holden would have to do an about-face and become the Molester in the Rye for anyone to complain nowadays.
Let’s face it, through all our screaming and bitching we’ve become a pretty jaded modern society.
Americans may still fret over supposed wardrobe malfunctions on live TV, or whether or not Daniel Radcliffe should be doing stage plays in the buff between Harry Potter movies, but think about it; Madonna’s so-called scandalous performances of only a few years ago are almost comical now. George Carlin is mainstream (I’ve heard nearly all the “seven dirty words” on network television!). The Comics Code Authority was beaten into submission long since.
Guess what, freedom fighters, if you'd lower your weapons a little you’d see that you’re winning! Cease fire! Relax and smell the roses. Bite into the fruits of your labor once in a while. But careful not to choke on it, though, because you can’t have everything!
No one wants Thought Police, but no one wants anarchy either. The far left and the far right are both dangerous.
The law may in fact be the big blunt instrument that Neil Gaiman accuses it of being, but absolute freedom is no less big or blunt. In fact, it is bigger and blunter because it is limitless and would be swung by the Alpha males and females that take control when there is no rule of law.
In the end, though, the thing that really pisses me off the most about this whole argument is the “it’s just a picture” defence.
Why is art always so bloody important that we must protect it at all costs – defend the indefensible - yet when art becomes something reprehensible it is “only a picture”?
Well, which one is it!?!?
Remember the infamous political cartoon in the New York Post that showed two police officers standing over the body of a chimp, with the officer that pulled the trigger multiple times I might add, saying: "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill"?
In case you don't know it, here it is:
In defense of that cartoon, The Post wrote, among other things, “Sometimes a cartoon is just a cartoon - even as the opportunists seek to make it something else.”
Just a cartoon. Just a drawing. Ink on paper, right?
Think that defence made the many, many people that cartoon pissed off say, “Oh, shit… It IS just a picture…” and stop being upset?
If you agree that art means something, you have to accept the fact that it will mean different things to different people, and will elicit varied reactions. Artists often take pride in pushing boundaries, and sometimes it’s commendable, but they have to accept it when those boundaries won't move, or they are shoved back in their faces. Some artists will censor themselves rather than have their work marginalized for the sake of a gratuitous scene that lends nothing to the story, such as Shirow Masamune, who realized that he had to draw a line somewhere if he wanted to reach an audience beyond his hardcore fan base. To him, those extra little scenes were “just pictures” and he sacrificed them. To some fans, on the other hand, who haven’t created anything, yet still bitch, moan and scream at the slightest provocation, criticized him for it. Guess it wasn’t “just pictures” to them, eh?
It’s all in the eye of the beholder, but most people can still agree when something is over the top. Even the fans that criticized Shirow Masamune, and cried over their plastic models about his willful sell-out, know somewhere deep down that it really wasn’t worth fighting that hard for and didn't take away from the overall piece.
But art, in all forms, and artists can have an enormous influence on people. Artists have the power to invoke feelings and move people, sometimes on a mass scale.
That's a good thing. It means that art has meaning and people care.
But that's exactly why you end up with problems sometimes.
That’s also why every once in a while you have to draw the line.
With great power, there must also come great responsibility.
Right, Stan Lee?
My critics may have a hard time believing it, but my line is an extremely lenient one. But my line does still stop hard along the same lines as the Japan Committee for UNICEF who, along with ECPAT/Stop Japan, Yahoo! Japan and Microsoft Japan, launched the “Say ‘No’ to Child Pornography” in March of 2008. So far lawmakers have said “No” to their efforts and haven’t lifted a single decrepit finger in the effort to ban child porn (this includes the real kind that features real kids, folks!).
The big stumbling block, apparently, is virtual child porn. The government, in its infinite wisdom, is holding up any proposed change in legislation because of this and has decided to set up a committee to “study” the issue. This means, of course, that a group of government cronies will gather periodically over the course of a few years to view a government funded child porn collection and then hand down written recommendations, which will then be debated, and further “studied”, and so on, and so on... And nothing much will happen, if anything.
In any case, I think next I'll try and steer this argument away from being mostly North American “manga” fans and bring it to my Japanese artist friends to see what they think.
(And, yes, assholes who think I'm Rush Limbaugh, I have many artist friends!)
I think they may be able to offer a litte more insight with a lot less name calling.
In the meantime, back to work on the final part of the Urasawa interview...
XML Feeds