Introduction and disclaimer
Hey Everyone! This is going to be a different project that I’m planning on doing this year. What I’m going to be doing is to discuss controversial anime opinions. How this project is going to work is I’m going to take some of the most controversial and complex arguments from the anime community and discuss my personal views and opinions. The reason why I decided to do this is because ever since last year there have been millions of controversies on different forms of media that people usually argue on. Finding controversies especially online is just as easy as breathing in air and kind of now a big toxic trend. I’m also fully aware that this may be a rather risky and dangerous territory that I will be heading into and maybe a heavy one especially for the readers who are not anime fans. Please understand that this is not meant to force anyone into having a certain view or an opinion but rather a discussion.
Topic 2: Whitewashing and Blackwashing In Anime, the history, the debates and the solutions.
It’s been a huge while since I’ve written something from my blog. Sorry for the long wait. I’ve just started college this August and for the last 3-4 months it has just been stressful for me. Since I just started my Christmas Holidays I’ve decided to jump back to writing more blogs. We’re continuing my mini-series on “Controversial anime opinion that need to be talked about more”. Last time it was discussing the notorious Lolicon/Shotacon debate (You can go to the main menu of my page to find out more about it)
What is Whitewashing and What is Blackwashing?
Before I get into this discussion, I want to say that I am a Black girl, a Black-Asian Gen-Z female. Therefore my opinions do matter a lot and especially this particular topic where I can have a moment to voice myself. Please acknowledge that before reading, Thank you.
Let’s answer the obvious. Whitewashing specifically in art is when you erase or alter representation from particular cultures of another race or ethnicity (Usually minorities). It is practiced by taking non-western stories or characters and casting white actors rather than actors of the race that fits the story. Whitewashing practices often includes the use of Blackface, Yellowface, using over-exaggerated features and using harmful racist stereotypes of a specific culture. The point of whitewashing was to interpret a false, unrealistic image of the non-western world and to demonise, ridicule and exploit non-western people to it’s target demographic, a white audience. Historically infamous examples of whitewashing in media and art would be films such as “The Birth of a Nation” (1915) [A silent propaganda film which aim was to portray the image of black men as being predatory lecherous monsters who were out to harm and sexually violate white women and how it up to the white men to save them from the black men]. It is important to note that these “black men” were portrayed and written by white men. Another infamous historic film would be “The Mask of Fu Manchu” (1932) [Another Black and White film that portrayed East-Asians as being terrifying cultists, cannibals and monsters. The Asian women in the film (played by white actresses) were portrayed as being these exotic and sexually appealing oriental enchantresses, while the Asian men (played by white men) were portrayed as being barbaric and ugly old warrior men].
Although people nowadays are very much aware of the dangers of Whitewashing, There are many cases in the media where whitewashing unfortunately still occurs. A few modern examples of whitewashing would be “Avatar: The Last Airbender The Film” (2010) which received immense backlash from the fans of the original animated show.
Avatar: The Last Airbender the series (2005-2008) was a 2000’s show which was said to be very early for it’s time during its debut for its extremely complex, deep storylines and characters. The series took place in a fictional version of historical Asia, combining East-Asian and South-Asian culture. The film on the other hand, the backlash was received for completely whitewashing all the Asian characters (who were suppose to be the main protagonists) and choosing to make the Asians be the antagonists of the film. Another very recent case of whitewashing was when Netflix decided to adapt the beloved Italian animated series “Winx Club” into a live-action teen series. Winx Club was a series that many young girls in the early 2000’s grew up with including myself. When the Netflix adaptation was released this January, they received backlash for not just one thing but for multiple reasons. From the removal of certain very important characters, whitewashing the few minority characters and the whole change from the youthful magical girl concept to a dark and edgy concept.
Blackwashing (Which is a brand new term) is when a person (usually an artist) takes an existing character (usually a white character) and alters their appearance to fit their appearance. The reason of this practice is simply because historically the media doesn’t often include people of colour. So for many years people of colour had to grow up watching and reading successful movies and novels of caucasian characters written by caucasian writers or directed by caucasian directors. Usually the people of colour would either be small side characters or backdrop characters. So some artists feel empowered to take existing white characters and to transform them into the race that fits them.
Race and Representation in Anime:
To everyone reading this I think it’s important to be fair and to accept that Japan is well known to be a homogeneous country so it is understandable that most characters in anime are light skinned. To the answer on why anime characters or series have certain features or themes that resembles some similarities to the west is for multiple reasons. A being, as a result of Japan’s homogeneous nature. Characters will have different hair colours to differentiate from each other. B it also ties into Japan’s obsession with Western culture and history (Specifically European and American culture) so that could explain why some animes are set in countries like the UK, the USA, France, Germany or Russia etc.
The use of dark skin is used rather uniquely in anime. In slice of life or school anime which is usually set in normal Japan they do have a character archetype called “Gyaru”. Gyaru translated into “Gal” is equivalent to the East-American trope of a “Valley Girl” or the African-American trope of the “Ghetto Girl”. Being an actual fashion style in Japan, They are depicted as girls or women who wear very heavy makeup, often have a tanned complexion, have very eccentric hairstyles and wear very bold or scandalous outfits. Gyarus in anime have the exact same fashion styling to real life Gyarus. They often come with a very tanned complexion and a very feisty and sassy personality and a sharp-tongue. Popular examples of Gyarus would be Nagatoro from the comedy series “Don’t Tease Me! Nagatoro-San!” (Who is one my favourite Waifus of 2021). who is depicted as being a Japanese-Mixed (Unknown where’s she’s actually from) with a rather dark complexion.
The use of dark skin are also frequently used in Isekai (Transfer to another world), Harem (Male MC surrounded by tons of female love interests) and Fantasy anime. Isekai, Harem and Fantasy animes are often set in a western medieval-like setting or a western fairytale-like environment. Linking back to Japan being homogeneous and the obsession with western culture, I guess it is kind of understandable for manga writers and light novel authors to set their Isekais and Fantasy animes in a western like setting where they can draw and write characters that don’t look “Japanese”. Dark skin archetypes in Fantasy would include dark-skinned elves [Which are fantasy elves but instead of your typical standard elf where they have a fair complexion, blonde hair and blue/green eyes. These elves have a much more darker and brown complexion, have warm colour palette hair and eyes] or mystical girls that resemble countries of the Middle-East, Northern-African regions or Egypt.
While it is true that traditionally these types of characters can only appear in Isekais and are mainly not in the main cast or the main love interest. However I can say that this is a fresh start to include some diversity into anime. I would have to proudly say that ever since the beginning of the 4th generation anime, there’s been so many successful animes where people of colour can literally appear without being in an isekai or being a minor character. Most popular examples are “Carole and Tuesday” (2019), “Great Pretenders” (2020), “The Promised Neverland” (2019-2021), “Mitchiko and Hatchin” (2008) and “Arcane” (2021). There’s also been of a massive new wave of adding dark skin characters into anime gacha games. Examples would be the popular otome game (Female MC surrounded by multiple male love interests) “Obey The Master Who Can Them All!” and the worldwide success “Genshin Impact” where we are expected to get a load of dark skinned characters in future [Crossing fingers hopefully!!! ‘MIHOYO’ please don’t let me down!!!!]. So I would proudly say that anime over the decades has really been more accepting of many cultures. But at the end of the day what’s really important and matters are well written characters and a well-written story.
The Current Problem In The Anime/Art Community And How Do We Stop It.
The real reason of why I wanted to discuss this topic is because of the very toxic problem that’s currently boiling in the anime/art community. This rabbit hole all started during the BLM movement [Where it was one of the most heaviest and most horrible times for the Black Community.] During those difficult times, a lot of artists worldwide wanted to support the BLM by drawing beautiful art pieces of black people in different artforms.Japanese manga artist began to draw magnificent artworks of black people in different manga forms which was one of the best surprises and gifts the black community could wish ever for, considering how people of colour at first believed that anime could never be accepting of different cultures and races. As much as everyone was enjoying the support from international artists, there were a few big accusations from online critics and other artists who accused these Japanese artists of “Whitewashing” due to the fact that they were using a lighter shade of brown then a darker shade of brown. Some went to the extreme by calling them “racist” and sent them death threats. It sure isn’t a normal day on the internet without some sweet old Cancel Culture. It wasn’t long before this peaceful and empowering movement and project became a huge online warzone.
A brand new toxic trend was brewing up in the anime/art community known as “Fixing or Fixed Art”. For those of you who don’t what Fixing or Fixed Art is. It is essentially when you take someone else’s work (Usually work that you are not happy with) and alter the person’s work so it suits to your liking and claims it as “Fixed'”. For example someone takes the entire Harry Potter franchise and sets it in Asia and then claims their “work” to be way better than the original or fixed. This is a very big problem because you’re basically insulting the works of the original creator all because it didn’t suit to your liking and later plagiarising their work and claiming that yours is better. This kind of toxic behaviour can really damage those people who are really trying to understand the BLM movement and why it’s important or those who are really trying to get into it. Which to me is very disheartening to see since the main message is the BLM movement is for everyone to participate in and to fight for equal rights. I find it very disrespectful to see international artists who are making a brave move to support a community that I’m in, only to get their work ridiculed and stolen.
One personal thing that really angers me which ties into the category of Fixing art is when some people in the anime/art community state: there is only way to draw a black person or anyone with X skin makes that person X race. This is an issue that honestly happens a lot especially with racist and ignorant people where they immediately assume a character’s race or nationality because of their skin colour, culture or gender stereotypes. Saying offensive things like only Black characters can look like rappers or “swag” or only Asians can dress “kawaii” is just nonsense in my eyes and is highly offensive to me.
Black Artists Opinions on Blackwashing and My Final Thoughts.
Honestly as a Black person this is obviously a very complex topic and it’s quite overwhelming one. But IT’S INCREDIBLY CHILDISH AND EMBARRASSING to see people fighting non-stop on this topic. People being closed minded, delusional and incredibly racist. There has been endless fights on youtube, pinterest and twitter between those who are anti-fixing art/blackwashing or the pro-black-washers and it honestly makes my eyes bleed. I literally disagree with both sides. I remember i was following this sweet black female Youtuber named “Thumin” who is an art college student who makes beautiful pieces of manga art. Her channel is based on her telling stories as she draws or discussing the history of certain art styles and artists. She made a video stating her opinion on Blackwashing and she politely stated that she was ok with it as long if those people don’t claim that they’ve fixed it. I absolutely agreed with her opinion. Of course anyone can draw themselves as a character since it’s fictional. I mean i would draw myself as a Harry Potter character. Thumin later received horrific backlash from racist trolls who called her disgusting racist slurs and misogynistic slurs for politely stating her opinions. They even sent her edited versions of her own artwork only to draw her as a Jim Crow “coon caricature” cartoon. Words cannot express how disturbed and enraged I was to see such revolting despicable behaviour and how it broke my heart to her cry in her video about the racist comments she received. Being Black in the anime community is still not very easy, It is not to say that all of the anime community isn’t accepting to diversity but there still needs to be massive improvement in terms of behaviour because this isn’t what the anime community represents. We want to be a great unique community that embraces different races, ethnicities, genders, sexualities, tastes, opinions, ideas etc.
There was also another Youtube black female artist named “Spooksi”. She covers a lot a controversial topics on anime and in the media. (Kinda of like my little series that you’re currently reading at the moment :D) Known for her bold and unpopular opinions, unafraid to speak her mind which I admire her for. She discussed in a video how Blackwashing or racebending doesn’t equate to proper representation. She explained deeply how blackwashing a character doesn’t change the fact that the original source was already caucasian to begin with. Meaning that you could write a million successful versions of Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs” whether it be set in China, India or Malaysia. But the truth is, the original story originated from Europe. The original source is still from Germany and you are still relying on the source and its writers. Please remember it’s not a bad thing to take inspiration from X, that’s how our the stories we love today were created after all. She then explains how a younger relative of hers who was still young and naive came across a black-washed version of Elsa from Disney Frozen (2013). The girl hasn’t seen the original Elsa and mistook Elsa for being a Black princess. She was delighted how there was a princess that “looked” exactly like her only to her misfortune to then find out that the real Elsa was another caucasian princess. Spooksi expresses how the problem is really that there’s not enough original black characters written by black creators. I couldn’t agree more with her. In order for us to be respected and to be properly represented we need to step up and show the world that we are not going to just sit and complain that one day our community is going to magically get represented. We are going to prove to society how we are also capable of making empowering stories and characters.
She also went on to discuss the whole whitewashing controversy with the Japanese artists. She explained how those artist were completely innocent and what they were doing was nothing wrong. She explains how there’s nothing wrong with choosing to draw a character in a lighter shade. She moves on to explain that whitewashing would be taking Tiana from “Princess and The Frog” (2009) and turning her white in another movie. Why? because the she’s the only black princess in the Disney Princess line! Disney, who owns every right and creation to the film would erasing the entire existence of the first black disney princess in history. On the other hand if a random artist made Tiana white, sure that would be questionable but it wouldn’t harm the community as we know that Tiana is originally and forever black.
Now for my opinion: To me the proper way to do well written and beautiful representation of X is for the writers of an anime or a manga to be fully aware of what they are playing with. Because for decades anime has began to become more mainstream and global which means people worldwide are getting into the community. One Example is the worldwide success gacha game of 2021 “Genshin Impact”. This game is currently one of the biggest gaming fandoms of the anime community and has a very loyal fanbase as deserved. Genshin Impact to me is quite a revolutionary game to standard gacha anime games due to its visuals, characters, complex storyline and soundtrack. I would also like to the company ‘MIHOYO’ to be fully aware that they absolutely deserve their success but they are also growing an international fanbase which means if they planning to do something that’s based on X. I won’t force them at all but I would want every single anime company to think twice about how are they really going to maintain that success or devotion from fans and to really understand their market and fandom.
(Sorry for the extremely long comment. I usually try not to get involved in controversial arguments like this. However this has been something that I’ve been wanting to get of my back for a very long time because I’ve seen so many videos discussing and debating this topic and I’ve always been terrified and anxious to discuss my personal opinions on it so don’t take my opinion too seriously. I’m completely open to everyone thoughts and opinions no matter what the topic is) 🙂
