Author: Gabriel Persechino-Forest Published: July 29, 2021
A recent controversy has made its way across Japan and even the Western market; I am talking of course of Kadokawa President Takeshi Natsuno’s comments regarding manga and censorship. During an interview with Abema TV, Natsuno was asked about whether or not Japanese magazines should continue to feature gravure idols. His answer was rather uneventful. The real meat of the controversy came when he went on a tangent in talking about manga in general and the new “standards” by which they should be measured. Natsuno essentially stated that manga should strive to conform to the standards established by Google and Apple.
A sample of his responses can be found below:
Japan is awash with manga that are more extreme than gravure. Japanese manga often don’t pass Google and Apple’s screening process.
So, including that, I really feel that we need to redefine the standards of what is acceptable for the public, [and] what is not, to be appropriate for the Internet age.
But the publishing industry I’m in is very pro-freedom (of expression) party, full of pro-freedom (of expression) party, but I really feel that we need to redefine the standards…
Basically, the president of Japan’s biggest manga publisher stated that it’s time for Japan to start conforming to the extra-legal standards of censorship of international conglomerates by censoring itself to reach the foreign markets more easily.
Anime News Network also “covered” the incident, placing the term “Pro-censorship” in quotations when referring to Natsuno’s comments.
Ken Akamatsu also commented on the incident stating that he doesn’t believe that Natsuno’s comments were meant to influence other large publishers in censoring manga, but that a person with his level of influence has the power to impose self-censorship at Kadokawa. He also mentioned Kadokawa as being listed on the first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, unlike other big publishers such as Shogakugan and Kodansha, mentioning that it appeals to shareholders to conform to the standards of foreign capital.
Novelist Mikito Chinen also weighed in:
If [censorship] were to happen, then Japan’s manga and anime would lose all their predominance. Manga and anime are received well overseas because they were created with freedom and without consideration for what will do well there. It is quite dangerous for this kind of opinion to emerge from Kadokawa.
The Aftermath
This did not end there. The anger and worry of fans in Japan and abroad was enough to catch the attention of Kadokawa, which issued a statement following this incident that reads as follow:
…although Natsuno participated in the program in his personal capacity, his comments were highly inappropriate for the Company’s President and Representative Director, and he deeply regrets them…
…the series of comments he made on the program have no relevance to the Company’s business operation policy.
We take this matter very seriously and have received a request from the person in question to return a portion of his compensation, which we have accepted…
We at KADOKAWA will solemnly accept the opinions we have received from all of you, and will continue to promote our business by being even closer to our authors and creators, as well as our readers and users.
Natsuno will also return 20% of his total monthly executive compensation from across three months (August to October 2021) as punishment.
Dwango managing director Shigetaka Kurita also stated that Niconico does not have any plans to adopt censorship or restrictions on freedom of expression.
This is Not the End of Censorship for Japan’s Industry
Too many people presume that this is the end of it. Already you see people saying “Keep fighting Japan” or “Japan sticking it to the censors again!” but this incident is only one in a series of events that have applied pressure on the Japanese industry; it’s just that this one incident in particular happens to be more public and caught the attention of more people. Ken Akamatsu had recently warned that the Japanese industry was under greater and severe stress from foreign entities and markets to censor manga based on the new “standards” of political correctness and the profits and importance of the foreign markets is leading many companies to consider “Western sensibilities” when making a new series.
Ebay recently announced that its “Adult Only” listing is no longer available and the company intends to forbid (Basically ban) the sale of “items showing sexual activity, sexual content or sexually suggestive poses”. It followed by specifically mentioning “sexually explicit anime, comics, books, films, animation, manga, hentai, yaoi… Adult films and video games with a rating of X, XXX, R18, or unrated for an adults-only audience… adult anime/manga that include sexually-explicit content, nudity, or sexual stories…” as being part of the target group for banned materials. Their policy will not affect sex toys, Playboy, Playgirl, Mayfair and Penthouse. Starting to see a pattern yet?
Amazon has recently begun, or should I say resumed, their crackdown on anime figures; removing various items that include Nico Robin (One Piece), Kirino Kousaka (OreImo), Haruhi Suzumiya, Konata Izumi (Lucky Star) and a Touhou Project: Cirno nendoroid for supposedly “promoting child exploitation or depicting children or characters resembling children in a sexually suggestive manner.” The figures were tame and include materials as non-provocative as females in school girl outfits. Not sexy school girl outfits, just regular ones like you see in anime or even in Japan itself.
Netflix is now licensing more anime than ever before and is directly producing many of them and Sony has essentially monopolized the entire foreign market for anime, not to mention its stranglehold over the Playstation platform, which it used to push censorship in the Japanese video game market.
Dragon Ball found itself rejected from broadcast (Basically banned) in Spain’s Valencia region due to “local gender legislation that prohibits airing content that encourages gender discrimination through stereotypes or sexist roles”.
Western media also constantly attacks the way the medium is made with articles such as this one from CBR that states “Female characters often have little presence (In Isekai) and even when they do, they are usually created for two purposes – to serve as a romantic interest for the male lead or to exist for fanservice. This is why female protagonists in isekai who don’t fit into such boxes are a breath of fresh air…” Articles like these are posted all the time by Western media and consistently push the Western narrative of how women, sex, race and so on… should be depicted in anime. Those would be the “new standards” Natsuno spoke of.
Western Twitter has become a place filled with individuals making outlandish and nonsensical claims such as “My Hero Academia is attempting to normalize child abuse”.
Looking at the anime scene, has anyone else noticed how fanservice-heavy (Ecchi) series have decreased over the last few seasons? Or anyone else actually realized that loli characters are now practically nonexistent and when they are present, they are always presented “safely”; you only need to look at the latest season of Strike Witches (Road to Berlin) to see this phenomenon at play. Strike Witches was one of the most fanservice-filled franchise in Japan and it prominently featured lolis and now it was barely more spicy than a shonen series with the loli characters clearly and intentionally out of focus when fanservice was present.
And all this is without taking into consideration the blatant attack that was done on anime at an international level months ago (Highly suggest you read the link I posted; it contains clear and undeniable proof that anime is in fact specifically targeted).
The Washington Post also brought an important point: Anime is center stage worldwide thanks to the Olympics. Is there any doubt that anime’s more “problematic” aspects will soon be attacked due to this popularity. Introducing something to mainstream is always a precursor to calls for censorship and reform as was the case for anime when it was first brought to the larger mainstream consciousness a few years ago.
And at the end of the day, Kadokawa still has a president that openly supports censorship, whether he was reprimanded or not. And if you think such matters are not a big issue, that they won’t negatively impact your manga, then I ask you how that train of thought worked out for the video game, comic book and tabletop game industries or for Hollywood for that matter? Political correctness, the Woke Agenda, “diversity”, censorship… call it what you will, we’ve all seen this grimm reaper rip through one industry after another in recent years and now its coming for anime.
If you’re a fan of anime, if you are an otaku, you need to be concerned and alert because anime is definitely under attack. It’s not some far away possibility, it’s actually happening now. You need to vote with your wallet, of course. But there is more that can be done. You need to let your voice be heard. Too often fans stay silent while activists scream their lungs out. Right now, we need to speak up and make sure the companies are hearing from real fans. To highlight the power of speaking up: Just now, Kadokawa heard the voice of a lot of fans from across the world and they apparently took enough notice to take actions on the matter. I can’t say this enough, SPEAK UP!
Source: Bounding into Comics, Abema, rayforcegame (Translation) and Dare ga Elf no Oyome-sama? from Kadokawa’s Dengeki Bunko Magazine (As article image)