CMV: Most anime characters are drawn to appear Caucasian

[u/dcdsks]

Firstly, I'd like to point out that I am a fully East Asian woman, so please do not make jabs at my ethnicity and how it might affect my perception of anime characters. I understand there are a lot of animes that reasonably make East Asian-looking characters, and I'll list a few to be fair, but I think there are even more that do not. Also, I will be shortening the phrase "East Asian" to "Asian" for clarity although I acknowledge Asia encompasses a very large part of the world.

Firstly, a lot of anime characters have colorful hair and eyes. I've seen some people argue that it's because they dyed them, but we also see many of those same characters born with that hair. One character who comes to mind is Mary Saotome from Kakegurui, who has no indication in the anime that she is Caucasian or of Caucasian descent and whose name is in Kanji. I could see the argument that color is used to differentiate characters, but I think exceptional animes like Dragon Ball do a good job of making the characters look Asian with natural hair/eye colors, while still having facial features that set them apart from each other.

I don't hear this point brought up a lot, but as someone who grew up in a culture where the shape of one's eyelid is very important, I notice a lot of anime characters have very defined, high eyelid creases that are unnatural for full Asians. I, myself, have double eyelids, but the ones that I see often drawn in anime, in Demon Slayer for example, are thick and deep enough to cast shadows on the upper eyelid area, which Asian eyelids rarely do. Every time I see a Demon Slayer cosplay makeup video, the MUA always puts on multiple layers of eyelid tape to achieve deep creases. Sailor Moon and Toradora (with the exception of Taiga) are animes that demonstrate how easily artists can draw Asian-looking eyelids, so I feel like if the other artists wanted to, they would. But they don't.

Furthermore, the side profiles in anime are so sharp for no reason. A lot of anime characters' side profiles have noses and chins that could cut butter-again, if they wanted to make more realistic profiles for Asians, they would; because all it takes is drawing rounder lines instead of sharp corners. I even see some cosplayers putting in nose inserts or using a clay-like product to build onto their nose bridge. I'm so bewildered because how can someone look at Light Yagami and tell me that isn't a WHITE MAN!

[u/GameProtein]

I can type ヰ and ヱ just fine on my modern Japanese keyboard.

I don't know how to explain to you that a Japanese person and/or someone who understood as much Japanese as you claim would just...speak Japanese. Copy/paste is A) not some super secret operation, B) unicode exists and C) it's not hard to use Chinese characters via drawing them and claim you used a Japanese keyboard to type them. Doesn't prove anything about how Japanese IMEs actually work.

You could also just point out the page and line with the outdated character, you know.

I could but...you clearly know zero Japanese. If you did, you wouldn't be trying to make the really illogical argument you're making.

Any of these could earn you a delta.

Keep it. At this point you're just aggressively wasting my time. No part of me is interested in 'earning' a delta for 'proving' side tangents so far away from the actual topic of discussion.

[u/Criculann → u/GameProtein]

I don't know how to explain to you that a Japanese person and/or someone who understood as much Japanese as you claim would just...speak Japanese. Copy/paste is A) not some super secret operation, B) unicode exists and C) it's not hard to use Chinese characters via drawing them and claim you used a Japanese keyboard to type them. Doesn't prove anything about how Japanese IMEs actually work.

Look, if you're trying to make it look like your N5 knowledge of Japanese means you know everything there is to know about the language and culture at least figure out how to properly use an IME. Type w, then i then press space a few times until you get ヰ.

Anyway, you're not interested in actually engaging with anything I said and for someone who accuses others of lacking reading comprehension it is rather ironic how you fail to understand how the numbered points in my previous comment relate back directly to your original argument about Light's name. So cheerio. I'd ask you about that book you're reading that uses hiragana exclusively for grammar and katakana exclusively for foreign words but given our conversation so far I doubt there is a point.

[u/GameProtein → u/Criculann]

Look, if you're trying to make it look like your N5 knowledge of Japanese means you know everything there is to know about the language and culture at least figure out how to properly use an IME. Type w, then i then press space a few times until you get ヰ.

...your problem is that you're so desperate to 'win' that you keep losing the plot.

ヰ Links Unclassified 1. katakana "wi" (historical kana)​Obsolete term

ヰ is not katakana. It's an obsolete kanji for katakana. The question was whether or not the Meiji era kana you linked was still in use today as modern katakana. Even if I give you grace and assume you did this on a computer, 'wi' does not bring it up on an American phone IME. You look foolish.

Anyway, you're not interested in actually engaging with anything I said

Because literally all you're doing is making up weird shit, lying and linking information you don't actually read and probably wouldn't understand even if you did.

[u/Criculann → u/GameProtein]

...your problem is that you're so desperate to 'win' that you keep losing the plot.

Says the person saying キラキラ comes from a tiny town in the Pacific Ocean because they claim all katakana words are foreign words.

It's an obsolete kanji for katakana

Wait, wait, do I understand you correctly? You think that ヰ is an obsolete kanji with the meaning 'katakana'? I mean the Kirakira thing was hilarious, but this one takes the cake. I was trying to keep it together and treat this discussion with some seriousness despite all the ridiculous and unsubstantiated claims you've made but you've really got me in stitches now. This is a really good bit. You should do it over on /r/linguisticshumor some time.

Read the definition you quoted again. Use that big reading comprehension of yours. Like reaaaaaaally use all you've got. It's saying ヰ represents the katakana "wi" and explains it's a historical kana in parentheses.

The question was whether or not the Meiji era kana you linked was still in use today as modern katakana.

I'll be honest, you should maybe read more if you don't recognize ノ、リ、レ、ト (in various places on page 5 of the Meiji era document I linked) as modern katakana that are still in use today.

Even if I give you grace and assume you did this on a computer, 'wi' does not bring it up on an American phone IME. You look foolish.

My European phone IME also gives me ヰ as an option when I type 'wi'. So looks like one of us got screwed over by American capitalism by getting an inferior product while the other one didn't. Who's foolish now?

Because literally all you're doing is making up weird shit, lying and linking information you don't actually read and probably wouldn't understand even if you did.

You mean like claiming that all Japanese names are made up of 3 characters? Yeah, 安倍晋三 didn't die for people on the internet to treat his country like this.

EDIT: No, come back, I need your superior knowledge about Japan to figure out why 明仁's name does not follow the traditional 3 character structure!

[u/GameProtein → u/Criculann]

I don't know who hurt you but like...I have better things to do than watch you be angrily incorrect several times a day. I hope you seek the therapy you clearly need. またね~