quote:Originally posted by No Guts, No Dory: It's real. Which doesn't make it any less disturbing...
What makes it so much more disturbing than when Bugs Bunny does it?
Because when Bugs Bunny,or any american cartoon characters does it,it's in an exagerated way.They have horrible make-up,ridiculous wigs and badly made dresses to illustrate the sillyness of crossdressing.However in anime they're a bit more serious about it,sometimes the crossdresser is shown to start enjoying his feminine appearance wich is funny to the japanese and freaky to the american
-------------------- "I love God,he's so deliciously evil!" -Stewie,Family Guy
The fun thing about standards is that they come in so many varieties. Posts: 510 | From: Ontario, Canada | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Greg of Winter: IIRC, there were a few episodes that were never translated into English and never shown in the USA because of some of the subjects. One was the beauty contest episode (the pic in the OP) and another about a "Solstice Festival" that they were afraid pCms would view as too paganistic.
The only episodes that have never been aired in the US are the Dratini episode, the infamous Porygon episode (which I hear is banned even in Japan. Hell, Porygon never appeared again, and its evolution is the only Pokemon to never appear in the series or movies...), and some episode starring Jynx.
quote:Originally posted by Cobalt Kitty: The episode this scene comes from was shown in Canada, although it was very long after it was supposed to based on the order of the episodes. It was advertised as being a "lost episode", and a semi-big deal was made about its showing on YTV.
The scene in the OP was edited out, of course.
That happened here too.
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Schwarz: Look, there's three ways to do things: the right way, the wrong way, and the Ninja way. Rey: Isn't that the wrong way? Schwarz: Yup, only stealthier. Posts: 546 | From: Pennsylvania | Registered: Jan 2004
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posted
It's not the cross-dressing that bothers me. It's the fact those are some huge natural-looking hooters for a guy.
-------------------- "But about the reindeer...what kind of a nose shines? How did he get it? Maybe it's not a reindeer after all. It could be something else." Posts: 2216 | From: Winston-Salem, NC | Registered: Nov 2003
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Sometimes I wish they would just show R. Crumb to the kids and get the debauchery over with. I'm kidding, of course, but it's so pathetic, trying to edit out all the scenes with breasts or nipples or any nudity at all. It's a wonder kids ever get entertained by anything in the US. (Okay, I have to admit I've banned Crayon Shin-chan in my house but not because it's crude. It's just bad art. I wish I could do the same to Bob the Builder or Hamtaro but at least we have them in English.)
Posts: 4922 | From: Kyoto, Japan | Registered: Sep 2005
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verycoolnin
The Red and the Green Stamps
posted
Well, my first message was deleted but I'm still going to put my message across. I don't see why this is a big deal. There isn't any nudity.
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quote:Originally posted by Ganzfeld: The Episode 38 - Electric Soldier Porygon, which supposedly caused all kinds of illnesses, has never been fuly explained. Personally, I doubt it was anything serious.
Going on all of my second and third hand information, what basically happened was this:
The gang was fighting some kind of PokeComputer Virus in a virtual computer world (something about Porygon bringin them there, I think). At some point some virtual "nukes" where launched, to which Pikachu thunderbolted, making fast red/white/blue flashes of color go by on the screen.
Due to this fast display of color, it caused seizures in lots of kiddies. The general conclusion was that due to a combination of the scene and the habit of sitting too close to the television, it was able to affect a wide number of people.
Of course, this doesn't precisely explain why the episode was introduced to the circular file, but I'm guessing that's just a PR decision, seeing as the problematic scene could just be edited*.
(*And it could be, seeing how much editing, paintbrushing, blah blah blah that 4Kids likes to do already.)
-------------------- "I told you I didn't do it!" - Mr. Green
posted
Has anybody yet mentioned that this particular show is also distributed westernly by "4KIDS". Although most of the linguistic editing is done by the studio producing the episode, I believe that most the animation editing is done by the licensee in general.
This clip, was of course, edited out for the Canadian and U.S. "Pokemon" airings, as well as the episode Greg of Winter mentioned.
-------------------- Come on! Ninja kick the damn rabbit! Posts: 273 | From: Ontario, Canada | Registered: May 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Ian - Crawling on a Mirror:
quote:Originally posted by Ganzfeld: The Episode 38 - Electric Soldier Porygon, which supposedly caused all kinds of illnesses, has never been fuly explained. Personally, I doubt it was anything serious.
Going on all of my second and third hand information, what basically happened was this:...Due to this fast display of color, it caused seizures in lots of kiddies. The general conclusion was that due to a combination of the scene and the habit of sitting too close to the television, it was able to affect a wide number of people....
Thank. I already know the story. As far as I know no one has ever confirmed that it was really as widespread or serious as the papers said it was. Another opinion was that a couple parents complained andd suddenly many people were complaining, perhaps a form of mass hysteria.
Posts: 4922 | From: Kyoto, Japan | Registered: Sep 2005
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quote:After 618 Japanese children reportedly experienced seizures from viewing that December 1997 episode of Pocket Monsters (later renamed Pokemon) and were rushed to hospital, the TV show was shut down for several months... here
618, that seems pretty serious to me. Thank you snopes!
-------------------- Come on! Ninja kick the damn rabbit! Posts: 273 | From: Ontario, Canada | Registered: May 2004
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(The home grown answer by snopes for snopesters.)
The key word in your snippet of that paragraph is "reportedly". Perhaps the more important sentence in the paragraph is
quote:Later, researchers who studied the Pokemon phenomenon reported in the Southern Medical Journal that only a small fraction of the 618 children treated were actually diagnosed with photosensitive epilepsy.
So I'm going to do something very bold here (ha ha) and agree with snopes that the legend is false.
Posts: 4922 | From: Kyoto, Japan | Registered: Sep 2005
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I'm not saying snopes is wrong...but I'm not saying he's completely right. The episode did in fact give over 600 children seizures. 10-13 of those children did not have an epileptic past. Those children were apparently susceptible to photosensitive epilepsy, while the other children have had at one time or another had a seizure.
600, with a little over half being triggered by the episode, is still, I'd say, pretty serious.
-------------------- Come on! Ninja kick the damn rabbit! Posts: 273 | From: Ontario, Canada | Registered: May 2004
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Muffin, the reason only a very small number of children were diagnosed with photosensitive epilepsy is because the others didn't have it. Why were so many reported to have had it? The reason is simple: The reports included anyone with "symptoms" of it. The symptoms, like any symptom list, included some all-around complaints, such as "feeling nauseous". So 600 children didn't have seizures from watching Pokemon. 600 children had one or more of the various symptoms of photosensitive epilepsy the same night that they watched Pokemon. It was a very popular show (16.5% rating that night) and millions of kids were watching it. So 600 is about one kid in 2,000, extremely conservatively. Now, almost any night kids are watching TV there are bound to be a few real seizures unrelated to the TV show. But add to that small number any kids who felt nauseous and the number could have been much higher than 600 without a single one having photosensitive epilepsy. What happened? In my opinion, the media love a good story and this was a great story: “Animation makes kids sick!” And that's what we heard for weeks, without much evidence to support it.
(By the way, I wrote “by snopes for snopesters” but the article in the link has a different by-line than the snopes on the message board.)
ETA Here is a much deeper discussion of the incident but if you read it you have to read the second half too, or you will come away with the wrong conclusion (that hundreds of kids had seizures after watching Pokemon that night).
Posts: 4922 | From: Kyoto, Japan | Registered: Sep 2005
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quote:(By the way, I wrote “by snopes for snopesters” but the article in the link has a different by-line than the snopes on the message board.)
Huh? I'm completely lost?
quote:So 600 is about one kid in 2,000, extremely conservatively
You're right! I do believe that a lot of it was mass hysteria, and made to be something bigger than it actually was. But something stood out for me in the article
quote:"But it's hard to conceive that 700 did."
Now, if in Tokyo alone, 50,714 students had watched Pokemon on that day. I think that over 700 children in the whole of Japan experiencing PSE isn't to far fetched. Theres a good chance most weren't taken to the hospital because of either: The parent already knew of the child's PSE, and took care of the child until the seizure ended.
The parent was unaware that the child had a seizure.
The child was unaware that he/she had a seizure.
Seeing as how PSE is more likely to occure in children, and the insane number of children viewing Pokemon on that day, I think that 700 is a very low number, but until reall proof is found for exactly how many children experienced seizures apart from just the common symptoms. I'll stand by the report your posted as well as the ones I found searching the internet.
Anyway, after some reading. Both the article you posted and the ones I found earlier. I retract my original statement. It wasn't that serious, and mostly chalked up to mass hysteria.
Off topic, I was just wondering if you saw the episode when it originally aired?
-------------------- Come on! Ninja kick the damn rabbit! Posts: 273 | From: Ontario, Canada | Registered: May 2004
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When I was a kid, not very many Japanese cartoons filtered over to the US, but I did watch Speed Racer, Voltron, Robotech, and a couple of others. I still remember several scenes that my parent might not have approved of if they had seen them.
Voltron had a couple of near-nudity jokes involving the Princess. She loses part of her swimsuit in one, she rushes to a meeting wearing a towel in another. No actual nudity, but still risque for some parents' tastes.
I vaguely remember an episode of something, possibly Robotech, where some aliens tried to force their human captives to demonstrate human reproduction.
And lets not forget Tranzor Z (aka Mazinger), where the female robots launch their breasts as rockets, and one of the villains is a hermaphrodite.
-------------------- I believe I'm growing skeptical of cynicism. MyspaceNWNBoard Posts: 917 | From: Nashville TN | Registered: Oct 2005
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quote:(By the way, I wrote “by snopes for snopesters” but the article in the link has a different by-line than the snopes on the message board.)
Huh? I'm completely lost?
It's just that the snopes.com article you linked to is credited to Ryan Aston, not snopes. My comment was just a "by the way" so I don't get any replies saying "It's not by snopes!".
quote:Off topic, I was just wondering if you saw the episode when it originally aired?
That was before my son was born and after I reached the age of thirteen so, no, I didn't watch it. I usually only get my son the ones with English (he gets enough Japanese from good shows) so we probably won't ever see it. (No offense intended to Pokemon or Pokemon fans... I haven't watched it enough to offer an educated opinion on the true merits of the show.)
Posts: 4922 | From: Kyoto, Japan | Registered: Sep 2005
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This is nothing. I've seen so many things in Japanese animation that made me go "What the??!!"
A seemingly common gag, which I have seen several times, is the Penis-Elephant bit. There's a Crayon Shin-chan episode where he comes out of his room, naked from the waist down, having drawn an elephant on his bits. There's a Sailor Moon episode where Chibi-Usa tries to befriend a boy at the park who whips off his knickers and shouts "CUTE ELEPHANT!" Before getting a whack on the noggin from his mom. Those are actual kids shows, with actual NUDITY. (Although, I think the Sailor Moon episode just showed Chibi-Usa's reaction with drawings of elephants in the background.) Shaking around the covered boobies? That's nothing. I know it's already been said, but it's true: Japanese kids find breasts funny. Especially big ones. I had a friend in Japan whose six year old daughter took great pleasure in poking me in the Oppai, proclaiming that they were too big, stuffing pillows down her shirt, and basically turning my every visit to the family into an extended boob joke.
-------------------- "In perfume, as in underwear, the scantiest of applications provides the greatest of returns." -Silas Sparkhammer Posts: 858 | From: Arlington, Texas | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by BlushingBride: A seemingly common gag, which I have seen several times, is the Penis-Elephant bit. There's a Crayon Shin-chan episode where he comes out of his room, naked from the waist down, having drawn an elephant on his bits. There's a Sailor Moon episode where Chibi-Usa tries to befriend a boy at the park who whips off his knickers and shouts "CUTE ELEPHANT!" Before getting a whack on the noggin from his mom...
That's what bothers me ten times more than a little nudity. Kids end up thinking this stuff is funny. Then they become adults and everyone here seems to wonder, "Where do these chikan get the idea that exhibitionism is normal?" Like, duh.
The whacking on the head thing is another of my pet peeves about Japanese TV. Maybe its because I've had a few bad head accidents (can't you tell?). To me, after the groin and the breasts, the head is one part of the body nobody should touch, and certainly not whack. And the Japanese have entire TV shows devoted to "Why do we have a bullying problem?" Gee, I wonder where kids learn to smack each other around. I don't even watch TV much anymore.
Posts: 4922 | From: Kyoto, Japan | Registered: Sep 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Ganzfeld: The whacking on the head thing is another of my pet peeves about Japanese TV. Maybe its because I've had a few bad head accidents (can't you tell?). To me, after the groin and the breasts, the head is one part of the body nobody should touch, and certainly not whack. And the Japanese have entire TV shows devoted to "Why do we have a bullying problem?" Gee, I wonder where kids learn to smack each other around. I don't even watch TV much anymore.
But no heads were ever whacked by mallets in Bugs Bunny cartoons? I don't live in Japan, obviously, but I don't think it's exclusive to Japanese television. The head is bonked on TV pretty much everywhere. Is it linked to bullying? I wouldn't want to answer that, but I definitely think that making anatomy a taboo is linked to why there's so much immaturity surrounding it.
-------------------- "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use." - Galileo Galilei Posts: 134 | From: Toronto, Ontario | Registered: Oct 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Cyber: ...I don't think it's exclusive to Japanese television. The head is bonked on TV pretty much everywhere. Is it linked to bullying? I wouldn't want to answer that, but I definitely think that making anatomy a taboo is linked to why there's so much immaturity surrounding it.
I knew someone was gong to say something like this but didn't have time to explain this with enough detail. Obviously if you read my posts you'll see that I have nothing against slapstick per se, so it is a good question. I'll try to explain as briefly as possible.
Japanese people have a certain head slapping habit as a kind of spanking, a punishment or a way of putting someone in their place. In the west, no one seriously considers taking a mallet to someone else's head but here such toys are quite common and part of many comedy routines. This action is very closely linked to the real abuse parents give their children by slapping them on the head (even teachers used to do this!) and children give each other. That's the connection to bullying. I don't think slapping someone on the head is appropriate in any case, especially children. It's so pervasive here that no one ever realizes that its wrong. That's what I object to -- not putting it in the cartoon, but doing so without realizing it's wrong. (Everyone knows dropping a piano on someone's head is wrong. That's part of what makes it so darn funny.)
The same goes for the sexist bits. Nudity doesn't bother me at all but some of these gags are done with no understanding of the sexism in the joke so the viewer never sees the sexism either. The US is a little bit too uptight about nudity but Japan is a little insensitive to some of the objectification going on.
A little more awareness is all I want: Body parts aren't something you have to hide but they aren't really that funny either; Hitting someone on the head is very funny in cartoons but please don't do it for real, even if you're only playing.
ETA - I should add that the example given above was one in which the mother punches her kid in the top of the head as a form of punishment, which, believe it or not, is not uncommon here. It makes me really mad to see it so I wish cartoons would stop showing it too.
Posts: 4922 | From: Kyoto, Japan | Registered: Sep 2005
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posted
In that case, slapstick aside, I'm pretty sure I know what you're talking about. I have seen that sort of thing, not only in Japanese culture but Korean (I saw a Korean movie recently called "Sex is Zero," and heads were slapped on at least 20 separate occasions). I guess I'm getting into the habit of agreeing with you, Ganzfeld
In terms of nudity, again, I do think that it's the controversy that causes the problems, sexism included. The pokemon scene, from my perspective, is pretty damn stupid, but I could compare that to - more or less - (and once again I choose a Looney Tunes reference) a beefy cartoon character flaunting his muscles at the scrawny protagonist. The sexual connotation comes from the adult mind, not the child's.
-------------------- "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use." - Galileo Galilei Posts: 134 | From: Toronto, Ontario | Registered: Oct 2002
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quote:Originally posted by 1958Fury: I vaguely remember an episode of something, possibly Robotech, where some aliens tried to force their human captives to demonstrate human reproduction.
It was Robotech. That scene is actually pretty tame. All that happens is the aliens are interrogating the humans and demand to know how humans reproduce. The two humans kiss (fully clothed) and the aliens get scared and freak out. It's a really weird scene, but not really objectional in any way.
-------------------- "Most people don't find me nearly as funny as I find me." Posts: 55 | From: Philadelphia | Registered: Sep 2003
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Ganzfeld, I totally agree with you on the head-smacking thing. There was a teacher at one of the schools where I worked who bonked kids on the head every time they got an answer wrong. Another one who did it for every student who forgot their textbook, sometimes fifteen kids. And I never saw it as an open-handed slap, either. It was always done with a closed fist, middle finger slightly raised to a point, and that's what they brought down on your skull. That hurts. That same school had the worst behaved kids of any of my three JHSs, and at the end of the year they had a "Why do we have such a bully problem?" brainstorming session. They asked my opinion (as one who worked at other schools) and I said that I thought it was because they hit the kids for punishment, where my other schools took away priviliges, forced students to make public apologies, etc. They waved it off and said the kids would be worse if they didn't hit them.
-------------------- "In perfume, as in underwear, the scantiest of applications provides the greatest of returns." -Silas Sparkhammer Posts: 858 | From: Arlington, Texas | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by BlushingBride: Ganzfeld, I totally agree with you on the head-smacking thing. There was a teacher at one of the schools where I worked who bonked kids on the head every time they got an answer wrong.... said the kids would be worse if they didn't hit them.
That makes me angry. I hope for my son's and his teachers' sake nobody touches his head because there are some things I just won't tolerate.
Posts: 4922 | From: Kyoto, Japan | Registered: Sep 2005
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posted
Yeah, this is legit. The episode was shown in America, but the scenes with James dressed in the bikini were pretty much entirely edited out. I saw the unedited Japanese version online a long time ago, and the above clip was included.
Posts: 12 | From: Indiana | Registered: Jul 2005
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WittySquirrel
I'll Be Home for After Christmas Sales
posted
quote:Originally posted by BlushingBride: This is nothing. I've seen so many things in Japanese animation that made me go "What the??!!"
A seemingly common gag, which I have seen several times, is the Penis-Elephant bit. There's a Crayon Shin-chan episode where he comes out of his room, naked from the waist down, having drawn an elephant on his bits. There's a Sailor Moon episode where Chibi-Usa tries to befriend a boy at the park who whips off his knickers and shouts "CUTE ELEPHANT!" Before getting a whack on the noggin from his mom. Those are actual kids shows, with actual NUDITY. (Although, I think the Sailor Moon episode just showed Chibi-Usa's reaction with drawings of elephants in the background.)
I remember seeing a Hong Kong comedy movie sometime between 7 to 10 years ago, that had a scene similar to the ones you're talking about. There was a little boy with a hole in his pants, right at the spot where the bits would pop out and so he decides to disguise it as an elephant and walk around as normal. When questioned by a foreign tourist (American perhaps), the woman goes "oh, how cute!" and fondles it.
I don't remember the title of the movie anymore, but I've never seen that scene on TV again, though I probably might've seen an edited version after that. It just seems very weird at that time, hence the burning image in the mind. Some Hong Kong movies are full of sexual imagery and innuendos (especially comedies) that it went under the chopping board from the censorship department here.
quote:Originally posted by Greg of Winter: IIRC, there were a few episodes that were never translated into English and never shown in the USA because of some of the subjects. One was the beauty contest episode (the pic in the OP) and another about a "Solstice Festival" that they were afraid pCms would view as too paganistic.
The only episodes that have never been aired in the US are the Dratini episode, the infamous Porygon episode (which I hear is banned even in Japan. Hell, Porygon never appeared again, and its evolution is the only Pokemon to never appear in the series or movies...), and some episode starring Jynx.
quote:Originally posted by Cobalt Kitty: The episode this scene comes from was shown in Canada, although it was very long after it was supposed to based on the order of the episodes. It was advertised as being a "lost episode", and a semi-big deal was made about its showing on YTV.
The scene in the OP was edited out, of course.
That happened here too.
I've seen (when i was younger... <__<) both the episodes with Dratini and with Jynx in on UK TV, so i have no idea why they'd be banned in the US. What's the reason for them not being shown?
-------------------- We have just gotten a wake-up call from the Nintendo Generation! Posts: 225 | From: New York, no grass... | Registered: Mar 2004
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I'm not sure about the Dratini episode (what the heck is Dratini anyways. I know of some Pokemon by osmosis, but this isn't one of the ones I know). The episode with Jynx was banned because Jynx apperantly looks too much like someone in blackface makeup, which could be considered offensive to african-americans.
ETA: At least, as it was told to me. I didn notice it in the background a couple of times in the episodes I caught in the breakroom at work.
-------------------- I'm as giddy as a Japanese school girl in an octopus tank. Posts: 641 | From: Portland, Oregon | Registered: Jun 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Kitsune26: The episode with Jynx was banned because Jynx apperantly looks too much like someone in blackface makeup, which could be considered offensive to african-americans.
Now that's just pathetic.
-------------------- We have just gotten a wake-up call from the Nintendo Generation! Posts: 225 | From: New York, no grass... | Registered: Mar 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Kitsune26: I'm not sure about the Dratini episode (what the heck is Dratini anyways. I know of some Pokemon by osmosis, but this isn't one of the ones I know).
Dratini is a eastern-style dragon, where it's more like a snake of sorts. Of course, examining the name myself, I'm guessing that Dratini is supposed to be "tiny dragon", which is the case. (Google Image brings up plenty of results.)
Anyway, IIRC, the episode they were in was banned because in that particular episode, the warden of the Safari Zone brandished a six-shooter.
Of course, who cares when Team Rocket carries high explosives? Silly standards.
-------------------- "I told you I didn't do it!" - Mr. Green
posted
Wikipedia says that there are 8 episodes of Pokemon banned in the USA.
Also, since the original Jynx episode was aired, the Pokemon creators changed her skin colour from black to purple.
Posts: 22 | From: Somerset, UK | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:Originally posted by piffpuffpickle: Wikipedia says that there are 8 episodes of Pokemon banned in the USA.
I'd only say 6, as the Porygon and Whiscash episodes were banned by Japan...
quote:Also, since the original Jynx episode was aired, the Pokemon creators changed her skin colour from black to purple.
The games did it a long time ago, the anime only did it fairly recently (when Jynx had a starring role in a Contest)...
-------------------- "Elly: Oops, I'm a damsel in distress now. Better scream girlishly and all… ahem. EEEK!"
Schwarz: Look, there's three ways to do things: the right way, the wrong way, and the Ninja way. Rey: Isn't that the wrong way? Schwarz: Yup, only stealthier. Posts: 546 | From: Pennsylvania | Registered: Jan 2004
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That makes me angry. I hope for my son's and his teachers' sake nobody touches his head because there are some things I just won't tolerate.
