On Women in Shounen Manga

[kuroraka]

Now that i'm finally *drumroll* caught up with One Piece /*drumroll*, i looked around a bit in the community and there was an interesting discussion on gender inequality. There's been a similar thread on the Naruto comm not so long ago and i also remember seeing one on the Reborn comm, back when i was still interested in that series

Comments

[glareola]

Okay, I'm probably going to be killed now, but I must say that I don't like fictional women anyway, so to me it's a positive trait if a series features as few females as possible. As to their portrayal - I don't care as long as they keep out of the way. So-called "strong woman" make me break into a rash. Although this feeling does not apply to real life most of the time, I obviously suffer from a bad case of "Stutenbissigkeit", whatever that may be in English.

So please let me get my bullet-proof vest now before you start shooting at me.

[kuroraka]

Well, this is you personal opinion which you are perfectly entitled to and with which you are certainly not alone from my experience. But since i'm not here to 'convert' anyone, i'm gonna refrain from commenting on it.^^

It's also not really relevant to my post as i wasn't trying to discuss the (un)importance of (strong) female characters in shounen manga but rather the claim that it's pointless to discuss gender inequality or sexism in shounen manga.

[glareola]

I suppose I wouldn't notice sexism even if I was thrown into it with my nose forward. So I'm probably not the right person to discuss with but I wanted to say something about it too! :D

[glareola]

PS: Thank you for not killing me! ♥

[aflyingteapot]

The reson why I tend not to participate in this kind of serious fandom discussion is because I know I will inevitably get depressed at people's ignorance later =__= (I was honest here)

There is a point in the fact that shounen manga are directed to young males, though: it inevitably calls for pin-up girls because that's what they will be attacted to. This doesn't mean of course that it's a reason not to introduce strong female characters who don't rely on their looks, so you point still stands. And my personal opinion on why this doesn't happen is: male mangaka don't know women. There, I said it XD

[kuroraka]

I don't really feel like participating in those discussions either, that's why i prefer to ramble in my own journal.XD Though i gotta say that what i've read so far was surprising civil. The most stupid comment i've ever seen was by a female in the Naruto comm who claimed that she doesn't want strong female characters because they would emasculate her beloved male characters! I LOLed so hard, though i cried a bit inside, too...

I wouldn't mind the sexy babes so much if they could fight on par with the guys. OP isn't so bad in this respect as there really are badass women who can fight. But in the end they are still weaker than the guys, even the devil fruit users.

LOL! I wish that was true, but one of the worst examples of women's portrayal in shounen manga is definitely Katekyo Hitman Reborn and the mangaka is a woman. It would probably interesting to know how much influence the editors have here. Reading Bakuman (which portrays women in an absolutely awful way, IMO) is a bit educational at least...XD

[aflyingteapot]

Girls on OP are pretty strong and also, people are *actually* scared by them, which failry often (if not always...) doesn't happen in shounen manga. But when the actual fighting takes place, they inevitably fight other female characters =__= I don't know if Oda is restraining from hurting man pride or what, but still... MORE COULD BE DONE!

Well, given the looks of certain (strong) characters, I wouldn't be surprised if they were conceived as female and then for whatever reason they were turned to males... But maybe it's just the great effort of a woman mangaka to fit in a shounen manga world that makes her introduce only "ideal" female characters. I mean, even poisonous Bianchi turns out to be all caring about her brother and his friends in proper Japanese wife fashion.

[kuroraka]

Yeah, it's amazing how - even though there's usually only one female in each party - they always miraculously end up fighting each other...speaking of male pride, it also bothers me a bit that Sanji's refusal to hurt women even if they intend to kill him is supposed to be seen as admirable. Even chivalry should have its limits...

I'm sure it's hard to break out of the formulistic rules of a shounen series, maybe even harder for a female mangaka. Makes you wonder if Oda introduced the okama because there were no rules for okama in shounen, so he could make them do whatever he wanted...XD