And MERRY only mumbled that non Japanese people are stupid and simply didn’t uNdErStAnD tHeIr ArT and kept using the pictures domestically and that was it. Or is that already considered “being canceled” these days?
Japan is a country where it is not really the act that is considered that bad but rather getting caught is viewed as bad, if that makes sense? like I know large groups of people in entertainment who know the same things about certain people but those scandals only become “bad” really after it becomes news. So more of like a shame thing? so for Japan cancelled would def be like someone said Sakura from L’arc, dude went from being in one of the biggest bands to having to work in a kind of sex job place ran by some mid tier vkei company for a bit. But after time the shame thing/ “ooooo you got caught!” effect wears off in Japan and then they are good to go again usually so it is not really being cancelled, more like being in Time Out (probably because everyone else in the entertainment industry usually has huge skeletons in their closet also.)
In general lots of these things apply to any country, however here most people just do not /have the culture of being offended for fun and moral signalling like in the west (not saying that stuff is bad or good)
*side note on the nazi uniforms:
I find it interesting that certain western bands have been banned/dropped from shows just from slight past comments or tattoos etc. but I wonder if like promoters would do the same or have ever done the same for Japanese bands with a history of these kind of pictures? that’d be interesting.
I Don’t know why people are mad to japanese people especially VK people for wearing N@ZI uniform. they probably think it looks cool and interpreted the N@ZI logo as the symbol for eternity in hinduism (Remember. the art guy has stolen the symbol and change its meaning and looks for the worst) I mean the japanese never taught the WW2 subject at their school (for obvious reasons) and i literally had proof for this yesterday when i was watching a VTuber stream.
Edit: found the afromention clip: WARNING: ANIME GIRL NOISES ALERT
@zog regular rearing his head earlier - jews or not, but karma doing a post-ironic homage to nazi-kei era in 2020 was enough to get him and his band rands cancelled (presumably by negative twitter feedback), despite his band gaining traction and having some tenured scene regulars involved
I referenced that band, but in reality I have no clue what really went on, except for the ~feeling~ that shit like that doesn’t happen accidentally in a country so otherwise anal about safety precautions as japan. so yeah unless someone from the scene decides to open up a bit about that particular incident, it would be just speculation on my part.
It looks especially bad to foreigners because not only was Japan allied with Axis, it also committed appalling atrocities during that period like what happened in Unit 731. Was considering posting a few links but it’s so abhorrently horrendous and I don’t really want to get banned. Of course not every Japanese person is like this, although it’s worth noting the context.
I’m sure that to some VK artists, a Nazi uniform is edgy Shock Rock material. To (most) everyone else, it’s at best naïve behaviour and at worst a truly vile means of praising and supporting one of the most detestable events in human history.
And yes, the manji and/or swastika symbol is to this day a holy symbol. However, you have to look at the whole picture. A person specifically wearing that uniform with the Nazified version of the symbol (rotated 45 degrees) complete with SS and Iron Cross symbols (and bondage gear) is probably looking to piss people off rather than refer to anything divine.
I would add that remaining ignorant about their history nowadays doesnt give them a green pass to do stupid things. If at least there was “something” behind those looks, lets say, a critic against their gov, emperor system, their “cleaning” history ways… it could be understandable, but just empty background with it to just be “edgy” is …
A behaviour similar to what that Johnny Somalyi was doing in Japan lately.
But then I wonder, why does Military-kei still (barely) exist nowadays?
Is it because they change the color and get rid of the sw@stik@ symbol? that’s it? i mean i’ve seen some band with the same military aestethic but BLUE or GREEN or any other colours.
So tired of circling the drain about DAE THINK NAZI IMAGERY IS BAD?!!? Of course we do, but bands do it because it makes people uncomfortable and sparks a conversation. Good or bad, it gets you talking about them and that’s their ultimate goal. The usual response is something along the lines of “Japan and Germany were allies during WW2 and thus the society has different feelings on it”, but the truth is that they have their own problematic imagery that gets ignored in lieu of fetishizing Nazi aesthetics.
If you don’t know, I’m talking about the Japanese imperialism aesthetic, which is just as offensive but no one takes the time to discuss.
In former Japanese occupied countries, the rising sun flag symbolizes Japanese imperial aggression and war crimes. The flags were carried by soldiers and were raised when enemy territories fell to Japanese forces.
It’s equivalent to the Confederate Flag in East and Southeast Asia, and this shit is everywhere, yet we only seem to talk about Nazis.
These are the quickest examples that jumps to mind of this imagery in visual kei:
キズ (Kizu) - ピアスにフード, 2021
(this was edited out at a later date)
ベル (Belle) - 拡声決起ストライキ promo materials, 2021
Right there, the (mirrored) swastika and the rising sun flag are bosom buddies on the same item, and these are current events, not just something that happened ten years ago.
@Kumanosuke has said everything that needs to be said about this:
So there you go, it doesn’t exist in the same sense as in Western cultures, and this is one of those times where we have to stop applying a Western mindset to a global issue viewed from a Japanese perspective. Move on to something other than Nazi/imperialist imagery, unless you have a bombshell to add that no one’s discussed yet.
I think I mentioned in another topic about vkei labels running things like pink salons etc. before so to keep on subject I will just say this about that; Even that was common knowledge among a bunch of fans, some of them even working at such places, so again we cannot apply the same type of cancel culture mindset to Japan. it is as I said “doing it is not bad, getting caught is bad.”
if there was some scandal at such a place the media would eat it up and turn it into a deal.
The nazi uniform thing; thanks to the person who replied to my question about if a band did get gigs overseas cancelled etc due to that! I do not know much about newer bands so that knowledge helps!
I am wayyyy too open lots of the time but I like knowledge more than anything so I will mention my personal interaction with this stuff here:
our singer is a wee baby, only like 21, he like other japanese was basically taught little to nothing about the realities of WW2 in school, even yesterday I got a japanese far right ad on youtube saying something like “why was hitler a genius?” and was like “ohhh jesus no no no.”
So lots of these people are just ignorant to it, but then again you have people with common sense that war is bad and such so our support drummer and I told him after he mentioned he wanted to wear a nazi type uniform “you do not know the history but you will make many fans sad if you do so, the reality is not good, my family had to eat their pets, lost friends and homes, in war no one wins, its not cool” and then he apologized and was generally embarrassed for not knowing etc.
“now everyone shut the fuck up about it” is not really the purpose of forums I feel, and this cancel culture question has alot to do with that stuff.
Sure some of these artists view it as shock culture, some also are far right douche bags, some view it just as fashion and a trope they saw an older artist do in the 90s etc. or they’ve seen it in anime and such. it is a tricky thing! but again that wont get you cancelled in Japan, even chinese or russian communists uniforms, there was like an event at CHOP where some bands did that and it is not like it is some huge politically charged thing, more like fashion? so even wearing the enemy uniforms here wont get people into SJW mode. Personally I think it is gross and stupid but meh, im just one person, and I would just choose to not support them but would fight for their right to wear whatever they want too.
I def do agree we need to stop applying western view points to Japan, after a decade here I cannot understand how lots of Americans think too so.
But instead of cancel culture sometimes I think it is better to try and educate instead of just get angry, or simply do not support that band/artist.
If you get angry you will sometimes just make people want to do it more.
While there is an argument to be made about having this conversation, this forum isn’t the place for it. Having uncomfortable conversations about Japan’s role to play in WW2 is related to, but not the same as discussing Nazi/imperialist symbolism in visual kei. It targets different audiences for one; one is a Japanese audience and the other is this online international one.
But by far the most important reason this rule has been implemented is that these topics spring up again and again with barely any substance beyond “isn’t this distasteful?”. Of course it is! But then we inevitably get into conversations where there are people applying outside cultural perspectives to this issue versus those who aren’t, and it’s not a productive conversation because neither side is usually licensed to speak about this issue. And I had to bring up imperialist imagery because it sits right next to all this, and pops up in visual kei quite often, but it usually gets a pass here because the ignorance cuts the other way, and many people are not aware of the connotations behind rising sun imagery. So this devolves into a conversation of what people personally find offensive versus what this culture actually considers offensive, and I consider that to be off-topic.
So the official forum stance is “yes it’s distasteful; support/don’t support if you want” and I don’t see what further discussion here has to offer, since we’re not the target audience.
Also, as others have pointed out, expecting to hear an answer explicitly explaining the political motives for a photo shoot or a piece of merch is a complete fool’s errand.
Even if they do agree with those symbols on face value, the answer that the vast majority of bands will give is “We weren’t thinking about it that way, but it looks cool, ne?” (Which honestly, is the most disappointing answer they could give)
Any attempts to argue about their motives is pure speculation and doesn’t really change anyone’s mind in the grand scheme of things.
