Why I hated Haruhi Suzumiya and everything that show stands for

[feuervogel]

Pursuant to a discussion on another, locked journal, I was reminded how violently I hated "The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya." At the time I watched it, I couldn't really put into words why I hated it, other than I wanted to stab Haruhi in the eye, kick her in the teeth, rip her head off, and shit down her throat. I also thought the bullshit pretentious wankery of "we're gonna show the episodes out of order!" was a bunch of bullshit pretentious wankery for the sake of being Experimental and Pretentious Wankers.

There was also an extreme discomfort at the way they treated Mikuru (aka tits-girl). Yay, reducing a woman to a sexual object (and never a subject, Mikuru... she was literally incapable of saying no or even giving consent. Seriously fucking gross.)

But eisen, who writes amazingly thinky things about cartoons and society and culture and whose brain I fangirl mightily, put into words her own loathing of TMHS, and in her words, I found the expression of what I found so disgusting.

It is intellectually and emotionally dishonest, its characters never rise above cardboard cutouts in temperament, personality, or character designs - and it chooses the most tawdry and tautological justifications why - its most popular and beloved running gag involves the nonconsensual molestation and sexual abuse of a girl who's repeatedly demonstrated to be psychologically incapable of saying "no" and even if she were THE SURVIVAL OF THE UNIVERSE HINGES ON HER ALLOWING HARUHI TO DENY HER RIGHT TO CONTROL HER OWN BODY because otherwise Haruhi might get fucking bored, the number of "funny molestation" gags don't end with just Mikuru, Kyon is supposed to come off like a beleaguered Everyman but instead he comes off as an insufferable, cynical, selfish, egotistical boor (and a bore!) who's deluded himself into thinking he and he alone really understands the situations they're all stuck in - and the series wants you to believe he's right, not to mention that for all Haruhi's vaunted control over the fucking cosmos DID YOU PERHAPS NOTICE THAT HARUHI WASN'T IN CONTROL OF THE FIRST TIME SHE USED HER ABILITIES? No, that was Kyon, aka "I am John Smith", thanks for playing "I might be impotent and a loser but I bet if I just knew a reality warper she'd listen to me and it would be my will that shaped the world after all, haha".

[...]

The entire premise of the show is that the main characters can and will have their own identities, their bodies, nonconsensually violated at any time, without permission, and that they should just shut the fuck up and deal because Haruhi's just too awesome to be denied, and really, it's okay, because Haruhi just wants to have fun! And Kyon can control her, don't you know? Don't you trust Kyon? You should! Because he's a jackass, but he's a jackass Haruhi will listen to!

In summary: Consent? Who needs that?

If you like the show, I'm not judging you. Just recognize and acknowledge the vile misogynist shit that TMHS (and a lot of anime full of fanservice, moe-blobs, and otherwise directed at the male gaze) are perpetuating. Be aware. There's some sketchy shit out there that I like, but I still acknowledge it's sketchy.

eisen again: The most execrable part of HARUHI and its fandom is not that the show itself contains cynically misogynistic elements - but that the show itself, and its fandom by extension, often sees nothing wrong with the way these elements are presented, and in fact considers them exemplary of their worldview, glorifies them as wish fulfillment.... I just can't accept a show that treats learned sociopathy as a desirable characteristic in everyday life.

If you think I'm overreacting, being too sensitive, and ought to just let it go or ignore it? Kindly go fuck yourself. I don't need to enjoy yet another piece of popular culture that perpetuates vile, heteronormative, patriarchal crap while reducing me to a sexual object.

Comments

[yhibiki]

I never looked at it like that -- I watched Haruhi, thought it was mildly amusing, and then just moved on. I agree that Mikuru was absolutely terrible as a character, in how she existed simply for fan service. Oh, and that the "airing out of order" makes no sense if you were to watch it in order, because the episode that aired last, which is chronologically really somewhere near the beginning of the show, is a _final_ episode in every sense of the word.

I've kind of given up watching most anime anyway. Especially all the "popular" stuff, I just can't get into it anymore. :/

[feuervogel]

I didn't make it to the end of the show. I think I quit around the first half of the cozy murder segment (in broadcast order), because I hated it so much and wanted to set it on fire. With my brain.

That's another reason I'm quitting anime club. I don't give a shit about 90% of the shows they show, and the popular things are getting worse and worse, with more moe-blob, fanservicey, lolicon shit. It's kind of sad that the shows I've been interested in lately have been sports shows (Rideback, Giant Killing) or disaster porn (Tokyo Magnitude 8.0) or the occasional high school rom-com (Toradora). And, of course, anything Gundam or Macross, because I'm a mecha fangirl.

[yhibiki]

Lol, the only anime I watch these days is BL anime. And even then I'm very picky. I tend to stick to stuff I've read the manga to.

I really do hate the moe-blob stuff. 9_9

[feuervogel]

I can't even watch BL much anymore, because I can't handle the heteronormativity :( It makes me sad. (Though I will read the hell out of Fumi Yoshinaga manga.)

[eisen]

RIDEBACK and TORADORA!. I love both of them so much it's ridiculous. ;_;

(The manga version of RIDEBACK is so much better, though - it's basically Gundam, with transforming motorbike robots and a female version of Amuro and and and. Oh, just go read my reaction post to the whole thing, why don't you, I am bad at words.)

[feuervogel]

I need to download the rest of Rideback, because there was NO INTEREST in the club to watch more. Booooo. (Add that to the litany for why I quit...)

I mean, really: transforming motorbike robots. How can this not appeal? Oh, well, maybe it's the girl main character and girl BFF. *grumble*

There's still no scanslation of the manga, is there? My Japanese reading ability is practically non-existent now, and I remember there being a complex political thing in the background, in the anime anyway.

[eisen]

I think what gets to me more than the total lack of consent across the board - since I've enjoyed, or at least been invested in, plenty of stories that cross consent lines like fucking crazy, both on an in-story level and a metanarrative level, and a cursory skim of my icons ought to bear that out - is that the noncon aspect of the show is treated by the narrative as nothing more than a jumping-off point for WACKY HIJINKS, rather than anything worth problematizing in and of itself.

Like. The skeevy part is not that Haruhi as a character exists and does these things. It's that the show never expects anyone to care.

[feuervogel]

I agree - done well, a story that dances around the borders of consent can be really interesting.

It's that the show never expects anyone to care. is a really good point. And I think it helps explain where the misogyny lives, as a perpetuation of the narrative in society that women don't deserve to own their own bodies or lives -- and it's OK! It's for their own good! *barf*

[eisen]

I've not read many examples of doing it well, I suppose - or rather, I've read and been invested in many more that don't do it any more decently than "okay?" - but I will at least settle for a bare minimum of the story itself recognizing that the characters deserve a right to consent to what happens to them and that when they don't it's a bad thing. Really. My expectations seriously are that low, sometimes. (Deliberate Simca icon is deliberate.)

And, you know, HARUHI didn't even manage that.

[feuervogel]

That's about my bar, sadly enough :( The things we're conditioned to...

[kurai-seraphim.livejournal.com]

Not that I'm disagreeing with the main argument (as honestly the point of the series is "Do what Haruhi wants or you die"), but I'm curious as to the use of the term "misogynistic" in relations to what you're describing. It seems to me like pretty much everyone in the universe is exploited by Haruhi's whims. The entirely male computer club gets repeatedly screwed out of their equipment. Kyon's entire life is disrupted by her presence and he ultimately is told that he has to kiss her or the world ends. Haruhi is a spoiled child who exploits everyone around her, so I think boiling things down to simply saying that the series is negative towards women is a bit shortsighted.

As far as Kyon having control, I never really got that message out of it. Maybe it's because I saw it only once and it was a very long time ago, but per my memory he seemed to be along for the ride as well and stuck fulfilling his role as the stand-in narrator. He clearly found other characters more interesting/attractive/whatever but couldn't show any of this without the world ending. He's as much of a slave to Haruhi as Mikuru is, although on a less physical level.

The only character in the entire series who seems to even remotely have power or authority outside of Haruhi is Yuki (the AI chick). She's utterly devoid of emotion (as that's her lot as a stock character), but she's consistently the only relevant "power" who is fully aware of the situation and capable of doing something about it (though admittedly she generally asks for permission from an unseen AI entity and falls into the dating sim-esque "must like narrator character" drivel).

The Haruhi God premise is the narrative device that lets the writer do whatever they want in a given novel/episode with little to no justification, not unlike the TARDIS randomly showing up somewhere when plot is about to happen. It didn't have to be such a horrible narrative crutch and it's a literal deus ex machina in the hands of a horny Japanese public.

Again, don't get me wrong: the whole series is loaded with stock characters and exists to cause fan wank. It's a fanservice monster designed by a Japanese marketing department to appeal to the socially retarded Japanese otaku fanbase. Its only real redeeming qualities are the high animation budget, the catchy music, and the other qualities we generally associate with show marketing rather than show content.

I just wanted to hear a little more clarification on how a series where everyone in existence is at the whim of a single entity is misogynistic rather than simply universally horrible and unforgivable. Do you have to grab the useless moe parody girl's boobs to tilt the scale in one gender's direction or can we settle on the idea that it's just one of the many things that the show does horribly to both genders in the name of appealing to the fanbase (which is arguably the bigger problem)?

[feuervogel]

I cut torches' paragraph on Yuki, and one on Haruhi's "agency" that isn't. Re Yuki: if a poorly socialized fanboy tries hard enough, and gets into as many compromising positions as possible, he'll be able to get the Rei-stand-in to fall for him.

Re Haruhi's "agency": even within the story named after her, Haruhi's own agency is an afterthought and always treated as a threat and something she has no control over herself, she needs to be taught how to be a better person, she is out of control, and thus even legitimate criticism of her character for being a gleeful rapist of her friends becomes suborned and undercut by the sexist treatment of her as "Woman with more power than a man, therefore creepy and must be muffled for the good of all".

It's misogynist because it treats women as lesser, as objects, as things that exist solely for male wish-fulfillment and wank fantasies. There's a lot of anime that does that (and a lot of Western media; I'm looking at you, Transformers).

Something doesn't have to feature people exhorting women to get back in the kitchen and have babies to be misogynist drivel.

[kurai-seraphim.livejournal.com]

It treats women as wish fulfillment, but that's been a problem with nearly every popular anime in the history of anime. Women are generally portrayed as the goal, the objective, and the prize in anything with a male protagonist. It's terrible, but it's hardly something to single Haruhi out on.

Haruhi is a reflection of the pathetic state of the mid-2000s and it's only gotten worse sense. What's really weird, though, is how the narrator (who I guess is the protagonist?) is supposed to be the audience's proxy, but he doesn't get to fulfill any of his wishes. He doesn't get the big boob fragile girl, he doesn't get the Rei clone, and he doesn't even get the option of avoiding the wrath of Hamlet. He's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern rolled into one. He, like everyone else, exists at the whim of a greater figure who is too big to sympathize with. I guess he fulfills the socially awkward otaku sympathy role who just wants some chick to show up and love him for no reason, then pull him into a world of wonder.

It's just the reversal of the princess waiting for her prince, only it's still misogynist because it's still centered on the guy. Snow White and the like followed the woman entirely and the Prince appears to save the day with 100% of the power, so people have trouble with it as a misogynist piece. When it happens the other way around, the woman (who is arguably a gender swap of Prince Charming) brings the man into a more exciting world and he's seen as using her?

I'm probably getting off point, but I guess I still see Haruhi as just universally bad to anyone and feel that focusing on its misogynist elements is applying too narrow of a hate focus. It's terrible to women as sex objects, but arguably if the gender roles for the entire thing were reversed it would be seen as misogynistic for giving a man all of the power and everyone in the world existing for the sole purpose of loving and appeasing him (also known as Twilight and/or the Bible). Being directed at men doesn't mean it isn't treating them like shit too.

Yaknow, I think I might just start calling Haruhi "Twilight for Boys" now. It feels appropriate.

[matt_doyle]

I prefer the books to the anime, but the way the series treats Mikuru is appalling. The books don't seem to apologize for it as much, but they still play it for laughs, which, ick.

[feuervogel]

Ick indeed. And, really, it's the playing for laughs part that makes me want to stab people.

Because sekuhara and rape are tewtelly lolarious. And groping women is tewtelly a compliment to her.

(Add that to the reasons I'm quitting anime club: way too many people laughed along.)

[matt_doyle]

Now, in the books at least, we get a few glances at future-Mikuru, who is mysterious and playful and in charge (it is heavily implied that she is her past self's immediate supervisor, though I don't know if the younger Mikuru knows it), and future-Mikuru is nostalgic about the outfits and activities, though she doesn't specifically reference the groping. It *does* make me wonder if younger Mikuru's shy-girl can't-say-no behavior is an act she's putting on, but even if it is that certainly doesn't excuse Haruhi's behavior to her, nor the others' general complicity in it (I think maybe once or twice at the most Kyon objects and stops it).

[anacoluthon.livejournal.com]

I remember watching a few episodes and the whole out-of-order thing, but I either don't remember the actual plot or didn't think it had one from the handful of episodes we watched in coup. Sounds like I didn't miss much.

I think the highest praise I have for the show is that I have seen some amusing videos of people trying to recreate the dance from the ending credits.

[feuervogel]

You didn't. Even if 98% of the club thought it was the best thing since, idk, Death Note.

[anacoluthon.livejournal.com]

You know, I read the Death Note manga online through some fan-scanlated site. I expected it to be pretty bad but the concept was interesting so I figured I'd read a little bit to see how it was. For the first third or half of it, it was actually a really interesting brilliant detective vs. brilliant criminal story. And then [huge spoiler] took the most interesting character out of the story, and it went steeply downhill very quickly.
Which has nothing to do with the topic at hand, but I was really surprised that I enjoyed the first part of it.

[thegreyghost.livejournal.com]

I know it's not the same thing, but I feel almost the same way when I watch most Bishounen anime where the guys are objectified for the female audience. Like whenever there's a fan service moment where a dude is put in a dress or a dog costume or whatever gets the girls in the audience squealing. My reaction is usually, "Come on, ladies! He's not a dress-up doll; he's a human being!"

[feuervogel]

Now imagine that you're a woman, and in EVERY SINGLE GODDAMN PIECE OF ENTERTAINMENT EVER this is what happens to people of your gender. Come on, men! She's not a walking pair of tits; she's a human being!

[thegreyghost.livejournal.com]

Oh, I sympathize!

What I think heavily influences my opinions on these things is that these are commercial products. Shows like this exploit and objectify women sexually, but it's a device to relieve the idiots that subscribe to those ideas of their money. So fuck those idiots.

[warpig1979.livejournal.com]

I read a whole bunch of the Haruhi novels a while back, up to like...I dunno, volume eight or nine or something like that? (The anime series adapts maybe two of them.) I'd hardly recommend them to you, obviously, but they go some interesting places eventually. As you say, the comedy bits often range from boring retread to sick and creepy. The bits where the stories start to work really well are when it decides to go for suspense and horror.

When the author is willing to look straight-on at the fact that his premise is completely fucked, he ends up somewhere worthwhile, I think. Only happens so often, though.

[feuervogel]

I can't comment on the novels, obviously, but the show was definitely not that self-aware. If it *had* been even remotely aware of how creepy and gross it was, there might have been a shot at redemption.

[warpig1979.livejournal.com]

Yeah. Like I say, the larger series has its moments.

As a for-instance, the fourth book, which is the last of the novel-length stories (that I know of), begins from the premise that Yuki actually does have a personality, albeit a deeply submerged one, and it's been driven to the edge of sanity by the torture of putting up with Haruhi's shit. It doesn't go quite as far with said premise as it could, but it's interesting enough. To a bored-ass shut-in like me anyhow.