December 28th, 2009
Mako, como es rutina,
But I'm not sure why it should be unusual, strength being firmly on the side of those who are Japanese and fight the Japanese way. Reborn is written by a Japanese person for a Japanese audience, so of course people from the in-group are going to be portrayed more favourably. In Hollywood, white men win. In Shounen Jump, they don't. :D
ETA: Just to clarify, the favourable portrayal of an in-group in Hollywood is problematic precisely because the US is multi-racial and multi-ethnic, but Japan is neither.
That's the problem with racism, you know. Also, the classic "Japanese people = white people." (Because I'm pissed and don't want to deal with people being clueless, let me say this: racism is based on erasure, genocide and domination of other cultures. Does Japan has a recent -or with still some impact on people's lives- history of doing that? Yes. Towards White Nations*? Big resonant no. Nor does any non-white culture. Conversely... yeah, you should know this.)
And see, people there are very much worried about white and half-white characters and their representation in manga (you know Japan has this problem about colonizing white people, oh wait). Leave alone that the whole fandom makes a good show in ignoring the existence or just plain making disgusting racist comments on the one black character. (And God knows the series in question doesn't do much better.)
Shonen series are not for me. Give it up.
*I use white here to refer to European or European descendants dominated countries. You know who they are.
** My explanation of racism here is very simplified. It doesn't cover a lot of things, but it sure as hell does cover white-supremacism and its repercussion worldwide.