Why Hentai Sickens Me...

[Mattio]

I ordered a Sailor Moon DVD from someplace and I got a catalog for more anime stuff. Well in the catalog there was an adult section, and I noticed something.


Why do the girls in these hentai cartoons and manga's always look like they are crying, or hurt! It always looks like they are getting raped. I think it is very sick! Why can't they ever have the girls look like they are enjoying sex?

Is it a Japanese thing? Is that what turns old men on over there?

[Tempest]

There are alot of people in America or other englsih speaking nations that enjoy that stuff. The whole 'rape' theme is why I don't watch it. Everytime my sister talks about a hentai she likes I just don't understand why. A virgin cop gets raped and falls head over heels for her rapist.

::shrugs::

I think it's stupid and unrealistic, but some people like that stuff. I don't completely understand why, but they do and it's their own perogitive to do so.

[mizangelamy]

Thats just plain wrong to tell you dat truth!

[RoastedTwinkies]

I'm with Tempest on this one. I also think hentai is stupid and unrealistic. I don't watch it because of those rape scenes. They disturb me. It also bothers me how some people will bitch and complain about hentai. For those who do, my advice is if you don't like it, don't watch it. Plain and simple. This is because hentai is an evil out there that can't be banned. There are people who like it and it's their given right to have access to that.

[Sailorasteroid]

While not all hentai is like that, a lot is, and it's symptomatic of the genre. Not to put too broad a stroke on it, but I think a lot of hentai-fans are people who don't have a lot of control or stability in their own sex lives, and are attracted to stories of other people in uncontrolled and unstable situations. But I think it's better to give such people an outlet in hentai rather than have the frustration build up until the person has a breakdown. For what it's worth, the US has a rape rate of 32.05 per hundred-thousand people, while Japan's is 1.78. So it's difficult to say that the existence of hentai makes people more likely to be criminally sexually deviant.

[Tempest]

I'm with Tempest on this one. I also think hentai is stupid and unrealistic. I don't watch it because of those rape scenes. They disturb me. It also bothers me how some people will bitch and complain about hentai. For those who do, my advice is if you don't like it, don't watch it. Plain and simple. This is because hentai is an evil out there that can't be banned. There are people who like it and it's their given right to have access to that.

I meant the whole 'Victim falls for rapist' is stupid and unrealistic. I know not all hentai is composed of rape, it's just the sceneros that I've ever been exposed has some woman being raped by someone, or something, and ENJOYING it.

If people like to watch any forms of hentai, it's not for me to shake my finger at them and tell them it's wrong and I didn't mean to imply it either. If pornography is legal, then a situation where there are no actual people, in this case cartoons, should be legal as well. There are perfectly legal porn that depicts a rape storyline because that's what some people are in to. I was just stating it's not only a Japanese fetish. Other people in other countries enjoy it to. I just don't know what the sexual appeal is about rape.

[RoastedTwinkies]

I'm with Tempest on this one. I also think hentai is stupid and unrealistic. I don't watch it because of those rape scenes. They disturb me. It also bothers me how some people will bitch and complain about hentai. For those who do, my advice is if you don't like it, don't watch it. Plain and simple. This is because hentai is an evil out there that can't be banned. There are people who like it and it's their given right to have access to that.

I meant the whole 'Victim falls for rapist' is stupid and unrealistic. I know not all hentai is composed of rape, it's just the sceneros that I've ever been exposed has some woman being raped by someone, or something, and ENJOYING it.

If people like to watch any forms of hentai, it's not for me to shake my finger at them and tell them it's wrong and I didn't mean to imply it either. If pornography is legal, then a situation where there are no actual people, in this case cartoons, should be legal as well. There are perfectly legal porn that depicts a rape storyline because that's what some people are in to. I was just stating it's not only a Japanese fetish. Other people in other countries enjoy it to. I just don't know what the sexual appeal is about rape.

I agree with you on that aspect. Sorry I didn't make myself more clear.

[Tiff]

I ordered a Sailor Moon DVD from someplace and I got a catalog for more anime stuff. Well in the catalog there was an adult section, and I noticed something.

Why do the girls in these hentai cartoons and manga's always look like they are crying, or hurt! It always looks like they are getting raped. I think it is very sick! Why can't they ever have the girls look like they are enjoying sex?

Is it a Japanese thing? Is that what turns old men on over there?

This is really an unfair generalization. While a lot of hentai does have rape and/or crying girls in it, an almost equal amount has a love story, comedy, and simple conensual sex. In fact, the majority of hentai I've watched is exactly that.

I think you're not judging fairly. It isn't fair to say that all hentai sickens you simply becuase SOME of it has rape. That'd be like if I said: "Christians sicken me becuase some of them think gays are evil!". I would be basing the fact that some Christians believe this on my own, unresearched judgement.

Looking into a magazine and seeing a few pictures and images doesn't make for clear knowledge and research. You haven't even WATCHED or READ any of it, and you're already deciding what all of it contains the same material. How on earth do you make an accurate judgement just by flipping t hrough some pages in a catalog?

And come on. Acting as though this is only a Japanese occurance is just wrong. PLENTY of American pornography portrays rape or crying girls, but of course, plenty of American pornography DOESN'T. It's simply a matter of fetish, and what some people enjoy watching.

Some people get turned on by that *shrug* It doesn't make them wrong, unless they go out and ACT on it. As an avid hentai watcher, I'm a bit offended that you seem to think we're all idiotic sickos who enjoy watching rape.

[ParaKiss_Groupie]

Sweetie, there's a difference between rape scenes and hentai. As others have said, not all hentai is filled with rape. There are so many sweet, wonderful shows that are classified as hentai. Sakura Diaries, Level C, Can Can Bunny Extra... I suggest that you broaden your horizons a little, and see what else hentai has to offer. You might be pleasantly surprised.

[Aya Reiko]

Sweetie, there's a difference between rape scenes and hentai. As others have said, not all hentai is filled with rape. There are so many sweet, wonderful shows that are classified as hentai. Sakura Diaries, Level C, Can Can Bunny Extra... I suggest that you broaden your horizons a little, and see what else hentai has to offer. You might be pleasantly surprised.

Add Koihime and Pia Carrot to that list too.

Plus some of my favorite series originated from hentai ren'ai games (a.k.a. dating sims), including Comic Party, Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito, D.C. ~Da Capo~, and, the source of my avatar, Tsukihime.

[AnimeGuru0]

I found this from http://www.jollyroper.com/hentai/hentaibad.htm (it's a hentai site i assume, I didn't look at the rest of the site but I believe they review hentai), and it pretty much sums up what I want to say. This is just an excerpt relevant to this topic.

Now, as for the prevalence of rape and bondage imagery in hentai. Why can't the hentai just have tons and tons and tons of consensual sex imagery, over and over again, like U.S. porn?

Well, clearly, tastes differ in this respect in Japan, and the simple fact is that bondage imagery is much more acceptable in Japan because consensual bondage is much more acceptable in Japan. To understand just how much more acceptable it is, imagine that in the U.S. every young couple that gets married is given a copy of The Joy of Sex and in that copy was an extensive section on bondage, showing happy couples with the woman being fucked while she is tied up in various ways.

Now, imagine that this custom has been in place for centuries so that American couples accept bondage as a normal part of the marital bed, something they can do with the full expectation that they will be considered normal by society.

That's the case in Japan, where "pillow books" depicting various sexual techniques, including bondage, have long been a proper gift for young newlyweds.

In tightlaced America, it's really hard to get a grasp on what this means to a culture, but basically, the Japanese have managed to completely sidestep the notion that sexual bondage is shameful, evil or wrong. So naturally they find sexual bondage imagery in porn much less frightening than we do. Sexual bondage is fun between lovers to them.

(In fact, the models and actresses who pose for sexual bondage porn in Japan have their names proudly displayed, because to them it's a form of being a model/actress, not some shameful misdeed to be committed anonymously.)

There's another reason that Japanese don't find sexual bondage and rape imagery as horrifying as we do. It is this: according to the crime stats, rape is much less prevalent in Japan. The rate of reported rape in Japan is 1/20th what it is in America. This compares favorably to the rate of rape in most European countries as well.

Women in Japanese cities are able to walk the streets at night completely without fear of rape, something that does not occur in American cities at all. It's hard for us to understand what that's like with all the rape and consequent fear of rape in the U.S., but it's obvious that it would make images of rape a lot less frightening and more fantastical to the Japanese. And obviously, if the rape and sexual bondage imagery which is so much more commonplace in Japanese hentai than in American porn were a function of the real incidence of rape, you'd expect the Japanese to have considerably MORE rape than Americans, not considerably LESS.

In a society where sexual bondage is a commonplace experience for most adults, it's not at all surprising that sexual bondage imagery is commonplace in sexually oriented hentai, is it?

And what looks so horrific to our eyes isn't nearly so scary to the Japanese because Japanese men don't rape women in real life nearly as often as American men do, sad to say (well, sad for us in America who care about the women around us).

We Americans see hentai very differently than the Japanese who created them. If you WANT to see hentai as rape training videos for peddos, you can do that. We don't agree but we can't stop you.

If you want to see them as dramatic sexual fantasies by, for and about adults, created by a culture that is much more comfortable with sexual bondage imagery, well, that's pretty much what they are, and that's they way we think of them.

*agrees 100% with that statement* It's more of a cultural thing. It has to do with their culture, their environment, the role women have in Japan (which is still very supressed and has just recently started to change), etc.

[Tiff]

That's an excellent article. But my opinion still remains that it's pretty wrong to generalize a whole genre based on SOME of the content.

[Mattio]

I ordered a Sailor Moon DVD from someplace and I got a catalog for more anime stuff. Well in the catalog there was an adult section, and I noticed something.

Why do the girls in these hentai cartoons and manga's always look like they are crying, or hurt! It always looks like they are getting raped. I think it is very sick! Why can't they ever have the girls look like they are enjoying sex?

Is it a Japanese thing? Is that what turns old men on over there?

I'm able to have my own opinion. I was not generalizing anyone. And you need to quit arguing with everybody.

I don't think that you are a very friendly person. You are very controlling, and don't let people say what they want. And when you do let them say it, you question and argue.

I came to this site hoping to meet everybody and discuss my hobby, but it is so controlled that I can't even post anything I want here, because I feel like you are going to argue about it!

So please, just let me say what I want! You can have your own opinion but JEEEEEEZ!

[AnimeGuru0]

Mattio - You officially have a warning now.

By no means are you to ever speak that way to another member or mod that way. All members and mods are allowed to express their opinions too. Tiff was not stifilling you, merely expressing her opinion. She wasn't arguing with you or anything. In fact, her post was very well written and had a very calm demenor. Just because we're mods does NOT mean we're not members too. We're members BEFORE were mods, and we're only mods when we're expressly acting as such.

Just as Tiff respected your opinion (even though she disagreed with it), you need to respect hers, and all the other members' opinion here as well.

If Tiff were "not letting you say what you wanted to say" she would have locked the topic or acted in a Mod like fashion. Since she didn't, you are by all means able to think and say what you want.

Also, why are you picking on just Tiff? I noticed several people disagreed with your opinion, so why is it that it is only Tiff that you focus on?

Just because someone disagrees with you does not mean they're arguing with you, or hate you. Just beacuse an admin disagrees with you does not mean they're "out to get you" or they're "stifiling" you.

Back on topic.

[Mattio]

Mattio - You officially have a warning now.

By no means are you to ever speak that way to another member or mod that way. All members and mods are allowed to express their opinions too. Tiff was not stifilling you, merely expressing her opinion. She wasn't arguing with you or anything. In fact, her post was very well written and had a very calm demenor. Just because we're mods does NOT mean we're not members too. We're members BEFORE were mods, and we're only mods when we're expressly acting as such.

Just as Tiff respected your opinion (even though she disagreed with it), you need to respect hers, and all the other members' opinion here as well.

If Tiff were "not letting you say what you wanted to say" she would have locked the topic or acted in a Mod like fashion. Since she didn't, you are by all means able to think and say what you want.

Also, why are you picking on just Tiff? I noticed several people disagreed with your opinion, so why is it that it is only Tiff that you focus on?

Just because someone disagrees with you does not mean they're arguing with you, or hate you. Just beacuse an admin disagrees with you does not mean they're "out to get you" or they're "stifiling" you.

Back on topic.

agreed.

Sorry I just dont like being told that I am generallzing a culture when that is not my intent.

Its dropped.

[Tiff]

Sorry I just dont like being told that I am generallzing a culture when that is not my intent.

Its dropped.

Never said you were. I said it sounded like you were generalizing a genre of anime.

[DreamEmpress]

Frankly I don't know if I'll ever fully understand the appeal of hentai in general. Watching anything like it makes me a little uncomfortable, but I also have my own reasons for that... However, if it's something that others enjoy, who am I to say you can't see it.

The earlier comment about victim falls for rapist, got me remembering something I saw a week ago. I think it was mentioning a soap opera back in the 80's. Supposively they were talking about the wedding scene where the girl was marrying the guy who had raped her earlier in the story. The whole idea scares me, but I guess it isn't uncommon (as story plots go).

[Sailor Wind]

I suppose alot of hentai fans like the whole "rape" scenes which makes the creators of the hentais make their plots how the viewers like it. Actually I don't think i've even seen one without a rape scene, seeing as though i don't watch any of it but I am curious in seeing which hentais don't have those sorts of plots.

[ParaKiss_Groupie]

I suppose alot of hentai fans like the whole "rape" scenes which makes the creators of the hentais make their plots how the viewers like it. Actually I don't think i've even seen one without a rape scene, seeing as though i don't watch any of it but I am curious in seeing which hentais don't have those sorts of plots.

If you don't watch any of it, then how can you know what you're talking about?

[Sailor Wind]

If you don't watch any of it, then how can you know what you're talking about?

I ment to say that I have seen some just that most of them do have the rape scenes involved in each hentai. Ignore the bit where I said i didn't ^^;.