I Got A Retro Feel: How Innocent Hobbies are No Longer Safe

Well, since this is going to show that I am a newbie here, I expect to be smacked for general cluelessness.

Anyway, I was perusing some websites regarding one of the hobbies I enjoy (Watching Japanese animation - anime.) when I stumbled upon a link to the following website:

Which is publicizing a war protest album which, judging from the list, seems entirely filled with songs from the Vietnam era:

Now all of these songs are being covered by some fairly well-known (To the anime community.) voice actors and actresses. While the list of charities benefiting from the album seems relatively unexceptional if on the left side of the scale - CARE, Doctors Without Borders and the Disabled American Veterans Charitable Service Trust - the very idea of them using war protest (Or peace-now.) songs seems...well, rather disconcerting.

While I have always expected that my favorite performers have their own opinions, I always seem to be surprised when those opinions manifest themselves. But in this case, the fact that we seem to have a "Return to the 70s!" vibe going on with this project, lead me to wonder if I can ever really enjoy any hobby without having to wonder if the people involved in that hobby intend to shove their political views in my face when I don't want to see it. This album is very different from commenting about your opinions in an interview...

And that implication that the GWOT/Iraq = Vietnam...Well, to begin, do they really know how Vietnam ended...?

In some cases, radio doesn't notice at all. But other bands do. The Big Boys/Poison 13 begat Green River which begat Mudhoney and Pearl Jam which begat a whole lot of bands (which did get on the radio).

Just because the Hall of Fame doesn't know history (or care to acknowledge small/indie label bands) doesn't mean that the musicians don't know their history. To me the whole history of music post-Woodstock is false. The corporations always had a hand in things but "corporate rock" was ushered in the 1970s. And more radio stations started locking playlists and format to "nostalgia" hits (whether that was the pre-rock era, golden oldies, classic rock, etc.).

I saw an interesting essay which traced how the music seems to go in movements where "rock" makes the same trajectory again and again (through different trends including country, punk, songwriter, pop...). I don't fully agree with the position but it was interesting to see how some bands (or eras) do make the same "discoveries" all over.

Re: Anime - Since anime is in common usage as describing animation from Japan, it is not surprising that it looks at the world from the Japanese POV. Some of the views are not very charitable toward Americans/the US, but that is hardly uncommon (Even in the US.), and many of the character traits you often find in the protagonists of serious anime productions are something that seem more American than Japanese. If you watch Adult Swim on Cartoon Network (Yes, it use to be Turner, but entertainment is where can you find it.), you will see things that are quite different from stereotypes of the Japanese (Cowboy Bebop, for example.).

Of course, anime shares the sentiment of many Japanese whose chief lesson from the Second World War was not "Evil must be fight/warred against," but that "fighting/war is evil," (There is a sequence in Patlabor 2 movie where one of the characters argues that an unjust peace was preferable to any war.) However, at least that is a considered improvement over the original pre-war opinion.

Those are my opinions, and I am sure Steven Den Beste, as well as Pixy Misahas some more to say about anime.

As a sidenote, Mamoru Oshi, the director of the Ghost in the Shell movies and Blood: The Last Vampire, has been known to go to Guam so he can shoot firearms at a firing range - which is highly restricted in Japan.

In this case, I am addressing the people who bring anime and release them in North America, not the content of the anime itself or the Japanese producers of them.

Re: The Album
I only wish I was paranoid.

Interview

The link above is an interview to one of the organizers of the album. The mental processes that you see on display is depressingly similar to a large block in the this country, if a bit more tame than usual, and has all the attributes you have come to expect from the "peace-now" crowd. I am not sure even where a fisking would start, let alone explore the basis of going retro with the Vietnam-era vibe and just how high the cost of "peace now" was to the people who had to lived under it. The part about what the future holds (Which comes at the end of the paragraph.) is even more depressing.

(The winning statement in the entire interview was about how the person was how many of the young fans she was meeting at conventions who were killed 6 months later, presumeably in combat. I heard anime is fairly popular in the US military, but that is breaking of laws of statistics and probability here...)

In fact, at least this time they are open about it. I know of at least two previous cases where the dubbing of anime series have either taken shots at President Bush, or at the GWOT.

I first posted on the subject because I was sad, annoyed, and whatnot about how an area of entertainment (Listening to English language dubs of anime.) that I enjoyed was being pushed into taking political stances that was the exact opposite of what I believed in. I can live with the Japanese expressing what they want - they made the anime after all. I can usually live with actors and actresses sharing their opinions - everyone has them, and while I will disagree with them (Sometimes vehemently.), I can enjoy their performances (Odd as it is to say, Alec Baldwin is one of my favorite actors despite that fact that I regard him as a nut.). But this particular circumstance and particular subject has just managed to push my buttons in a way that I do not enjoy at all.

As for me, right now I know this has sealed the deal on my next donation to the USO. I want to wholeheartedly help and honor the servicemen and women who have protected and are protecting my freedom right now, rather than helping the worst wounded while implicitly damning them for what they did. I am not going to stop watching anime (At least, not for this.) and in fact, several of the people participating in the album are people I greatly enjoy listening to and probably will in the future. But at least I will now being entertained without any illusions on the matter, which is a something of a sad affair to be in.

archerfish

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.