Lauren Faust (creator of My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic) said in a panel once: "We live in a society where saying that something is for girls is the equivalent to saying that something is stupid, or saying that something isn't worthwhile." This really struck a chord with me, because when I was a little girl, I was ashamed of the girly things I liked. I didn't think that I could be tough and like cute stuff at the same time. And I internalized that "girly stuff=stupid" attitude for a long time before I came out of it. I hate that our society is still like this. Really glad I found your channel! The world of shoujo/josei is so huge, so I never know what's good to pick up!
I'm glad you brought up My little pony cause the whole brony fandom was a very interesting case of men managing to put down and exclude girls, the very obviously target demographic, from the fandom of a Franchise that for decades has been considered for girls
I'm likely a bit older than you are so I've seen how the level of misogyny has changed over the decades. Although it is still a huge problem it was MUCH worse when I was young. Society does at least seem to be moving in the right direction albeit slowly.
@@kirbyjoe7484 Men telling women what they experience is very misogynist. And that's exactly what you're doing. Most men really have no idea what oppression looks or even feels like.
The irony here is male anime/manga fans get shit for liking it because it's "for kids." But then they turn around and do the same shit to women and girls who like it.
The thing about manga and anime being for kids is a pretty naive thing to believe, honestly, as there are many anime and manga that contain stuff that aren't for kids at all. SpongeBob and Dragon Ball Z are different animals in practically every way.
@@HarbingerOfBattle It's the circle of harm. Those fans of anime and manga who get shit on decide to take their anger out on those they deem smaller than them.
@@LuznoLindo I enjoy the occasional manga/anime, yet while I have been hazed and ridiculed for my hobby, I don’t belittle those who do not share my interest, nor do I threaten or insult those who criticize it. I am not the only one. It is common in society to blame art or media for degenerate behavior while overlooking the fact that these things are common place in society and that correlation does not equal causation. Let us not criticize all fans of anime and manga, but only those who behave badly.
This has been bugging me a lot lately. People have been pointing out that women are expected to enjoy male oriented media( such as marvel for example ) while the vice-versa can't be said. Great video as always!
Thanks for pointing this out. I realized at some point that all of the "coming of age" books I had to read in school were about boys. Women have to learn how to inhabit non-female perspectives, but men are hardly ever challenged to, so the stereotype that women are more capable of doing this is created and then propagated. So frustrating.
@@joshs7160 thats true but the exceptions still stand. We have more male protagonists than female ones. I mean we don't have whole discourse on " why is the main character a man?" But we do with female ones.
@@joshs7160 no it's not. It's just that society is already trained to think that male-oriented media is more "gender neutral" while stereotipically female things are not. Which is just not true, women just learned to accept this and are much more open to trying it out, while men never really had to step out of their little "male content" bubble, and a lot of times even be looked down upon when trying.
Gotta love how they said you have to “understand the heart of a boy” when some of the most popular manga of all time like Demon Slayer, Black Butler, Inuyasha, FMA, Pandora Hearts, Noragami, Toilet Bound Hanako kun, Blue Exorcist, etc, are all women-written works, the hypocrisy IS real EDIT: Though there have been many assumptions about Kimetsu no Yaiba’s mangaka and their gender, the author apparently prefers to remain anonymous and thus uses they/them pronouns. The earlier mention was a mistake on my part! From what I read, a WSJ employee leaked that Koyoharu Gotouge was a woman but until that’s confirmed by the author themselves I think it’s better to respect their wishes and continue using they/them/gender neutral references
Yeah I dont get how Rumiko Takahashi can be one of the most famous shonen mangaka of all time and these editors still try to act like its necessary to be a man in order to write shonen well.
Seriously, there are SO many shounen series written by women and some of them are considered some of the best series of all time. And yet on the flip side, there are almost NO male shoujo mangaka (most of the ones I know are from decades ago ie Shinji Wada)
And some of the shounen written by men has actually been the most objectifying towards the women or girl characters, so what exactly are they putting in young boys hearts? 🤔🤔
"Shoujo/josei manga isn't very varied" says the demographic with hundreds if not thousands of shounen stories with virtually the same generic protagonist meant to be a power fantasy for the readers.
As a subgenre of a larger category, that should not be surprising. There are a series of tropes or further sub-classification that go on within each of these broader sectors, and they have consistent rules because that is how you keep a consistent audience. Coming from a more generalized example base, romances have happy ending, fantasies have magic, science fiction has some form of future exploration or space, mysteries have a murder that must be solved, etc. Why the heck does that surprise anyone?
@@kathycoleman4648The problem is that shonen isn't a genre and shonen is fulled to the brim with extremely mediocre if not bad yet trendy works that lack any effort regarding writing. SINCE THE EARLY TWO THOUSANDS. It's 2024, and Shonen Jump is still doing the same exact shit again and again
Each of those statements are true. There is a world of difference between something not being 'good' or 'bad' and something not being for me. As an example, Cowboy Bebop is the Citizen Kane of anime and I find it absolutely boring and did not finish it.
@@yuuuurei As someone who likes Evangelion, I disagree that it is "objectively" good, since there is no objective reason why someone ought to value certain aspects of a piece of art over others.
Reading about how girls only recently got into manga is hilarious because a lot of top manga sellers in the 2000s were shoujo that girls bought like Fruits Basket and Kimi ni Todoke lol
We have been around since forever.. classic shoujo manga from like the 70s n 80s r soooo good and the arts are so beautiful. It's a shame they will never release them in English
I can't understand how they would think that when they could go into a book/comics shop and see that a huge portion of the manga that are localized are Shojo
Hell considering that the entire reason why people care about Gundam is because of FEMALE shippers in the 80s, people who try to turn manga into some boys club have to be delusional at best. And for some reason, those guys are also the kinds of guys who think Lucky Star is the height of sophistication.
Its one of the weirdest things to be, because when I was a kid. Girls were the ones reading Shojo and guys were watching anime on TV in the 2000s. Girls were reading Fruits Basket, Ouran High School or Inuyasha. Now all of a sudden when manga became normal for men to read due to the wider understanding how how anime is as a medium, suddenly there are guys who act as if they were the ones always there, girls weren't and gatekeeping starts. Like for some reason male fans of something popular have this tunnel vision of defining something as theirs, once they identify themselves with it; even if said people weren't nor could prove they were there first.
Yep! The exact same thing happened with Star Trek, the original Trekkies were housewives. It's true with doujin culture in Japan as well, almost everyone who participated in Comiket in the 70s were high school or college girls. Even now something like 60% of doujinka are women.
Same here! I remember the anime kids I hung out with were mostly girls and we never gate-kept. Just excited to meet someone with a shared interest. We usually were excited to lend new people books or suggest anime to people. When the anime community became more saturated with men is actually when I sort of lost interest. I feel like they made everything into a competition instead of a shared community
I dont read a ton of Shojo, just because it often doesnt get recommended to me, but the ones I've read have been fantastic. It is very weird how some dudes will go out of their way to hate anything even mildly directed towards women. Hating women is a straight up sport for a lot of these weird nerds. (I am also a weird nerd the hating women is the issue not the weird nerdiness.)
Thank you for sharing! Just wanted to share some lesser known shoujo manga recommendations: Red River From Far Away Dunia Mimpi Legend of Nerid (Similar to Basara) Kaze Hikaru Lady Georgie (Historical fiction) Alice 19th Special A Platinum Garden (Slice of life)
@@luvelycade I'm not usually super into strict like romance stories, I prefer when romance is a part of a bigger story, but I'll check it out for sure. I've loved a few good romances.
@@t-vann48 You won't regret reading Basara! I first read it over a decade ago and the story still gives me goosebumps!! All the manga I listed has romance in the story, but it isn't the main focus of the plot.
does anyone remember when jujutsu kaisen first started getting popular, and all of us just assumed the mangaka was a woman bc of the lack of sexism and objectification in the series? when the BARE MINIMUM is seen as something that would impossible for a man to make, that's how you know we have a problem.
The fact that JJK stans thought that Gege was a woman bc he didn't sexualize them is extremely embarrassing in itself since the only female character that seem to matter in the story is Maki Zenin 🙃
I remember reading the series and being like OMG a shonen manga without a big boob lady running around and falling on the guy. Whenever I praise JJK for having good female characters everyone jumps down my throat.
Honestly same for me with spy x family. I could swear there's no way in hell a man could write a funny, non-sexualized family comedy. I was genuinely shocked when I learned otherwise lol
@@chanelmapendo3761 I get where you’re coming from but I don’t think that’s fair. Maki is the only one who entered the games with them. Nobara is injured, Miwa and Momo have joined the games and there’s still more to see from Yuki and Angel. I know it feels like forever because it’s a weekly manga but time has not moved much in-universe for the manga. I’m waiting to see more from this arc before I judge the ‘lack’ of female characters. I could very well be wrong and it could all amount to nothing in the end but I still like to be optimistic
@@royoj966 Jujutsu Kaisen is already in their climax and in every interview gege doesnt even seem interested in the female characters, he think he's story is enough with the men. JJK stans give gege the feminist award for nothing
"you hate shounen because you like shoujo" People who says things on those lines kinda self-report what goes on their minds, idk i just smell projection.
That is the most absurd statement... I do not expect shonen to change its core formula because I am AWARE of shoujo. I am also aware of how society perceives things that it feels belong to women. Not every guy does it, but it does happen. And its even sadder when you get it from other ladies.
@@joshs7160 Exactly. People are confusing shonen jump's sexist beliefs that women aren't suited to making manga for boys with the actual opinions of readers, especially in the west, and it's kind of sad since comments like these are pretty much the opposite extreme of overgeneralizing differing genders' opinions.
@@joshs7160 I'd wager that last part is a self fulfilling prophecy. The male experience is presumed to be more generalizable so it is favored for content that is meant for a general audience. As a result female audiences are more exposed to male perspectives than vice versa, like you said. So, the male perspective becomes more widely understood across genders because it's just more widely accessed across genders, even when it's more targeted. Though, I guess that all depends on what you mean by accessible on a human level....
what bro said about "women haven't been anime fans for as long as men" is crazy. the only reason gundam is around today is because in the 70's after almost being cancelled and after it had aired, the majority female fanbase showed the producers that there was indeed a market for it leading to the release of the trilogy film series and the continuation of the production of gundam anime.
As a female ( older) Berserk fan who also loves Shojo, Thank You!! I absolutely don’t care about demographic! In fact, due to your channel, I have taken up titles in Shojo I would never have been exposed to! Yes, I think I’ve seen every video you’ve put out! Been doing manga since the early 90’s and anime since ‘75.
and you used to play my favorite game poupee girl too! you rock, older sis! thanks for being there for so long and being youself in such awful places that makes us feel not welcomed.
@@NanakoMajo I cried the day Poupee Girl shut down!!! I miss it soooooooo much! Oh yes, some of the fandom is Toxic! I’ve been told to make sandwiches before.
Curiosly speaking, Miura really respected the shojo genre and often seeked help from female shoujo authors for Berserk, which I think is the reason the manga resonates as well with female audiences too!
12:00 This may be valid excuse, but so so wrong. In Japan there's a lot of misogyny in general, not only in the manga community. As a woman I'd be terrified of working with only men, but I'm in no way justifying the exclusion of women in shonen editorials.
I'm not in Japan, but I've worked with all men before. It has its issues but if it's a decent workplace it's not scary. Men are people too. They gossip and talk about going on diets in the lunch room. Sometimes you have to raise an eyebrow at things, some of them are jerks, but most people don't want to cause trouble at work. I want women to not be afraid to pursue a career in a male dominated workplace, you know? If the guys are jerks and it doesn't work out it was a crappy company, but it doesn't mean it won't work out somewhere else.
@@jbstarkiller4626 "You'd be ok even walking alone at night" love when people say this, but don't take into account how sexual assault cases there go unreported and the victims rarely get any kind of justice. Japan is not that safe for women
@@jbstarkiller4626 you haven't lived there haven't you. It's only safe because it set the bar of what America's version of "safe" is when it's just normal.
@@francisconavarrete3031 no. But from what I've seen. It's just normal. In my country. There's literally zero school shootings. Even Denmark let's their babies strollers outside while they eat inside restaurants. America is just not safe so Japan is this Disney like country for these people.
Anime and manga fans rushing to call every female character that has flaws "useless" while simultaneously putting female characters into different "waifu" boxes like they're flavors of candy always bugs me.
I've BEEN SAYING THIS FOR YEARS BUT MY FRIENDS WHO ALSO WATCH ANIME DON'T LISTEN AND IT HURTS SO BAD! I screenshotted your comment because I feel so alone😭
@@orange1293 THIS. I SEE IT ALL THE TIME IN SHOUNEN. The problem is their definition of useful. If she's not some OP casually crushing her opponents and rejecting romance and all things girly with big boobs, she's useless and annoying. Usefulness is determined by so much more than that. A girl who's sweet and kind but physically weak could have the biggest impact on the male lead's personality and actions in a fucking action story if the writer wanted. And thereby, be useful despite not being able to take down 100 bad guys in 5 seconds(*cough, Shirley from Code Geass-Lulu lost his soul without her). I'm getting pissed just thinking about it.
@@greendoritoman2464 does jjk stand for something? I've read jigokuraken and quite a few other shonen with great female characters. I'm just stating the pattern I notice in terms of fandom mindset. Shirley from Code Geass, Lucy from Fairytail, Mikasa from AOT, etc. are all strong but hated female characters for example. And then you have Erza from fairytail who is the odd ball because she's strong yet is very girly, dreaming of weddings and liking strawberry cake. Usually that's enough for them to hate a girl but I guess Erza's girlyness was rarely shown or something so fans couldn't eyeroll at her for liking a boy and getting emotional all the times she thought he was the enemy/died.
Always wondered why big animanga youtubers never talked about this huge problem ever while talking about the community in general. Thank you for bringing this up Colleen. I always love to watch your videos keep them coming whenever you feel like it!!
It wouldn't surprise me if some of the larger youtubers held misogynistic sentiment and if they don't, they don't want to lose their core audience by speaking out.
Would just like to say that as a heterosexual male Shojo reader/watcher, I think this is brilliantly said and needed to be said. The stigma around liking shojo/josei is ridiculous to me. To highlight ur point , people needa remember that Shojo and Shounen are literally demographics or target audiences which arent the same thing as a genre (scifi,horror,etc.). Meaning that they arent limited to ONLY romance as most non-female readers think. They can literally be everything a shonen series can be in terms of genre, the only difference is it being written with the way young girls and adult women think in mind. This is not to say that they arent for men/boys but rather to offer a different take from a more feminine perspective. Sucks that people close the door on a whole category of show because those types of people see that perspective as “weak” or not “manly” smh.
I didn't realize until my late teens/early 20's how lucky i was to not have any male role models that made fun off things for being girly, or bragged about things being manly. I grew up with the viewpoint (at least about stories(books, movies, shows, manga, anime etc.)), If it is good, it is good. If you enjoy it, then you enjoy it. doesn't matter what the demographic was.. as a kid I would be turned away by stuff being super pink. Mostly just because i didn't like pink.. i liked green and red...
Yes. People often get confused about the fact that manga and anime are more largely categorized by the gender pov the piece is targeting, while neglecting the fact that you can do any genre within that split. From a western perspective, there is then also the additional confusion that Japanese sensibilities about men and women are not a 1 to 1 ratio with how we view those things, and present them in our media, here.
@@Rurix48 For me, its the same, i can watch anything, if it is good, the genre or the target audience doesnt matter. As for colours, i love everything, esp in combo, red with black, pastel green with white! My parents always made sure to dress me up since i was little, so i picked it up till date.
Nothing warms my cold, dead heart more than seeing my very masculine father voluntarily watch sappy romcoms and saccharine Hallmark films and enjoy them (He will postpone outtings to finish them on TV). Or seeing my spouse evolve from only consuming high-octane action/thrillers/sci-fi to human interest stories and drama, to recently picking out a shojo all by himself (No. 6) with no prodding from me (when I told him it was a shojo he didn't blink and said, "the story sounds good though" and bought all that was available)! I think men will come around, once they settle into themselves a bit. Attacking a genre you don't read or understand is weak. Cutting yourself off from exploring another genre is narrow. Tearing down enthusiasts of those genre you don't read, understand, or explore is cowardly. What a piss poor trifecta. Kudos to women who read beyond shojo and josei. And thank you for this video.
@@rubyrootless7324 i think its about being open to different things. if i had to guess, its probably easier to find a shojo fan that reads/watches shonen than vice versa
"I think men will come around, once they settle into themselves a bit." The main problem with modern Anime/Manga is that the main target audience is neither men or women or girls, its boys. Horny, teenage boys with a very simplistic and stereotypical view of masculinity and femininity. This is also why iam (as a man) increasingly getting tired of Anime & Manga, because the pandering to teenage boys is so strong, over-the-top and just everywhere, that its getting really annoying.
@@LegioXXI Agreed. I'm right there with you in your frustration with the medium. Fan service is a problem and definitely rips the reader/viewer (and me) out of the experience of many manga/anime (and gets me to drop a title faster). Teens, as a demographic, typically have more disposable income and less responsibility (bills, ect.) to purchase more "ecchi" and the market caters to that easy money pot. Which is a shame as the pool for non-ecchi manga/anime is diluted and a problem on what's readily offered to impressionable young consumers. (Rent-A-Girlfriend comes to mind as a bad actor of what you've described as low resolution depictions of masculinity and femininity for horny boys). My initial comment was more along the lines of maturity and barrier of entry to shojo/josei for male consumers, with 2 anecdotals of men in my immediate circle: "settling in themselves" meaning no longer buying into the idea that participating and consuming in X (in this case shojo/josei demos) will threaten their masculinity (or self identity), which prevents some men and boys from exploring the other side of the manga/anime aisle. You've identified a major issue with the product and oversaturated market, which I heartily agree primes young teens for shallow depictions of masculinity/femininity, that creates a perpetuating feedback loop of what gets marketed to us. What you've described for modern anime/manga has made me more choosy of what I watch, read, and purchase. And dropping an anime or manga once it exceeds my tolerance for suspension of disbelief is a bummer, pushing me further away from the medium as a whole. So yes, I empathize with your tired.
Those people are just dumb and wrong. A quick Google search would prove them wrong but then they'd have to admit they just don't like or respect women.
I teared up at the mention of being in a space that lacks creators who look like you. I still struggle to put my face on thumbnails for my videos literally because of this. I’m sick of people online still using demographics and the same regurgitated phrases like “manga for girls is mid in comparison to shonen” as a crutch for gatekeeping. It’s such a tired argument. But I’m glad that women creators are continuing to defend their space in the fandom (even though they shouldn’t have to). It reminds me to keep doing what I’m doing. Thank you for so eloquently putting this video together Colleen!
I'm actually someone who will defend creators rights to create the products they want and let capitalism decide their fate. That said, anyone who's argument about art is that "manga for girls is mid in comparison to shonen" is someone with weak vocabulary and piss poor articulation. They are correct in their statement that shonen is their preference. They are dead wrong in suggesting they speak for everybody.
I was happy to find both of you, and so are all the oldhead shoujo, josei, yaoi, & yuri fans in my circles. We started ShoujoCon, YuriCon, YaoiCon back in the day to make a space - cannot overstate how proud we all are that y'all are expanding that space into new mediums, new eras, new fandoms. Keep the content coming, @Colleen and @AnimeTea, we're more than here for it, and have your back. 💜👍
Honestly I miss the 2000s-early 2010s where the anime/manga fandom spaces were much more isolated. I grew up in the tumblr era so I never experienced this kind of misogyny there, but I was also on the cesspool MAL forums early on and definitely saw some ridiculous things being spouted there. I’m old now and have pretty much exited any online fandom spaces and just enjoy watching/reading things on my own, which has been great for me but people (especially younger fans) deserve community spaces that they feel safe in.
I definitely feel the need for online spaces. I stick solely to tumblr, but I went branching out for spaces to discuss anime that were non-men and all I found were threads from women discussing how they felt misogyny was totally gone from the anime/manga communities and I was like...where? Because I literally just saw a thread on MAL asking if women were ruining demon slayer? I literally stopped my search there but I really hope someone creates that community
Tumblr got demonized as hell during the 2010s for being associated with the dreaded "social justice warriors" and shit, but I now think a huge part of that backlash came from people being so upset that women and members of minority groups had a safe space where the discourse wasn't being controlled by the majority group. Tumblr was the only social media site where a lot of people felt safe enough to openly oppose the status quo, and that pissed a lot of people off to the point where we're still feeling the effects of that today through bigots who still see "SJWs" as a singular enemy that needs to be dehumanized, even to the point where mainstream politics have been affected by it
No same me too.. i was into sports anime in tumblr early 2010ish and they were mostly women-dominated it was so calm and peaceful.. so i was surprised to find out misogyny is still so prevalent in the anime community. Im starting to get more active on anime community in twitter and im lucky to have not seen much of those stuff tho but This really puts things into perspective
This is the same as me, too. I'm old and even class myself as a veteran weeb lol. I have all but exited the fandom community, except for ones on UA-cam. But even i can see this new wave of manga and anime fans that have come about in the last few years have the potential to be even more toxic than the most problematic stuff back then. Way more misogyny out in the open now and actively being thrown into female spaces.
This is insane, Nana is actually one of the best mangas/anime i’ve ever watched/read… though its from a female perspective, i’ve seen countless male Nana fans, bc Nana isnt just about the women its about the relationships and the moral ambiguity of each of them. It’s written brilliantly and is definitely more admirable to make a mark without using action or fantasy. You’re more limited but Nana still leaves a huge impression on you regardless of being shoujo.
isn't it quite misogynistic in and of itself to imply that an anime being "just" about women would be a mark against it? we don't deride anime for focusing primarily or solely on men - a story could in theory still embody the premise you described whilst also focusing solely on women's relationships. the structure of your statement inadvertently treats a female perspective and target audience as some kind of limitation or setback to overcome.
All things in general, that have majority female consumers are often seen as low quality and not something to be taken seriously. Music artists with female audience are perfect example outside of manga (the violent reactions towards, for example, BTS from men). But talking about our community, what comes to mind is Free, the swimming anime. When it was announced, Kyoani fanboys totally lost it because Kyoani made "anime aimed at girls". It keeps being trashed to this day even though it's in no way bad and if they made the very same story but with female protagonists, it would be hailed as yet another Kyoani masterpiece. But it's one of the lowest rated Kyoani series, along with Tsurune, that happens to have male protagonists too, hmm. I'm not even going to start on the homophobia that mixes in, when things get called "fujo bait".
Thank you for sacrificing yourself like this Colleen, before this comment section gets flooded with toxic comment I just wanted to say it was nice knowing you and you’ll continue living in our hearts forever. Truly the best shoujo connoisseur
A very good example of the whole "men not taking women seriously because they like shojo" is emirichu talking to the guys of trash taste about the anime she watches, which heavily consisted of feel good shojos. They gave her so much shit, I felt so bad for her. I know they're all friends but still didn't sit right with me how she was on the hot seat the entire podcast just for watching wholesome shows. They were so relentless with their "teasing" that everyone in the comments felt bad for her and even defended her tastes.
I was so mad watching that podcast episode. It made me realize that most of the biggest anitubers have practically the same taste and are close minded to other people's opinions.
Pretty sure they were joking with her as they are really good friends they shit on each other all the time and they all agreed that they love fruits basket and were just shitting on her because of the contrasting statements that she was making Ask her if she fell bad about it or not they are really good friends practically hang out together all the time
Yeah, I couldn't believe how they didn't realize why their tastes might possibly differ from hers. It's like they expected her to be a cool tomboy who likes the same things they do just because she also likes anime and manga
Their teasing was all in good fun but she got a bit flustered and had a hard time defending her taste which is why it seemed so one sided. She just wasn't prepared for that impromptu scrutiny, and to be fair to her, most people aren't
@@rammanohar7473 no, I know lol. I still felt bad because 90% of the video was all three of them mercilessly teasing her, and only her. I get that the podcast is called trash taste but them joking about her taste was only funny for so long.. then you can't help to just feel bad for her.
As a female fan of manga and anime for 7 years now, it's been so refreshing to have a creator who talks about shoujo and josei with such love and appreciation. I have felt pretty alienated in the past in this community because all anyone talked about was shounen or seinan, and any time shoujo was referenced it wasn't always in the best light (not always directly negative, sometimes just backhanded). It's even worse if you're a fan of BL stories too (GL is okay for a lot of male fans though funnily enough), as I've seen blatant hatred towards popular anime like Yuri on Ice just because "so many anime, that are much better, came out this year that deserve more praise", not because they didn't like the story or characters. So I just want to say thank you Colleen, for making me and many others feel less alone and seen. I hope you continue to make amazing videos! 💗💗💗😊😊
Don't even make me start on the amount of shit BL gets, I've turned my brain off at this point and just enjoyed myself with fellow BL fans. Like sure, it has plenty of its own problems and duds, but people pretend like it's *just* worthless cheap fun for "the girls". And then when they start stereotyping the fans as well...Like something can't possibly be good just because it's a BL. That tag has brought so many series their own curse of being easily dismissed
@@nutella7162 Yeah it's absolutely awful. Every time a new BL series comes out it gets so much hatred, and the way fans are treated is ven worse. I've seen so many people (usually straight men) call fujoshis "sick", "crazed", "weird" etc. just because they can appreciate a MxM love story. It's bonkers. Despite the lack of GL (compared to BL stories), it's much better off. People seem genuinely more accepting of those stories and fans, at least in my experience.
@@AKookieForYou Both BL and GL get maybe one full-fledged anime series a year (which is horribly little in comparison to everything else), but yeah overall I also think the reception of GL is better than BL, from those same people who despise BL with a passion. There are plenty great, good, decent BL manga but rarely anything gets properly animated or adapted (and by that I don't mean only the fluffy cutesy stories). I mean, the latest was Sasaki to Miyano this year and Given in 2019 (and there were only like 2-3 movies and short 5 minutes series in between those two, so that alone tells how BL anime is scarce). The latest GL series was I think Adachi to Shinamura I think was called? not sure, but it was also this year. Like you can literally count them on your fingers, it's tragic. It came to a point where I hide that I like BL when discussing something anime related because that'd mean that my opinion is less worthy, as if liking a genre guarantees that I'm not capable of critically expressing myself or that I'm just inherently dumber. People have actually stopped conversations with me after I mentioned it. Now that's a whole other level of entitlement and being a major dick
@@AKookieForYou also I think BL compared to shojo gets more manga licensed (like an okay-ish amount) whereas shojo gets more anime on a larger scale, not really that much of a difference but still. Neither is what could be done.
@@nutella7162 Oh yeah I definitely agree. We barely ever get adaptations, and the ones we do get can be pretty hit or miss with me. I've also gotten to a point where I kind of hide my appreciation for BL series for the same reasons as you. It's really sad how the community makes anyone who isn't strictly into shounen feel like garbage and like their opinions aren't important. At least the niche communities of people who do enjoy those things are very welcoming, most BL fans that I've seen online are really nice
The misogyny and general bigotry are the reasons I stay out of most online discussions or fandom talk about anime/manga. It’s a very depressing situation, but it makes me feel a lot better knowing that there are people actually talking about it and want it to be fixed.
Fr, i legit stopped watching anime because of this. I dont want to feel constantly sexualised, or watch a show in good spirits and like it only to be hit with sexualisation or belittling and that not being addressed at all, as if it is normal and should be accepted.
Ironic that male (and female) fans critize Shoujo manga when so many popular Shonen and Seinen mangakas find some of their inspiration in Shoujo, and even enjoy and read the genre. Kentaro Miura of Berserk, Yoshihiro Togashi of Yu Yu Hakusho and HunterXHunter, to mention a few. Ironic that they critize romance, but they still like it.
Even the creator of Fate franchise and Type Moon games Kinoko Nasu acknowledge his inspiration in shoujo series. Like Fate Stay Night was supposed to be a shoujo with a female MC, and his first stories before Fate are all around women like Witch's Holy Night and Garden of the Sinners
pretty sure gege akutami likes bl which explains a lot on that note makoto yukimura frequently retweets ship art of his male characters which is funny as hell to me
Colleen, I love your videos and I think this one touches a very important topic, I read tons of josei and shojo along shonen/seinen manga but when I recommend some of them to my male friends they disregard it because "of course you would like it, you are gay" (Which I am, they are not derogatory but they do seem to think I like shojo because I like men) and it shows how fragile my friends masculinity is but when I recommend Your lie in April they have no issues with it when is labeled as shonen, same case with Ao No Flag and they tantrum when they get to the middle of it. I'm so glad for videos like this highlighting issues that affect our community even in a niche group such as manga readers. ♥
@@joshs7160 I politely do not agree. A good romance can be as good and similar in both genres, for example, I think Ouran Kokou Host Club is as good as I"s when it comes to comedy Harem, Wotakoi is as wholesome and funny as Genshiken. And Colleen already made a great video about shojo mangas that include fighting that can be counterparts of a similar shonen with romance elements in it. I think the only difference comes with the fan service, art style (Which happens in both genres in this case, some people do not like some shojo art and some people won't read One Piece despite it's quality just because of the art). But all of us being humans and romance being a part of our adolescence and adult life should be able to enjoy it from all povs. If I had to read romances that only applies to my demographic I would have to read genres that are mostly erotica because there is almost none and no market for gay romance for men that are not heavily sexual, so my only choice is BL. I think being able to explore different genres, art style and narratives makes a better experience when reading manga, I'm capable of enjoying a good straight love story -which most of them are- because most of the feelings we feel are universal. Even reading a bad manga from any genre is fun from time to time.
I really enjoyed Blue Flag, but the last chapter came out of nowhere personally, I don't think I'd have minded if it wasn't a timeskip chapter which drastically changed the relationships of characters without any buildup, but that is what happened unfortunately. Still a really great manga up until that point though, the ending just didn't really fit with the series as much imo.
@@npclucario7005 Yeah, that's a shame, the issue with that manga was that it got cancelled after being moved from the magazine to the online-only version of it so the author had to skip a whole arc and the ending had to be rushed and is such a shame. In fact it was cancelled for the same reason my friends don't like the middle point: they gay confession and the coming up to terms with your sexuallity all the characters were going through.
@@cesarsuarez6414 that makes sense, I didn't realize it had been cancelled, I actually really enjoyed the gay confession and everything surrounding it, which I really didn't expect, but it was a really well done and nuanced exploration of the topic imo. It had seemed like by the second to last chapter all the characters had come to terms with their sexuality and it was really jarring to see Itachi end up being bi or straight when that wasn't really hinted towards at all before the last chapter, and while I'm sure the fans of the ship were happy to see it happen, Taichi and Toma ending up together didn't really make sense to me in the context of how both of them had developed up to that point. Still an excellent series overall though, and I'm glad that hearing negativity over the final chapter didn't scare me off.
@@npclucario7005 Yeah, sadly the author themselves had to mention the series was moved from the physical magazine due to "the topics being discussed in the material", it was supposed to have an university arc and Itachi would battle through her relationship and Toma being out of the picture but still on his mind until the break up and then him deciding to give Toma a try. Meanwhile Masumi ended up marrying a trans men but this was never able to developed further in the adult life arc. Sadly Ao No Flag received a big "Too gay for the boys in Shonen Jump" and got the cut way too early but it was so brave from the author to even try and do such a taboo thing. It pretty much proves the point Colleen is making in this video about Shonen Jump and Shonen in general.
I wholeheartedly believe men who say "women don't consume manga/anime" don't have any female friends. Though hard to be friends with people that they don't respect lol.
@@Rex13013if you hang out online then you’ll find them. Sometimes it’s (thankfully) harder to meet guys like this irl because the most sexist act really terminally online. I’m in an anime club and haven’t met anyone in it who act like this, but I’ve 1000% met and interacted with guys like this on social media.
I really appreciate this video. I’m a manga reader/collector who isn’t a part of the online manga community almost at all and this really opened my eyes to a lot of the issues in the community that I’ve passively seen and made me introspect on the biases I have towards shojo and josei manga. Also didn’t know that girls/women were the main readers of manga until recently. Very interesting
There was a library roundtable I read where they mentioned many of the people who came in to buy manga around the later 00s was mostly women but since I couldn't find it again I ended up not adding that as well.
@@ColleensMangaRecs but then they'll say it doesn't count because (probably) a majority is Yaoi or Shounen-ai sales, and it will "not count" for them... You know how it is, you'll not win, we're never good enough for misogynists lol
@@MissBMoon The majority of manga bought by women certainly isn't yaoi. Women and girls make up at least half of shonen buyers and 99% of shojo buyers. Fujoshi are a major part of the female manga demographic but their not the majority.
It's not surprising that women have traditionally been the key readers. In overall book sales, women buy 70% of printed media. One thing that may have shifted things is how stuff is going in western comics and how men are abandoning them for shonen.
Diving in before the comment section turns into toxic sewage to say many of the things you talked about are also ones I've noticed while being part of the manga community online the past few months (though I've been collecting for 15 years, I only started interacting with the larger community online around May this year). Thanks for bringing them to the surface in an easy to digest way, and with sources 🌟🙌
Colleen, stay strong before this comment section gets flooded with assholes!! You do such strong good work and your passion for topics oozes from every video! Stay strong! 😤
Don't get your panties in a twist just because a bunch of "assholes" are trying to dig under your skin. It doesn't take being a tough guy to ignore people who are purposefully trying to make you mad.
I will never truly understand this mindset. Sure, people have their preferences, but why shit on an entire demographic feels kind of pathetic. Keep up the good work Colleen.
Being a cis man with limited exposure to shoujo and josei (Akatsuki no Yona/Yona of the Dawn being the only shoujo manga I keep up with and not even knowing what josei manga are out there), I gotta say that I really do appreciate this kind of effort. I can only speak for myself, but this video especially hammers in how badly I need to broaden my horizons on that front, and I hope most other viewers feel the same way.
You should try Basara next. It's a series that I think men who are not familiar w shoujo would like.. it has its basic Shoujo shit (female protag.. GREAT romance) but it's complex, about war, and beautifully written and drawn (well.. the art is depend on if u like older style).
Yes there's a whole world of great stories out there! I love anime and manga from all kinds of genres and magazines and I think everyone can stand to try to read things written from a different perspective every now and then.
Shueisha's thing about not hiring women for Shonen Jump reminds me of a professor I had who worked for either Mattel or Hasbro in the 90s (can't remember and don't wanna get it wrong). When she asked to work on a certain male demographic toyline, the company expressly told her that they weren't hiring women on it, and directed her to a certain female demographic toyline that had no problem hiring both men and women. My initial reaction was "Oh, the company thought men could understand femininity but not vice versa." But thinking on it, it could have also been that whoever was in charge of hiring on the female toyline probably just didn't have weird hangups.
Thank you for addressing this issue! I'm glad you brought up internalized misogyny as well, as I've seen a surprising amount of non-men who diss shojo, claiming shonen is better. I distinctly remember being in a manga drawing class as a teen, and when asked about series I like, I mentioned shojo and Sailor Moon. The girl who I was talking to scrunched her nose and claimed that Sailor Moon was "too weak" and "a crybaby"...even though the whole series is about Usagi growing as a person and becoming a strong leader. When I asked what she liked, she only brought up shonen series.
Sarah Z’s video on the rise and fall of geek culture goes into some decent detail about why misogyny is so common in ‘geeky’ communities. not to excuse anything, but it seems to be caused by a combination of getting treated poorly (sometimes by women) for liking something that’s unpopular, and those men getting mad about losing that ‘niche’ identity. but I think the most important factor is developing empathy. It took me developing more empathy for women to appreciate things made for them, but it also took people (usually women) presenting these things in an empathetic manner for me to open up to that in the first place. Really, I think most of these guys would like more women sharing their interests even if they don’t know it, but bitterness really poisons people. I hope things keep getting better.
i think thats interesting bc often i see that while many (but not all) men internalize that anger and use it to ridicule other women who simply just want to have fun,, women also get ridiculed by men for their own interests but expect to be welcoming when a man shares the same.
i've seen a tumblr post about how these communities have historically kind of served a function as male safe spaces without having to admit to that overtly where society is otherwise hostile to their vulnerability and so as a result they view any disruption of it as a threat to that. solving that problem needs a whole lot of broad societal unpacking but, yeah
@@estrella9335 I believe the unfair dichotomy between the treatment of men and women in this case(where the women fact more prejudice when attempting to enter into traditionally masculine circles such as shounen) does have a lot to do with the fact that the system is traditionally patriarchal. In that kind of system, even the men who are typical ostracized in social setting are given more of a benefit of the doubt when entering these circles, one which women do not benefit from, which is not right.
I'm a big fan of other anitubers, trash taste in particular. The only real complaint I would ever have with them is that there's NEVER a shoujo topic. Not in their videos, not in their conversations, the fandom doesn't even really get mentioned. Don't get me wrong, shounen's great, but I feel like the characters and plot points I get really passionate about are always being swept under the rug because there's no one willing to give it a chance. Idk, maybe it's considered vapid or not on the same level. Bums me out, man.
What I also dislike is, people can hate on shoujo mangas as much as they want and then we have to be fine with they say. But if I say something bad about a shounen like Dragonball or Naruto, I always get questioned "did you even watch it completely, it gets so good after..." and my answer is always yes, but then they look at me bewildered like I lost my mind.
Religiously devout fans for any media work are always amusing when they encounter someone who isn’t that into It. 😀 DBZ & Sailor Moon fans are both very amusing groups, although I’ve only encountered devotees for them online.
I’ve had so many boys/men try to explain to me why I should continue watching Seven Deadly Sins and, honestly, I just don’t get the hype around it. Anyone who excuses SA/groping with “But they’re actually soulmates!! You’ve gotta continue watching! It explains it later!!!” is kinda insane to me?? Like, I’m sorry but if it starts out like that I’m not continuing until it “gets better”.
I also put this in the same vein as what we've seen with product marketing to kids - "boys" clothing and toys rarely feature female characters (Black Widow and Gamora always missing from group shots for example). It starts early on in conditioning and doesn't let up unless we make an active effort to dispel these notions that "boys can't like girls stuff". Thanks for making this video - nothing will change if we don't talk about it and keep making content promoting shoujo/josei titles so they get the respect the deserve!
Hiromu Arakawa is the mangaka of one of the great mainstream shonens, Fullmetal Alchemist. I think its safe to say women can figure out how to appeal to the hearts of boys just fine.
And not even since the 90's, my mom read/watched princess comet back in the 60's. Like, we always have been there, an integral part of the manga/anime community. Have an excellent day and thank you for addressing this, Collen :)
Interesting thing about Shonen Jump. They were not happy when Hirohiko Araki wanted the protagonist of Golden Wind (Part 5 from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure) to be a woman and he finally got his way in Part 6: Stone Ocean. Curiously after Part 6, Jojo was suddenly not serialized in Shonen Jump anymore...I wonder if there is a reason for that...
As a m4n, I gotta say that I deeply appreciate your work here. Throughout every video has been enlightening in some way. Like I've always noticed that I gravitated more into shoujo content for some reason, though unsure as to why at all, but seeing your videos, you had helped give an insight, and put into words what made me actually like about shoujo but also made me realise how little I knew of it. How without noticing, I was getting influenced into these weird expectations and misconceptions from the Western manga community and their remarks against shoujo, like I was one of those who thought shoujo was all about romance (which I watched a lot of) but there was never a moment I would come across about discussing that there's far more genres into it, largely due to the shounen-fanbois being the most vocal and loud about manga hottakes in internet that often drowns other communities' voices. So watching you discuss about it, has been really insightful, especially when you're not just talking about the manga itself, but as well these hard topics that pervades around the community which I find that is deeply needed to be addressed and talked about it, as it helps get people into the same page and have a thorough understanding of what's going on when it comes to stuff they enjoy and how it is affected by it (even if S0m3 p30ple D0nT Lik3 It). I hope you keep making videos like these when you feel it is needed to be discussed on. Also thank you for videos about shoujo recommendations, it helps a lot shedding some light into what else Shoujo has to offer and what else I can jump onto.
Just to touch on that twitter thread: I definitely used to be one of those people who said "I don't care about demographics, I'll read whatever!" when I was younger because I (as well as some of my other female friends) genuinely did read and collect series from all four major demographics. At that age I probably didn't even realize the disparity between certain demographics when it comes to publishing and exposure, or even really have as concrete of a grasp on the different demographics that I do as an adult. And sure, I probably read a little less seinen and josei due to age/maturity/the latter's unavailability in bookstores & libraries when I was younger, but that evened out as I got older and gender-wise there wasn't any avoidance or bias. It wasn't until around college age when I would hear that line said a lot by other manga fans and then be surprised at how one-sided their lists or collections were. And of course, if I followed up on it by asking about shoujo or josei series... at best I'd get a "oh I actually haven't read too many but I do like X or Y," and at worst, more often than not unfortunately, "yeah but most shoujo or josei series aren't really that good in comparison." So while I still do read and collect series from all four demographics, I've kinda stopped saying that years ago when people have asked me my manga preferences/tastes, and just go about listing some genres or series I love. And if anything I'm MORE vocal about making those demographic distinctions and supporting shoujo/josei releases (ex. pre-ordering early) if only to give more attention to shoujo/josei series that are comparatively ignored or brushed aside by a lot of manga fans. Also keep your chin up before the comment section gets flooded! We all know it's true even if it feels like kicking a hornet's nest saying it online.
Thank you for picking up this topic. It was about time we started addressing this issue more openly. And if you find any nasty comment, please try not to let the morons get to you. You have nothing to be ashamed of. On a personal note, I recently talked about manga with a male friend. He told me that he liked reading shounen and seinen manga. And when I inquired about shoujo and josei he asked me what was that. I mean... It's not like everyone absolutely MUST read shoujo and josei, to each their own, but to not even know what they were...
a friend once told me he indeed has nothing against shoujo and josei. he, and i quote "reads them just as much as Normal™ manga" this is what set the tone for every interest targetet at woman. if you're not socialized as such (or in similar ways for being another minority) or doesn't have the empathy, there's no way you would understand, really
I hate that male is the norm and female is a deviation in media. My male friends and I have different tastes but I do feel recentful when kimetsu no yaiba gets this huge animation budget and all the Shoujo anime in three years gets a shoestring budget and low quality orchestration because boys are for everyone and girls are less
Ever since I first started getting serious into manga and anime and being a part of the community I've noticed how misogynistic it can be, with terribly written female characters in shounen works to realizing not a lot of people even recommend shoujo bc "it's not as good as shounen". As a woman it really pains me specially bc most of the series that I enjoy are shounen, but I've always felt like shoujo just got me, it made me feel like home for some reason; I've found your chanel with the hopes of starting to read more shoujo and feeling this again, and I'm grateful for your work and how you still try and talk about such important issues. Stay strong, you're doing amazing💖
@@joshs7160 yeah my non male friends do the same thing. They pass up on good stories by calling it misogynistic. Sure it might have poorly written female characters but try to enjoy other aspects which are awesome. You still can enjoy the story if it is male centric. Same issue with men who ignore shoujo.
@@shekboi8316 hon I literally said most of the series I consume are shounen... Trust me when I tell you 90% of the content I watch I watch trying to look past this poorly written female character problem. But it's annoying. My favorite series treat my gender (mostly) as weak, romantic centric and just there to look pretty and hot. Even if I enjoy these series and look past these points, it's still horrible and every person has the right to not watch these stories bc of how they write these female characters
Thank you for this video❤️. I dealt with a lot of internalised misogyny growing up and always felt like the only way I could fit in with my friends was by engaging with mainstream entertainment that predominantly catered to young males. Anything that wasn’t gory or without action sequences was dismissed too “girly” and “immature”.It’s everywhere and something folks privately acknowledge but it’s refreshing to hear people publicly push back against this. Male creators and influencers discussing, reacting to and promoting shoujo and Josei manga and anime have a huge impact as well.
I was the exact same way growing up (less so with manga) and that is why I particularly am very passionate about de-stigmatizing feminine media. It is limiting to only enjoy things "for boys" and not opening yourself up to stories often drive on empathy.
It's funny to me because we once had a Shonen and a Shojo magazine here in Germany. The Shojo one survived multiple years after the Shonen one died off. That was in the early 2000s.
This is one of the most affirming videos I've ever seen. Period. I grew up watching anime on Toonami and Adult Swim, and saturday morning episodes of Yu-Gi-Oh!. I watched Sailor Moon and Cardcaptors after school. I loved Gundam Wing as much as Fruits Basket. When I went to an anime club at my local library the only people there were teenage girls like me. The fact that men are taking over these spaces that we were in is insane to me. Some of my old male friends would be impressed that I had watched Evangelion or Death Note years prior, but when asked what my favorite anime was, they would scoff, because it was Nana. They soon lost all respect for me because I would talk about how great a show it was. They only wanted to watch Slam Dunk and talk about Berserk. Anyways, I'm ranting. But I just want you to know how much your voice means to someone like me. Whenever I look up "Best Manga" it's always the same one. Finding a good josei or shoujo is like finding a needle in a haystack. Okay, off to watch and like all your other videos now byeeeeee!!!
I'm mostly into shounen stuff but shoujo ABSOLUTELY deserves to be better recognized. Presenting as female in the anime community is so much more of a trial than it should be.
Please don't stop making videos! I used to see shoujo as just a shitty romance genre with bad art and no substance. Your videos have taught me that while yes there is a lot of manga that fit into the "shoujo stereotype", there are many more with compelling and beautiful stories that could only be told through the shoujo genre. It makes me so so happy, as a woman, to watch another fem person talk about manga, something I didn't have as a kid. I promise you that while there are a lot of people who are vocal about their hate, there are many more like me who are grateful for your content but are just too shy to say something. Love you, hope you have a great day
I am glad to hear you changed your views ^^ Just one thing I'd like to mention, shoujo is not a genre but a demographic. These are very different things
@@drcaligaridane Yes, agreed. Shoujo is girls and Shonen is boys. You can have any genre within that split. Manga / Anime categorize things differently then what happens in the west.
Yes to all of this! Especially the point about the fact that every demographic has good and bad manga. There is no way that a man would enjoy every single shonen, and yet he somehow expects to enjoy every single shojo? Especially since he probably just picked one at random and didn't even check to see if it fit his other tastes first.
I grew up watching shonen anime. But I always longed for female protagonist. It was until I watched my 1st shoujo anime. It was something what I been looking for long time. It is bcz of u i started reading shoujo manga. U give the best recommendations. I so glad I found ur channel.
Thank you so, so much for this! ❤❤ Anyone who says all shojo and josei are bad just hasn't read or seen many (or only seen bad anime adaptations). It also bothers me so, so much that most the "Holy Grails" of manga are so hyper masculine. Like, sure Berserk is great, but so is Fruits Baskets yet only one gets the recognition it deserves (thankfully the fantastic new anime adaptation fixed that some). I do want to say the "prove it" mentality men have about women in fandoms isn't limited to nerd culture. I'm very into some sports and have "quizzed" by men to prove I'm a "real fan." Men seem to think women's lives revolve around them as much as poorly written female characters do. They think we dress up to please them and not ourselves, think we game to get their validation and not because we enjoy it, they think we like football because we want to use that to catch a boyfriend and not because we like football, etc . . . No matter what a woman is into (fashion, sports, nerdy stuff, etc . . .) they get accused of posing, being fake, and doing it just to get men's attention. I can't imagine how limited your perspectives must be if you truly think such a large portion of the population only has hobbies because they want YOUR attention. I think they also use it as a shield to protect themselves from the lack of success they have with women. If women truly enjoy sports, video games, and super heroes, they can no longer use the excuse women won't date them because they're not into nerdy stuff and face the reality it's a personal flaw they need to improve on.
I couldn't agree more with this comment. Too many men think women and nb people revolve our entire life around them. It's like they think we live our every waking moment with them in mind, as if we aren't fully human
Anyone who says all of any artistic genre are bad is a narrow minded fool. My aunt told me that and was talking about music, but I feel that way about pretty much any medium I engage with. Also: you can't know whether you like anything until you try it, and on the risk to reward ratio of trying things, checking out a new manga or anime is super freaking low.
here after the vid has finished. i feel like something you could have brought up here is the double standard regarding "problematic" (tropes in) anime, mainly that shoujo and josei get called out for problematic elements, while the same elements in shonen and seinen are ignored. people argue that shoujo has too many instances of MLs mistreating, and in some cases *SA'ing* the FL, and it being seen as romantic. and while this is a problem in shoujo, it's not like this isn't present in shonen. the case study of vanitas has *that exact trope,* (even though i DO like the series, it's really my only grievance with it) and fire force has the girls getting sa'd being played for laughs. people will (rightfully) criticize fruits basket, cardcaptor sakura etc for having many age gap relationships, but do they say the same thing for series that have the "she looks like she's 5 but is actually 5000" trope in shows like kobayashi's dragon maid? no. in fact they defend it. people will use diabolik lovers, a joseimuke, to paint all of reverse harem, and an entire demographic it's not even a part of as bad due to it being about a girl being mistreated horribly by a harem of boys. but do you see them using redo of healer, a show about *a guy mistreating his harem of girls horribly* to paint all of harem as bad, and a demographic it isn't even a part of? no. while dialovers fans can at least *acknowledge* that the Sakamakis are horrible to Yui, i've heard only the nastiest of people have defended redo of healer. i'm just sick of "feminine" things having to be perfect and spotless in every way, while "masculine" things can be as dirty, raunchy, and as questionable as possible and have it still be loved. EDIT: some of yall aren't getting the point. my point is that one bad/"problematic" shonen/seinen anime doesn't make those entire demographics bad, but one bad/"problematic" shoujo/josei anime suddenly means those demographics are all bad. double standards, people. ANOTHER EDIT, PUTTING THIS IN BABY TERMS SO YALL CAN UNDERSTAND: boy's thing does something weird, fans don't care and excuse it because good story. girl's thing does something weird, everyone freaks out, suddenly all of girls' things are bad.
THIS SO MUCH. Reverse harems will get shit on so often for being cheap wish fulfillment or badly written or whatever but regular harem shows are somehow immune to this? Idolish7 is just trash where every boy has a different hair color and yet Love Live is peak character writing? In the same vein every series with more than a few attractive male characters is called gaybait garbage but series with tons of girls are never called yuribait. I dread the treatment that Bibliophile Princess is gonna get next season for looking like such a stereotypical shoujo (I haven't read the novels unfortunately)
@@nicksvitak5416 tbh i'm scared bibliophile princess won't get any attention at all and instead just get buried under chainsaw man and the new bleach arc.
@@spectraltala6362 That's probably gonna happen but that's expected, Fruits Basket and Bakarina are the only recent shoujo seires I can think of that weren't buried by a shounen series airing at the same time
Definitely something I could have touched on and also thought about but I wanted to leave out any more controversial parts of an already controversial topic lol
Colleen you are constant inspiration to read more shoujo. I read shoujo when I was in my teens and early twenties--Kare Kano, Sukitte Ii Na Yo, and Akuma to Rabu Songu, REPRESENT!--then drifted away from it over time, and because of you I'm coming back. You made me realize that the desert of interesting anime isn't just a coincidence...shoujo manga, untranslated, underfunded, is where all the good stuff is hiding.
you got me to start a yona of the dawn collection (and now my amazon cart is filled with shoujo). I have always liked watching shoujo series with my sister but didn’t feel as confident talking about it because of the toxic manga/anime community. Your videos however have made me feel much more open to it and you are just great, keep up the good work!
YES! I’ve been seeing this so often with male anime fans. Nothing non-men are into is good, or could have any value, and if they’re into shonen, it’s for male attention. Which is completely ridiculous! Another interesting point is that these same assholes will ignore that their fav manga creators grew up on shojo manga. The creator of Berserk LOVED 70s shojo and it influenced him a lot in his writing. I swear they think these manga series sprung fully formed from the creators’ heads like Athena and had no influences.
i always assume shonen authors who don't clarify their gender (e.g.Gege Akutami of JJK and Koyoharu Gotouge of KNY) are women/nb and they just feel safer, or have been advised to not let audiences know because the misogyny is so real that readers will drop very successful series if they found out it's written by not a man. also the constant usage of he/him pronouns for these authors by western critics just because they write shonen always bothers me
Older Otaku here. To no one's surprise this really hasn't changed since the early 00's. Then it just depended on your friend group. My friends and I watched Inuyasha and Naruto and Bleach as soon as there was a fan translation. Fruits Basket and Fushugi Yugi made the rounds as well. I think it helped that no one dare turn anything down because you never knew if you would be able to find it again.
Same here, in the late 90s/early 2000s our group was watching/reading anything we could find (even untranslated media). I feel like our cause was more unified back then - to "prove" that anime was not just "cartoons" to the "non-geeks". Now that it has some recognition as a medium, we're seeing subcultures within the fanspace. I do think social media has influenced this even more, since anyone can make posts and pile on about a series (good or bad).
Growing up, the people I knew (male & female) who regularly read manga/manhwa were like myself, couldn’t buy them so you just read whatever the local free (aka public) libraries had available + what inner library loan request was granted. For many this meant grabbing almost anything off the shelves to bring for a spin at least once.
you already pointed this out, but I think this issue has definitely gotten worse. I mean all of my IRL friends who are into manga are women, I feel like back around 2010 that was seen as more normal? Like back then the people who ran my highschools anime club were two girls, as were most of the members. They introduced me to FMA Brotherhood and Bleach.. Nerd culture has always had a misogyny problem, but something has changed in the last decade
"Something changed" Yeah that "something" is that neckbeards, incels, and weebs discovered that women exist, and they went into full revolt. Now nerds are primed to be against "woke culture" which is basically women and minorities existing.
I started reading manga when corona started and honestly I was just bored after reading the same shonen shit over and over of " guy gets superpowers which he randomly recieved not worked to get"(don't get me wrong I do like this stuff when I just want to turn off my brain and read) and villains just for the sake of being villains. Then I tumbled across Yona of the dawn anime and started watching it which I thought was just another series about guy saves girl but oh man the first episode started off showing Yona and the group and I was pleasantly surprised after finishing it i jumped straight into the manga cause the anime stopped abruptly(RIP S2) and now honestly it has really become one of my favourite series. Same with condition called love. I just want you to know how much you have helped me ready out new series' which I've never heard of. Thank you for the lovely recommendation and waiting for your next shonen to shoujo video. Love from India and All the best ❤️❤️❤️
Thank you for this well reasoned and level headed, yet personal take on things. I'm sad to say that I am also a former 'not like other girls' reader, and so missed out on many years of quality shoujo. I absolutely love you and other amazing MangaTubers who have introduced me to a whole new generation of shoujo and josei. So... Thank you for everything you do.
What I hate is that these ppl refuse to acknowledge that shojo and Josei both explore the human experience and emotions in such depth. Characters often reflect on themselves and their actions. They study their emotions. It’s good character writing.
Thanks Colleen for saying what we've all been thinking but too reluctant to say outright. So many will hate on this( and thereby prove your point lol)but just know you're doing the shojo community a huge favor. I also find it so funny that when some men(not all) enjoy popular and well-liked shojo such as Fruits basket and Yona of the dawn they will say something along the lines of "I like this DESPITE it being a shojo" and then not see the problem behind such statements!
I don’t know if all of those types of comments come out of a misogynistic mindset, I also often encounter individuals saying they like something despite it being shonen, isekai, harem…but I’m sure a percentage of them who are saying it (in regards to josei or shojo) are saying it simply because it was attempting to target girls.
I’m sure there are women who say this too just because shoujo gets a bad rap in general, but yeah I have seen comments like that before. “I don’t like shoujo, but this one shoujo is okay/good.” I’ve never seen anyone make a comment like that in regards to shounen. I do feel however there are companies like Crunchyroll that have recently acknowledged that the female audience is underserved so I think things are going to end up changing for the better.
The shonen comments usually stem from three mindsets 1. the belief that shonen is a genre & that genre is battle manga 2. if a story is 'mature', 'psychological' or 'dark' it is seinen. 3. If a story is 'fluffy', 'romantic' etc. it is shojo.
@@crackle6875 I definitely feel there is misogyny involved for sure, but I do agree with you on those 3 mindsets as well. I feel shoujo getting more attention will help people begin to understand that shoujo is not simply fluffy and romance. I never got into the shoujo magazine, but when Colleen mention the person who wrote a negative article about shoujo and then Colleen mentions the first vol had manga including Godchild it was very clear that misogyny was at play the way they shit on volume 1 of the magazine. Godchild is a horror manga far from fluffy and romance that’s for sure. This really became apparent just how much misogyny affects things when I started watching Pop Culture Detective. He breaks things down piece by piece and does a full analysis on how misogyny affects media.
recently gigguk did a stream talking about upcoming anime. When stuff like 'play it cool, guys' & 'bibliophile princess' came up, a lot of chat was up in arms saying girl anime, gay anime, fujobait and whatnot. dissapointing
Hope you know you're absolutely not responsible for the increase in hate Shojo has been getting recently. Tbh shojo fans in general have been more vocal about loving shojo and about the misogyny in the community and well.. men don't like it when we point out their misogyny, never do and it's like this in literally all communities across the board. They get very sensitive when their dominance is being threatened and that's why they there's an increase in hate recently. I think us being more vocal is good, it means the men in the fandom are now being confronted with the issues and i don't know if it'll do much, but if we're large in number and vocal enough, they can't silence us or stop us.
Yeah I agree but sometimes it's not because of losing male dominance but they just get pissed off when trash their favorite show which means alot to them. Kinda like the twilight example. We can point out the flaws in the story but we should never shame someone for liking a story.
@@shekboi8316 I agree with this. When someone says "Your show sucks!" and that gets countered with "No, your show sucks." and then the other person hurls an insult and then we go "Misogynist!" we are throwing a grenade in a snowball fight.
I wish more people talked about this, most of the nerd culture is so much gatekept by men who say one piece is the best manga of all time and if you don't watch naruto you don't understand anime or manga while disregarding chihayafuru and Natsume book of friends as a genuinely brilliant work of anime and manga. It makes me so angry that people just say women are into nerd culture because it's popular while one just forgets that nerd culture is just there and the stories have had different audience. The only difference being that men usually don't like promoting a subjective taste and mostly jump onto things that other men watch which only makes a handful of their works very popular at a particular time. Edit: grammar
@@joshs7160 Why would they laugh? OP makes a good point and this actually happened in Colleen’s experimental thread where once a certain group of men found out her list was of shoujo they made fun of it and were listing the most popular/well known shounen or asking why those well known shounen manga weren’t listed completely missing the point. Definitely some heavy gatekeeping going on.
I liked the anime club my friends had at school back in 2011. Guys and girls recommended manga and anime to eachother respectfully. It was really fun. I remember getting one of the guys into vampire knight back then. I really wish it was that simple now.
Thank you for making this video! Even in Japan, most videos talking about manga/anime contain misogyny, homophobia, and sometimes xenophobia, so it's hard to watch. Please take care of your health and keep posting videos. I only know a few classic shoujo manga, so it was fun getting to know new shoujo manga through your videos and tweets. I used Google Translate.
Ohh I remember that twitter thread. Imagine countering an actual thread about refreshing series that a lot of people might have actually not read with the same top 20 mal seinen and shounen. Ouch!!!
Thank you for making this video, it outlines the issues of misogyny very well. As a male fan of Shonen and a budding new reader to Shoujo (Just read Nana, that goes so hard and I am so sad that we may never see an ending) To build on your point about the way people see Shoujo as a form that is inferior because it is created by women, I have seen other men make this assertion on Twitter with Demon slayer and Full metal Alchemist profile pictures; the mangaka of which are both women. I think this stems from this idea that female storytellers are inferior because some weirdo sexist thing, despite the fact that there are plenty of fantastic manga in Shonen alone from women. For example: Demon Slater, Noragami, Full metal Alchemist, Dorohedoro, D-Gray Man, Blue Box, The Promised Neverland and Blue Exorcist just to name a few. Hence, it baffles me why there is idea that women are inferior are in this medium, given the clear prevalence and quality of many female driven works.
Algorithmic punch! (Hey, just wanted to say as a man who started reading shojo back when I was a kid in the 90s, I have been really happy to find your channel. I had way back been reading things like the original sailor moon, magic knight ray earth, Card captor, then later nana, angelic layer, and I deeply loved fruits basket. I stepped away from manga for many years, but coming back I have found it hard to back into shojo because the lack of focus on it in the online community. I have been grateful for your recommendations, and willingness to share your perspective. Thanks!)
I know you discuss that this is a reflection of larger issues and mention comics, but let me assure you that this has been a problem since the beginning of human society. Work by/for men is given inherent value, but by/for women is instantly devalued. Take textiles or cooking...or computing. It's "women's work" so it's ignored for centuries. When it became noticed, it suddenly becomes men's work at high value levels - men are chefs, women are cooks. Men are textile artists, women are seamstresses. Women are "computers," men are programmers. So this issue is patriarchy, and the fact that low-status men feel like they have few options to feel powerful and thus resort to shouting. Which is where it gets so sad and pathetic. They *could* just like stuff and not care about other people. Like the article stated, Bonobo monkeys with small balls scream loudest.
This is the reason I am happy women mangaka are publishing in Shonen and Seinen magazines stuff that are clearly targeted at girls and women (The Ancient Magus bride and A bride Story being two examples each). Maybe it will change people ideas
I've seen people say that there's no way that AMB could be a shounen and they're really just showing that they think the only shounen is mindless battle series
I agree with everything you've said. I was brought up in a comic book collecting household so I've always been subjected to the kind of misogyny found in the comic book community (ESP pre-MCU). While I've only gotten into manga in the last 5 years, I see similar attitudes. I'm often asked to "prove" my knowledge, as if being a woman makes you entirely incapable of consuming or understanding this medium lol.
As a male. I like to read manga from every demographic. I love the Lovely Complex which is shoujo and Wondering Son which is about children and their experience with being lgbt. Witch Hat Atelier and Land of The Lustrous are also manga that I love.
Never understood the hate to shoujo series, I lately been reading shoujo manga such as "A sign of Affection", Blue Spring Ride and hoenstly they are amazing. It tells a very amazing story and a good break from the usual shonen jump action battle series. It's ok dislike a series, but these shonen fans just call anything mid without even reading it and it's so fucking cringe.
Well tbh, many anime fans always thrash other series of any genre except their fav and those widely regarded as good (berserk). Haven't really seen much shoujo hate. Thank God for that. I do enjoy some of them very much. Kimi ni Todoke, Akatsuki no Yona, Kauchou wa maid sama, Love so Life, etc
Shoujo can be great although there are some problematic tropes but yeah it's a cute genre if you enjoy the problematic parts, would love some new shoujo content. Josei can be great too I still love Nana.
I had a really great friend growing up who introduced me to manga. She loved shoujo so most of her recommendations to me were shoujos, which I absolutely adored (she has great taste). When I didn't know much about manga in general and I ran out of recommendations I would look up popular mangas, often which were shounen. I liked some of them, read *a lot* of a few of them, but ultimately found I enjoyed the shoujo genre more. Only later did I discover that almost no one I knew personally (and even online), knew or talked about shoujo and that I couldn't talk about it to anyone else because shoujo was "lame" or "girly" or just in general not as good as shounen. I'm really lucky to still be friends with this girl who started my shoujo obsession so I have at least one person to talk to about it, but it really sucks that I feel like I have to hide my interests so that other people don't immediately brush off my opinions just because I like shoujo. This channel has been giving me so much validation, and I want to thank you for that Colleen!
Chiming in to say this past year is for me the first time I’ve seen a strong shoujo fandom presence on the internet and it’s been kind of fun. I’m sure I wasn’t looking that hard because I’ve been finding series and reading on my own for 20 years. Most people never read what I read. Nobody I knew had heard of Basara, Red River, Paradise Kiss, Mars, etc. The only shoujo we could bond over was Sailor Moon and most people had only seen an episode or two in passing. So it’s been a bit sad to me to see negative commentary against shoujo and women who are pushing shoujo forward. Makes me not want to be on the internet sometimes. But I have found new series to love thanks to female reviewers this year - unfortunately one of which is already out of print without even being a year old 🤷♀️ Because that’s how much faith publishers have in women’s media. Cool cool. Good luck with the comments! 😅 Editing to say demographic absolutely does matter. I know if a manga is shounen, there’s a high likelihood the women in the stories aren’t gonna get much shine and half the time will be dismissed entirely or sexualized. There are exceptions to this rule of course. But I brace myself when picking a shounen up so I can recalibrate my expectations.
I love how the Shoujo Beat mag was ripped to shreds with the exception of a full metal alchemist ad in the corner. You have to wonder if he would've even dunked on FMA if he knew the creator was female. Great video Colleen, it was a great intro to your channel, I'm glad it was on my recommended.
Once I tried buying a cartoon link plushy for a friend at best buy. The cashier who was one of *those* men. And he wouldn't let me check out until he quizzed me on the characters to see if I was a "real fan" I've never played a god damn Nintendo game in my life besides a few wii sports game. Still answered that shit right. He was all "what's this characters name" and I said "Li-" "you probably almost said Zelda didn't you?" Bro cut me off.... I refuse to check out tloz because I'm salty now
hearing how awful this community can be sometimes makes me so sad :( just know what you’re doing is truly shining a better light in the scene. your videos are so interesting & i don’t even read manga!! love the way you tell stories & your acting cracked me up in this vid haha
Thank you for this important video, I hope the comment section will remain somewhat peaceful... Your channel helped (and still helps) fuel my new-born interest for shôjo manga, I'm grateful for that.
Just wanted to say: thank you so much for making this video. I haven't interacted a lot with the mainstream fandoms because for some reason I just tend to like more niche things with dead or non existend fandoms that drive me to talking to my bestie for hours about a manga she has never and will never read, but when I started out reading manga with One Piece and the like I definitly felt that stigma against non men (I'm non binary but was read as female a lot when I was younger). I also want to get more into shoujo and josei titles and your content helps me with that a lot, so thank you so much, again. I'm hyped everytime I see that you uploaded a new video and really love your content. :)
I wouldn’t have started reading shojo if it wasn’t for channels like yours. there’s plenty of people making content on shonen manga, that’s how I found manga in the first place. Having creators who do the same for shojo is really great
Super insightful video! Its very difficult and frustrating to be talked down and alienated from your hobbies and passions just because some ppl dont wanna hear or acknowledge your existence, so its always nice to hear this topic being discussed. Feels very validating to see others talk about this problem. Thank you for posting this :D
While growing up I was pretty invested in anime and manga, but it got to a point where I couldn’t keep up with it bc I got tired of the toxic environment. Not only bc people was testing my “knowledge” or dismissing my favorite anime but also bc I kept running into situation where guys were making creppy comments to us girls and even harassing us. My last straw happened in an anime convention when a random guy complemented my friend’s shirt and then touch her chest. After many years far away from the Community, I start reading/watching anime again bc I have come across female mangakas and anime that’s not full of fan service( u also have been part of my journey. I never stopped liking anime/manga but I didn’t know what to consume bc the popular names were not what I was looking for. Your recommendations are awesome, and I think it what fans like me need :)
I'm honestly just glad your channel and others like you are popping up, because I've almost *only* been interested in shoujo and josei since I've gotten into anime. I like some shounens, but the genre as a whole is mid-- nah I'm just kidding, but it often doesn't appeal to me in the same way.
As someone who has read a lot of Shounen series to completion, many of them ARE mid. It's tough to find ones that are written well. On another note, shout out to Kids on the Slope, Honey & Clover, Chihayafuru, Shouwa Genroku, Princess Jellyfish, and Usagi Drop (at least the anime version) for all being 9-10/10 Josei series in my opinion.
It really can be really exhausting just existing in an anime fandom when you're not male... It makes me feel quite sad to think about these kinds of things, but it's important to talk about them. Great video!
Just came across your channel, and this is a great video! The misogyny present in anime communities is so baffling to me. As a male nerd/geek, having women get interested in the same things you are would be an absolute godsend. and when we finally have a chance to get more women into a hobby that we love, so many guys push them away. it's insane! anime should be appreciated by people of ALL genders.
As usual, awesome video essay! As a manga fan for 22 years, I grew up with Fushigi Yugi, Ranma 1/2, Inu Yasha,Sailor moon and anything by CLAMP. Because I didn't have any money, I read whatever I could get my hands on at the public library or read while visiting book stores. There are so many good stories out there and I'm glad more people are reading manga in general. Be kind to each other!
Lauren Faust (creator of My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic) said in a panel once: "We live in a society where saying that something is for girls is the equivalent to saying that something is stupid, or saying that something isn't worthwhile." This really struck a chord with me, because when I was a little girl, I was ashamed of the girly things I liked. I didn't think that I could be tough and like cute stuff at the same time. And I internalized that "girly stuff=stupid" attitude for a long time before I came out of it. I hate that our society is still like this.
Really glad I found your channel! The world of shoujo/josei is so huge, so I never know what's good to pick up!
I'm glad you brought up My little pony cause the whole brony fandom was a very interesting case of men managing to put down and exclude girls, the very obviously target demographic, from the fandom of a Franchise that for decades has been considered for girls
I'm likely a bit older than you are so I've seen how the level of misogyny has changed over the decades. Although it is still a huge problem it was MUCH worse when I was young. Society does at least seem to be moving in the right direction albeit slowly.
@@kirbyjoe7484 I love you seem to just forget about other countries and assume just bc it's nicer in your own then hey everything is better
@@kirbyjoe7484 Men telling women what they experience is very misogynist. And that's exactly what you're doing.
Most men really have no idea what oppression looks or even feels like.
We live in a society
The irony here is male anime/manga fans get shit for liking it because it's "for kids." But then they turn around and do the same shit to women and girls who like it.
It's almost as if punching down on people (like violence) only begets more of itself.
No matter who those people may be.
The thing about manga and anime being for kids is a pretty naive thing to believe, honestly, as there are many anime and manga that contain stuff that aren't for kids at all.
SpongeBob and Dragon Ball Z are different animals in practically every way.
@@HarbingerOfBattle It's the circle of harm. Those fans of anime and manga who get shit on decide to take their anger out on those they deem smaller than them.
@@LuznoLindo I enjoy the occasional manga/anime, yet while I have been hazed and ridiculed for my hobby, I don’t belittle those who do not share my interest, nor do I threaten or insult those who criticize it. I am not the only one. It is common in society to blame art or media for degenerate behavior while overlooking the fact that these things are common place in society and that correlation does not equal causation. Let us not criticize all fans of anime and manga, but only those who behave badly.
@@HarbingerOfBattle "nor do I threaten or insult those who criticize it." Yeah but still.
This has been bugging me a lot lately. People have been pointing out that women are expected to enjoy male oriented media( such as marvel for example ) while the vice-versa can't be said. Great video as always!
Thanks for pointing this out. I realized at some point that all of the "coming of age" books I had to read in school were about boys. Women have to learn how to inhabit non-female perspectives, but men are hardly ever challenged to, so the stereotype that women are more capable of doing this is created and then propagated. So frustrating.
@@joshs7160 thats true but the exceptions still stand. We have more male protagonists than female ones. I mean we don't have whole discourse on " why is the main character a man?" But we do with female ones.
@@joshs7160 no it's not. It's just that society is already trained to think that male-oriented media is more "gender neutral" while stereotipically female things are not. Which is just not true, women just learned to accept this and are much more open to trying it out, while men never really had to step out of their little "male content" bubble, and a lot of times even be looked down upon when trying.
@@joshs7160 okay mr incel
@@joshs7160 lmao what? are fights more inclusive than talking about feelings? hilarious
Gotta love how they said you have to “understand the heart of a boy” when some of the most popular manga of all time like Demon Slayer, Black Butler, Inuyasha, FMA, Pandora Hearts, Noragami, Toilet Bound Hanako kun, Blue Exorcist, etc, are all women-written works, the hypocrisy IS real
EDIT: Though there have been many assumptions about Kimetsu no Yaiba’s mangaka and their gender, the author apparently prefers to remain anonymous and thus uses they/them pronouns. The earlier mention was a mistake on my part! From what I read, a WSJ employee leaked that Koyoharu Gotouge was a woman but until that’s confirmed by the author themselves I think it’s better to respect their wishes and continue using they/them/gender neutral references
Yeah I dont get how Rumiko Takahashi can be one of the most famous shonen mangaka of all time and these editors still try to act like its necessary to be a man in order to write shonen well.
Seriously, there are SO many shounen series written by women and some of them are considered some of the best series of all time. And yet on the flip side, there are almost NO male shoujo mangaka (most of the ones I know are from decades ago ie Shinji Wada)
not even mentioning most of those ARE shonen, it’s crazy
@@cinnamon5675 All of them are actually, I was surprised when I found that out about Black Butler
And some of the shounen written by men has actually been the most objectifying towards the women or girl characters, so what exactly are they putting in young boys hearts? 🤔🤔
"Shoujo/josei manga isn't very varied" says the demographic with hundreds if not thousands of shounen stories with virtually the same generic protagonist meant to be a power fantasy for the readers.
As a subgenre of a larger category, that should not be surprising. There are a series of tropes or further sub-classification that go on within each of these broader sectors, and they have consistent rules because that is how you keep a consistent audience. Coming from a more generalized example base, romances have happy ending, fantasies have magic, science fiction has some form of future exploration or space, mysteries have a murder that must be solved, etc. Why the heck does that surprise anyone?
@@kathycoleman4648The problem is that shonen isn't a genre and shonen is fulled to the brim with extremely mediocre if not bad yet trendy works that lack any effort regarding writing.
SINCE THE EARLY TWO THOUSANDS. It's 2024, and Shonen Jump is still doing the same exact shit again and again
“This shonen series isn’t made for you.”
“Okay, then you can’t say shojo is bad since it isn’t made for you.”
“No, wait!”
Each of those statements are true. There is a world of difference between something not being 'good' or 'bad' and something not being for me. As an example, Cowboy Bebop is the Citizen Kane of anime and I find it absolutely boring and did not finish it.
@@kathycoleman4648If you find it absolutely boring and couldn’t even finish it, why would you say it’s good?
@@yuuuurei As someone who likes Evangelion, I disagree that it is "objectively" good, since there is no objective reason why someone ought to value certain aspects of a piece of art over others.
@Kathy Coleman just like the actual Citizen Kane, really
Reading about how girls only recently got into manga is hilarious because a lot of top manga sellers in the 2000s were shoujo that girls bought like Fruits Basket and Kimi ni Todoke lol
We have been around since forever.. classic shoujo manga from like the 70s n 80s r soooo good and the arts are so beautiful. It's a shame they will never release them in English
I can't understand how they would think that when they could go into a book/comics shop and see that a huge portion of the manga that are localized are Shojo
@@lotus_dream Princess knight is from the 50s iirc but i really like it
Yep yep yep
Hell considering that the entire reason why people care about Gundam is because of FEMALE shippers in the 80s, people who try to turn manga into some boys club have to be delusional at best. And for some reason, those guys are also the kinds of guys who think Lucky Star is the height of sophistication.
Its one of the weirdest things to be, because when I was a kid. Girls were the ones reading Shojo and guys were watching anime on TV in the 2000s. Girls were reading Fruits Basket, Ouran High School or Inuyasha. Now all of a sudden when manga became normal for men to read due to the wider understanding how how anime is as a medium, suddenly there are guys who act as if they were the ones always there, girls weren't and gatekeeping starts. Like for some reason male fans of something popular have this tunnel vision of defining something as theirs, once they identify themselves with it; even if said people weren't nor could prove they were there first.
Yep! The exact same thing happened with Star Trek, the original Trekkies were housewives.
It's true with doujin culture in Japan as well, almost everyone who participated in Comiket in the 70s were high school or college girls. Even now something like 60% of doujinka are women.
Same here! I remember the anime kids I hung out with were mostly girls and we never gate-kept. Just excited to meet someone with a shared interest. We usually were excited to lend new people books or suggest anime to people. When the anime community became more saturated with men is actually when I sort of lost interest. I feel like they made everything into a competition instead of a shared community
@@HeruruMeruru the first Trekkies being house wives makes sense
Right,
I was always made fun of for wanting to read and check out anime and manga at the library and read it at school .
Then others suddenly have read all the series I had and more and I'm lesser
I dont read a ton of Shojo, just because it often doesnt get recommended to me, but the ones I've read have been fantastic. It is very weird how some dudes will go out of their way to hate anything even mildly directed towards women. Hating women is a straight up sport for a lot of these weird nerds. (I am also a weird nerd the hating women is the issue not the weird nerdiness.)
hey, idk if you read romance manga, but i can definitely recommend "a condition called love" (incase you need a good shojo rec)
Thank you for sharing!
Just wanted to share some lesser known shoujo manga recommendations:
Red River
From Far Away
Dunia Mimpi
Legend of Nerid
(Similar to Basara)
Kaze Hikaru
Lady Georgie
(Historical fiction)
Alice 19th
Special A
Platinum Garden
(Slice of life)
@@luvelycade I'm not usually super into strict like romance stories, I prefer when romance is a part of a bigger story, but I'll check it out for sure. I've loved a few good romances.
@@LevePalestinaKrossaSionismen thanks for the rec's! I havent actually read Basara yet. Havent had the time. But I want to.
@@t-vann48 You won't regret reading Basara! I first read it over a decade ago and the story still gives me goosebumps!! All the manga I listed has romance in the story, but it isn't the main focus of the plot.
does anyone remember when jujutsu kaisen first started getting popular, and all of us just assumed the mangaka was a woman bc of the lack of sexism and objectification in the series?
when the BARE MINIMUM is seen as something that would impossible for a man to make, that's how you know we have a problem.
The fact that JJK stans thought that Gege was a woman bc he didn't sexualize them is extremely embarrassing in itself since the only female character that seem to matter in the story is Maki Zenin 🙃
I remember reading the series and being like OMG a shonen manga without a big boob lady running around and falling on the guy. Whenever I praise JJK for having good female characters everyone jumps down my throat.
Honestly same for me with spy x family. I could swear there's no way in hell a man could write a funny, non-sexualized family comedy. I was genuinely shocked when I learned otherwise lol
@@chanelmapendo3761 I get where you’re coming from but I don’t think that’s fair. Maki is the only one who entered the games with them. Nobara is injured, Miwa and Momo have joined the games and there’s still more to see from Yuki and Angel. I know it feels like forever because it’s a weekly manga but time has not moved much in-universe for the manga. I’m waiting to see more from this arc before I judge the ‘lack’ of female characters. I could very well be wrong and it could all amount to nothing in the end but I still like to be optimistic
@@royoj966 Jujutsu Kaisen is already in their climax and in every interview gege doesnt even seem interested in the female characters, he think he's story is enough with the men. JJK stans give gege the feminist award for nothing
"you hate shounen because you like shoujo" People who says things on those lines kinda self-report what goes on their minds, idk i just smell projection.
Exactly. What if you happen to like and gravitate towards both over seinen/or even dark fantasy?
That is the most absurd statement... I do not expect shonen to change its core formula because I am AWARE of shoujo. I am also aware of how society perceives things that it feels belong to women. Not every guy does it, but it does happen. And its even sadder when you get it from other ladies.
"SHOUJO BAD." Watches the 2434th shounen isekai in the past decade.
Ironically the first isekai was a shoujo
@@Dsadsasasad pretty sure Narnia isn't anime/manga and isekai refers to Japanese animated and illustrated mediums
@@Dsadsasasad pretty sure narnia isn’t old enough to be the “first isekai”
Facts.
guess shoujo manga biggest trope
yup you guessed it
:|
Take a shot everytime a shounen fan says manga made by women are bad, but then are fan of a manga thats actually written by a women 🥴
they always love fullmetal alchemist. always. and don't understand the irony
@@joshs7160 Exactly. People are confusing shonen jump's sexist beliefs that women aren't suited to making manga for boys with the actual opinions of readers, especially in the west, and it's kind of sad since comments like these are pretty much the opposite extreme of overgeneralizing differing genders' opinions.
Beaststars fans got exposed.
Acute alcohol poisoning is what happens
@@joshs7160 I'd wager that last part is a self fulfilling prophecy. The male experience is presumed to be more generalizable so it is favored for content that is meant for a general audience. As a result female audiences are more exposed to male perspectives than vice versa, like you said. So, the male perspective becomes more widely understood across genders because it's just more widely accessed across genders, even when it's more targeted. Though, I guess that all depends on what you mean by accessible on a human level....
what bro said about "women haven't been anime fans for as long as men" is crazy. the only reason gundam is around today is because in the 70's after almost being cancelled and after it had aired, the majority female fanbase showed the producers that there was indeed a market for it leading to the release of the trilogy film series and the continuation of the production of gundam anime.
Well that and the success of the model kits, but that does not invalidate the contributions of the female fanbase.
@@HarbingerOfBattle No.
@@HarbingerOfBattle The model kits came later, far later.
Yes
As a female ( older) Berserk fan who also loves Shojo, Thank You!! I absolutely don’t care about demographic! In fact, due to your channel, I have taken up titles in Shojo I would never have been exposed to! Yes, I think I’ve seen every video you’ve put out! Been doing manga since the early 90’s and anime since ‘75.
and you used to play my favorite game poupee girl too! you rock, older sis! thanks for being there for so long and being youself in such awful places that makes us feel not welcomed.
@@NanakoMajo I cried the day Poupee Girl shut down!!! I miss it soooooooo much! Oh yes, some of the fandom is Toxic! I’ve been told to make sandwiches before.
Curiosly speaking, Miura really respected the shojo genre and often seeked help from female shoujo authors for Berserk, which I think is the reason the manga resonates as well with female audiences too!
@@MekuChanAnime exactly!
Finally a fellow female Berserk fan 😩 so many ppl I've met who also like Berserk are your typical dude bro lol
12:00 This may be valid excuse, but so so wrong. In Japan there's a lot of misogyny in general, not only in the manga community. As a woman I'd be terrified of working with only men, but I'm in no way justifying the exclusion of women in shonen editorials.
I'm not in Japan, but I've worked with all men before. It has its issues but if it's a decent workplace it's not scary. Men are people too. They gossip and talk about going on diets in the lunch room. Sometimes you have to raise an eyebrow at things, some of them are jerks, but most people don't want to cause trouble at work.
I want women to not be afraid to pursue a career in a male dominated workplace, you know? If the guys are jerks and it doesn't work out it was a crappy company, but it doesn't mean it won't work out somewhere else.
@@jbstarkiller4626 "You'd be ok even walking alone at night" love when people say this, but don't take into account how sexual assault cases there go unreported and the victims rarely get any kind of justice. Japan is not that safe for women
@@jbstarkiller4626 dude you are not even safe on a public bus stop lying
@@jbstarkiller4626 you haven't lived there haven't you. It's only safe because it set the bar of what America's version of "safe" is when it's just normal.
@@francisconavarrete3031 no. But from what I've seen. It's just normal. In my country. There's literally zero school shootings. Even Denmark let's their babies strollers outside while they eat inside restaurants. America is just not safe so Japan is this Disney like country for these people.
Anime and manga fans rushing to call every female character that has flaws "useless" while simultaneously putting female characters into different "waifu" boxes like they're flavors of candy always bugs me.
I've BEEN SAYING THIS FOR YEARS BUT MY FRIENDS WHO ALSO WATCH ANIME DON'T LISTEN AND IT HURTS SO BAD! I screenshotted your comment because I feel so alone😭
like they think female characters only deserve respect if they are useful, especially to other male characters
@@orange1293 THIS. I SEE IT ALL THE TIME IN SHOUNEN. The problem is their definition of useful. If she's not some OP casually crushing her opponents and rejecting romance and all things girly with big boobs, she's useless and annoying. Usefulness is determined by so much more than that. A girl who's sweet and kind but physically weak could have the biggest impact on the male lead's personality and actions in a fucking action story if the writer wanted. And thereby, be useful despite not being able to take down 100 bad guys in 5 seconds(*cough, Shirley from Code Geass-Lulu lost his soul without her). I'm getting pissed just thinking about it.
@@sunnysodapop hell's paradise and jjk have pretty good female characters imo
Hanako kun is also pretty great
@@greendoritoman2464 does jjk stand for something? I've read jigokuraken and quite a few other shonen with great female characters. I'm just stating the pattern I notice in terms of fandom mindset. Shirley from Code Geass, Lucy from Fairytail, Mikasa from AOT, etc. are all strong but hated female characters for example. And then you have Erza from fairytail who is the odd ball because she's strong yet is very girly, dreaming of weddings and liking strawberry cake. Usually that's enough for them to hate a girl but I guess Erza's girlyness was rarely shown or something so fans couldn't eyeroll at her for liking a boy and getting emotional all the times she thought he was the enemy/died.
Always wondered why big animanga youtubers never talked about this huge problem ever while talking about the community in general. Thank you for bringing this up Colleen. I always love to watch your videos keep them coming whenever you feel like it!!
Most of them are dudes, so… yeah
Cause they don't wanna alienate their larger male audience, which has a lot of these misogynistic dude (whether they admit it or not...)
@@Y2Kikii Yeah I figured that out. Of course they wouldn't want to lose their AUDIENCE.
It wouldn't surprise me if some of the larger youtubers held misogynistic sentiment and if they don't, they don't want to lose their core audience by speaking out.
The more time passes the more it pisses me of( particularly about Gigguk and Mother's basement)
Would just like to say that as a heterosexual male Shojo reader/watcher, I think this is brilliantly said and needed to be said. The stigma around liking shojo/josei is ridiculous to me. To highlight ur point , people needa remember that Shojo and Shounen are literally demographics or target audiences which arent the same thing as a genre (scifi,horror,etc.). Meaning that they arent limited to ONLY romance as most non-female readers think. They can literally be everything a shonen series can be in terms of genre, the only difference is it being written with the way young girls and adult women think in mind. This is not to say that they arent for men/boys but rather to offer a different take from a more feminine perspective. Sucks that people close the door on a whole category of show because those types of people see that perspective as “weak” or not “manly” smh.
👏👏👏
A good example for me of action shoujos would be the mahoushoujo genre like madoka magica or sailor moon.
I didn't realize until my late teens/early 20's how lucky i was to not have any male role models that made fun off things for being girly, or bragged about things being manly. I grew up with the viewpoint (at least about stories(books, movies, shows, manga, anime etc.)), If it is good, it is good. If you enjoy it, then you enjoy it. doesn't matter what the demographic was.. as a kid I would be turned away by stuff being super pink. Mostly just because i didn't like pink.. i liked green and red...
Yes. People often get confused about the fact that manga and anime are more largely categorized by the gender pov the piece is targeting, while neglecting the fact that you can do any genre within that split. From a western perspective, there is then also the additional confusion that Japanese sensibilities about men and women are not a 1 to 1 ratio with how we view those things, and present them in our media, here.
@@Rurix48 For me, its the same, i can watch anything, if it is good, the genre or the target audience doesnt matter.
As for colours, i love everything, esp in combo, red with black, pastel green with white! My parents always made sure to dress me up since i was little, so i picked it up till date.
Nothing warms my cold, dead heart more than seeing my very masculine father voluntarily watch sappy romcoms and saccharine Hallmark films and enjoy them (He will postpone outtings to finish them on TV). Or seeing my spouse evolve from only consuming high-octane action/thrillers/sci-fi to human interest stories and drama, to recently picking out a shojo all by himself (No. 6) with no prodding from me (when I told him it was a shojo he didn't blink and said, "the story sounds good though" and bought all that was available)!
I think men will come around, once they settle into themselves a bit. Attacking a genre you don't read or understand is weak. Cutting yourself off from exploring another genre is narrow. Tearing down enthusiasts of those genre you don't read, understand, or explore is cowardly. What a piss poor trifecta.
Kudos to women who read beyond shojo and josei. And thank you for this video.
lol shounen is often just a good read, no need for the kudos, lol. makes it sound like it's tough to read for non-men 😂
@@rubyrootless7324 i think its about being open to different things. if i had to guess, its probably easier to find a shojo fan that reads/watches shonen than vice versa
"I think men will come around, once they settle into themselves a bit."
The main problem with modern Anime/Manga is that the main target audience is neither men or women or girls, its boys. Horny, teenage boys with a very simplistic and stereotypical view of masculinity and femininity. This is also why iam (as a man) increasingly getting tired of Anime & Manga, because the pandering to teenage boys is so strong, over-the-top and just everywhere, that its getting really annoying.
@@LegioXXI Agreed. I'm right there with you in your frustration with the medium.
Fan service is a problem and definitely rips the reader/viewer (and me) out of the experience of many manga/anime (and gets me to drop a title faster). Teens, as a demographic, typically have more disposable income and less responsibility (bills, ect.) to purchase more "ecchi" and the market caters to that easy money pot. Which is a shame as the pool for non-ecchi manga/anime is diluted and a problem on what's readily offered to impressionable young consumers. (Rent-A-Girlfriend comes to mind as a bad actor of what you've described as low resolution depictions of masculinity and femininity for horny boys).
My initial comment was more along the lines of maturity and barrier of entry to shojo/josei for male consumers, with 2 anecdotals of men in my immediate circle: "settling in themselves" meaning no longer buying into the idea that participating and consuming in X (in this case shojo/josei demos) will threaten their masculinity (or self identity), which prevents some men and boys from exploring the other side of the manga/anime aisle. You've identified a major issue with the product and oversaturated market, which I heartily agree primes young teens for shallow depictions of masculinity/femininity, that creates a perpetuating feedback loop of what gets marketed to us.
What you've described for modern anime/manga has made me more choosy of what I watch, read, and purchase. And dropping an anime or manga once it exceeds my tolerance for suspension of disbelief is a bummer, pushing me further away from the medium as a whole. So yes, I empathize with your tired.
@@rubyrootless7324 It actually often is lmao. Certain men like this know nothing about women and take pride in it
The amount of misogyny in the manga community annoys me to hell. Some people think women can’t write Shounen. I just… Christ, it’s annoying.
Those people are just dumb and wrong. A quick Google search would prove them wrong but then they'd have to admit they just don't like or respect women.
the people saying that always have a fullmetal alchemist profile pic and I lose my mind
@@Nakiami oh god, those idiots drive me up a wall. And I adore Fullmetal Alchemist.
Meanwhile FMA and Blue Exorcist and DEMON SLAYER are thriving.
Some of the best Shonen is written by woman. The creators of Demon Slayer and Full Metal Alchemist to name a couple.
I teared up at the mention of being in a space that lacks creators who look like you. I still struggle to put my face on thumbnails for my videos literally because of this.
I’m sick of people online still using demographics and the same regurgitated phrases like “manga for girls is mid in comparison to shonen” as a crutch for gatekeeping. It’s such a tired argument. But I’m glad that women creators are continuing to defend their space in the fandom (even though they shouldn’t have to). It reminds me to keep doing what I’m doing. Thank you for so eloquently putting this video together Colleen!
PLEASE KEEPING DOING WHAT YOU DO!!! I'm so happy I found your channel in this space.
@@ColleensMangaRecs so glad to have found your channel too! ✨❤
Seriously though gender has nothing to do with making a good story.
I'm actually someone who will defend creators rights to create the products they want and let capitalism decide their fate.
That said, anyone who's argument about art is that "manga for girls is mid in comparison to shonen" is someone with weak vocabulary and piss poor articulation. They are correct in their statement that shonen is their preference. They are dead wrong in suggesting they speak for everybody.
I was happy to find both of you, and so are all the oldhead shoujo, josei, yaoi, & yuri fans in my circles. We started ShoujoCon, YuriCon, YaoiCon back in the day to make a space - cannot overstate how proud we all are that y'all are expanding that space into new mediums, new eras, new fandoms.
Keep the content coming, @Colleen and @AnimeTea, we're more than here for it, and have your back. 💜👍
Honestly I miss the 2000s-early 2010s where the anime/manga fandom spaces were much more isolated. I grew up in the tumblr era so I never experienced this kind of misogyny there, but I was also on the cesspool MAL forums early on and definitely saw some ridiculous things being spouted there. I’m old now and have pretty much exited any online fandom spaces and just enjoy watching/reading things on my own, which has been great for me but people (especially younger fans) deserve community spaces that they feel safe in.
I definitely feel the need for online spaces. I stick solely to tumblr, but I went branching out for spaces to discuss anime that were non-men and all I found were threads from women discussing how they felt misogyny was totally gone from the anime/manga communities and I was like...where? Because I literally just saw a thread on MAL asking if women were ruining demon slayer? I literally stopped my search there but I really hope someone creates that community
Tumblr got demonized as hell during the 2010s for being associated with the dreaded "social justice warriors" and shit, but I now think a huge part of that backlash came from people being so upset that women and members of minority groups had a safe space where the discourse wasn't being controlled by the majority group. Tumblr was the only social media site where a lot of people felt safe enough to openly oppose the status quo, and that pissed a lot of people off to the point where we're still feeling the effects of that today through bigots who still see "SJWs" as a singular enemy that needs to be dehumanized, even to the point where mainstream politics have been affected by it
No same me too.. i was into sports anime in tumblr early 2010ish and they were mostly women-dominated it was so calm and peaceful.. so i was surprised to find out misogyny is still so prevalent in the anime community. Im starting to get more active on anime community in twitter and im lucky to have not seen much of those stuff tho but This really puts things into perspective
This is the same as me, too.
I'm old and even class myself as a veteran weeb lol. I have all but exited the fandom community, except for ones on UA-cam.
But even i can see this new wave of manga and anime fans that have come about in the last few years have the potential to be even more toxic than the most problematic stuff back then. Way more misogyny out in the open now and actively being thrown into female spaces.
My anime list
This is insane, Nana is actually one of the best mangas/anime i’ve ever watched/read… though its from a female perspective, i’ve seen countless male Nana fans, bc Nana isnt just about the women its about the relationships and the moral ambiguity of each of them. It’s written brilliantly and is definitely more admirable to make a mark without using action or fantasy. You’re more limited but Nana still leaves a huge impression on you regardless of being shoujo.
@@francisconavarrete3031 nah it's shoujo they're right
isn't it quite misogynistic in and of itself to imply that an anime being "just" about women would be a mark against it? we don't deride anime for focusing primarily or solely on men - a story could in theory still embody the premise you described whilst also focusing solely on women's relationships. the structure of your statement inadvertently treats a female perspective and target audience as some kind of limitation or setback to overcome.
@@knight-of-bells I agree
Yes
When someone uses the word "mid" to describe an anime I will automatically disregard their opinion point blank. Great video btw
Most of time they don’t read or watch one second from it.
it just has that vibe to it doesn't it? like someone whose "tastes/opinions" rely on external validation
All things in general, that have majority female consumers are often seen as low quality and not something to be taken seriously. Music artists with female audience are perfect example outside of manga (the violent reactions towards, for example, BTS from men). But talking about our community, what comes to mind is Free, the swimming anime. When it was announced, Kyoani fanboys totally lost it because Kyoani made "anime aimed at girls". It keeps being trashed to this day even though it's in no way bad and if they made the very same story but with female protagonists, it would be hailed as yet another Kyoani masterpiece. But it's one of the lowest rated Kyoani series, along with Tsurune, that happens to have male protagonists too, hmm. I'm not even going to start on the homophobia that mixes in, when things get called "fujo bait".
Bunch of hypocrites, free is good and it is getting more success with all these movie coming between the years
Thank you for sacrificing yourself like this Colleen, before this comment section gets flooded with toxic comment I just wanted to say it was nice knowing you and you’ll continue living in our hearts forever.
Truly the best shoujo connoisseur
A very good example of the whole "men not taking women seriously because they like shojo" is emirichu talking to the guys of trash taste about the anime she watches, which heavily consisted of feel good shojos. They gave her so much shit, I felt so bad for her. I know they're all friends but still didn't sit right with me how she was on the hot seat the entire podcast just for watching wholesome shows. They were so relentless with their "teasing" that everyone in the comments felt bad for her and even defended her tastes.
I was so mad watching that podcast episode. It made me realize that most of the biggest anitubers have practically the same taste and are close minded to other people's opinions.
Pretty sure they were joking with her as they are really good friends they shit on each other all the time and they all agreed that they love fruits basket and were just shitting on her because of the contrasting statements that she was making
Ask her if she fell bad about it or not they are really good friends practically hang out together all the time
Yeah, I couldn't believe how they didn't realize why their tastes might possibly differ from hers. It's like they expected her to be a cool tomboy who likes the same things they do just because she also likes anime and manga
Their teasing was all in good fun but she got a bit flustered and had a hard time defending her taste which is why it seemed so one sided. She just wasn't prepared for that impromptu scrutiny, and to be fair to her, most people aren't
@@rammanohar7473 no, I know lol. I still felt bad because 90% of the video was all three of them mercilessly teasing her, and only her. I get that the podcast is called trash taste but them joking about her taste was only funny for so long.. then you can't help to just feel bad for her.
As a female fan of manga and anime for 7 years now, it's been so refreshing to have a creator who talks about shoujo and josei with such love and appreciation. I have felt pretty alienated in the past in this community because all anyone talked about was shounen or seinan, and any time shoujo was referenced it wasn't always in the best light (not always directly negative, sometimes just backhanded). It's even worse if you're a fan of BL stories too (GL is okay for a lot of male fans though funnily enough), as I've seen blatant hatred towards popular anime like Yuri on Ice just because "so many anime, that are much better, came out this year that deserve more praise", not because they didn't like the story or characters.
So I just want to say thank you Colleen, for making me and many others feel less alone and seen. I hope you continue to make amazing videos! 💗💗💗😊😊
Don't even make me start on the amount of shit BL gets, I've turned my brain off at this point and just enjoyed myself with fellow BL fans. Like sure, it has plenty of its own problems and duds, but people pretend like it's *just* worthless cheap fun for "the girls". And then when they start stereotyping the fans as well...Like something can't possibly be good just because it's a BL. That tag has brought so many series their own curse of being easily dismissed
@@nutella7162 Yeah it's absolutely awful. Every time a new BL series comes out it gets so much hatred, and the way fans are treated is ven worse. I've seen so many people (usually straight men) call fujoshis "sick", "crazed", "weird" etc. just because they can appreciate a MxM love story. It's bonkers. Despite the lack of GL (compared to BL stories), it's much better off. People seem genuinely more accepting of those stories and fans, at least in my experience.
@@AKookieForYou Both BL and GL get maybe one full-fledged anime series a year (which is horribly little in comparison to everything else), but yeah overall I also think the reception of GL is better than BL, from those same people who despise BL with a passion.
There are plenty great, good, decent BL manga but rarely anything gets properly animated or adapted (and by that I don't mean only the fluffy cutesy stories). I mean, the latest was Sasaki to Miyano this year and Given in 2019 (and there were only like 2-3 movies and short 5 minutes series in between those two, so that alone tells how BL anime is scarce). The latest GL series was I think Adachi to Shinamura I think was called? not sure, but it was also this year. Like you can literally count them on your fingers, it's tragic.
It came to a point where I hide that I like BL when discussing something anime related because that'd mean that my opinion is less worthy, as if liking a genre guarantees that I'm not capable of critically expressing myself or that I'm just inherently dumber. People have actually stopped conversations with me after I mentioned it. Now that's a whole other level of entitlement and being a major dick
@@AKookieForYou also I think BL compared to shojo gets more manga licensed (like an okay-ish amount) whereas shojo gets more anime on a larger scale, not really that much of a difference but still. Neither is what could be done.
@@nutella7162 Oh yeah I definitely agree. We barely ever get adaptations, and the ones we do get can be pretty hit or miss with me. I've also gotten to a point where I kind of hide my appreciation for BL series for the same reasons as you. It's really sad how the community makes anyone who isn't strictly into shounen feel like garbage and like their opinions aren't important. At least the niche communities of people who do enjoy those things are very welcoming, most BL fans that I've seen online are really nice
The misogyny and general bigotry are the reasons I stay out of most online discussions or fandom talk about anime/manga. It’s a very depressing situation, but it makes me feel a lot better knowing that there are people actually talking about it and want it to be fixed.
I have literally given up on talking about anime and manga with people in general because of this. It's really depressing and frustrating.
Fr, i legit stopped watching anime because of this. I dont want to feel constantly sexualised, or watch a show in good spirits and like it only to be hit with sexualisation or belittling and that not being addressed at all, as if it is normal and should be accepted.
Ironic that male (and female) fans critize Shoujo manga when so many popular Shonen and Seinen mangakas find some of their inspiration in Shoujo, and even enjoy and read the genre. Kentaro Miura of Berserk, Yoshihiro Togashi of Yu Yu Hakusho and HunterXHunter, to mention a few.
Ironic that they critize romance, but they still like it.
Even the creator of Fate franchise and Type Moon games Kinoko Nasu acknowledge his inspiration in shoujo series. Like Fate Stay Night was supposed to be a shoujo with a female MC, and his first stories before Fate are all around women like Witch's Holy Night and Garden of the Sinners
Who decided you couldn't criticize something and still like it?
@@fireandbombs12most of the 'criticism' is actually just hate.
pretty sure gege akutami likes bl which explains a lot
on that note makoto yukimura frequently retweets ship art of his male characters which is funny as hell to me
Colleen, I love your videos and I think this one touches a very important topic, I read tons of josei and shojo along shonen/seinen manga but when I recommend some of them to my male friends they disregard it because "of course you would like it, you are gay" (Which I am, they are not derogatory but they do seem to think I like shojo because I like men) and it shows how fragile my friends masculinity is but when I recommend Your lie in April they have no issues with it when is labeled as shonen, same case with Ao No Flag and they tantrum when they get to the middle of it. I'm so glad for videos like this highlighting issues that affect our community even in a niche group such as manga readers. ♥
@@joshs7160 I politely do not agree. A good romance can be as good and similar in both genres, for example, I think Ouran Kokou Host Club is as good as I"s when it comes to comedy Harem, Wotakoi is as wholesome and funny as Genshiken. And Colleen already made a great video about shojo mangas that include fighting that can be counterparts of a similar shonen with romance elements in it. I think the only difference comes with the fan service, art style (Which happens in both genres in this case, some people do not like some shojo art and some people won't read One Piece despite it's quality just because of the art). But all of us being humans and romance being a part of our adolescence and adult life should be able to enjoy it from all povs. If I had to read romances that only applies to my demographic I would have to read genres that are mostly erotica because there is almost none and no market for gay romance for men that are not heavily sexual, so my only choice is BL. I think being able to explore different genres, art style and narratives makes a better experience when reading manga, I'm capable of enjoying a good straight love story -which most of them are- because most of the feelings we feel are universal. Even reading a bad manga from any genre is fun from time to time.
I really enjoyed Blue Flag, but the last chapter came out of nowhere personally, I don't think I'd have minded if it wasn't a timeskip chapter which drastically changed the relationships of characters without any buildup, but that is what happened unfortunately. Still a really great manga up until that point though, the ending just didn't really fit with the series as much imo.
@@npclucario7005 Yeah, that's a shame, the issue with that manga was that it got cancelled after being moved from the magazine to the online-only version of it so the author had to skip a whole arc and the ending had to be rushed and is such a shame. In fact it was cancelled for the same reason my friends don't like the middle point: they gay confession and the coming up to terms with your sexuallity all the characters were going through.
@@cesarsuarez6414 that makes sense, I didn't realize it had been cancelled, I actually really enjoyed the gay confession and everything surrounding it, which I really didn't expect, but it was a really well done and nuanced exploration of the topic imo. It had seemed like by the second to last chapter all the characters had come to terms with their sexuality and it was really jarring to see Itachi end up being bi or straight when that wasn't really hinted towards at all before the last chapter, and while I'm sure the fans of the ship were happy to see it happen, Taichi and Toma ending up together didn't really make sense to me in the context of how both of them had developed up to that point. Still an excellent series overall though, and I'm glad that hearing negativity over the final chapter didn't scare me off.
@@npclucario7005 Yeah, sadly the author themselves had to mention the series was moved from the physical magazine due to "the topics being discussed in the material", it was supposed to have an university arc and Itachi would battle through her relationship and Toma being out of the picture but still on his mind until the break up and then him deciding to give Toma a try. Meanwhile Masumi ended up marrying a trans men but this was never able to developed further in the adult life arc. Sadly Ao No Flag received a big "Too gay for the boys in Shonen Jump" and got the cut way too early but it was so brave from the author to even try and do such a taboo thing. It pretty much proves the point Colleen is making in this video about Shonen Jump and Shonen in general.
I wholeheartedly believe men who say "women don't consume manga/anime" don't have any female friends. Though hard to be friends with people that they don't respect lol.
Can you point me to those type of guys because I find that hard to believe
@@Rex13013 they’re everywhere, it’s not hard to believe just cause you’ve never seen it. I’ve seen plenty of guys online that day stuff like that
@@Rex13013if you hang out online then you’ll find them. Sometimes it’s (thankfully) harder to meet guys like this irl because the most sexist act really terminally online. I’m in an anime club and haven’t met anyone in it who act like this, but I’ve 1000% met and interacted with guys like this on social media.
I really appreciate this video. I’m a manga reader/collector who isn’t a part of the online manga community almost at all and this really opened my eyes to a lot of the issues in the community that I’ve passively seen and made me introspect on the biases I have towards shojo and josei manga. Also didn’t know that girls/women were the main readers of manga until recently. Very interesting
There was a library roundtable I read where they mentioned many of the people who came in to buy manga around the later 00s was mostly women but since I couldn't find it again I ended up not adding that as well.
@@ColleensMangaRecs but then they'll say it doesn't count because (probably) a majority is Yaoi or Shounen-ai sales, and it will "not count" for them... You know how it is, you'll not win, we're never good enough for misogynists lol
@@MissBMoon The majority of manga bought by women certainly isn't yaoi. Women and girls make up at least half of shonen buyers and 99% of shojo buyers. Fujoshi are a major part of the female manga demographic but their not the majority.
It's not surprising that women have traditionally been the key readers. In overall book sales, women buy 70% of printed media. One thing that may have shifted things is how stuff is going in western comics and how men are abandoning them for shonen.
Diving in before the comment section turns into toxic sewage to say many of the things you talked about are also ones I've noticed while being part of the manga community online the past few months (though I've been collecting for 15 years, I only started interacting with the larger community online around May this year). Thanks for bringing them to the surface in an easy to digest way, and with sources 🌟🙌
Colleen, stay strong before this comment section gets flooded with assholes!! You do such strong good work and your passion for topics oozes from every video!
Stay strong! 😤
Thank you!! ✌
Don't get your panties in a twist just because a bunch of "assholes" are trying to dig under your skin. It doesn't take being a tough guy to ignore people who are purposefully trying to make you mad.
Women 😂
You are not even worth their concern
@@sorais8130 Looks like someone's concerned...
Incel @@sorais8130
I will never truly understand this mindset. Sure, people have their preferences, but why shit on an entire demographic feels kind of pathetic. Keep up the good work Colleen.
Because putting down women and their interests makes them feel like powerful men. That’s the patriarchy for you.
@@piccolofan24 Isn't it other way around?
Being a cis man with limited exposure to shoujo and josei (Akatsuki no Yona/Yona of the Dawn being the only shoujo manga I keep up with and not even knowing what josei manga are out there), I gotta say that I really do appreciate this kind of effort. I can only speak for myself, but this video especially hammers in how badly I need to broaden my horizons on that front, and I hope most other viewers feel the same way.
You should try Basara next. It's a series that I think men who are not familiar w shoujo would like.. it has its basic Shoujo shit (female protag.. GREAT romance) but it's complex, about war, and beautifully written and drawn (well.. the art is depend on if u like older style).
Yes there's a whole world of great stories out there! I love anime and manga from all kinds of genres and magazines and I think everyone can stand to try to read things written from a different perspective every now and then.
Shueisha's thing about not hiring women for Shonen Jump reminds me of a professor I had who worked for either Mattel or Hasbro in the 90s (can't remember and don't wanna get it wrong). When she asked to work on a certain male demographic toyline, the company expressly told her that they weren't hiring women on it, and directed her to a certain female demographic toyline that had no problem hiring both men and women. My initial reaction was "Oh, the company thought men could understand femininity but not vice versa." But thinking on it, it could have also been that whoever was in charge of hiring on the female toyline probably just didn't have weird hangups.
Thank you for addressing this issue! I'm glad you brought up internalized misogyny as well, as I've seen a surprising amount of non-men who diss shojo, claiming shonen is better. I distinctly remember being in a manga drawing class as a teen, and when asked about series I like, I mentioned shojo and Sailor Moon. The girl who I was talking to scrunched her nose and claimed that Sailor Moon was "too weak" and "a crybaby"...even though the whole series is about Usagi growing as a person and becoming a strong leader. When I asked what she liked, she only brought up shonen series.
@@kyleward7417 i love misogyny but i draw the line at sailor moon hate, thats better than 99% of shounen you legally arent allowed to hate on it
She is the type I am not like other girl
Sarah Z’s video on the rise and fall of geek culture goes into some decent detail about why misogyny is so common in ‘geeky’ communities. not to excuse anything, but it seems to be caused by a combination of getting treated poorly (sometimes by women) for liking something that’s unpopular, and those men getting mad about losing that ‘niche’ identity.
but I think the most important factor is developing empathy. It took me developing more empathy for women to appreciate things made for them, but it also took people (usually women) presenting these things in an empathetic manner for me to open up to that in the first place.
Really, I think most of these guys would like more women sharing their interests even if they don’t know it, but bitterness really poisons people. I hope things keep getting better.
Yes definitely would recommend that video by Sarah Z as well!! Should have referenced it at the beginning too honestly.
i think thats interesting bc often i see that while many (but not all) men internalize that anger and use it to ridicule other women who simply just want to have fun,, women also get ridiculed by men for their own interests but expect to be welcoming when a man shares the same.
i've seen a tumblr post about how these communities have historically kind of served a function as male safe spaces without having to admit to that overtly where society is otherwise hostile to their vulnerability and so as a result they view any disruption of it as a threat to that. solving that problem needs a whole lot of broad societal unpacking but, yeah
@@estrella9335 I believe the unfair dichotomy between the treatment of men and women in this case(where the women fact more prejudice when attempting to enter into traditionally masculine circles such as shounen) does have a lot to do with the fact that the system is traditionally patriarchal. In that kind of system, even the men who are typical ostracized in social setting are given more of a benefit of the doubt when entering these circles, one which women do not benefit from, which is not right.
Hmmm that video sounds interesting
"She's not like other Shojo"
Guys, its not masculine to be this way, it's just sad.
I'm a big fan of other anitubers, trash taste in particular. The only real complaint I would ever have with them is that there's NEVER a shoujo topic. Not in their videos, not in their conversations, the fandom doesn't even really get mentioned. Don't get me wrong, shounen's great, but I feel like the characters and plot points I get really passionate about are always being swept under the rug because there's no one willing to give it a chance. Idk, maybe it's considered vapid or not on the same level. Bums me out, man.
To be fair, they never really talk about anything outside of the most milquetoast mainstream stuff in general.
What I also dislike is, people can hate on shoujo mangas as much as they want and then we have to be fine with they say. But if I say something bad about a shounen like Dragonball or Naruto, I always get questioned "did you even watch it completely, it gets so good after..." and my answer is always yes, but then they look at me bewildered like I lost my mind.
Religiously devout fans for any media work are always amusing when they encounter someone who isn’t that into It. 😀 DBZ & Sailor Moon fans are both very amusing groups, although I’ve only encountered devotees for them online.
I’ve had so many boys/men try to explain to me why I should continue watching Seven Deadly Sins and, honestly, I just don’t get the hype around it. Anyone who excuses SA/groping with “But they’re actually soulmates!! You’ve gotta continue watching! It explains it later!!!” is kinda insane to me?? Like, I’m sorry but if it starts out like that I’m not continuing until it “gets better”.
I also put this in the same vein as what we've seen with product marketing to kids - "boys" clothing and toys rarely feature female characters (Black Widow and Gamora always missing from group shots for example). It starts early on in conditioning and doesn't let up unless we make an active effort to dispel these notions that "boys can't like girls stuff". Thanks for making this video - nothing will change if we don't talk about it and keep making content promoting shoujo/josei titles so they get the respect the deserve!
saying that nana is poorly drawn is insane actually
Art is subjective, maybe they just don't like the style of drawing
@@enterurnamehere27That doesn't mean it's poorly drawn though. I don't like One Piece's art style but that doesn't mean it's inherently poorly drawn
Hiromu Arakawa is the mangaka of one of the great mainstream shonens, Fullmetal Alchemist. I think its safe to say women can figure out how to appeal to the hearts of boys just fine.
And not even since the 90's, my mom read/watched princess comet back in the 60's. Like, we always have been there, an integral part of the manga/anime community. Have an excellent day and thank you for addressing this, Collen :)
Interesting thing about Shonen Jump. They were not happy when Hirohiko Araki wanted the protagonist of Golden Wind (Part 5 from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure) to be a woman and he finally got his way in Part 6: Stone Ocean. Curiously after Part 6, Jojo was suddenly not serialized in Shonen Jump anymore...I wonder if there is a reason for that...
More time to write/draw the manga
Araki wanted diff
As a m4n, I gotta say that I deeply appreciate your work here. Throughout every video has been enlightening in some way. Like I've always noticed that I gravitated more into shoujo content for some reason, though unsure as to why at all, but seeing your videos, you had helped give an insight, and put into words what made me actually like about shoujo but also made me realise how little I knew of it. How without noticing, I was getting influenced into these weird expectations and misconceptions from the Western manga community and their remarks against shoujo, like I was one of those who thought shoujo was all about romance (which I watched a lot of) but there was never a moment I would come across about discussing that there's far more genres into it, largely due to the shounen-fanbois being the most vocal and loud about manga hottakes in internet that often drowns other communities' voices. So watching you discuss about it, has been really insightful, especially when you're not just talking about the manga itself, but as well these hard topics that pervades around the community which I find that is deeply needed to be addressed and talked about it, as it helps get people into the same page and have a thorough understanding of what's going on when it comes to stuff they enjoy and how it is affected by it (even if S0m3 p30ple D0nT Lik3 It).
I hope you keep making videos like these when you feel it is needed to be discussed on. Also thank you for videos about shoujo recommendations, it helps a lot shedding some light into what else Shoujo has to offer and what else I can jump onto.
Just to touch on that twitter thread: I definitely used to be one of those people who said "I don't care about demographics, I'll read whatever!" when I was younger because I (as well as some of my other female friends) genuinely did read and collect series from all four major demographics. At that age I probably didn't even realize the disparity between certain demographics when it comes to publishing and exposure, or even really have as concrete of a grasp on the different demographics that I do as an adult. And sure, I probably read a little less seinen and josei due to age/maturity/the latter's unavailability in bookstores & libraries when I was younger, but that evened out as I got older and gender-wise there wasn't any avoidance or bias. It wasn't until around college age when I would hear that line said a lot by other manga fans and then be surprised at how one-sided their lists or collections were. And of course, if I followed up on it by asking about shoujo or josei series... at best I'd get a "oh I actually haven't read too many but I do like X or Y," and at worst, more often than not unfortunately, "yeah but most shoujo or josei series aren't really that good in comparison."
So while I still do read and collect series from all four demographics, I've kinda stopped saying that years ago when people have asked me my manga preferences/tastes, and just go about listing some genres or series I love. And if anything I'm MORE vocal about making those demographic distinctions and supporting shoujo/josei releases (ex. pre-ordering early) if only to give more attention to shoujo/josei series that are comparatively ignored or brushed aside by a lot of manga fans.
Also keep your chin up before the comment section gets flooded! We all know it's true even if it feels like kicking a hornet's nest saying it online.
Thank you for picking up this topic. It was about time we started addressing this issue more openly. And if you find any nasty comment, please try not to let the morons get to you. You have nothing to be ashamed of.
On a personal note, I recently talked about manga with a male friend. He told me that he liked reading shounen and seinen manga. And when I inquired about shoujo and josei he asked me what was that. I mean... It's not like everyone absolutely MUST read shoujo and josei, to each their own, but to not even know what they were...
It's funny how it didn't cross his mind that if there are manga for boys, then there are probably manga for girls as well.
a friend once told me he indeed has nothing against shoujo and josei. he, and i quote "reads them just as much as Normal™ manga"
this is what set the tone for every interest targetet at woman. if you're not socialized as such (or in similar ways for being another minority) or doesn't have the empathy, there's no way you would understand, really
I hate that male is the norm and female is a deviation in media. My male friends and I have different tastes but I do feel recentful when kimetsu no yaiba gets this huge animation budget and all the Shoujo anime in three years gets a shoestring budget and low quality orchestration because boys are for everyone and girls are less
@@rankushrenada I kind of disagree with that statement, I just think they get that take of recognition because Shonen is just more popular than Shojo.
Ever since I first started getting serious into manga and anime and being a part of the community I've noticed how misogynistic it can be, with terribly written female characters in shounen works to realizing not a lot of people even recommend shoujo bc "it's not as good as shounen". As a woman it really pains me specially bc most of the series that I enjoy are shounen, but I've always felt like shoujo just got me, it made me feel like home for some reason; I've found your chanel with the hopes of starting to read more shoujo and feeling this again, and I'm grateful for your work and how you still try and talk about such important issues.
Stay strong, you're doing amazing💖
@@joshs7160 yeah my non male friends do the same thing. They pass up on good stories by calling it misogynistic. Sure it might have poorly written female characters but try to enjoy other aspects which are awesome. You still can enjoy the story if it is male centric. Same issue with men who ignore shoujo.
@@shekboi8316 hon I literally said most of the series I consume are shounen... Trust me when I tell you 90% of the content I watch I watch trying to look past this poorly written female character problem. But it's annoying. My favorite series treat my gender (mostly) as weak, romantic centric and just there to look pretty and hot. Even if I enjoy these series and look past these points, it's still horrible and every person has the right to not watch these stories bc of how they write these female characters
@@mah9183 yeah hopefully it changes for the better because I find such characters cringe as well.
Thank you for this video❤️. I dealt with a lot of internalised misogyny growing up and always felt like the only way I could fit in with my friends was by engaging with mainstream entertainment that predominantly catered to young males. Anything that wasn’t gory or without action sequences was dismissed too “girly” and “immature”.It’s everywhere and something folks privately acknowledge but it’s refreshing to hear people publicly push back against this. Male creators and influencers discussing, reacting to and promoting shoujo and Josei manga and anime have a huge impact as well.
I was the exact same way growing up (less so with manga) and that is why I particularly am very passionate about de-stigmatizing feminine media. It is limiting to only enjoy things "for boys" and not opening yourself up to stories often drive on empathy.
It's funny to me because we once had a Shonen and a Shojo magazine here in Germany. The Shojo one survived multiple years after the Shonen one died off. That was in the early 2000s.
This is one of the most affirming videos I've ever seen. Period. I grew up watching anime on Toonami and Adult Swim, and saturday morning episodes of Yu-Gi-Oh!. I watched Sailor Moon and Cardcaptors after school. I loved Gundam Wing as much as Fruits Basket. When I went to an anime club at my local library the only people there were teenage girls like me.
The fact that men are taking over these spaces that we were in is insane to me. Some of my old male friends would be impressed that I had watched Evangelion or Death Note years prior, but when asked what my favorite anime was, they would scoff, because it was Nana. They soon lost all respect for me because I would talk about how great a show it was. They only wanted to watch Slam Dunk and talk about Berserk.
Anyways, I'm ranting. But I just want you to know how much your voice means to someone like me. Whenever I look up "Best Manga" it's always the same one. Finding a good josei or shoujo is like finding a needle in a haystack. Okay, off to watch and like all your other videos now byeeeeee!!!
I'm mostly into shounen stuff but shoujo ABSOLUTELY deserves to be better recognized. Presenting as female in the anime community is so much more of a trial than it should be.
Please don't stop making videos! I used to see shoujo as just a shitty romance genre with bad art and no substance. Your videos have taught me that while yes there is a lot of manga that fit into the "shoujo stereotype", there are many more with compelling and beautiful stories that could only be told through the shoujo genre. It makes me so so happy, as a woman, to watch another fem person talk about manga, something I didn't have as a kid. I promise you that while there are a lot of people who are vocal about their hate, there are many more like me who are grateful for your content but are just too shy to say something. Love you, hope you have a great day
I am glad to hear you changed your views ^^
Just one thing I'd like to mention, shoujo is not a genre but a demographic. These are very different things
@@drcaligaridane Yes, agreed. Shoujo is girls and Shonen is boys. You can have any genre within that split. Manga / Anime categorize things differently then what happens in the west.
Yes to all of this! Especially the point about the fact that every demographic has good and bad manga. There is no way that a man would enjoy every single shonen, and yet he somehow expects to enjoy every single shojo? Especially since he probably just picked one at random and didn't even check to see if it fit his other tastes first.
I grew up watching shonen anime. But I always longed for female protagonist. It was until I watched my 1st shoujo anime. It was something what I been looking for long time. It is bcz of u i started reading shoujo manga. U give the best recommendations. I so glad I found ur channel.
It's why I play Pokémon
Thank you so, so much for this! ❤❤ Anyone who says all shojo and josei are bad just hasn't read or seen many (or only seen bad anime adaptations). It also bothers me so, so much that most the "Holy Grails" of manga are so hyper masculine. Like, sure Berserk is great, but so is Fruits Baskets yet only one gets the recognition it deserves (thankfully the fantastic new anime adaptation fixed that some).
I do want to say the "prove it" mentality men have about women in fandoms isn't limited to nerd culture. I'm very into some sports and have "quizzed" by men to prove I'm a "real fan." Men seem to think women's lives revolve around them as much as poorly written female characters do. They think we dress up to please them and not ourselves, think we game to get their validation and not because we enjoy it, they think we like football because we want to use that to catch a boyfriend and not because we like football, etc . . . No matter what a woman is into (fashion, sports, nerdy stuff, etc . . .) they get accused of posing, being fake, and doing it just to get men's attention. I can't imagine how limited your perspectives must be if you truly think such a large portion of the population only has hobbies because they want YOUR attention.
I think they also use it as a shield to protect themselves from the lack of success they have with women. If women truly enjoy sports, video games, and super heroes, they can no longer use the excuse women won't date them because they're not into nerdy stuff and face the reality it's a personal flaw they need to improve on.
I couldn't agree more with this comment. Too many men think women and nb people revolve our entire life around them. It's like they think we live our every waking moment with them in mind, as if we aren't fully human
@@crystalo1186 Yup. That’s what they’ve been taught to believe after all.
Anyone who says all of any artistic genre are bad is a narrow minded fool. My aunt told me that and was talking about music, but I feel that way about pretty much any medium I engage with. Also: you can't know whether you like anything until you try it, and on the risk to reward ratio of trying things, checking out a new manga or anime is super freaking low.
here after the vid has finished. i feel like something you could have brought up here is the double standard regarding "problematic" (tropes in) anime, mainly that shoujo and josei get called out for problematic elements, while the same elements in shonen and seinen are ignored.
people argue that shoujo has too many instances of MLs mistreating, and in some cases *SA'ing* the FL, and it being seen as romantic. and while this is a problem in shoujo, it's not like this isn't present in shonen. the case study of vanitas has *that exact trope,* (even though i DO like the series, it's really my only grievance with it) and fire force has the girls getting sa'd being played for laughs. people will (rightfully) criticize fruits basket, cardcaptor sakura etc for having many age gap relationships, but do they say the same thing for series that have the "she looks like she's 5 but is actually 5000" trope in shows like kobayashi's dragon maid? no. in fact they defend it. people will use diabolik lovers, a joseimuke, to paint all of reverse harem, and an entire demographic it's not even a part of as bad due to it being about a girl being mistreated horribly by a harem of boys. but do you see them using redo of healer, a show about *a guy mistreating his harem of girls horribly* to paint all of harem as bad, and a demographic it isn't even a part of? no. while dialovers fans can at least *acknowledge* that the Sakamakis are horrible to Yui, i've heard only the nastiest of people have defended redo of healer.
i'm just sick of "feminine" things having to be perfect and spotless in every way, while "masculine" things can be as dirty, raunchy, and as questionable as possible and have it still be loved.
EDIT: some of yall aren't getting the point. my point is that one bad/"problematic" shonen/seinen anime doesn't make those entire demographics bad, but one bad/"problematic" shoujo/josei anime suddenly means those demographics are all bad. double standards, people.
ANOTHER EDIT, PUTTING THIS IN BABY TERMS SO YALL CAN UNDERSTAND: boy's thing does something weird, fans don't care and excuse it because good story. girl's thing does something weird, everyone freaks out, suddenly all of girls' things are bad.
THIS SO MUCH. Reverse harems will get shit on so often for being cheap wish fulfillment or badly written or whatever but regular harem shows are somehow immune to this? Idolish7 is just trash where every boy has a different hair color and yet Love Live is peak character writing? In the same vein every series with more than a few attractive male characters is called gaybait garbage but series with tons of girls are never called yuribait.
I dread the treatment that Bibliophile Princess is gonna get next season for looking like such a stereotypical shoujo (I haven't read the novels unfortunately)
@@nicksvitak5416 tbh i'm scared bibliophile princess won't get any attention at all and instead just get buried under chainsaw man and the new bleach arc.
@@spectraltala6362 That's probably gonna happen but that's expected, Fruits Basket and Bakarina are the only recent shoujo seires I can think of that weren't buried by a shounen series airing at the same time
Definitely something I could have touched on and also thought about but I wanted to leave out any more controversial parts of an already controversial topic lol
@@joshs7160 yeah but the problem is you don't see people using them to go "the entire demographic (in this case, shonen) is bad."
Colleen you are constant inspiration to read more shoujo. I read shoujo when I was in my teens and early twenties--Kare Kano, Sukitte Ii Na Yo, and Akuma to Rabu Songu, REPRESENT!--then drifted away from it over time, and because of you I'm coming back. You made me realize that the desert of interesting anime isn't just a coincidence...shoujo manga, untranslated, underfunded, is where all the good stuff is hiding.
you got me to start a yona of the dawn collection (and now my amazon cart is filled with shoujo). I have always liked watching shoujo series with my sister but didn’t feel as confident talking about it because of the toxic manga/anime community. Your videos however have made me feel much more open to it and you are just great, keep up the good work!
Love to hear it!! And good thing Yona is starting to come back in stock too lol. Just in time for you to get into it!
YES! I’ve been seeing this so often with male anime fans. Nothing non-men are into is good, or could have any value, and if they’re into shonen, it’s for male attention. Which is completely ridiculous!
Another interesting point is that these same assholes will ignore that their fav manga creators grew up on shojo manga. The creator of Berserk LOVED 70s shojo and it influenced him a lot in his writing. I swear they think these manga series sprung fully formed from the creators’ heads like Athena and had no influences.
i always assume shonen authors who don't clarify their gender (e.g.Gege Akutami of JJK and Koyoharu Gotouge of KNY) are women/nb and they just feel safer, or have been advised to not let audiences know because the misogyny is so real that readers will drop very successful series if they found out it's written by not a man. also the constant usage of he/him pronouns for these authors by western critics just because they write shonen always bothers me
Older Otaku here. To no one's surprise this really hasn't changed since the early 00's. Then it just depended on your friend group. My friends and I watched Inuyasha and Naruto and Bleach as soon as there was a fan translation. Fruits Basket and Fushugi Yugi made the rounds as well. I think it helped that no one dare turn anything down because you never knew if you would be able to find it again.
Same here, in the late 90s/early 2000s our group was watching/reading anything we could find (even untranslated media). I feel like our cause was more unified back then - to "prove" that anime was not just "cartoons" to the "non-geeks". Now that it has some recognition as a medium, we're seeing subcultures within the fanspace. I do think social media has influenced this even more, since anyone can make posts and pile on about a series (good or bad).
Growing up, the people I knew (male & female) who regularly read manga/manhwa were like myself, couldn’t buy them so you just read whatever the local free (aka public) libraries had available + what inner library loan request was granted. For many this meant grabbing almost anything off the shelves to bring for a spin at least once.
you already pointed this out, but I think this issue has definitely gotten worse. I mean all of my IRL friends who are into manga are women, I feel like back around 2010 that was seen as more normal? Like back then the people who ran my highschools anime club were two girls, as were most of the members. They introduced me to FMA Brotherhood and Bleach.. Nerd culture has always had a misogyny problem, but something has changed in the last decade
"Something changed"
Yeah that "something" is that neckbeards, incels, and weebs discovered that women exist, and they went into full revolt. Now nerds are primed to be against "woke culture" which is basically women and minorities existing.
I started reading manga when corona started and honestly I was just bored after reading the same shonen shit over and over of " guy gets superpowers which he randomly recieved not worked to get"(don't get me wrong I do like this stuff when I just want to turn off my brain and read) and villains just for the sake of being villains. Then I tumbled across Yona of the dawn anime and started watching it which I thought was just another series about guy saves girl but oh man the first episode started off showing Yona and the group and I was pleasantly surprised after finishing it i jumped straight into the manga cause the anime stopped abruptly(RIP S2) and now honestly it has really become one of my favourite series. Same with condition called love. I just want you to know how much you have helped me ready out new series' which I've never heard of. Thank you for the lovely recommendation and waiting for your next shonen to shoujo video. Love from India and All the best ❤️❤️❤️
Thank you for this well reasoned and level headed, yet personal take on things. I'm sad to say that I am also a former 'not like other girls' reader, and so missed out on many years of quality shoujo. I absolutely love you and other amazing MangaTubers who have introduced me to a whole new generation of shoujo and josei. So... Thank you for everything you do.
What I hate is that these ppl refuse to acknowledge that shojo and Josei both explore the human experience and emotions in such depth. Characters often reflect on themselves and their actions. They study their emotions. It’s good character writing.
Thanks Colleen for saying what we've all been thinking but too reluctant to say outright. So many will hate on this( and thereby prove your point lol)but just know you're doing the shojo community a huge favor.
I also find it so funny that when some men(not all) enjoy popular and well-liked shojo such as Fruits basket and Yona of the dawn they will say something along the lines of "I like this DESPITE it being a shojo" and then not see the problem behind such statements!
I don’t know if all of those types of comments come out of a misogynistic mindset, I also often encounter individuals saying they like something despite it being shonen, isekai, harem…but I’m sure a percentage of them who are saying it (in regards to josei or shojo) are saying it simply because it was attempting to target girls.
I’m sure there are women who say this too just because shoujo gets a bad rap in general, but yeah I have seen comments like that before. “I don’t like shoujo, but this one shoujo is okay/good.” I’ve never seen anyone make a comment like that in regards to shounen. I do feel however there are companies like Crunchyroll that have recently acknowledged that the female audience is underserved so I think things are going to end up changing for the better.
The shonen comments usually stem from three mindsets 1. the belief that shonen is a genre & that genre is battle manga 2. if a story is 'mature', 'psychological' or 'dark' it is seinen. 3. If a story is 'fluffy', 'romantic' etc. it is shojo.
@@crackle6875 I definitely feel there is misogyny involved for sure, but I do agree with you on those 3 mindsets as well. I feel shoujo getting more attention will help people begin to understand that shoujo is not simply fluffy and romance.
I never got into the shoujo magazine, but when Colleen mention the person who wrote a negative article about shoujo and then Colleen mentions the first vol had manga including Godchild it was very clear that misogyny was at play the way they shit on volume 1 of the magazine. Godchild is a horror manga far from fluffy and romance that’s for sure.
This really became apparent just how much misogyny affects things when I started watching Pop Culture Detective. He breaks things down piece by piece and does a full analysis on how misogyny affects media.
recently gigguk did a stream talking about upcoming anime. When stuff like 'play it cool, guys' & 'bibliophile princess' came up, a lot of chat was up in arms saying girl anime, gay anime, fujobait and whatnot. dissapointing
Hope you know you're absolutely not responsible for the increase in hate Shojo has been getting recently. Tbh shojo fans in general have been more vocal about loving shojo and about the misogyny in the community and well.. men don't like it when we point out their misogyny, never do and it's like this in literally all communities across the board. They get very sensitive when their dominance is being threatened and that's why they there's an increase in hate recently. I think us being more vocal is good, it means the men in the fandom are now being confronted with the issues and i don't know if it'll do much, but if we're large in number and vocal enough, they can't silence us or stop us.
Yeah I agree but sometimes it's not because of losing male dominance but they just get pissed off when trash their favorite show which means alot to them. Kinda like the twilight example. We can point out the flaws in the story but we should never shame someone for liking a story.
@@shekboi8316 I agree with this. When someone says "Your show sucks!" and that gets countered with "No, your show sucks." and then the other person hurls an insult and then we go "Misogynist!" we are throwing a grenade in a snowball fight.
I wish more people talked about this, most of the nerd culture is so much gatekept by men who say one piece is the best manga of all time and if you don't watch naruto you don't understand anime or manga while disregarding chihayafuru and Natsume book of friends as a genuinely brilliant work of anime and manga. It makes me so angry that people just say women are into nerd culture because it's popular while one just forgets that nerd culture is just there and the stories have had different audience. The only difference being that men usually don't like promoting a subjective taste and mostly jump onto things that other men watch which only makes a handful of their works very popular at a particular time.
Edit: grammar
@@joshs7160 have you ever watch chihayafuru and Natsume book of friends? Or maybe fruits basket?
@@joshs7160 Why would they laugh? OP makes a good point and this actually happened in Colleen’s experimental thread where once a certain group of men found out her list was of shoujo they made fun of it and were listing the most popular/well known shounen or asking why those well known shounen manga weren’t listed completely missing the point. Definitely some heavy gatekeeping going on.
@@joshs7160 did you finish all of it?
@@joshs7160 I'm asking cause you seem like a person who is stubborn and dismissal in someone's own opinion.
I liked the anime club my friends had at school back in 2011. Guys and girls recommended manga and anime to eachother respectfully. It was really fun. I remember getting one of the guys into vampire knight back then. I really wish it was that simple now.
Thank you for making this video! Even in Japan, most videos talking about manga/anime contain misogyny, homophobia, and sometimes xenophobia, so it's hard to watch.
Please take care of your health and keep posting videos. I only know a few classic shoujo manga, so it was fun getting to know new shoujo manga through your videos and tweets. I used Google Translate.
Thank you so much!!
Ohh I remember that twitter thread. Imagine countering an actual thread about refreshing series that a lot of people might have actually not read with the same top 20 mal seinen and shounen. Ouch!!!
Thank you for making this video, it outlines the issues of misogyny very well. As a male fan of Shonen and a budding new reader to Shoujo (Just read Nana, that goes so hard and I am so sad that we may never see an ending) To build on your point about the way people see Shoujo as a form that is inferior because it is created by women, I have seen other men make this assertion on Twitter with Demon slayer and Full metal Alchemist profile pictures; the mangaka of which are both women. I think this stems from this idea that female storytellers are inferior because some weirdo sexist thing, despite the fact that there are plenty of fantastic manga in Shonen alone from women. For example: Demon Slater, Noragami, Full metal Alchemist, Dorohedoro, D-Gray Man, Blue Box, The Promised Neverland and Blue Exorcist just to name a few. Hence, it baffles me why there is idea that women are inferior are in this medium, given the clear prevalence and quality of many female driven works.
Algorithmic punch!
(Hey, just wanted to say as a man who started reading shojo back when I was a kid in the 90s, I have been really happy to find your channel. I had way back been reading things like the original sailor moon, magic knight ray earth, Card captor, then later nana, angelic layer, and I deeply loved fruits basket. I stepped away from manga for many years, but coming back I have found it hard to back into shojo because the lack of focus on it in the online community. I have been grateful for your recommendations, and willingness to share your perspective. Thanks!)
I know you discuss that this is a reflection of larger issues and mention comics, but let me assure you that this has been a problem since the beginning of human society. Work by/for men is given inherent value, but by/for women is instantly devalued. Take textiles or cooking...or computing. It's "women's work" so it's ignored for centuries. When it became noticed, it suddenly becomes men's work at high value levels - men are chefs, women are cooks. Men are textile artists, women are seamstresses. Women are "computers," men are programmers.
So this issue is patriarchy, and the fact that low-status men feel like they have few options to feel powerful and thus resort to shouting. Which is where it gets so sad and pathetic. They *could* just like stuff and not care about other people. Like the article stated, Bonobo monkeys with small balls scream loudest.
This is the reason I am happy women mangaka are publishing in Shonen and Seinen magazines stuff that are clearly targeted at girls and women (The Ancient Magus bride and A bride Story being two examples each). Maybe it will change people ideas
I've seen people say that there's no way that AMB could be a shounen and they're really just showing that they think the only shounen is mindless battle series
@@nicksvitak5416 This is mostly western readers that are new to manga and anime I hope. There are many school romances targeted at a male audience now
A bride story is insanely beautiful
I agree with everything you've said. I was brought up in a comic book collecting household so I've always been subjected to the kind of misogyny found in the comic book community (ESP pre-MCU). While I've only gotten into manga in the last 5 years, I see similar attitudes. I'm often asked to "prove" my knowledge, as if being a woman makes you entirely incapable of consuming or understanding this medium lol.
As a old anime fan, thank you. Only speaking up about this issues can we hope to see a change for the better. Please keep doing videos like this!
As a male. I like to read manga from every demographic. I love the Lovely Complex which is shoujo and Wondering Son which is about children and their experience with being lgbt. Witch Hat Atelier and Land of The Lustrous are also manga that I love.
Never understood the hate to shoujo series, I lately been reading shoujo manga such as "A sign of Affection", Blue Spring Ride and hoenstly they are amazing. It tells a very amazing story and a good break from the usual shonen jump action battle series. It's ok dislike a series, but these shonen fans just call anything mid without even reading it and it's so fucking cringe.
Fr. They make hate the word "mid" now. Most of the times the they don't even read those series
Well tbh, many anime fans always thrash other series of any genre except their fav and those widely regarded as good (berserk). Haven't really seen much shoujo hate. Thank God for that. I do enjoy some of them very much. Kimi ni Todoke, Akatsuki no Yona, Kauchou wa maid sama, Love so Life, etc
Shoujo can be great although there are some problematic tropes but yeah it's a cute genre if you enjoy the problematic parts, would love some new shoujo content. Josei can be great too I still love Nana.
@@majlordag1889 Well, shonen also has many problematic elements and tropes, so...
@@theshire9173 yeah of course but one doesn't exclude the other
I had a really great friend growing up who introduced me to manga. She loved shoujo so most of her recommendations to me were shoujos, which I absolutely adored (she has great taste). When I didn't know much about manga in general and I ran out of recommendations I would look up popular mangas, often which were shounen. I liked some of them, read *a lot* of a few of them, but ultimately found I enjoyed the shoujo genre more. Only later did I discover that almost no one I knew personally (and even online), knew or talked about shoujo and that I couldn't talk about it to anyone else because shoujo was "lame" or "girly" or just in general not as good as shounen. I'm really lucky to still be friends with this girl who started my shoujo obsession so I have at least one person to talk to about it, but it really sucks that I feel like I have to hide my interests so that other people don't immediately brush off my opinions just because I like shoujo. This channel has been giving me so much validation, and I want to thank you for that Colleen!
Chiming in to say this past year is for me the first time I’ve seen a strong shoujo fandom presence on the internet and it’s been kind of fun. I’m sure I wasn’t looking that hard because I’ve been finding series and reading on my own for 20 years. Most people never read what I read. Nobody I knew had heard of Basara, Red River, Paradise Kiss, Mars, etc. The only shoujo we could bond over was Sailor Moon and most people had only seen an episode or two in passing. So it’s been a bit sad to me to see negative commentary against shoujo and women who are pushing shoujo forward. Makes me not want to be on the internet sometimes. But I have found new series to love thanks to female reviewers this year - unfortunately one of which is already out of print without even being a year old 🤷♀️ Because that’s how much faith publishers have in women’s media. Cool cool. Good luck with the comments! 😅
Editing to say demographic absolutely does matter. I know if a manga is shounen, there’s a high likelihood the women in the stories aren’t gonna get much shine and half the time will be dismissed entirely or sexualized. There are exceptions to this rule of course. But I brace myself when picking a shounen up so I can recalibrate my expectations.
I love how the Shoujo Beat mag was ripped to shreds with the exception of a full metal alchemist ad in the corner. You have to wonder if he would've even dunked on FMA if he knew the creator was female. Great video Colleen, it was a great intro to your channel, I'm glad it was on my recommended.
Once I tried buying a cartoon link plushy for a friend at best buy.
The cashier who was one of *those* men. And he wouldn't let me check out until he quizzed me on the characters to see if I was a "real fan" I've never played a god damn Nintendo game in my life besides a few wii sports game.
Still answered that shit right. He was all "what's this characters name" and I said "Li-" "you probably almost said Zelda didn't you?" Bro cut me off....
I refuse to check out tloz because I'm salty now
I'm really sorry that happened to you. I hope you got that cashier fired because that is *unacceptable*
sorry that happened. that dude is a cornball.
hearing how awful this community can be sometimes makes me so sad :( just know what you’re doing is truly shining a better light in the scene. your videos are so interesting & i don’t even read manga!! love the way you tell stories & your acting cracked me up in this vid haha
Thank you for this important video, I hope the comment section will remain somewhat peaceful...
Your channel helped (and still helps) fuel my new-born interest for shôjo manga, I'm grateful for that.
That's all I ever need to hear 🙌
Just wanted to say: thank you so much for making this video. I haven't interacted a lot with the mainstream fandoms because for some reason I just tend to like more niche things with dead or non existend fandoms that drive me to talking to my bestie for hours about a manga she has never and will never read, but when I started out reading manga with One Piece and the like I definitly felt that stigma against non men (I'm non binary but was read as female a lot when I was younger).
I also want to get more into shoujo and josei titles and your content helps me with that a lot, so thank you so much, again. I'm hyped everytime I see that you uploaded a new video and really love your content. :)
I wouldn’t have started reading shojo if it wasn’t for channels like yours. there’s plenty of people making content on shonen manga, that’s how I found manga in the first place. Having creators who do the same for shojo is really great
Super insightful video! Its very difficult and frustrating to be talked down and alienated from your hobbies and passions just because some ppl dont wanna hear or acknowledge your existence, so its always nice to hear this topic being discussed. Feels very validating to see others talk about this problem. Thank you for posting this :D
While growing up I was pretty invested in anime and manga, but it got to a point where I couldn’t keep up with it bc I got tired of the toxic environment. Not only bc people was testing my “knowledge” or dismissing my favorite anime but also bc I kept running into situation where guys were making creppy comments to us girls and even harassing us. My last straw happened in an anime convention when a random guy complemented my friend’s shirt and then touch her chest. After many years far away from the Community, I start reading/watching anime again bc I have come across female mangakas and anime that’s not full of fan service( u also have been part of my journey. I never stopped liking anime/manga but I didn’t know what to consume bc the popular names were not what I was looking for. Your recommendations are awesome, and I think it what fans like me need :)
I'm honestly just glad your channel and others like you are popping up, because I've almost *only* been interested in shoujo and josei since I've gotten into anime. I like some shounens, but the genre as a whole is mid-- nah I'm just kidding, but it often doesn't appeal to me in the same way.
Same
SAME
As someone who has read a lot of Shounen series to completion, many of them ARE mid. It's tough to find ones that are written well. On another note, shout out to Kids on the Slope, Honey & Clover, Chihayafuru, Shouwa Genroku, Princess Jellyfish, and Usagi Drop (at least the anime version) for all being 9-10/10 Josei series in my opinion.
@@atmmachine11Dragon Ball and jojo
@@Sonicthehedgehog-ub2oj I own both and agree. Good choices!
It really can be really exhausting just existing in an anime fandom when you're not male... It makes me feel quite sad to think about these kinds of things, but it's important to talk about them. Great video!
Just came across your channel, and this is a great video!
The misogyny present in anime communities is so baffling to me. As a male nerd/geek, having women get interested in the same things you are would be an absolute godsend. and when we finally have a chance to get more women into a hobby that we love, so many guys push them away. it's insane! anime should be appreciated by people of ALL genders.
As usual, awesome video essay! As a manga fan for 22 years, I grew up with Fushigi Yugi, Ranma 1/2, Inu Yasha,Sailor moon and anything by CLAMP. Because I didn't have any money, I read whatever I could get my hands on at the public library or read while visiting book stores. There are so many good stories out there and I'm glad more people are reading manga in general. Be kind to each other!