Warning: I’m not mincing words.

Oh look, assumptive trash who can’t read context ruining the day of yet another person. This time the target is a manga artist.

I don’t typically read teen romance manga series (nothing wrong with them, just not my cup of tea). But I gave this one a check. Quick summary: main character (Nakamura Okuto) has a crush on his schoolmate (Hirose Aiki) and is trying to get closer to him.

The manga does a pretty good job representing the insecurity-fuelled wild imagination of the late teen years; almost everyone was like this, with the MC being gay adding further insecurity.

Here’s the octopus scene in question, from chapter 2:

It’s clear by context that this (first page) is just Nakamura’s imagination going wild, as reality (second page) is shared immediately afterwards. And come on, Hirose is fully clothed, the scene is by no means “raunchy”, even if you get the reference (NSFW Wikipedia link). It’s being played for humour and characterisation of the MC, not for sexual gratification.

The allegedly “inappropriate behaviour” with the teacher? Chapter 10. Some assumptive teachers picking up on a student (Hirose), the teacher calling him into a room, and pretending to give the student an earful. Then winking to convey “it’s all fake” to the reader. And here’s what the teacher is up to, from chapter 11:

Trying to be a teacher his students can rely on. Wow such shameful behaviour. /s

Now, let’s ask the following: if the love interest of the main character was a girl instead of a boy, would people create such a ruckus? I genuinely do not think so, and I think the fake outrage is motivated by homophobia.

But that’s how the cookie crumbles in Twitter and Reddit, innit? And here (the Fediverse) too. Distort what you see, vomit assumptions, clip context, all so you can fake some outrage “for great justice” while enforcing injustice. Because it doesn’t bloody matter if you’re actually helping with a social cause, you just want to vomit “as an ally lol lmao”, those slacktivists consider their precious-oh-so-precious feelings more important than the marginalised groups they lie (yes) to defend. And it’s pretty easy to bring the “think on the children teens!” discourse to distil homophobia.

The fact the Syundei-sensei is a woman also relevant. Society forces women to bend to pressure way more than us men; doubly so in Japan, where the idealised woman (yamako nadeshiko) is supposed to show submission.

Side note: her art style clearly takes inspiration of the early 90s manga scene, I love it.

Great choice to leave that cesspit. It’s unfortunate that it’s due to harassment. It’s a hateful place. Always has been, but it’s worse since Elon took it.

More people should leave it.

Let’s hope she opens up her own blog elsewhere.
Twitter has always been a cesspit. But now it’s a Nazipit.