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Regarding the Sanaki controversy.


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I admit that at first, I really didn’t like the idea if putting a child in a bridal outfit, but after reading Bridal Sanaki’s Lv.40 conversation, my opinion changed. It’s actually quite sad...

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16 hours ago, Shoblongoo said:

...people pick the weirdest things to get upset over...

Child bride implications notwithstanding--its at least a modest and tasteful piece of attire.

Meanwhile, Halloween Nowi legit looks like she's working a stripper pole.  

Nowi looks like she's working the pole in her normal outfit, too

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It's in poor taste, and I'm yet again disappointed by the creative choices they're running with. As some of you have pointed out already, it's another example of the pandering to otaku subculture, which I think is a detriment to the series' playerbase growing beyond a certain point (if economic trends are anything to go by). This isn't just evident specifically with the brides, but there's a gradual shift in the presentation of characters to be more and more derivative in their aesthetic design, and consequently we get more objectified female characters.

I just want the series, its creators, and the fanbase to be above all that shit.

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9 hours ago, Excellen Browning said:

Nowi looks like she's working the pole in her normal outfit, too

No I mean the positioning of the broom and her pose In her attack + special attack art literally makes it look like she's doing a pole dance. It wasn't enough to put her in a fetishy outfit that barely covers anything. They had to put her on her back with her legs out for a PoV shot. (...and they probably sold the shit out of that banner...)

Edited by Shoblongoo
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I think there's an undercurrent of anime culture that caters to a base that wants kids in those types of outfits.  I also think that said base is getting bigger.

I'm all for freedom of expression and personal preference, but putting kids in revealing clothing, and making a profit off of it makes me uncomfortable.  I've seen the negative effects of child abuse (and I lump pedophilia in that category), and I don't want that to be normalized, ever.

There's some subtlety in this particular instance, which is why I'm of a split mind on this banner.  On one hand, it's catering to that "put kids in inappropriate clothing" fetish, which I don't want to even acknowledge.  On the other hand, the symbolism and prologue is basically a middle finger to that audience.  Perhaps that's the developer's way of saying "we know this will make money, but we protest it anyway".

But maybe I'm a little salty because I'd rather have Meg as this year's bride.

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Come one guys! This is serious discussion. Where's all that anger and resentment and attacking people instead of logic. Seems like everyone respectfully doesn't care that much. Entertainment me you sheep! This paragraph should be strikes through, but apparently I can't do that on mobile 

15 hours ago, eclipse said:

I'm all for freedom of expression and personal preference, but putting kids in revealing clothing, and making a profit off of it makes me uncomfortable.  I've seen the negative effects of child abuse (and I lump pedophilia in that category), and I don't want that to be normalized, ever.

How could it not be in the same category?

15 hours ago, eclipse said:

But maybe I'm a little salty because I'd rather have Meg as this year's bride.

Mega as Bride is so ridiculously obvious. But I guess that's the curse of not being a popular character. Maybe if her stats were better it would have happened.

Edited by Jotari
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16 minutes ago, Jotari said:

This paragraph should be strikes through, but apparently I can't do that on mobile

You can access the strikethrough by being in landscape mode.

Edited by Hylian Air Force
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On 5/22/2018 at 1:07 PM, Florete said:

This post from Reddit explains my thoughts better than I ever would have been able to.

1hRJEr4.png

I'm not outraged, exactly, but I am quite disappointed. And I really wish that even if people don't take issue with it, they'd at least try to understand, try to see from the perspective of those who do take issue with it instead of hurling insults everywhere. You can understand without agreeing. If people were willing to do that this situation probably would have been a whole lot more peaceful.

This. I was initially not going to post in this thread because I'd already voiced my views in the threads eclipse locked, but this also sums up my thoughts on Sanaki. And I actually like her as a character, so I might be even more uncomfortable than this Reddit poster is.

Also, Sanaki was picked here when IS could've easily gone with the more popular Elincia, Micaiah, Mia, or Nephenee for a Tellius bride. Titania was a good option too.

And those wondering where the complaints about Nowi and Elise are? A little girl in a swimsuit is not unusual or anything. Elise is even in a one-piece, not anything that really shows a lot of her skin. Nowi I do have an issue with. Why does she have more clothes on her arms than her torso in her Halloween version especially? I decided I wanted her for being a red mage which I lacked at the time, and her being a witch is a cute idea, but still.

On 5/22/2018 at 1:31 PM, Etrurian emperor said:

We actually know such child marriage exist in Begnion. Astrid was to marry Lekain and she sure wasn't an adult by the time of POR. So maybe Sanaki's off marrying Veltome?

She's not a ten year old little girl either. Astrid looks 16-17 in PoR to me.

Edited by Anacybele
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4 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

This. I was initially not going to post in this thread because I'd already voiced my views in the threads eclipse locked, but this also sums up my thoughts on Sanaki. And I actually like her as a character, so I might be even more uncomfortable than this Reddit poster is.

And those wondering where the complaints about Nowi and Elise are? A little girl in a swimsuit is not unusual or anything. Elise is even in a one-piece, not anything that really shows a lot of her skin. Nowi I do have an issue with. Why does she have more clothes on her arms than her torso in her Halloween version especially? I decided I wanted her for being a red mage which I lacked at the time, and her being a witch is a cute idea, but still.

She's not a ten year old little girl either. Astrid looks 16-17 in PoR to me.

Not to mention the fact a bride inevitably links back to certain acts that a swimsuit doesn't. Anyone who thinks a kid in a swimsuit is sexualized as opposed to ready for the beach is either grasping at straws or worse. People who see a child in a wedding dress and think of child brides have a legitimate gripe.

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1 minute ago, Mad-manakete said:

Not to mention the fact a bride inevitably links back to certain acts that a swimsuit doesn't. Anyone who thinks a kid in a swimsuit is sexualized as opposed to ready for the beach is either grasping at straws or worse. People who see a child in a wedding dress and think of child brides have a legitimate gripe.

Yeah, exactly, though I would understand if Elise had been put in a bikini and top that barely covered anything. But honestly, even irl there are little girl swimsuits that cover less than what she has on (and even most of those don't exactly look too suggestive either, just differently styled).

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2 hours ago, Anacybele said:

he's not a ten year old little girl either. Astrid looks 16-17 in PoR to me.

I'd say she looks closer to 15 but you're right. She's clearly older than Sanaki. Those few years Astrid has on Sanaki don't really mean much however since she's still not an adult and Lekain is still several decades older than she is. He should be like 60 or something. 

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30 minutes ago, Etrurian emperor said:

I'd say she looks closer to 15 but you're right. She's clearly older than Sanaki. Those few years Astrid has on Sanaki don't really mean much however since she's still not an adult and Lekain is still several decades older than she is. He should be like 60 or something. 

Yeah, and I thought that was creepy too, honestly. Even Astrid herself was doing what she could to escape it.

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20 hours ago, eclipse said:

But maybe I'm a little salty because I'd rather have Meg as this year's bride.

I was hoping the same thing, even if only to subvert everyone's expectations

4 hours ago, Anacybele said:

And those wondering where the complaints about Nowi and Elise are? A little girl in a swimsuit is not unusual or anything. Elise is even in a one-piece, not anything that really shows a lot of her skin. Nowi I do have an issue with. Why does she have more clothes on her arms than her torso in her Halloween version especially? I decided I wanted her for being a red mage which I lacked at the time, and her being a witch is a cute idea, but still.

Yeah, people who are acting like nobody complains about those two are just willfully ignorant or playing dumb. Incidentally, the criticisms about Nowi (and to similar extents, Elise when applicable) are in line with the Bridal Sanaki stuff. If Nowi wasn't a marriage candidate in Awakening, and wasn't given ridiculous outfits (including her Halloween version), then nobody would have a problem.

4 hours ago, Anacybele said:

She's not a ten year old little girl either. Astrid looks 16-17 in PoR to me.

On top of that, Astrid's engagement is always shown or described as a horrible situation for her

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Just to chime in: the fact that like half the people in this thread don't see it the way the other half does (one half is taking it in good faith and one half isn't) is kinda proving the point imo. Basically, what Florete quoted echoes my exact sentiments.

I just think it's *really* tone deaf, because it really doesn't exist in a vacuum. It's quite pedo-bait-y. They couldn't have used at least one of a hundred other characters but they went with a 10-13 year old. But I mean, I sent a complaint to IS about it and didn't pull any greens on that banner. I think having one Nowi on every arena team was enough, personally.

Considering how in a mainline game you can marry Elise/Sakura and have a kid basically immediately then stick him in some dumb pocket dimension until they're ready for war I don't think they thought this one all the way through in terms of perception.

Here I am happy that I got Tharja and Ninian in like 14 orbs tho

Edited by Lord Raven
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22 hours ago, eclipse said:

I think there's an undercurrent of anime culture that caters to a base that wants kids in those types of outfits.  I also think that said base is getting bigger.

I distinctly remember when I first got into the fandom back in the early GBA era, Jaffar x Nino of all things was considered controversial.  The newly acquired western fanbase was split on how they felt about seeing the game present a grown man's romantic interest in a 14 year-old-girl; circa 2003, that was considered pushing the envelope of pedo-bait and good taste.   

...Flash forward to 2018...

If that game were made today, Nino would be running around in a holter top and booty-shorts + S-Supporting with half the male cast.  And no one would bat an eye. 

"Normalized" is certainly the word for it. 

Edited by Shoblongoo
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Was it? I distinctly don't remember that being a thing circa 2005 at least. Nino and Jaffar are like 2-3 years apart in age, it's like a senior dating a freshman in high school. Maybe the fandom was younger then as a whole and thought that kinda thing was dumb. I guess that's the issue with anecdotes, because that was nowhere close to that kind of thing I recall.

I mean, what, the worst we had in old school FE (sans FE5) was a ton of pretty scandalously short skirts and the stripper dancers of FE4. Nowadays it's much more neutral simply due to the fact that the fandom like 10tupled in size in the last 5 years. It's definitely just mass appeal, because it's not like FE has shied away from fucked up taboos before (the entirety of FE4 including how 15-year-old Lachesis has an actually romantic crush on her much older brother).

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9 minutes ago, Lord Raven said:

 Nino and Jaffar are like 2-3 years apart in age

People keep saying that and I have absolutely no idea what that is based off of--we never got an official age for Jaffar. I don't know why people just assume he's a teenager. 

Especially with how in old school fire emblem--being a prepromote close to your cap on recruitment is generally supposed to signify that you're an older, more matured character.

I think people just head-canoned that in because they like the ~ship and wanted to feel less dirty about it. 

Edited by Shoblongoo
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8 minutes ago, Shoblongoo said:

People keep saying that and I have absolutely no idea what that is based off of--we never got an official age for Jaffar. I don't know why people just assume he's a teenager. 

Especially with how in old school fire emblem--being a prepromote close to your cap on recruitment is generally supposed to signify that you're an older, more matured character.

I think people just head-canoned that in because they like the ~ship and wanted to feel less dirty about it. 

It's not a difficult argument to make that he is even if there's no official sources. He is quite a bit younger than his comrades in the Black Fang and it's fairly obvious, especially since Nergal found him as an orphan and used him (and created Sonia) to infiltrate the black fang. Keeping in mind that FE7s timeline is fucked up but I don't think it's out of the question to find two young orphans close in age at around the same time (I'm presuming this part because the game is vague, but Jaffar is definitely very young).

According to a search, VincentASM recalls it being 17 as stated in an interview. He just didn't have the interview on hand.

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On 23/05/2018 at 9:06 PM, eclipse said:

I'm all for freedom of expression and personal preference, but putting kids in revealing clothing, and making a profit off of it makes me uncomfortable.  I've seen the negative effects of child abuse (and I lump pedophilia in that category), and I don't want that to be normalized, ever.

There's some subtlety in this particular instance, which is why I'm of a split mind on this banner.  On one hand, it's catering to that "put kids in inappropriate clothing" fetish, which I don't want to even acknowledge. 

You mentioned how there are serious consequences for the abuse of real children, and talked about how this makes the fictitious children in inappropriate situations is wrong. However, I feel you have made a subtle leap in logic when implying that doing things to fictitious characters is similar to doing those same things to a real person or animal, capable of feeling harm. So, I must ask the question: Do abusive/harmful acts against fictitious characters share any causal link with the abuse of real people? If the apparent falsehood of the "video games turn our kids into killers" argument is anything to go by, I'd argue that the answer may well be "no."

And thus, we go back to the controversy. If a person can act out a fetish without inflicting harm on anyone or anything, regardless of how close to being harmful or how disgusting we feel it is, is it our place to judge people on differing tastes?

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1 hour ago, The_antithesis said:

You mentioned how there are serious consequences for the abuse of real children, and talked about how this makes the fictitious children in inappropriate situations is wrong. However, I feel you have made a subtle leap in logic when implying that doing things to fictitious characters is similar to doing those same things to a real person or animal, capable of feeling harm. So, I must ask the question: Do abusive/harmful acts against fictitious characters share any causal link with the abuse of real people? If the apparent falsehood of the "video games turn our kids into killers" argument is anything to go by, I'd argue that the answer may well be "no."

And thus, we go back to the controversy. If a person can act out a fetish without inflicting harm on anyone or anything, regardless of how close to being harmful or how disgusting we feel it is, is it our place to judge people on differing tastes?

I think that's a false equivalence. Violent urges aren't identical to sexual urges. I'm not suggesting that the likes of loli and rape porn are harmful, in fact in my inexpert opinion I'd guess it's not, but the simple truth is that proper research hasn't been done on the subject (to my knowledge) and comparing it to something related, but still intrinsically different might or might not be relevant.

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49 minutes ago, Jotari said:

I think that's a false equivalence. Violent urges aren't identical to sexual urges. I'm not suggesting that the likes of loli and rape porn are harmful, in fact in my inexpert opinion I'd guess it's not, but the simple truth is that proper research hasn't been done on the subject (to my knowledge) and comparing it to something related, but still intrinsically different might or might not be relevant.

And therein lies the problem. Inadequate research. We don't really know what goes on in the human brain, and what acting upon fictional characters does to these unknown processes. I brought up the violent video games argument because it's the closest thing we actually have data on! However, it does show that people can use fiction as an outlet for their more harmful urges without normalising it in real life. That can be translated towards any of our urges and desires.

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On 22/05/2018 at 11:09 AM, Shoblongoo said:

Meanwhile, Halloween Nowi legit looks like she's working a stripper pole.  

Halloween Nowi didn't have dialogue about marrying off and she honestly looks more modest than her normal clothes, so I guess it's... er, fine?

I don't like seeing child Sanaki talking about marriage, but I don't find it a huge issue either.

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3 hours ago, The_antithesis said:

You mentioned how there are serious consequences for the abuse of real children, and talked about how this makes the fictitious children in inappropriate situations is wrong. However, I feel you have made a subtle leap in logic when implying that doing things to fictitious characters is similar to doing those same things to a real person or animal, capable of feeling harm. So, I must ask the question: Do abusive/harmful acts against fictitious characters share any causal link with the abuse of real people? If the apparent falsehood of the "video games turn our kids into killers" argument is anything to go by, I'd argue that the answer may well be "no."

And thus, we go back to the controversy. If a person can act out a fetish without inflicting harm on anyone or anything, regardless of how close to being harmful or how disgusting we feel it is, is it our place to judge people on differing tastes?

Media (including video games) isn't necessarily good at shaping our behavior per se (like, violent games and movies don't make you more violent), but they do influence your worldview (violent games and movies tends to make people more accepting of violence, including as a means of solving problems). There is a lot of research on this, as a quick Google search will reveal, especially regarding depictions of violence and sex.

What you might not have understood from @eclipse's post is the word "normalize". It's not that these depictions increase the rate of pedophilia (they probably don't), but that it makes people somewhat more accepting and/or desensitized to it in real life. Granted, Fire Emblem is has an extremely small audience and isn't going to leave much of a mark on society as a whole, but the more it's done in various media, the greater that influence becomes.

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