high school girls... in japan...

[kodalai]

I come to you to report that the anime stereotype of the team manager -- the token pretty girl on an all-male team whose only job is to make tea and distribute snacks -- is in fact a reality!

Akiko had mentioned that she was "baseball team manager" before, but I hadn't really registered until during the interview I asked her if she'd be playing a lot of baseball this summer, and she said, crestfallen, "Oh, no! I want to play, but I don't play. I hand out equipment, I make tea. Lots of tea." Poor girl.

This same girl wrote, on her exam, that if she were to start an NGO, it would be a weight-loss program; and she'd be the first client, because she's a "fatty" and needs to lose weight. If this girl is over 115 pounds, I'll eat my hat. It can be the start of a new diet. The hat-of-moral-outrage diet.

Comments

[meritjubet.livejournal.com]

Ookiki Furikabutte (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%8Ckiku_Furikabutte) challenges that stereotype some what by having the manager as a female who actually coaches them. They still have a 'regular' girl manager but. Oh stereotypes...

Poor Akiko, it's a hard time being an adolescent when society places so much emphasis of beauty and the 'right body'.

[titlecharacter.livejournal.com]

"On the bright side, the hat is delicious."

[kodalai.livejournal.com]

THIS IS CAKETOOOOOOOWN!

[nekojita.livejournal.com]

Hmm, might not be too bad if it's straw hats, lots of roughage there...

[alphasean.livejournal.com]

Is there some way I can be a token pretty boy on an all female baseball team whose only job is to make tea?

Y'see I am not very good at baseball.

[kodalai.livejournal.com]

I can see the appeal, if it comes to that, but alas our school has no female baseball club. :'( We do have female tennis and female ping-pong, as well as a bunch of girls in the archery club tho.

[alphasean.livejournal.com]

THERE IS NO JUSTICE

[velvet-mace.livejournal.com]

Part of me recoils when I see these girls who are so sweet and proper and helpful whose apparent job is to be sweet and proper and helpful. It's a bit like idolizing a young June Cleaver. American's have so rejected the idea of the hostess (except at restaurants where her job is to greet you, show you your table and then disappear forever without letting a trace of personality show in the process). There's this idea in America that people should damn well take care of themselves, and to do less is laziness. At the same time we sneer on those who are subserviant as if it were a failure of will.

But not so in other cultures. So I have to put aside my prejudices when I watch Fruits Basket, and tell myself there is no shame in Tohru's quazi-religious faith in not standing up for herself.

[kodalai.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm past the point where I tell people they HAVE to watch fruits basket and like it! -- if Tohru's status as a near-saint passive woman puts you off, then there's just no getting around that. But it's not an issue that bothers me personally, and I prefer to see her and her relationships simply as individuals, rather than thinking too hard about the archetypes underneath them.

[velvet-mace.livejournal.com]

No, I'm actually enjoying Fruits Basket -- I just find that I have to give myself permission to enjoy it, much the way I had to give myself permission to enjoy porn.

[midnightbanshee.livejournal.com]

NO EATING OF THE HAT! D: