Kiki's Topics (274)

Just because you didn't get the subtlety of it doesn't mean sensei made a mistake. I personally thought it was obvious that societal values got in the way and made Akira break up with Yuuki. The character development was subtle and realistic and beautiful. And the years that passed were enough time for us to understand the depth and strength of Akira's guilt and and regret for his mistake. Shame you couldn't see that :)

Exactly. When I read realistic I think WTF? How is realistic the strange behavior of Itou that make non sense, is inconsistent and ilogical. And how is realistic the forgiveness of Yukii? so easy. As you say theres not character development.

Well said!!!!!!!

It's realistic because of what Anonymous said. This is how some relationships work especially some gay relationships. People get worried about what society/parents will think and they panic and make rhe wrong decision.
And then regret for eight years which were wasted. Oh poor Yuuki.

The thing here is that Itou more than being pressured by social values what he shows in ch3 is apathy, like he doesnt love Yukii anymore but then in ch4 he says to himself that he do that for Yukkis sake and to not fall inlove more, society... One thing or another, both not do. He could have been scared but how the mangaka shows it in ch3, he was fall out of love of him too.

He didn't fall out of love. Sense said that he was scared of how deep his feelings for Yuuki were on the morning of their trip to the beach. Combined with societal pressures, he "closed off his heart" to Yuuki. It has the same symptoms of falling out of love but it's much more complex than that. In reality Akira loved Yuuki more than he could bear, and that was part of the problem.

*Sensei

I am sorry I am not being rude but I am curious here,are you defending why seme did what he did here? Or are you trying to tell what Mangaka had shown in this manga?.

Explaining the mangaka. I think the seme made a really stupid mistake and when Yuuki punched him I was like YES DO IT AGAIN haha. But I still love the seme and I feel the pain of his guilt because he's so aware of the mistake he made. I hope he finds a way to make it up to Yuuki.

Explaining the mangaka. I think the seme made a really stupid mistake and when Yuuki punched him I was like YES DO IT AGAIN haha. But I still love the seme and I feel the pain of his guilt because he's so aware of the mistake he made. I hope he finds a way to make it up to Yuuki.

Oh alright I was confused there thanku ^^.

Same Anonymous as above .... yes perfectly said here! I completely agree.

Well, if you say so.. I think is free of interpretation I think, but how sensei read it and draw it doesnt convey that at all to me. They sound more like excuses that he make to himself to me or otherwise make no sense. "close my heart" or whatever more than realistic feels melodramatic. And the way he break up with him was cold, he didnt show barely emotion. But well, its my opinion.

*write it* nor read it

I see your point and I totally agree it's up for interpretation. Personally I think the fact that he was cold to Yuuki during the break-up is perfectly in line with him having closed off his heart. He had to be cold and build that barrier around himself in order to leave someone he loved and tell himself it was the right thing to do. As for whether it's realistic or melodramatic, I can see your point of view. I suppose that's up to each reader to decide.

Thats right. A recommendation I would do of manga that address these matter in a more realistic way in my POV is Only you Only of Asou Mitsuaki. Really beautiful, realistic and emotional charged.

Thanks I'll be sure to check it out! Btw I really like that your approach to giving your opinion was balanced and that you said it was only your opinion. (Unlike the person who started this thread, who seems to think the mangaka is flawed without considering other interpretations first..... anyway.)

Ah, thanks.. uhm well I supposse he/she dont think she/he is in the right its just his/her way of putting could lead to think that. Idk. Well, for sure this manga has marked in a way or another in people emotions. I dont know if I wrote it right, my english is bad sorry.

Ah! and you give you opinion in a very polite way. thank you. I forgot to tell. The age...

Yep. I loved how this started, and then dramatically, it got way too slapdash. There is some beautiful symbolism. And I can see the author working with the idea of terror at losing happiness (makes total sense when you have a true love, fear of them leaving or dying or whatever). And the truth is, he never gave a shit about societal rules and we are pretty much told it was more about his own fear (same as the first time he disappeared after the kiss).

He is just a coward and it's got nothing to do with normality, or he'd have had kids with the wife. He didn't. He married for years and never reproduced, so this wasn't at base about "normal." It was running away (again). And it was about Yuuki desperately waiting "on the line"--again.

Sorry, but if we're talking dramatic subtlety, he did not dump Yuuki due to "societal" reasons. He started being robotic, cold, aloof and rude to Yuuki before the babies and lady colleague. It started when he thought Yuuki was missing then found him on the beach and realized he was afraid of losing that happiness. The author was smart enough to show how he's a "runner." He ran away with fear after teh first kiss. He ran away with fear after realizing how much he loved Yuuki and dreaded loving him more. THAT was why he ran. He used societal reasons (family,children) as the excuse, but that wasn't the reason the author set up early and even reiterated later.

Exactly. You got it (others seemed to miss that). Societal values was the excuse he latched onto to leave Yuuki, but the distancing came from terror at loving so deeply that the loss of that love might destroy him. So, he ran first before Yuuki could dump him. (Exactly as when he first kissed him and ran away afraid Yuuki would hate him.) He never changed his character: he is afraid of losing Yuuki, then and then and now.

Nope, it doesn't get to be subtle and obvious at the same time. Pick a side.

It was obvious in 1: foreshadowing that Akira would run away when afraid of his feelings (as he did after the kiss,), which was fulfilled when he emotionally ran away after the beach thing and physically ran away after the coworker came onto him.

It was obvious that the REAL reason he pulled away from Yuuki was his fear of loving him TOO Much and not recovering from a blow if Yuuki left him or was lost to him. (Lost like the lighter, that's the subtle metaphor).

The subtle: the white line that symbolized theiir early relationship showed that Yuuki would always wait for Akira (like he did in rain or shine for days, later in terms of years alone).

The subtle: how the limited white line becomes the broad, open white snowy expanse when Akira finally breaks free of his mental/emotional bounds.

Many stories have both obvious and subtle, so BZZZT, you're wrong to limit it.

Oh, and the other subtle "reversal" aspect: the lighter is a metaphor of light. Yuuki is light for this guy. When he lost the lighter, it was a symbol that he would lose Yuuki (through his own carelessless). Since Yuuki found the lighter that time (terrifying Akira at the depth of his feeling so that he soon runs away), we know that it will then be Akira's turn to go in search of the light (no lighter) and the light is symbolized by 1. the aurora borealis in the sky --like lines and 2. by Yuuki himself, the light of Akira's life.

Seme was stupid actually i don't get him TBH.to me it feels like he wanted to believe himself that it was all because of society norms (delusional) is what I will say here.but in his heart he got too scared to love him too much which he said himself.it can be be that societal pressure was one of the little factor because it was given in a manga by the author but .societal pressure seems like a excuse of him to get away from the uke (because as he said he loves him too much) more then the actual problem .even if it was out of true love or it was due to societal pressure it was wrong of him. In both the cases what he did was selfish and cowardly.

And as you said the thing that piss me off the most is he got forgiven with just I love you and in the past or present always got what he wanted where Yuki spent eight years sleeping around with people who resemble seme .

Hey Annabis I just read what you recommended here to rattail and let me tell you it's a gem I loved it thanku

Um, nope. You don't get to conflate two different issues that you think someone else is doing while doing it yourself then act like you're not doing it.

See, subtlety CAN be obvious. To DIFFERENT people, AS the person themselves said. Just as people can miss what's BLATANTLY written out for them.

You ASSumed that societal values are the same as holding up societal values as a fake excuse. If not, then you should really address the VALID points that everyone else made, before posting, next time. Otherwise it just looks like you're ignoring them because you can't be bothered to deal with them and thus still think you're right in everything you said. And which... brings us back to the point I made in my FIRST paragraph. KT.

See, Annabis is the one who made a really great point for YOUR side. I can totally see how someone can come away from this believing that Itou is making up how he was afraid to fall in love more deeply with Yuuki as just yet another excuse. Even though it is NOT my interpretation.

Huh? Please quote and share any part of my post in which I a) described the mangaka as flawed and b) presented my views as anything more than an opinion.

I thought the character development was inexplicable in the third chapter and the book itself didn't present the realism others lauded it for. I appreciated the points Annabis and ManganiME made about his fear driving his decisions rather than societal pressure. But for me it read as an abrupt insertion of a problem for the sake of creating conflict rather than coming organically from the story. Fear clouding sense fit with a younger Itou in the beginning but not after years in a stable, loving, long term relationship as depicted in the story. If it is that Itou did not mature *at all* over the years then I think that needed to be illustrated. Tokokura took the short cut of telling not showing (with the panel series of Itou's inner monologue) but I found it inadequate for such a major plot turn.

That's all. I never stated that the mangaka herself was flawed. (Mangaka ≠ writing.) In fact, the misstep stood out for me because everything before it was sensitively and charmingly done. Annabis recommendation of the Asou Mitsuaki is an excellent example of a book which approaches emotional authenticity.

As for the "opinion" issue, the Cambridge English Dictionary defines it as: 1. A thought or belief about something or someone; 2. a judgement about someone or something. That's what I did, literally. That's what all of us do here every day. Unless someone explicitly tries to assert their view as fact, then opinions are the default. Why is this something I need to bring up every time I do a post? Naah.

My counter opinions to the "realism" defence sprung directly from "considering other interpretations first". No, I don't find it realistic ie resembling reality that any person dumped as coldly as Nishi was after building a life together would meet the person umpteenth years later and forgive them after a punch, slap, and kiss. Feel free to disagree. We're in the manga discussion board section, open to readers, where we can share *opinions*.

Anyway....

Sigh. You don't understand my point and all misunderstandings flow from there. You are absolutely right---the mangaka did blatantly write out a neat summary of Itou's reasons for his decision, right in the series of panels at the beginning of chapter four. Yes? She had to because Itou took a 180 from Supportive Partner Of Several Years to I'm Scared This is Pointless I'ma Marry the First Woman Who Says She Likes Me.

This for me was off, structurally and stylistically. Sensei took two chapters which involved several tiny scenes on which she built their relationship which spanned several years. At this point, as I stated, they functioned like a married couple. The scenes in that single chapter to the climax of the break up felt rushed in comparison. And then the reasoning for it wasn't illustrated but wrapped up in a few lines in what's a manga not a novel. (His entire relationship with the woman happened off page! For a far more realistic depiction of this kind of dilemma there's Sojou No Koi Wa Nido Haneru by Mizushiro Setona.) That sense of it being rushed to meet a deadline or a page limit was compounded when the joyful reunion and resolution occurred in an even shorter number of pages. That's not balanced to me but obviously opinions differ.

I don't think it's a shame that you think differently, or that you're so dumb you're missing something.

And I think how great it could have been if the sensei took the time to flesh it out, because Itou was seriously acting like some PTSD person just on the basis of Yuuki not being in the bed next to him.

I definitely liked that we got snapshots of some years, but it still was rushed, and this trauma they experienced needed more. Maybe it's not sensei's fault and the editors rushed her. Could be Happens. But I Liked this so much when they were young and we saw their gradual progression, that suddenly slapped with "I'm love you too much, now I'm cold to you, now I'm leaving you cause Chick/Baby/Fear/RunningAwayAgain" was whiplashy.

I do really like the stylistic element of showing us their age, but we didn't see enough. And you're right, a scene more with the gf/wife about how that relationship was deteriorating (I mean, we go from zero to dissatisfied, and that makes no sense).

I am really thinking now more them your actual comment what made people anxious more was you topic line (￣∇￣")

Than*

Right: you've described my reaction precisely lol. I know editors have a lot of control in the writing process so that wouldn't surprise me. I wouldn't have posted anything if I hadn't been so dissatisfied by the "realism" defence.

I like the first two chapters so much I'm sure I'll reread them.

LOL. I guess so ╮(￣▽￣)╭. The more I like something the stronger is my opinion about it. I made a deliberate choice to state how I felt in a separate post rather than insert myself in earlier threads about Itou's actions precisely because I didn't want to change the tone in those conversations. And I don't make it personal or shade others for disagreeing (unless they do it first ;>).

Ikr. You are welcome. (⌒▽⌒)

Child adoption is not common in Japan at all. Just Google and you'll see lots of articles about it.

Here's an article about adoption in Japan http://www.tokyoweekender.com/2015/05/adoption-in-japan-the-children-left-behind/

Oooo, that explains a whoooole lot. It hadn't occurred to me that I was on the right path with the question and so hadn't even considered googling. Thanks for that.

I bet Chiho's heard adult's gossiping about Fumi and his situation before. Oh, everyone's action and reactions to this incident take on additional nuance. I really like this manga.

OMG, that article makes me want to cry. Thanks for linking to it.

I completely agree, whether it is "common practice" in their society to view non-blood relations as "fake" or not is irrelevant. Just because a lot of people think one way and it feels like common sense to them doesn't mean it is okay... Anyone should know that if you have people you consider family that they are family, and adoption even more so since you legally take them into your family so there is an actual physical claim... That and its not really other peoples' business to be judging. They provided that link for you, but are also completely ignoring how big japan is on politeness. Even if the adults didn't find fault in what she was saying, they should have said something when she was so rude in the WAY she was saying it and when they noticed she made him cry. He was crying for a while before she pushed him to the point that he hit her, which i personally don't blame him for. I would never hit a girl personally, but she was clearly making a conscious effort to upset him because she was jealous that he was so happy with his family when her mother hadn't shown up. He never said anything to her, he was just off in his own world all happy and then she just starting attacking his familial ties calling them fake and weird so in retaliation he hit her... they're kids so he didn't know what else to do, it's not like he could deny it since he'd been having some doubts about these things himself... I'm not trying to say i don't feel any sympathy for the girl too, just that i can understand him hitting her. He's a kid and she made him mad by criticizing things VERY important to him. I think the parents did make ONE right decision, making the BOTH of them apologize. She was at fault for obvious reasons and he was at fault for hitting her, even if she did instigate it.

I don't think the other two commenters were "ignoring" any other factors: they just responded to my question about how big child adoption is in Japan. I questioned not because of Chiho's comments -- she's a child and may understandably not be aware of all the different forms families can take beyond her own limited experience -- but because of her stepfather's.

"Anyone should know that if you have people you consider family that they are family, and adoption even more so since you legally take them into your family so there is an actual physical claim."

Anyone should know? That's not true, though. If it's not the norm in a society then they won't know. Norms mostly develop because of a country's history and culture not an objective idea of what's good or bad (which many would argue doesn't exist). Where I live formal child adoption is not very popular but a more informal variety is: more persons take in nieces, nephews, distant cousins etc and even kids who are unrelated. That's likely because of our mostly African background. So it's not that big a leap for us.

Japan is different. I don't think you read the article. If you did you would understand that child adoption isn't big there is because *legally* biological parents retain a stronger claim to the child even *after* another person/s formally adopts them. No doubt it reflects strong cultural ideas about how they envision the family unit based on their own history. Yes, persons realise it's not a good thing now and are working hard to change it. But it takes time and effort. None of us are born with instinctive ideas of what's good or bad in every sense for every situation. It's learnt.

I'd bet money that KII Kanna sensei wrote this story to explore that idea of "family" as it is understood in Japan. What would be considered good and normal over what seems bad and abnormal and which one better lives up to the ideal. On one hand we have Fumi's. His father took time off from work because of depression in a society that overvalues work to the point where people die from it; a son who left under questionable circumstances and returns with a male "friend" to whom he is very close and lives with them; and Fumi himself is adopted in a country that doesn't give them the same status as a biological relative.

Chiho's is closer to the norm: she has (we assume) heterosexual parents who are married and live together, even though it's the stepdad who appears to be the primary caregiver. On paper, she's got the "better" ticket. Yet it's Fumi's "strange" family that is clearly more functional and supportive. You can point to her jealousy but from previous chapters it's obvious that she's heard adult gossip about Fumi's situation. Learning how uncommon child adoption is there adds further clarity on how strange his family appears in the community. More pointedly, it shows how Chiho may be pressured to apologise *only* because of politeness, as most of the adults likely agree with every word she said. To the point where adults "politely" repeat, in front of her, a variation on "Fumi has a fake family"--like her stepfather did in the restaurant. Chiho isn't dumb. Any child with a brain will question why they should be sorry about saying something that everyone else agrees with.

I didn't read the article, it wasn't relevant to what i'm trying to say. If you consider someone family and tell the people around you that they are your family, then it is common sense to not criticize the familial ties, that is what i was trying to say. I just expanded on this by saying that adoption gives you an actual legal bond. This is something anyone would know, regardless of culture. They brought up the article showing that adoption isn't a big thing in japan, this gave a reason for the way chiho and the adults were acting towards the situation. I was saying that the reason is just an excuse, regardless of how society views adoption in japan, Fumi was going around calling them family and treating them as family, common sense/decency should've put people in a position where they wouldn't judge or argue the familial bond just because of a lack of blood relation. I expanded on this by stating that Japan may not be big on adoption, but it IS big on politeness, this is, in my opinion, a good counterargument to the whole "society is like that" approach to the way the adults and chiho acted in that scene because taking politeness into account the adults would've stopped her when she said what she did even if they didn't think she was wrong because it was rude. Especially when Fumi started to cry. People have been bringing up that article trying to use it as a reason for the adults just standing back and letting chiho say what she wants without getting on to her for what she said, they've been trying to say that in society's view it is the common way of thinking and i don't see how society's view of things matters in the face of a person's common decency. If an adult hears their child calling another child's family "fake", they would know it is just rude and with japan's focus on politeness i don't really see how a person would just think "well, adoption isn't something i run into often, so despite the child acting like they're family i guess i'll just consider them not family and tell them to their face". I'd also like to point out that you're making A LOT of assumptions in an effort to keep this article relevant to the manga, even going so far as to try and say the mangaka had this specific cultural decision, that being the rejection of adoptive familial ties, in mind when creating this.

Here're a few assumptions you've made:

"Japan is different. I don't think you read the article. If you did you would understand that child adoption isn't big there is because *legally* biological parents retain a stronger claim to the child even *after* another person/s formally adopts them. No doubt it reflects strong cultural ideas about how they envision the family unit based on their own history."----Why no doubt? You're saying that because, by law, biological parents have more claim over the child that society itself views it this way? Law and society aren't inseparable by any standards. Law is often changed BY society all around the world, there're just some old laws still overlooked. Just putting this assumption aside weakens the link between the article and the manga's premise since you're trying to say that the mangaka is trying to re-create some idea that you JUST got put in your head by reading ONE article, that being that the laws somehow betray the societal outlook on the subject.

"Chiho's is closer to the norm: she has (we assume) heterosexual parents who are married and live together, even though it's the stepdad who appears to be the primary caregiver. On paper, she's got the "better" ticket."----Here you're assuming that people even look down on Fumi's family... the only ones who've shown any prejudice towards Fumi's adoptive familial ties are Chiho and her step dad. You also assume that Chiho's family is "closer to the norm" which just really doesn't make sense to me as Chiho's mother is portrayed as a neglectful mother who just got divorced and Chiho doesn't acknowledge her step father as even that, she just calls him by his name and is extremely disrespectful to him. You're trying to make both families out to be something they're not to fit your vision of what the article makes you believe the mangaka was trying to portray through their manga. It's like you're spinning everything you read in the manga around the article now that you read it.

"Learning how uncommon child adoption is there adds further clarity on how strange his family appears in the community. More pointedly, it shows how Chiho may be pressured to apologise *only* because of politeness, as most of the adults likely agree with every word she said. To the point where adults "politely" repeat, in front of her, a variation on "Fumi has a fake family"--like her stepfather did in the restaurant. Chiho isn't dumb. Any child with a brain will question why they should be sorry about saying something that everyone else agrees with."----First, what i want to point out is what i've been trying to say in response to the article since i started writing here, just because society views things a certain way doesn't mean that every person cant individually look at a presented problem and come up with their own opinion. You're reading that article, which seems to only tell about a stance the law takes on adoptive vs biological claim and assuming from what you read that in japan if someone compares the two claims over a child that they'd side with the biological parent and you're trying to apply this to the manga. You're trying to say that society would view his adoptive family as less than family. Once again, you're assuming that the people in that area even HAVE the opinion that Fumi isn't really part of their family because of the adoption, what's worse is that you're basing your assumption that the step dad is only getting onto Chiho because she was impolite ON the assumption that society's view has effected his own view in a way that he thinks the family is fake. You're literally basing an assumption on an assumption here.

Don't take this the wrong way, but you come across as REALLY impressionable. It just seems like you've jumped on the article bandwagon and are even looking for ways that the manga ties into it. I just don't personally see how the article is at all relevant when each person in that situation, the fight between chiho and fumi, would've formed their own opinion on the matter and based on how big japan is on politeness they surely wouldn't have felt chiho was in the right even if they DID agree with her because of the way she presented herself. I don't think it has anything to do with society's values so much as that the step dad didn't think he had a right to get onto chiho when she doesn't even really consider him her father.

I don't understand your reasoning. You have posted a very long response in which you constantly refer to an article you have not read. How is that sensible? Is it to avoid being "impressionable"? How do you learn, then? If it is not relevant to the point you want to make then why did you respond to my comment and anything I had to opine about it?

You are determined to argue about a world that does not exist. It is "common sense" to not criticise family ties in a world in which it is extremely common to do so, in which laws are made to support certain types of families and marginalise others. On the one hand you dismiss the social ideas around child adoption yet rest your entire argument on social ideas around politeness. There are a number of factors that influenced how that school scene played out...which I listed. You have ignored them all in favour of belittling an article on adoption you have not read. It's too ridiculous. I can't parse it.

And you can't parse mine. You have refashioned my opinion into a series of straw men in order to knock them down. The word "may", as I used it, denotes possibility: some adults *may* (ie a possibility not a certainty) feel this way about certain things because of clues I detected in various scenes, bolstered by helpful information about the book's cultural context. It was a simple literary analysis which may or may not bear out depending on how the story continues. That's all.

The article quotes volunteers and adoption advocates along with statistics and sources among which is the United Nations. It gives a good snapshot which facilitates further reading.

This is my last response. Mi brain cyaan manage. Cheers!

Okay? I have said everything i wanted to say.

I do not think the article has any relevance to the manga, i believe it is more the personal relationships between the children and their family that brought about the lack of action during the fight between Chiho and Fumi. Chiho does not consider the step dad her dad and he shows a lack of confidence in handling her, i think THIS is why they acted the way they did, rather than some random article on legal stance between biological and adoptive familial claim. Fumi accepts his brother´s gay relationship, but there is still awkwardness and questioning going on within the family that would explain the lack of interference on what was being said about Fumi as well. I feel this is the more obvious reason rather than looking for connections to the article. I was criticizing the article itself, i was criticizing itś connection to the manga.

Its the winner. (๑•ㅂ•)و✧

*insert white blinking man meme*

This comment made my day. Poor Ayumu...

He is stupid but we love him ╮(￣▽￣)╭

HaHa, you're my kind of people ヾ(☆▽☆)

LOL <3. I thought *for sure* this was the chapter in which Yocchan would turn a corner. We're gonna be grey haired by the time Kenji decides to stop being a manipulative asshole just because he can. If I could I would find one of those self-care tumblr posts and text it to Yocchan. A link to Lemonade? Something! ┗( T﹏T )┛

I knew he wouldn't stop loving him but at least I hoped he would ignore Kenji or just renounce to the idea of a relationship with him unless Kenji showed some kind of respect