Damn Twlight giving anime a bad name...

Coldguy wrote:

Damn Twlight giving anime a bad name...

Amen to that. I actually got all the books in hardcover for a gift once. I read them, and then I took them to my friend's bonfire later that month. Did you know that the filmy covers burn an odd color? I think I saw green flames.

How is you guys in the right for taking a small detail and blowing it out of proportion (the Forks thing) while also being mad at people for doing the same thing. This had no real connection to anime OR twilight. You guys are being Friggin hypocrites.

I'd like to debate you, Good sir, but I'm afraid I haven't a fucking clue what you just said.

Twilight is going to be the end of us all

and something tells me this story will be linked more to the technology thing rather then anime.....how a girl can be online through a phone

parents = clueless

oh my god that's disgraceful!

She's a fan of TWILIGHT!?
she should be the one getting the 15 years!

anyways, great coverage as always Marz

And the thing is, that ALMOST (I said "almost" all Twilight fans seem to think Stalking, Raping, Pedophilia, etc. is okay, because Stephenie Meyer has convinced them that it's "romantic". They also think that both mental and physical abuse in relationships is romantic. So, this guy could've done whatever he wanted to her and she probably would've been all like "Oooh, he's so romantic and loves me".

On to the anime thing, though. I can hear Fox News now:

"This new an-ee-maze craze is now causing children to be kidnapped! More at 5."

When did any raping or pedophilia ever happen in Twilight? (I can see how you would think stalking could be in there) I dont want to argue with you I just dont see where you got that from.

Rape and Pedophilia both appeared in the last book, Breaking Dawn. I guess it isn't rape by law, but when Edward has sex with Bella, she seems to be knocked out the whole time and wakes up with many bruises all over, and according to Edward, he almost killed her. Pedophilia? Well, Jacob falls in love with a baby (long story, don't ask) and decides that he'll "imprint" on her. Well, normally, that wouldn't make any sense at all, but in Stephenie Meyer's world, that means as soon as that baby hits puberty, they WILL be your lover and bed buddy, whether they want to or not.

Accually, in Breaking Dawn Bella comments on how it was the best night of her life and never says that she was knocked out during..well..you know.. She obvisously knew what was going on during the night and probably just fell asleep afterwards. She has bruises all over her afterwards because Edward was to rough with her by accident. I dont think that counts as rape if she was conscience and willing during the entire time.

As for jacob and his imprint with the baby, thats not really his fault, its not something he cant decide and its definatly not sexual or anything like that (at least not when she's a baby), its more of a need to protect the one he imprinted on. Accually he wanted to kill the baby before he even saw her so it doesnt really make any sense that he would want to imprint on the person he hates. The subject came up earlier in the series and it was made clear that it wasnt anything sexual (at least not when the one who got imprinted was a child). The imprinted person doesnt have to end up with whoever imprinted on them, its just more probable that they'll end up together in the future.

I blame the guy from America's Most Wanted.

John Walsh? What did he do? I think he's a great man, and that show helps a lot of people.

TGWTG.com Should use their powers to end the world of Twilight once and for all.

Yeah the 15 yrs in prison. But way it goes it seems today. Murder is a slap in the wrist. But do anything to a child. Bam it's like you genocide a certian number of people.

Yeah, the justice system is messed up. Not just in America, all over the world. America has problems like 1 year for stabbing someone to death because he durk yer jawb, and 15 for taking a willing teenager and driving around a couple of states. Over in other countries, there are different problems, sure, but this is just one of the things that makes America look worse than it already does.

Parents who should take care of their kids? Really that's what your going with? I don't disagree at all, in fact I strongly agree with you.

However looking at the past trends, when it comes to news stories and such and they have an option of blaming Movies/video games/anime/modern televison. OR telling parents to grow a pair and watch their kids....

They ALWAYS blame the media.....

Also, I agree with you in the sentencing, in Oklahoma ((I live their)) the age of consent is 16.... So, yeah to me this makes no sense at all.

From my studies in law to become a cop a lot of states have different jail times for the kidnapping I only know my own states new hampshire policy, which is only 5 years for kidnapping a teen so 15 years does seem very odd. I guess if you have a very anti-youth couture it makes sense. This also changes if its on the federal level which is more on a sliding bar all the way up to a life depending on the age of the child and what they did.

The only reason I made it through high school being an anime fan was because i was on the football team and fairly popular with everyone from the geeks to the jocks.

I'm sorry, I still can't get over the fact that the parents released an old picture of her daughter.

Were they ashamed of how she looked? Or were they trying to get more sympathy out of the cute white girl picture? Or both?

In all fairness, they might have been worried that there might have been less sympathy if their daughter was revealed as she was. People are idiots like that.

Now, I wonder if there'll be any backlash at Twilight for this. Somehow I doubt it.

Yeah this just seems like a major failure on all fronts from the kidnapper to the parents to the law.

As weird a case as this is, I really don't think that anything anime-related will take the flak for it. She liked anime and wanted to go to a convention. He was maybe going to take her to one. Anime isn't really even a factor in this story, so I wouldn't worry about that.

What did this have to do with anime aside from the connection? Don't get me wrong, this was a very well-done and well-thought out video, but the subject in itself didn't strike me as quite enough to warrant an Anime Newscast about it.

Considering that they only TALKED about going to anime conventions but actually WENT to Twilight Town, I'd imagine that the latter fandom will be taking more flak than the former... if any.

I don't think twilight can really take any flak from it either. Twilight's popularity isn't a problem. Rather, it's a symptom of a problem.

But I'm probably being generous to the media and popular opinion to think that opinion will be held.

There are SOME traces of connections to "anime" in this editorial, but the main focus is far from the medium itself.
This felt much more like an editorial on both teenage insecurity and the declining ability to trust certain people with their decisions. This was a radical departure from your usual brand of news editorials, and felt rather out of place under your ANE banner.
Nevertheless, the points that you DO make strike me as accurate and logically thought out. Taking any person that is below adulthood and without consent from their guardians is a poor slip of thinking, and I don't have much sympathy for the girl either. The sentence may be a bit extreme, but I must gawk at the kind of thought process that brought the two to such a conclusion.
If anything, this can act as an anti-example so that non of us accidentally fall into the same scenario, as either the adult or the kid. Like you said, this could have happened with any person of any focused interest (rock music, puppetry, caligraphy, cooking, you name it).
In the future though, I'd advise a better focus on the anime aspects, added to the level of attention given to the other topics being addressed. I don't fault your editorial skills, but please remember that your primary and underlining topic is __________. (fill in the blank)

He's a disgrace......to all internet predators! She's like the easiest target ever! Who COULDN'T kidnap her? Where's your thrill of the hunt?! You're the worst kind of pervert...a LAZY one!

I would say, "Oh, well, it'll be fine because anime has almost nothing to do with this."

Then I remember all the cases of video games being linked to shootings.

Fuck.

And I agree that 15 years is a bit much. This guy is pretty...euch, but I'd say 5 years if even that is sufficient.

By the way, not to be a superficial prick, but does he look like the kind of person anyone would trust? Even a 14-year-old? Seriously?

And, maybe I just didn't catch it, but what did Twilight have to do with this besides her wanting to go to Forks? Or is that the point?

That Fat Guy and That 14 year old together ? EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW EW GROSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Historically, many feel the first time that the public began to panic over otaku occurred in Japan in 1989, when a man named Tsutomu Miyazaki was arrested for killing, mutilating, sexually molesting, and eating the bodies of four girls ages four to seven. When captured, a search of his home revealed that he was a fan of anime. Although the media reported that it was his obsession with anime which led him to commit these crimes, the fact is that this was a very sick and troubled man, both physically and mentally, as he had suffered from both physical and mental disabilities, and most people now feel it was his obsession to the Guinea Pig horror film series that influenced his killing spree, and not an obsession to lolicon anime, like so many assumed when he was first captured. Even so, he was labeled "The Otaku Murderer," and the public began to fear the effects that anime and manga had on the youth.

By comparison, this recent incident of kidnapping is quite tame by comparison, but it's quite common for Americans to blow things out of proportion, so it is possible that this issue could be used as evidence to show the dangers of anime obsession. However, if it does, I feel it would be just as weak and stupid as saying that Obama is trying to indoctrinate our school children because of one youtube clip of a class of grade schoolers singing a song about him...

...Of course, that's just one little otaku's opinion.

PS: Watch my show: http://animefordummies.blip.tv

I don't remember MarzGurl mentioning Obama once in this video. Why did you feel the need to go on a mini rant about Obama criticizing? This video had nothing to do with him and nobody in the comments is talking about him but you. This kidnapping/ANE had NOTHING to do with Obama.

All gone

I hate it when people attribute anime automatically to the status of weird, childish, or creepy. Granted, it's still a bit of a niche market, but it's rapidly expanding, which means more people are getting into it, yet it still carries a bad name.

What probably irritates me most is how skewed the media can make a story, turning gothic vampire otaku chick into sweet lil' innocent Mary Sue (granted, the parents may have given one inaccurate photo, but I doubt between the school, friends, family, and other sources they didn't get an accurate one; the media just loves the dramatic and an innocent all-American girl makes for better press than Ebony-Hiyazaki-Cullen).

Eh, it'll blow over, hopefully. I know my parents attributed my distance from them due to anime for a while. It wasn't so much that as the divorce, fighting, second divorce, moving, and a slew of other factors; I think people like to place the blame elsewhere, even at the cost of real danger. Who knows what her home life was like or how she was received at school; apparently, it's all anime's fault.

This isn't surprising really, hell its a good thing this didnt' happen at a convention which would have made it even more awkward for people. Everyone knows that things happen at conventions (i.e. underage people having sex with older ones) and unfortunately they don't always come out because of mindsets like "oh we're in love", "it's just a con", or "well we have to because we're the pairing of our favorite characters" (yes this is an actual excuse that was used). Underage drinking, illegal drugs, whatever but you don't normally see it because it happens at the hotel rooms, houses, or wherever they con goers stay at however hotels do sometimes open themsleves up for convention lease which is nice but when illegal shit happens at the hotel and that is where the convention is....well shit tends to hit the fan pretty quickly.

It seems odd that that guy got 15 years seeing really the only thing he's guilty of is just taking advantage of what he considered favorable circumstances. I wonder if his lawyer pointed out that yeah he may have kidnapped her but she went willingly but then again I woudlnt' know if the journey took that in consideration or not. Worse is that now this girl has a reputation and she's going to go through the rest of her school life with that hanging over her head unless she moves to another state or country. Sucks to be you hun but this is your fault too.

I don't know if Marzgurl intended this or not but when she sais Oklahoma she had the same tone that Hank Hill usesto say Oklahoma lol

Anyway, hopefully panic doesnt start to sink in so parents will start thinking

Anime=Kidnapping

Keep up the good work MarzGurl

Marzgurl makes me happy

In the news reports, did they focus on the girl's interest in anime? I mean, I don't think anyone would start to hate it for that reason. Perhaps they would, if the only anime thing they've ever seen was tentacle porn, or something of that sort. I believe that the general public will still and always consider anime fans to be "nerdy". (I don't mean this in a derogatory way. ^^; I consider myself a nerd!) However, I do agree with you about the number of years that guy got sentenced to. I mean, rapists and murderers should get a more severe punishment than that.

Oh, the My Immortal refrence made me laugh.

But yeah, the stupidity of every side involved in all of this was just sad.

Its not he who got to hard punishment compared to the others, its the others who got to easy punishment compared to him.

As a Role Playing Geek I know this pain.

So this girl went with this guy because of selfasteem problems.
I know a lot nerds who could use a girlfriend. So deperate they can endure the twilight obsesion. And more like her age.
Hell i'm so desperate i could even date a twilight fan. (evenso i'm afraid how a twilight fanboy might look like.)

Yeah. Newer picture of her would had speed things up but also way how this was handled by media shows what those people working in it really are. But parents really should rake reponsibility from they own children. Then again its always easier to find something else to blaim instead.

you hit the nail on the head there