Last couple of days I’ve been introduced to one of the most subtle and effective propaganda mediums I’ve ever seen. It is master level work, no mistaking that. Nor is it the effort of one group, one company, one master, which pretty well confirms it as the work of a collective entity, a social force so cohesive as to have achieved an internal identity of its’ own.
What I am speaking of are the cartoon shows the Japanese market to the youth, the children, the form known as Anime. Gorgeous artwork in flawless animation, a wide range of characters, plot lines devised as perfectly crafted morality plays with a heavy bias in favor of education, a world filled with creative technologies to be called fantastic ideally suited to being incorporated into a child’s fantasy play. All in all quite entertaining.
So why claim it a propaganda medium dispensing despair, subtle or otherwise? Because of one other facet seemingly widespread through the genre: no victory over the various social evils incorporated into the morality play plotlines is ever portrayed as being the effort of strictly human abilities, real world verifiable common human abilities.
In the world of Anime only those possessing, or possessed by, some ability transcending the human ever achieve a victory. These supra-human abilities take a variety of forms ranging from savant intelligence wielding ultra-advanced technologies to influence among any number of mythical creatures acting to a wide variety of motives, or some combination of the above, but in the world shown the children only those who possess what cannot be had in reality ever prevail. The evils shown are very real in the world, but the things required to contest those evils quite unavailable if not down right impossible.
Do you see it? Do you see how this genre of entertainment becomes a most effective tactic in the cause of maintaining a corrupt and perverted status quo? Do you see how it plants the despair the status quo exploits to maintain its’ power base? As the children grow into their maturity one message is reinforced to them over and over to contradict the fantasies, the play that shaped the development of confidence and self esteem. You can’t contest the evils you see on a daily basis, you’re just a little human, an ordinary human. You don’t have any special powers, no one does. You don’t have allies among the mythical, the magical. You’re not special, you can’t be special. You? You’re just... ordinary. You’d better do what you’re told.
Of course it is an effective tactic, it’s oriental in it’s origin. The oriental, where the societies are so very old, such very old monsters dominating and enslaving the humans unfortunate enough to have been born into the hive. The oriental, that is currently waging covert cultural warfare against the free minds of the world. The enemy is a patient and subtle enemy of substance, and like any skilled enemy its’ first points of attack will target what provides the line of supply enabling a defense against the assault. Regardless of the nature of the combat despair in the enemy is a valuable weapon, and Anime is a fine weapon in the orient’s efforts to enslave the world. It just takes a generation or two for the damage done to reveal itself.
Hmmm...I wonder how different this anime is from Superman, Batman, X Men and other such comics produced in this country. Of those, Batman is the closest to being "ordinary," and even he had near-superhuman skills, finance and technology to call on. Very different from, say, The Lord of the Rings in which the hero, Frodo, is a very ordinary person from the least of the races, hobbits, who saved the world by simple perseverance in the face of overwhelming forces arrayed against him. But in the cartoon world, it mostly takes superhumans to save the world. Mostly. Sometimes it takes only a simple "Beep beep!"
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