Tokyo Damage Report

kanjidamage updates!

April 15th, 2012 | Category: Uncategorized

Tooting my own horn:  KANJIDAMAGE, my other site, where you can learn 1,700 kanji with Yo Mama jokes, is getting a little update! The nice guys at Mobalean improved the design, and I'm about to update the content with new lookalikes. If you're interested in learning kanji, check it out.

5 comments

ANOTHER LACUNA IN THE DISCOURSE: MODERN TIMES

April 12th, 2012 | Category: politics

 
Modern times brought us a lot of good shit , including: jazz, rock, rap, movies with rad special effects, Minesweeper、separation of church and state, Nina Hagen , the Simpsons, medicine besides leeches, feminism and civil rights, heavy metal, and comic books.
 
But there are a lot of bad things about it: pollution, atomic bombs, materialism that tells you “you are what you buy,” the idea that everything goes back to normal after a 30 minute episode, shallowness, the homogenization of local cultures, a mentality that everything is a plastic throw-away, the idea that training hard and spending years to achieve a goal is dumb (you should just buy the goal now and charge it to your card! Anything you can’t buy with a click is worthless!!!!), that Ronald MacDonald is more well-known than Jesus or Mohammed, the commodification of every single thing (turning everything into a product, the market is the only valid way of measuring worth), the fact that no one knows who the people in their community are, but we know details of celebrities’ sex lives or that Emma Stone has a wrinkle, the fact that we pay millions to guys that throw a ball or sing a shitty tune, but pay no attention and give no support to hometown heroes who help the homeless or volunteer at the old folks’ home. Oh, and 12 year old girls dressing like hookers and 10 year old boys spending all day killing things on the tv.
 
And underlying all these: that people under 90 years old can't even conceive of things being any other way. The older, more community-oriented or spiritual, non-market forms of thinking have been erased more effectively than the word for "freedom" was from the newspeak society of 1984. People don't even know what they are missing, they just feel fragmented inside and try to fill the void with plastic crap and internet porn.
 
That  laundry list of complaints is nothing new. Here is what is new:
 
The above critique of Modern Culture is actually shared by hippies and radical left people, AND radical right people ALL OVER THE WORLD (even racists and crazy Japanese nationalists = “Our young people are losing the traditional ways and all they are getting in return is Macdonalds and heart disease!”), and  what’s more, this critique is also shared by muslims (who are hated by both the left AND right) . . . .
 
 .. . and yet. . .
 
 There is NO ONE who is even trying to unify these groups to make a  counter-attack on Modern Times. There is NO ONE who is even interested in brinigng together the left, right, and muslims on this issue that they all totally agree on.
 
WTF man.
4 comments

ANOTHER LACUNA IN THE DISCOURSE: GLOBALIZATION

April 10th, 2012 | Category: politics

 
It’s impossible to have a good discussion of globalization for two dumb avoidable reasons and one very good reason.
 
The two dumb reasons misconceptions which are shared by both the left and the right, which guarantees that no one has an incentive to challenge them.
 
Misconception one: globalization is one thing. The fact is, the word “globalization” is so broad it encompasses like 100 different phenomena, some good and some bad. It’s not a take-it-or-leave-it proposition! We should be able to break it into easy-to-digest pieces and then debate them individually on their merits. I like this bit but not that bit. (the same problem applies to political parties in general: if you’re anti-abortion you have to be anti-envrionmental-regulation and pro-handgun. Huh?!?!?)
 
And yet, I have yet to see ONE fucking spreadsheet that analyzes globalization this way: tallies all the good shit on one side and all the bad shit on the other side.
 
Misconception two: globalization is something you can be for or against. It’s fucking not. Asshats like Thomas Friedman aren’t in favor of globalization. They’re in favor of one particular dickhole WAY of doing it. Which they present as the only way, saying things like, “Globalization is a trend that has been steadily building for 1,000 years so you can’t fight it, it’s a force of nature.” Bullshit, Einstein. Increasing trade and exchange of information between distant lands has been steadily increasing, yes. But! Things like the IMF, World Bank, neo-liberal economics, and  the network of Shadow Banks have only been in place for 50 years. So fuck you!!!
 
And protestors who say they are against globalization, aren’t in fact against it. They are against the particular way in which it’s being done these days. In fact a lot of third world countries (the ones that the western protestors are trying to “save”) really WANT globalization, but they just want the contracts and treaties to be written more fairly.   The fact is there are hundreds of different possible ways to do it, but the way the issue is framed prevents people from even beginning to think about that.
 
Moving on to the good but unavoidable reason it’s impossible to have a productive discussion about globalization:
 
As you start breaking it down into 100 bite-sized aspects, you at some point will find that you are now talking about the even more nebulous phenomenon of Modern Times In General.  Which is a concept so vague, so all-encompassing, it’s like asking “what is the meaning of life?” or “what is art?” . . . .in other words a real useless time-waster! There’s no real border between Globalization and modernity. Or whenever I start talking about it, I wind up complaining about neo-liberal economics instead.  It’s not even a venn diagram . . . it’s more like a fucking casserole where everything got melted together.
 
 It’s like trying to look directly at air!
 
 
POSTSCRIPT:
 
If I had to break globalization into bits and then arrange them on a scorecard, it would look like this:
 
Bad:
 
 
Super-national treaty organizations that allow unelected bureaucrats (appointed by big business) to overturn the member nations’ own labor or environmental laws without the public voting for it or, in most cases, even knowing that their own sovigreinity has been usurped. “Yeah, that Chinese beef you bought was genetically mutated, irradiated, hormone-fed, full of feces, and slaughtered by slave labor, but we’re not allowed to put a sticker on it explaining any of that, since that would be A VIOLATION OF THE TREATY and an INFRINGEMENT OF FAIR TRADE.” Informed consumer choices are so anti-free-market!
 
A “race to the bottom” where every country has to lower wages, lower corporate taxes, lower environmental and work safety rules in order to keep jobs.
 
Now people can move a billion dollars from Switzerland to the cayman islands and then to dubai with the click of a button in one second. This makes it easier for local warlords, dictators, terrorists, mafias, and large “respectable” corporations to avoid regulations and launder money. It also makes it easier for financial wall street types to destroy the economies of countries who don’t play ball: just a click of a button and all the capital goes somewhere else.
 
By assembling their goods in 5  foreign countries (as opposed to their home country), multinationals can cheat tax by using a technique called transfer mispricing. This hurts the third world especially, since that is where most of the raw material and labor is. Basically the corp. tells Bangladesh or Belize or whoever, “Yeah, you supplied the raw material and the non-union factory to assemble it. . . but wouldn’t you know it. . . that factory actually lost money! Because we sold the cars for 3 pesos apiece (to our OTHER subsidiary in the Bahamas. (Who then sold the cars in America for  $40,000 each)). So we don’t owe you any tax. Plus actually our corporate headquarters is in the Cayman Islands, so we only pay tax to the Caymans. The Cayman government charges us $5 a year. And that is totally legal! So, smell you later, Jose!”
 
Instead of torturing dissidents at home, America can set up torture rendition camps all over the globe! Where suspected “enemy combatants” can be tortured by 24 hours a day loops of It’s A Small World After All.
 
Good:
 
easy for me to visit America, cheap underwerar at walmart, big Macs taste the same in Uruguay!
 
The thing is, I know this list is only about 10% complete, because I’m not an economist, I’m a jerkoff  metalhead with some free time. So why don’t actual economists make a real list? Why is it up to me?!??
 
So I’m asking you people reading this: have you seen any lists of the good and bad aspects of globalization?
 
And, can anyone do a venn diagram that untangles globalism, modern times, and neoliberal economics?
 
1 comment

american school reform: a real heartbreaker

April 06th, 2012 | Category: politics
This is not a “how to reform schools” rant. That is another web page of mine. This is more like WHY IS IT SO EFFING HARD TO EVEN TALK ABOUT REFORM IN THIS FUCKING COUNTRY.
 
All discussions of reform seem to get hung up on 2 issues, both defined by the American right: unions and religion in schools.
 
These polarizing issues are enough to stall any meaningful discussion, so the other 98 aspects of this very difficult problem never get talked about!
 
My parents are teachers. And not just any teachers: my Dad taught at a institutional foster-home for kids who had basically been thrown out by their parents. I really respect him for that, since it would have been much easier for him to teach public school kids without so many issues.
 
And yet at the same time some of the people I most want to get revenge on are also teachers. Still. Right-wingers complain that teachers get paid too much, and yet support wars and private insurance companies. But just because right-wingers are insane doesn’t mean they are wrong. Wait, yes it does. Because the problem isn’t that certain teachers need a pay-cut, the problem is certain teachers need to be fired. Because they are assholes.
 
(ALSO:  why all the repubs concentrating on TEACHERS’ salaries? We should concentrate on firing all the extra administrators. Who knows what the fuck those people even do all day! That’s the way to save money: either fire the pencil-pushers or reform the education bureaucracy so that there is not a NEED for 1,000 forms to be filled out in the first place)
 
But unions can’t say “OK we’ll allow you to sack the burn-outs, the bullies, and the incompetents, in exchange for more wages for good teachers.” They can’t say this because there is no way to measure who is a good teacher.
 
That’s the central problem. And this sets teachers totally apart from other government bureaucrats, who are supposed to be interchangeable parts. As long as the dude from DMV knows the manual and all the rules, he is a good employee. But teaching is not like that! There is no manual for motivating students to have self-worth and aspire to go far in life!
 
 
How to separate good teachers from bad?
 
You can’t use standardized tests because, as the last 10 years of No Child Left Behind has shown, a) teachers will just help the kids cheat, b) they will force problem kids to drop out or put them in jail , because they drag down the average class test score, c) the teachers just “teach to the test” instead of teaching the non-quantafiable life lessons which , let’s face it, are what all of us remember about our favorite teachers.
 
 
How about popularity with students? All really good teachers are popular, but some of the most burn-out teachers are also popular, because they let you fuck around in class and give everyone a B.
 
Should we let the administrators and principals decide? Hell no! since the life-changing teachers almost universally stir up shit and are hated by the school administrators, who will use any bureaucratic tool to get rid of them?
 
How about we let the parents decide. Are you nuts? The bible-thumpers would flip out and within a week there would be no science or literature teachers left in the country.
 
 
At the unspoken center of the debate: what makes a teacher really life-changing and inspiring for students is NOT RANKABLE OR QUANTAFIABLE.
 
 
FUCKING SPUTNIK
 

 The race to space! (aka the race to have LRBMs). Back in the ‘50s, when Russia launched sputnik (demonstrating it had the technology to lob a fucking nuke missile at us from across the ocean), science and smarts became an immediate matter of national survival. It’s difficult to imagine, but  it used to be the most right-wing, General Jack D. Ripper type Crusty anti-commies that were pushing the HARDEST for more education.  Smart kids were seen as vital for national defense. WWII vets got the GI bill to repay them for being good warriors. If a modern right-winger went back in time to the ‘50s and started talking about reducing teacher salaries and sending all the kids off to private religious schools to learn about Jesus, they would be laughed out of the fucking Republican party, if not called a Commie agent!

 
 
WHY DOESN'T OUR TAX MONEY BUY RESULTS??
 
Liberals like to point out that “we spend more on each prisoner than each student.” But the fact is: USA still spends more on education per-pupil than most industrialized countries. The problem is, we aren’t getting good results for the dough. So why the fuck is that????
 
Throwing more money at a problem without finding out who is wasting the existing money is just gonna guarantee that the culprits will simply have more money to steal!
 
you can’t teach poor kids who are mostly worried about having to quit school to get money, or if their parents are sick and the insurance isn’t covering it, and they have to take care of their parents. Or if they ‘re mostly worried about doing all the household grown-up stuff their parents don’t have time to do because the parents are working 2 jobs each. You can’t teach kids who are mostly worried about gang violence, or their family being in jail.  Or if the parents are on drugs and they have to deal with that. They have other shit on their minds. But because of our separation of bureaucracies, the school system doesn’t have the power to fix poverty. And the social welfare bureaucrat says, “It’s not our problem if poor kids can’t learn, it’s the schools’ problem.”  
 
In other words: When you try to fix schools, you quickly run into half-a-dozen systemic problems that you have no power to fix: poverty, the penal system, the drug-treatment system, the  health-care system, religion,  labor law, and so on. And then when the kids don’t learn because the welfare system, penal, health-care, labor, and drug-treatment systems don’t work and the kids can’t concentrate on schoolwork, who gets blamed? The school systems! Better cut their budget, since they are crappy teachers!!!!
 
 
And when I say poor neighborhoods, I don’t mean Compton or Detroit. for every Compton or Detroit there are like a dozen white towns in the middle of nowhere, where there is nothing to do and all the jobs left because factories move to china, and so the parents re unemployed hillbillies strung out on meth.
 
But on the other hand, a lot of kids are assholes, too. They need to go to that special school where they will be the bullied, not the bullies. Talking about juvie. Later for all that “he is just misunderstood” crap. Remember that rolling stone article about the Michelle Bachmann school where the gay kids kept suiciding one after the other? It didn’t even mention penalties for the bullies. Not even to argue against the idea. Just not even on the fucking table. Can you believe that shit?
 

 

SCHOOL REFORM WITHOUT CURRICULUM REFORM?!?

 
Also: even when someone tries to reform schools, like michelle rhee, there is a lot of controversy. She’s great! She’s a fraud!  The righties scream “But more kids are graduating, barely!” and the lefties scream, “But she’s firing teachers!”
 
But even given all the media time debating it and all the public, grass-roots protests, NOT ONE MENTION ON EITHER SIDE of the actual CURRICULUM!! No one on either side cares what THE KIDS ARE ACTUALLY SPENDING ALL DAY LEARNING UNDER MS. RHEE.
 
And yet that subject is not even up for discussion in the media. It’s like reporters and pundits were never kids themselves, who never had to sit for 5 hours a week memorizing the exports of Chad or the life cycle of the common fern. Fucking adults, man.
 
 
 
“YAYYY!! OUR KIDS ARE GRADUATING AT A SLIGHTLY HIGHER RATE!!! THEY ARE JUST BARELY SMART ENOUGH TO PASS THE GRADUATION TEST WITHOUT BEING SHOT DEAD IN CLASS!! USA #1!” 
 
What the fuck. Is that where we are at, as a country?
That is just sad. It doesn’t matter if you are a indie, repub or dem,. . .that should be saddening.
 
Is our shit that small-time now? Cmon. Let’s talk about curriculum. Parents should ask themselves (regardless of politics) ARE MY KIDS LEARNING THE SAME RANDOM OUT OF CONTEXT FACTOIDS THAT I PROMPTLY FORGOT AS SOON AS I GRADUATED, OR ARE THEY LEARNING THE SHIT ABOUT LIFE THAT I JUST LEARNED AT 30 AND WISHED I HAD LEARNED SOONER?
 
Who wouldn’t want that for their kids?????
 
 
Fucking weird as hell . .. unless you remember exactly how much work it is being a parent!
 
Every parent, whether repub, dem, or indie, knows damn well that 90% of the shit they were forced to learn had no practical application and they forgot it as soon as they graduated. You’d think that being loving parents , preventing their own kids from undergoing these 10,000s of wasted hours would be a huge priority! And yet by the time people get older and busy and spend 5 years changing diapers, they are so worn down! By the time their kids are old enough to go to school, the parents say JUST TAKE THEM OFF MY HANDS FOR 8 HOURS A DAY, I COULD GIVE A FUCK WHAT YOU TEACH THEM. JUST LET ME HAVE SOME QUIET TIME.
 
And that’s sad.
 
 
TO SUM UP
 
 Repubs are like FIRE all the teachers!  Public schools are government socialism! Everything kids need to know they can learn from goldman sachs and jerry fallwell!!
 
Dems are like union power! Never fire any teachers!
 
And yet, ALL the adults had that one teacher: that taught much more about life than what their official state-mandated course was. That opened their eyes to new ways of thinking. All the adults had that one teacher that gave them more self esteem that taught them: you are capable of so much more than what your environment expects you to be. You have so many unique qualities that can be a boon to you an those around you. And ALL the adults had like 5 or 6 teachers that were burn outs bullies or just plain didn’t know what the fuck they were talking about, teachers that deserved the sack. 
 
I’m pretty sure if a person on one political side talked in detail about the teachers who changed their life for the better, the people on the other side would be like, “That teacher sounds great. We can agree that the system needs more people like that.”
 
 And if a person on the other political side talked about a teacher who was a dick or a waste-case, I’m sure their political opponents would remember the asshole teachers from their OWN youth and say, “Hey I agree with you too! That teacher was a clown! We need less teachers like that in the system!” And then we could fucking get down to business. 
 
And yet adults grow up and pretend everything is black-and-white, and use crappy schools to make political points about unions or privatization, rather than trying to help the kids. 
 
And then we wonder why kids hate adults.
6 comments

probably gone until april

February 16th, 2012 | Category: Uncategorized

working on a big musical project.

10 comments

comic market 2009 RONBUN ROUNDUP

December 22nd, 2011 | Category: Uncategorized

let's start this off modestly:

THE WATCHES ON MY ARM

 

This is a page-by-page review of all the watches dude owns. Not like the best watches. Just ones he owns.  The dude is defiantly analog:  writing about wind-up watches in a zine format.

POSTAL GUIDE VOL. 7

I didn't post any scans of the inside, because this is basically a guide to filling out post-office forms. Written not by the post office, but a post office customer/obsessive maniac.

I asked him why HE was doing it (instead of the post office itself) and he just looked at me, as if this should be self-evident.

Also: just like with the watch zine, there is something defiantly old-school about this. . . considering the USA post office is now considered obsolete and about to shut down!

 

THE ILLUSTRATED GUIDE TO TIC-TACS FROM AROUND THE WORLD

(at the bottom it adds: A MEMBER OF THE  "TABLET FIELD GUIDE CREATORS" ASSOCIATION) which should give you some idea.

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The scan shows tic-tacs of latin america and africa.

Each box is analyzed for the following criteria:

local maker

flavor

color

country of mexico

date bought

type of label (adhesive, etc.) (IS there even more than one type of label?!?!)

Comment:
 "There's more than I thought around here! I suppose South America wants some too!"

 

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ACADEMIC JOURNAL #23

 

 

This zine is thick- almost a pound! And consists mostly of reviews of the most eccentric or absurd books (fiction and non-) from around the world. Like a freak-show of books.

For example, here are some article titles:

"katakana foreign words I learned from anime"

"the author of this book is spiritually deluded!!"
"a book about animals trained to fight wars"

"I want to explain to fictional characters what their nuroses are"

"funny new subculture words  in Japanese Wikipedia"

"a book which is a fictional interview with barrack obama from america"

"a new manga which is entirely about anti-korean sentiments"

 

But the main article in this book is not about literature at all. The main article is an analysis of the physics and math involved in making 3d-animated boobs bounce realistically.

 

 

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S=?-2

 

This is the creation of a gentleman who is 1) obssessed with Eames furniture, and 2) interested to see what each Eames chair would look like as a moe girl.

The term for "anthropomorphism" in Japanese is 擬人化 (gijinka).

 

BLUE OCEAN SOMETHING SOMETHING

 

 

The same idea as the previous 'zine, but substitute "deep-sea life-forms" for "eames furniture."

Is this a great country or what?!?!?

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AN ILLUSTRATED GUIDE TO SURGERY AND THERAPY OF THE HEISEI (the current era) ERA

 

Here , a cartoon panda teaches you how to do surgery. Just like the Post Office book, this is not written by any official institution.

Below: the panda is dressed like Michael Jackson while teaching you different suture knots.

below: a rabbit helps the panda put on his/her surgical scrubs.

A GUIDE TO SEPARATING YOUR GARBAGE INTO RECYLABLE AND NON-RECYCLABLE, FOR OTAKU, MANGA, AND EROTIC PEOPLE.

 

 

A guide for specifially otaku items: your PC, your porno magazines, and (in a nice touch) your old comic market merchandise!

But the best part is this:

. . . how to break down your old pocket pussy to recycle it.

Also: the zine is printed on news-print. Kudos.
 

 

 

Another "ranking" zine, but this one is more tongue-in-cheek. The "categories" are different for each pen. For instance:

 

GUNDAM-NESS: *****

PROBABILITY THAT THE DESIGNER IS A FAN OF GANDAM W: *****

PROBABLITY THAT HE'S A HERO FAN: *****

THAT HE'S WORRIED ABOUT GANDAM 00: *****

FUNNY-NESS:******

the rest of the text:

You know how when a comedian you like debuts a new joke that you find un-funny, but you instantly adapt to it because you like the comedian?

This pen is not like that.

This pen combines the instant-transformation beloved by gundam fans with principles of ergonomics, and. . . .

Oh, forget it.

I'm sure there are lots and lots of reasons why it looks the way it does, but the fact is. . .

IT IS UNCOMFORTABLE TO USE!!!

I suppose that pens, like everything else which evolves, must have some false-starts in their evolution!

 

MOKONIKA YONJIJUKUGO

Mokonika's four-kanji expressions

 

 

 

 

This book is a really nice idea: they  take four-kanji idioms (yonjijukugo) and not only personify them as cute girls, but they do a little manga that shows the girl doing the thing.

The opposite page has her statistics as if she's a game character. Also the book's cover is designed to look like a elementary school-kid's kanji workbook.
 

NAME: ACCOU ZOUGON

SPECIAL ABILITY: every time she opens her mouth, bad things come out.

PERSONALITY: For her own benefit, or to shame others, she delights in putting on a magnificent display of abuse and scorn. If you see someone talking irresponsibly, making sure they aren't caught by the target, backstabbing, or spreading malice without ever making a mistake, you know it's her!  However, if confronted, she gives up more easily than a regular person.

MEMBERS OF SAME CATEGORY:　akkoubari, zannboubari, barizougon (none of these are in my dictionary, sorry.)

 

 

Right page:

PANEL 1:

STICK FIGURE GIRL: Thanks so much for helping me!

AKKOU ZOUGON: (taking off her mask) Don't worry about it. By the way. . .

PANEL2:

AKKOU ZOUGON: Is it true that your older brother is unemployed? That he's a hikikomori?

PANEL 3:

AKKOU ZOUGON: Everybody's saying it so I just happened to overhear. They say he's otaku, but to the extent that he stopped coming to school altogether? I was just wondering because everybody's talking about it

PANEL 4:

STICK FIGURE GIRL: (runs off crying)

PANEL 5:

GLASSES GIRL: You're enjoying yourself, aren't you? Even you shouldn't take things too far, Accou Zougon

PANEL 6:

 

GLASSES GIRL:  That girl's brother got hurt – he's been in the hospital. And of course he's unemployed – he's still in school, like us!

PANEL 7:

AKKOU ZOUGON: FUCK YOU, I HATE YOU!!!!!

PANEL 8:

NARRARATOR: (translation of above statement: you're so cool, i wish i could be more like you!)

H25

 

 

A "lifestyle magazine" for people who enjoy the ona-ho (short for onna-hole, which means "woman hole" which means "pocket pussy")

What makes this zine unique is that every issue has back cover which is a parody of a real lifestyle magazine: in this case, MEN'S NO-NO.

Below:  weekly sales rankings of the top 5 brands:

text on the cover reads:

ona-ho will save the world!

ona-ho and lotion!

limited edition and special collaboration ona-ho festival! wheeee!!

the lucky vibrator that calls the god of death!

i will become the unrivalled king of winter ona-hos!!!!!

 

also in the issue:

How to make a glove out of fried bean paste so when you jack off it feels like someone else doing it.

masturbation-related chinese zodiac forcasts

final page just says "this space for rent"

 

 

 

 

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Just that! it only works if you already have the english transcript but can't find the slang in your J-E dictionary.

 

DAILY LIFE WITH YOUR PROSTHETIC LEG

 

 

 

The main article in this one is , how to change the batteries in your prosthesis. I didn't even know they HAD batteries.

 

DO YOU LIKE ROMANCE???

The lovely but absurd world of Harlequin Romances

This is yet ANOTHER review zine, reviewing only japanese translations of Harlequins! It comes complete with its own 3 ranking categories:

ROMANTICNESS

REDICULOUSNESS

STORY QUALITY

 

The standout review, which the zine seller helpfully pointed out to me is this:

a review of NIGHT OF MADAM BUTTERFLY – a novel about a western woman who goes to Japan and gets laid.

(romanticness 3, rediculousness 5, story 3)

 

the title of this section is:

GEISHA COSPLAY AND SUPER-EXPENSIVE BONSAI GIFTS ARE THE WAY TO A MAN'S HEART?

 

It goes on to print an extract from the book, which takes place at a bath-house, where the Japanese man says to the foreign lady:

"When in Japan, you should forget your western attitudes about nudity.  Here, mixed bath-houses are common. We're not embarrassed of our bodies. Neither should you be! Perhaps the fat or aged are another matter, but you've got a nice style there, so you shouldn't be shy about it."

The zine author then goes on to make fun of the book for saying the heroine bought her man a 370-year-old bonsai: "No one would be able to afford such a thing, and even if it did exist, it would be listed as 'a national treasure' and not for sale! Clearly the heroine got decieved by the bonsai seller."

the final verdict?

"This book thoughtlessly gets the details of our culture all wrong.  Perhaps only a foreigner can fully enjoy the "exotic Japan" atmosphere of it. "

 

CONVENIENCE CAFE AU-LAIT REVIEW

 

 

 

 

Just like all the other "ranking" zines. Honestly there are hundreds more of these things. I include this one because they went the extra mile and included a diagram which familiarizes the reader with how to read their coffee-ranking diagrams:

 

 

COFFEE AMOUNT:

MILK AMOUNT:

SWEETNESS:

MAKER, PRICE, QUANTITY, CALORIES

COMMENTS

THE HISTORICAL BOYS LOVE MANGA OF JAPAN

 

 

This book is amazing!  The guy gets these real, historical gay pornos from back in samurai times, and "translates" them from old-timey Japanese to modern Japanese. He says that, although we would today call the pornos "fiction", or "manga",  they are actually closer to journalism – such distinctions were not made back in those days.

In the passage below, well, you figure it out.

 

 

As a bonus, here are some indies gag comics I've picked up over the years.

 

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that's right: SUPER-DEFORMED HITLER!!!!

 

 

. . . AND HERE ARE SOME RANDOM UH BL ("boys'-love") MANGA:

 

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this is the only ultra-man sex joujinshi i could find. I must have gone to 2 or 3 comic conventions looking for this kind of godzilla-fucking-ultraman's-ass stuff, and the guys at the tables stocked with underage rape-porn would be offended , like really indignant , that i would even ASK them such a thing: SHIRANAI!!!

 

I don't know what is so offensive about it. I guess comics should only be used for porn, never just for humor? But finally just by chance i found this one, which is kind of nice.

 

 

 

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8 comments

Mexico