#I thought my readers should be able to understand “Otaku” “BL” and “Yuri” without explanation

[asaka-lucy-dr-rc]

what would you say are some intresting differences between japanese and english speaking fandom spaces?

I find it interesting that the topic of gender and sexual orientation of characters is often discussed in English fandom. This is a topic that is rarely seen in Japanese fandom, so I was a bit surprised at first, but now I think it is an interesting topic. 🙂

I would like to add here that it is not that Japanese people do not talk much about gender and sexual orientation itself, but rather that we do not discuss the gender and sexual orientation of anime or game characters using general terms. For example, when we talk about a real-life person's sexual orientation, we use general terms like "he's gay," but we almost never use the word "gay" for a character unless that word appears in the story. Instead, for example, they say "ホモい(homoi)" to a gay-feeling boy character, or "百合百合しい(yuriyurishii)" to a lesbian-feeling girl character. * The word "ホモい(homoi)" was coined by adding the "い(i)" at the end of many adjectives in Japanese to the homo-sexual word "homo-". The word "homo" has a history of being used as a discriminatory term, so it is probably not used much these days.

There are many ways of saying this when Japanese otaku talks about such topics. For example, when boy characters seem to have a very close relationship with each other, they sometimes say "BLみを感じる (feeling BL-ish)" to refer to such a state. An anime with many scenes in which the girl characters are close and friendly to each other is sometimes referred to as "百合成分多め (full of yuri ingredient)". We do not say these things to real people. There is a possibility that we could talk about idols or other people in the entertainment industry using such words, but that is because we think those people are some kind of fantasy existence.

In this way, Japanese otaku are quite divided in the language they use for fictional characters and for real people, so I was surprised to see the English fandom discussing or expressing the gender and sexual orientation of characters using the same words and flag colors they use for real people. But I find it interesting that some of these discussions make sense and I think, "Oh, sure, I can see why this character would look like that".

I don't know why there's such a difference between Japanese fandom and English fandom, but I suspect it's simply because Japanese otaku tend to be as secretive as possible about their fan activities, not just on topics like this, so they use such special terms or wording so that non-otaku can't understand what they're talking about. (The way Japanese fans talk about their favorite characters is almost like it's a coded message. 😄)

In fact, I'm curious if people in the English fandom have ever been approached by someone they had no intention of talking to because they were using common terms to talk about their favorite characters. 🤔 To those who have read this post, I would love to hear your experiences or opinions in the comments or through an ask!