East Asians fascinate — about as fully alien, as they are, from Western culture as one can get on this, God’s Green Earth, save for, perhaps, untouched indigenous tribes of the Amazon or remote islands of the Andaman Sea. (But in such places, you’re more likely to be speared than culturally enriched, like the missionary who went to spread God’s word and ended up dispatched to meet Him, presumably, in the afterlife.)
I haven't perused the links (yet), but I feel obligated to note that, as strange as Japanese culture can be, it produced Toshiro Mifune. Consider this trailer to "Mifune" as an eyewash to shokushu goukan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZT_54ZbpXI Then again, I think in some ways Mifune and Kurosawa were more "American" than most Americans.
I re-watched some Kurosawa films recently, and then listened to some commentary and watched some documentaries. I learned that Kurosawa was heavily influenced by the work of John Ford. Ford influences Kurosawa, Kurosawa plots are plagiarized by Sergio Leone, Clint Eastwood influenced by Leone. And on and on.
A Western male can consider himself worldly and experienced with nothing more than champagne slippers, but nothing debases the psyche like Japanese porn. Once seen, it cannot be unseen. One almost wonders if it is better to stick with Juarez dog and pony shows, than to venture into the Japanese libido. I think it is the ritualistic nature of it that disturbs the mind the most.
Two related points: 1. They come by tentacle porn honestly, in that it's got a storied history, and one of Japan's most famous and valuable artworks, "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife", is a 200-year old woodcut of a giant octopus having its way with a woman, made by Hokusai, the artist known for "The Great Wave", and 2. if you think bizarre fetish porn reached its pinnacle in Japan, I challenge you to watch the movie "Re-Animator", where you wil be treated to a headless body holding its head by the hair between the legs of a bound, screaming woman so that the disembodied, dripping head can perform cunnilingus on the squirming victim. It's as bizarre, twisted and yes, funny, as anything the Japanese have come up with.
For me personally, what I find more disturbing than any perversion displayed in Hentai, is the manga/anime series combining two typical adolescent male obsessions, that of armored vehicles of the 1930s-40s with the fantasy of young quasi-Asian female characters dressed in school uniforms, the title is "Girls und Panzer" or "Garupan". To me this is a clanging bell sounding an alert that entire groups of males, not just in Japan, will never attain maturity. Hopefully they will not succeed in breeding. It means, okay, you can know everything about a military technology from a certain period of time, and then imagine that impossible archetype of Elven nubile females will want to join you in your obsession and worship you for it. No reason to develop any skills which actually help maintain a viable civilization.
Godzilla was a gateway drug.
I haven't perused the links (yet), but I feel obligated to note that, as strange as Japanese culture can be, it produced Toshiro Mifune. Consider this trailer to "Mifune" as an eyewash to shokushu goukan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZT_54ZbpXI Then again, I think in some ways Mifune and Kurosawa were more "American" than most Americans.
On the other hand, they officially consider themselves literal aliens as in from a planet far, far away.
And I see no reason to dispute that.
I re-watched some Kurosawa films recently, and then listened to some commentary and watched some documentaries. I learned that Kurosawa was heavily influenced by the work of John Ford. Ford influences Kurosawa, Kurosawa plots are plagiarized by Sergio Leone, Clint Eastwood influenced by Leone. And on and on.
A Western male can consider himself worldly and experienced with nothing more than champagne slippers, but nothing debases the psyche like Japanese porn. Once seen, it cannot be unseen. One almost wonders if it is better to stick with Juarez dog and pony shows, than to venture into the Japanese libido. I think it is the ritualistic nature of it that disturbs the mind the most.
Two related points: 1. They come by tentacle porn honestly, in that it's got a storied history, and one of Japan's most famous and valuable artworks, "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife", is a 200-year old woodcut of a giant octopus having its way with a woman, made by Hokusai, the artist known for "The Great Wave", and 2. if you think bizarre fetish porn reached its pinnacle in Japan, I challenge you to watch the movie "Re-Animator", where you wil be treated to a headless body holding its head by the hair between the legs of a bound, screaming woman so that the disembodied, dripping head can perform cunnilingus on the squirming victim. It's as bizarre, twisted and yes, funny, as anything the Japanese have come up with.
I've spent a lot of time there and I love to characterize the strangest of places for a Westerner, Japan, as "a cartoon that's real".
For me personally, what I find more disturbing than any perversion displayed in Hentai, is the manga/anime series combining two typical adolescent male obsessions, that of armored vehicles of the 1930s-40s with the fantasy of young quasi-Asian female characters dressed in school uniforms, the title is "Girls und Panzer" or "Garupan". To me this is a clanging bell sounding an alert that entire groups of males, not just in Japan, will never attain maturity. Hopefully they will not succeed in breeding. It means, okay, you can know everything about a military technology from a certain period of time, and then imagine that impossible archetype of Elven nubile females will want to join you in your obsession and worship you for it. No reason to develop any skills which actually help maintain a viable civilization.