nDroae said:Here's an actual "SJW" POV on this show. TL;DR, they don't like it either.
https://www.animefeminist.com/review-between-the-sky-and-sea-episode-1/
Emphases added:
Do y’all remember the 90s? More specifically, the “Grrl Power” movement that suffused a lot of western (particularly American) media at the time? It was a particular kind of well-meaning-but-tryhard media, often written by men, that wanted to let you know that GIRLS CAN DO ANYTHING and they’re TOUGH AND INDEPENDENT…but along the way usually painted sexism in laughably two-dimensional terms and either failed to examine or outright perpetuated more subtle forms of sexism and misogyny.
(...)this premiere also undercuts its own seemingly sincere message at every turn. The six leads are broad archetypes who act out pre-approved designations of quirkiness, and Haru in particular is so far along the “clumsy ditz” scale that I was left afraid for the safety of her coworkers. And the male antagonists are the type to loudly shout “girls shouldn’t be allowed in this field!” so that the audience can pat themselves on the back and say “well, I’m not that bad.”
(...)
The girls’ boss is the cherry on top, the only woman we’re shown in a position of authority…who is extremely emotional at the drop of a hat and repeatedly needs reigned in (sic) by her levelheaded male assistant. I’m still puzzling over her outburst at one of the recruits using “boku”—is it because any kind of masculinity is a betrayal of The Cause? Because her assistant lightly touched the girl on the shoulder, and The EssJayDubyahs are calling any kind of friendly, innocuous touch sexual harassment? I’d like to know what kind of straw feminist I’m dealing with here, show.
(...)
You did indeed try, show. I kind of wish you hadn’t.
I relate to these comments.
Dawnstorm: The bizarrest thing about this is that anime girls have been doing these sort of things for years and years and years, and the expectation is that men exist at best as background radiation. I went into this show taking this fantasy space so for granted that it took me a whole second to realise what was going on.
Ayal92: You nailed it. After an anime where tankery is a female only sport a fictional job with gender politics straight out of 1950 is really jarring.
There is one girls vs. boys CGDCT I really loved:
https://myanimelist.net/anime/5141/Taishou_Yakyuu_Musume
It's set in the 1920's, so the boys' attitude is to be expected, and they are portrayed with humanity, not as cardboard antagonists. The way the conflict worked out was more satisfying than I expected.
but the girls lost