Do you think Tate no Yuusha/Shield Hero will cause the next big "controversy"?

Dhyan_manu said:


Just to make sure are you talking about WN or LN coz many things doesn't happen in LN. If you are talking about WN then you are in wrong place since the anime is adapted from LN and it doesn't follow WN after volume 4.

NthDegree said:

I'm talking about the LN. I tried reading the WN first but it was written so bad that I couldn't get past a chapter... It was like reading a theater play script.

If LN is the toned down version... I don't wanna even think about what the WN is like.

Grey-Zone said:
It doesn't help that Naofumi originally buys Raphtalia with the ulterior motive of venting his frustrations against Myne on Raphtalia by using her as a "substitute", but he changes his mind when he sees that her mind is already more broken than his own at that point, as well as the fact that he has to infact help her to overcome her trauma at least to some extent just so she can actually do the work he bought her for to begin with and by that time he is already too attached to her.

jal90 said:
The more I know about this show, the more confident I am that I'm dodging a bullet by skipping it. The controversy will be entertaining to follow though.

gastert said:


At first I don't get how people will offended. But I get it now, child slavery huh? And a girl of course. I hope people understand this is just a story and not someone promoting slavery or misogyny.

NthDegree said:

Have you considered the possibility of it being just a story AND promoting slavery and misogyny? Those two aren't exclusionary, you know.

Nurguburu said:
Don't feed SJW like Zac Bertschy, they are just a bunch of trolls.



Why?

NthDegree said:

Have you considered the possibility of it being just a story AND promoting slavery and misogyny? Those two aren't exclusionary, you know.

gastert said:


Well, I have considering it, but I don't think it is promoting slavery or misogyny. Well I only read upto volume 4 of LN anyway. How about you, do you think the author promoting slavery and misogyny?

NthDegree said:

Oh boy, you have not been reading my earlier comments on the thread, have you?

Promoting slavery is simple: the MC supports actual slavery by being a slave master. That's bad enough but furthermore


I've mostly focused on the slavery bit but as for misogyny

EDIT: tl;dr: Guys get to be heroes, girls get to be slaves. Real subtle, guys.

Dhyan_manu said:

Can you mention in which volume of LN this happens? Don't tell me WN coz I even created thread for it.

NthDegree said:

NthDegree said:

Oh boy, you have not been reading my earlier comments on the thread, have you?

Promoting slavery is simple: the MC supports actual slavery by being a slave master. That's bad enough but furthermore


I've mostly focused on the slavery bit but as for misogyny

gastert said:


Hmm, you have really good points there. If we see it that way, the MC is really not a great person. I think the author is really good at playing the sympathy card to make us like the MC. But honestly, the MC is somewhat realistic in his mind and action (yeah he is sometimes irrational or too rational). Still, I don't think it will impactful enough for people in the real world to do slavery because of this story (I hope so).

For the misogyny part, well I can't really argue. I should admit I change some of my opinion about this part. But still I think it is not that bad for a story like this.

And for your last paragraph, if that is really happen that is so f**ked up.

NthDegree said:

Well, the main point I was arguing here was that it promotes slavery and misogyny. How much it affects the viewers is a separate argument. At the very least, I can say that it makes the story impossible to enjoy for me and there might be others that feel the same way. I'm glad you're so understanding.

Dhyan_manu said:


You are right about expressing your opinion. Well it's a seinen series when people watching they will or should be ready for extreme contents in my opinion.
Also the MC was never meant to be loved he is more famous as the shield demon than his other name great sage, he couldn't save the girl who owed to be his shield(I am upset about that even now), he couldn't protect the one who have gave his dignity the queen and in the end he couldn't save anyone(in the original ending not the trashy fan service ending later on).
I am a berserk manga fan so I like these type of stuff.

Dhyan_manu said:


You are right about expressing your opinion. Well it's a seinen series when people watching they will or should be ready for extreme contents in my opinion.
Also the MC was never meant to be loved he is more famous as the shield demon than his other name great sage, he couldn't save the girl who owed to be his shield(I am upset about that even now), he couldn't protect the one who have gave his dignity the queen and in the end he couldn't save anyone(in the original ending not the trashy fan service ending later on).
I am a berserk manga fan so I like these type of stuff.

NthDegree said:
Promoting slavery is simple: the MC supports actual slavery by being a slave master. That's bad enough but furthermore

NthDegree said:
I've mostly focused on the slavery bit but as for misogyny

NthDegree said:
EDIT: tl;dr: Guys get to be heroes, girls get to be slaves. Real subtle, guys.

Grey-Zone said:

You forgot the most important thing though: He never treats them as slaves. Infact, he basically becomes their slave, or rather becomes a sort-of a parent who spoils his children a lot.




First you claim that a single female character doesn't debunk that that the author or story is "promoting misogyny", then you proceed to use one character as "proof" that females are somehow being collectively sexualized, but that's not how it works. Quite the opposite, infact. If you want to prove that sexualization applies to all and exclusively the females, (or that the story and/or author promote misogyny) you have to prove that it applies to every single female character while ALSO hoping that no male counter-example is mentioned by someone else or that the sexualization of a female character is debunked.

If you want to explain something with an "exception" then you have got the burden of proof to explain WHY it's an exception to the rule rather than a counter-point that outright disproves your claim. Since you accused the author and/or the story of "being misogynistic" in the first place.


Also let me raise the stakes with the following counter-argument a bit: This series presents ALL characters as individuals rather than some collective label. Every character is their own person. This claim directly contradicts your claim. Now who is right? Or are we both wrong?

Regarding the "agency of female characters", there is an arc in the WN where Naofumi goes crazy and becomes a sort-of mad scientist and the rest of the cast have to save him from his own crazyness. You get plenty of that stuff there.



Again the girls never get treated like slaves, and there's also Fohl, a male character with a lot of screentime, among the main cast who is also Naofumi's slave, so you aren't really correct there.

In addition "being a hero" is not as nice as it sounds. Getting several screws loose PERMANENTLY everytime you feel particulary strong emotions in an environment where you have to constantly fight for your life is not something anyone would willingly want to participate in. Infact the various female characters are on average by far more stable, grounded and mature when compared to the male ones the only exception for male side being Naofumi (though only at time), the blacksmith guy, as well as...



So no, I am certainly far from convinced that there's anything problematic like you describe in this series. The series does has several flaws in it's writing and some "convenient" asspulls (both positive and negative for the protagonist) that disregards or overwrites the lore we learned about beforehand.




Also never use Mayne as an example or representation for ANYTHING. Just don't. If you know about the part with the Queen you should also be aware at that point that Mayne is a complete and utter psychopath. There also spoiler reasons why she in particular should never be used as an example or representation of ANYTHING, but that's really big spoilers so I won't even dare to mention it here. Just know that any collective argument based on her is worth nothing.

NthDegree said:
@Grey-Zone Too long to quote. I'll just use numbers again.

1. That doesn't debunk anything what I said, you know. I was arguing that the show promotes slavery, because it is treated as a good thing

Do you not agree that most of the time the show portrays slavery positively?

2.

3. Again, it doesn't matter if being a hero is 'fun' or not. At the very least, heroes have agency while the slaves don't. The rest of your explanation is irrelevant to my argument. By the way, you're casually dropping pretty major spoilers there about the heroes.

Dhyan_manu said:

Still the modern day society doesn't know enough about slavery to be outrageous about this topic. Most people will even ignore that fact later on since he never treats them as slaves or use their slave curse.
In regarding promoting slavery I don't think some of the extreme depictions of slavery in raphtalia's back story helps that. Some scenes even terrifies me when raphtalia stood strong even when tortured as slave hoping shield hero would come to save her like their parents said but after her best friend's death she realised reality which gives me goosebumps how that scene will be animated.

Dhyan_manu said:

Still the modern day society doesn't know enough about slavery to be outrageous about this topic. Most people will even ignore that fact later on since he never treats them as slaves or use their slave curse.
In regarding promoting slavery I don't think some of the extreme depictions of slavery in raphtalia's back story helps that. Some scenes even terrifies me when raphtalia stood strong even when tortured as slave hoping shield hero would come to save her like their parents said but after her best friend's death she realised reality which gives me goosebumps how that scene will be animated.

NthDegree said:

If we bring your argument about slavery to the modern world, you're saying that we're not allowed to condemn slavery or human trafficking because there is not enough research about whether it's bad or not?

Regarding to Raphitalia's scene... spoilers much? That being said even if some negative examples do exist they're only a fraction of the screentime MC gets to show off its 'good-sides' and benefiting from them. Ergo, it is reasonable to say that the show as a whole does promote it.

Dhyan_manu said:

Also there are many recent anime which involves slavery like for example
Isekai maou
Death March
I didn't see people complaining especially in isekai maou.

NthDegree said:

Firstly, somebody else doing a bad thing doesn't make it acceptable to do the same.

Secondly, the slavery in Maou was accidental and treated as a problem to be solved (at least in the first episode that I saw). One might argue about how it may not be in best taste either, but at least it's not as bad as the MC outright supporting it.

I can't say anything about Death March because I haven't seen it. I do remember people complaining about slavery in Hyakuren no Haou to Seiyaku no Valkyria though.

Dhyan_manu said:

Even the MC knows it was bad that he is using slaves especially younger ones but he realised he had no choice read chapter 3 of manga.

NthDegree said:
1. That doesn't debunk anything what I said, you know. I was arguing that the show promotes slavery, because it is treated as a good thing

Do you not agree that most of the time the show portrays slavery positively?

NthDegree said:
2.

By the way, sexualization and being sexual are different things. You're confusing the terms.

NthDegree said:
3. Again, it doesn't matter if being a hero is 'fun' or not. At the very least, heroes have agency while the slaves don't. The rest of your explanation is irrelevant to my argument. By the way, you're casually dropping pretty major spoilers there about the heroes.

NthDegree said:

Once again, those rules are arbitrarily decided by the author. That only happens because the author wants it to. Nothing about your argument suggests that the parts depicting it positively don't exist even if brief hesitation may exist. For the majority of the screentime it's positive and beneficial to the MC.

Vooo said:
Stay off social media if you’re sensitive

Grey-Zone said:

It doesn't treat it as a "good" thing. Never. It's a measure made out of neccessity, because he has a shield with that effect with that specific requirement (and considering it's the same thing that also spawned the "curse series", no one would view the legendary weapons as a "moral guide"), because every bit of strength counts when you are literally fighting a battle that would result in complete extinction of the world if they lose. "Sorry everyone died! We just couldn't bring it upon ourselves to commit slavery or raise child soldiers! I'd rather have the world go extinct than resort to that!" - such a view might be understandable, but take into consideration that not everyone would just give in to death and world extinction for the sake of upholding morals. And "it might not be neccessary in the end"? That's always easy to say in hindsight - but a difficult to swallow pill in death once it turns out to have really been necessary, with all the high stakes.

Also you are insisting that it's slavery despite it effectively being completely different from what anyone would ever consider to be slavery

slavery (naofumi ver.) is different from slavery (earth ver.), the former doesn't share anything with the latter other than the name. Infact Naofumi's "version" of it is essentially only the fantasy part that doesn't even exist on earth, i.e. the slave seal, but contains nothing of what we consider slavery in our world, i.e. oppression and being used for undesireable work while being treated like an object in possession. At most it's comparable to conscription.



That presumes a collectivist world-view in the first place. Why are you even grouping up female characters in the first place by default? Is there any reason why people would presume that Mayne represents the other female characters? It baffles me that you, BY DEFAULT, make that presumption.

And you completely lost me in regards to "agency". What do you even mean by that? Please elaborate.

Because if you mean that they just "fulfill their role", then so do the heroes, the only difference being that in comparison to those two female characters in a position of power, the heroes, other than Naofumi, are just extremely bad at it and get controlled by their delusions that it's all a "just a game"

As for the king? The only thing he actually does is the hero summoning and... other than that in his relationship with his wife... and so it takes a long long time until a certain "plot twist" much much later on that he actually does something.

I guess if "doing something other than just fulfilling one's role regularily" is the condition to "have agency", then even Naofumi doesn't pass since he pretty much always gets dragged into things rather starting it himself aside from a few minor things that aren't very significant.

So who DOES fulfill the condition? The only ones off the top of my head are the blacksmith guy and the martial arts granny.


I have a hard time understanding how you can consider people living under a delusion and getting their minds messed up by supernatural transforming weapons as having more agency than anyone else in the story. It's not like Naofumi forbade the slaves to do anything unless he explicitly allows it. Infact considering how many times in the story any mind control magic just outright overpowers the slave seal, that slave seal doesn't even really seem relevant most of the time.

Infact the story makes quite a deal out of it that every time the heroes going out doing something on their own, solo, usually leads to a huge mess afterwards. That includes Naofumi (though his lack of attack power makes that considerably rare). In turn when the slaves do something out of their own initiative, it has a positive effects most of the time.

Dhyan_manu said:
Without those rules why would the heroes even fight the waves or get stronger they would have stopped fighting the moment when glass kicked their ass. Those rules are meant for mandatory fighting not to increase slaves. You are going too deep into this slavery thing hence you feel everything author is doing is for promoting slavery so he can earn more slaves in real life?
I never felt anyone surrounding naofumi as a slave. To begin with who is slave and master by definition.
If you have read WN completely you know that slavery was abolished in the end since the slave village later became small country and residents there as the Royal members of the country.

lordrhem said:
good just in the beginning, after that, harem slave..

i want corrupted mc.! (lol)

Dhyan_manu said:

You do realize that harem and slavery doesn't mean it's bad. Majority of harem haters are either elitists or feminists because the first had watched too many anime that they forgot what is anime true purpose (of course its for entertainment) and the second one better not talk about them since they can't differentiate fantasy with reality.

MABfan11 said:


harem does have the potential to be really good: several character archetypes interacting with each other while having their own storyline and development that may cross with another character's story and devolpment

but usually it ends up being girls with no storyline or development of their own hanging around a bland MC

Dhyan_manu said:


Bland MC? Are you talking about naofumi lol. He has so many emotions and expresses them clearly, the shield of wrath is a symbol of that.
He is strategic in fights and has a charm to attract so many big shots like slave trader and many more. You might have misunderstood what bland character means watch death March you will know what bland character is like.

KreatorX said:


You misunderstood his argument.

It wasn't about Naofumi at all, it was about the structure of harem with girls helicoptering around the same dick, and a majority of harems have the tendency to have a "bland"/indecisive MC. Furthermore, there are people who simply dislike the whole dynamic of a bevy of girls fawning for the same person (be it in fiction/fantasy or in reality)

gastert said:

Lol. I think both of you only defend your arguments against each other until to the points it confuse me (and maybe both of you too) what it is that both of you try to defend anymore lol.

It seems this is just two different viewpoints in the end. I think his/her points is just not liking the way the topics handled in the story. Maybe he/she just doesn't like the story of tate no yuusha (correct me if I wrong).

NthDegree said:
@Grey-Zone I like you much more when your posts are this concise.

By agency I mean (non-evil) character's ability to make decisions that affect the plot or status quo based on their own motivations. So for example the MC deciding to

is a decision with agency since he did that for his own needs and it was a major change. However,

is not a decision with agency because it's defined by her relation to the MC (and him being in trouble) and it's used to preserve status quo.

If you like we can talk only up until that point in the manga, sure. To my understanding it follows the LN plot so there shouldn't be any major differences.

So does he benefit from slavery?

NthDegree said:
@Grey-Zone I like you much more when your posts are this concise.

By agency I mean (non-evil) character's ability to make decisions that affect the plot or status quo based on their own motivations. So for example the MC deciding to

is a decision with agency since he did that for his own needs and it was a major change. However,

is not a decision with agency because it's defined by her relation to the MC (and him being in trouble) and it's used to preserve status quo.

NthDegree said:
If you like we can talk only up until that point in the manga, sure. To my understanding it follows the LN plot so there shouldn't be any major differences.

NthDegree said:
So does he benefit from slavery?