White obsession
It's hard being a reader that can read beyond the text in relation to culture, race, gender, and class because they hate it when you write educated conclusions and questions.
But anyway, I just want to yap about how a lot of manga, especially reincarnation managa have this white worship aspect. Let a character have blonde hair and blue eyes, they're now the peak of beauty within the story.
I was reading, "Wounds Shared Between Girls" out of boredom because I don't really care for stories that take place in highschool since I'm in University now. And as I'm reading, one of the fls goes on about her, "...look and noble lineage..."
Looks being blonde hair and lineage being just having a British father. That's it. Ngl, I stopped reading here because it was already boring.
But my point is how common it is in manga to worship commonly white features. And not just any white features, other than their noses, but features that even white people want, such as blue eyes, and blonde hair.
And this just reads as loser behavior to me, because why are you as an Asian person with none of these features pushing these features as better than yours? Commonly even going so far as to call characters with straight black/brown Hair, smaller eyes, and black/brown eyes, as plain.
Now, to talk about the anime style in general, that being, big eyes, and a straight nose. If the character didn't have an Asain name or a setting in Asia, you would not know they were Asian. You can say that's just the art style, but they simply don't look like an Asain person who has not had work done.
Big eyes and a straight and pointing nose simply isn't a commonly Asain feature without plastic surgery. (Comic art styles are really good for distinguishing race in art. Ex.Jojo's Bizarre adventure, Gachiakuta, and etc)
But, hey, this is all just my cultural perspective as an American person of color. I'd like to hear other perspectives without me being reduced to just some American with dirty Western thoughts
Messages
it's actually a little crazy the amount of manhwas (korean btw), mangas (japanese T.T), and manhuas (chinese!!) have their asian main characters (even side charas) looking completely white?? like at one point white people colonised you and you're gonna say the best looking features is that of a white man? the brainwashing is concerning.
ntm the amount of times they use studying abroad (always in a western country and 93% the usa) as some sort of marker for their child to be a genius when it's only a marker of the family being unfairly wealthy. instead of trying to make the mc look western (..white..) why not just have diverse side characters (diverse doesn't equal white or light skinned btw). it's also a colourism issue, which is huge in asia.
one of my fav books is tgcf but im not gonna defend the colourism woven throughout. hua cheng is a ghost king so a ghost being so pale he's almost translucent blah blah sure lemme give mxtx that. but xie lian has been a scrap collector for the better part of 8 centuries (means he's roaming around outside underneath the sun that even his bamboo hat shouldn't fully stop the the tanning that's supposed to happen) and u expect me to believe that he's as white as snow—which, sorry ppl white as snow, that looks a little sickly :((
and it's a prevalent issue where as soon as they're talking about some peerless beauty they have to be fair or likened to some white material, usually snow -_- as if people with darker skin can't be a beauty ;_;
GENUINELY!!!! manhwas, especially of the historical fantasy genre, are so fucking Eurocentric its a little gross at times. don't even get me started on the 'tan skin = barbaric/eccentric/foreign' trope where the female lead 'saves them' from themselves and their culture on her white saviour ass mission.
I know a lot of South Korean beauty standards have been heavily influenced by western imperialism but it's sad at times when most manhwas won't even acknowledge traits that exist outside of that mould, especially in this day and age. why're we chasing a romanticized version of 'the ideal woman' that was created to exaggerate your 'inferiority' to white people? its literally ridiculous omfg.
also its so fucking gendered, as in when there ARE tan skinned characters who aren't show in any orientalist light, they'll almost always be male and/or a side character. what is up with that??!! ive seen a few manhwas really honour middle eastern and south asian cultures but unfortunately they're just a minority and STILL fall into stereotypes. whatever.
it just speaks of this entire escapist fantasy of the perfect white woman living up to ideals that were created to be impossible. at least to me.
Actually, you have a really solid point, thank you for taking effort to write this.
I don't really let it bother me too much, but I do think about it and wonder why artists will put so much effort into portraying white features as absolutely gorgeous, and not put in quarter the effort for other more Asian features (when they're Asian themselves and their characters are supposedly Asian as well)
I mean, yeah it's their artistic choice and art style, but seeing things from your perspective really puts a lot of necessary layers to the whole concept of what facial features are generally perceived as 'beautiful'