Honestly the queerness of Persona feels like a gay art school who's faculty is homophobic, like there's a lot of gay clubs but its all in SPITE of the school not because of it and if at any time they stop fighting they'll be snuffed out
yeah, 😔and the only person that you can talk to in the school is the art history teacher about any queer problems because the art history teacher themselves is gay but none of the other faculty know about it due to them not wanting to lose their job. And they have a secret little art club that is a safe space for any gay students on campus, that is off-campus at a local Art Studio.
this is SUCH a nuanced, considerate and well-researched analysis -- as a queer persona fan i've definitely had similar musings and this was such a great summary of many of these thoughts. definitely hoping that persona 6 has even a *crumb* of canon queer representation but at this point hope is all that i can have lol
As someone who is Japanese the vibe I got is Atlus devs are warmly open to queer representation but don't fully know how to go about it. Given formal queer education is nonexistent and that until these recent years average LGBTQ people were largely completely invisible unless you intentionally seek out the community; the rep reads to me as attempts when your only frame of reference is stereotypes, or second hand empathizing with queer people but not enough insight into lots of queer people's actual lived experiences to flesh out the themes with better execution. But I think that's why despite stumbling into straight-cis views of gay/trans tropes many queer Persona fans can still strongly resonate emotionally, and Lala's Crossroads in P5 is a very lovely representation of an "okama bar." Ironic next to the two gay men in vanilla P5, but given how often I use to hear people say Shinjuku Nichome (Tokyo's gay district) is a very dangerous place to be avoided as recent as 2018 when I was last in Japan, I'd be pleasantly surprised if staff members had ever set foot there. Btw it's not dangerous, really it's a night life area and safe haven for gays. Just goes back to that zero education thing making gays out to be those unknown different people. My family also cautioned us never to go there lol not knowing my brother and I were secretly gay and lesbian and already frequenting Nichome. But stigma has rapidly died down and I hear wider LGBTQIA+ awareness in Japan is now a whole world of different since 2018! So just maybe there's hope in P6 yet. Fantastic video a great use of an hour and a half :) thank you
Thank you so much, and it's really interesting to hear that perspective about Nichome, it's funny to think that a lot of the scenes there could've just been inspired by stereotypes. Glad to hear you're hopeful for P6! :)
Sadly even in America, lgbtq education is barely touched, it wasn’t spoken about in my high school in health class, only in a civics/government class when people would ask about it :( your comment had really enlightened me though!
@@garfieldkermit aw thank you I'm glad it was! At the time it seemed a large portion of people going to Nichome were partially or fully in the closet so more often you wouldn't hear what it's like unless you go yourself. So I'm happy to share
In Persona 6 there will be a character who will look directly at the player and say "I'm transgender," and people will still argue that they're not trans and that we don't understand Japanese culture
Yup, and ironically queerness was very common in Japanese history last time I checked. Definitely know people who use the “everything is woke” argument love to skew logic for their petty opinions.
I’m glad the comment section is so tame and supportive! As a gay guy and long-time RPG fan, I know how quickly online conversations like this devolve into thinly veiled homophobia/transphobia.
Never understood the recent obsession with ships/romances having to be healthy. They DO realize that literature and drama as a whole has been founded upon years and years of tragic romance, right?
@@supremeoverlord0 youre so correct!!! also fictional toxic romance is good bc its an outlet for expressing those kind of relationships in a way where they can just be fun and not have any irl consequences
@@teeth227 i do know yaoi and shuake feels very unnatural to me as a yaoi couple when they're clearly just rivals them being romantic would ruin the narrative just to appeal to some fans😭😭😭
Another thing: In the third semester of p5r, two young men talk about their wedding date being set and everything is going great. Maruki said gay rights
It is actually wild that Shin Megami Tensei dx2 has an open lesbian and hinted at a bisexual male but we can't have male love interests in persona anymore
For Ryoji, it's also notable that if you complete his Linked Episodes, Makoto places his music box at the top of his bed (the only item from a Social Link/Linked Episode displayed in his room). His first Linked Episode is also automatic, and Makoto will always say that Ryoji's piano playing will stay with him forever on 3/4 because of that. These things aren't necessarily romantic out of context, but combined with Ryoji's confession (which, unlike Social Links where you can avoid girls' confessions entirely by not hitting romance flags, is impossible to avoid short of not completing his Linked Episodes) and the lines on 12/31 taken from his romance route, create an interesting separation between Makoto-as-a-self-insert and Makoto-as-a-character. The romantic Social Links are effectively for self-insert purposes, and rely on player choice. But you don't choose to put the music box there - Makoto does that himself. It reminds me of how they originally didn't want to give Aigis a Social Link (and it's not there in vanilla P3), because it wasn't really necessary. Makoto has a special relationship with both Ryoji and Aigis no matter what the player does. I think it could be argued that Ryoji occupies the same space as Aigis once did in vanilla P3 - not a romance option for the player, but one for Makoto who exists outside the self-insert aspect of the game.
a few fun facts: akechis english VA is a supporter of shuake (joker x akechi) and even made exclusive merch of it, and in the p5r guidebook, one of the game directors refers to the royal trio (joker, akechi, and sumire)'s dynamic as a "love triangle" in a way implying akechi has romantic feelings for the protagonist
Robbie is the gaot but max also agree with bisexual ryuji headcanon too so idk ,but the love triangle is something that I didn't hear off before 😮,I just know of the fact that the one who made cover art (the movie )or maybe the manga for p3 ships Makoto/ryoji
I think with naoto its just a bit messy because to me its naotos arc definitely was intended just to be one about sexism but, similar to what was up with kanji and even yosuke, the way they went about the dungeons and story arcs hammed the point up so hard they ended up coding them as queer anyway. Like no matter what you believe, i feel like there was better way to go about those arcs (if you didnt want coding) than "i want a new body" and "welcome to my mens only bathhouse"
The entire third semester in P5 Royal is just “Joker’s wish was for Akechi to live” lmao. And they go on multiple dates. He wines and dines him. The song “Our Light” literally has the most queer-coded lyrics and they literally made Joker, A BLANK SLATE character undeniably treat Akechi as a friend and confidant. That’s not even taking into account all the cut content or the Proof of Justice anime.
It wasn’t really mentioned but in ryojis second(?) linked episode in p3R he mentions wanting to maybe be something more with makoto and yea in the grand scheme it really isn’t important but you can’t look at that scene and say it isn’t queer coded
I actually got round to mentioning it briefly in the Oversights section at the end! Still can't believe I missed it first time round since it's such an obvious thing to include!
@@voiceofthelegion578bro the social link ending with you dating yosuke right after he moved on from his crush dying sounds mad weird lmao like I dont even know if there to describe how that's messed up lmao
@@vernessawashington9007 Dude it is not weird to have moved on to dating someone else a year after your crush has died. I KNEW people in real life that were able to do that and it wasn't because they didn't care about the person that died.
@@voiceofthelegion578 why do you keep saying a year that's misconstruing the events yosuke doesnt naturally doesnt ever truly get over saki's death unless you do his social link and in rank 8 or seven he just broke down and got over saki's death it be weird if you just helped him through the death of his crush one rank then the next start dating him him there's no way to date yosuke in the story without it feeling predatory on yu's side without completely overhauling parts of the story
@@asyuoli696 Well things like him clearly not understanding how Ann would be worried throughout that entire painting arc is probably the easiest example. Not only does he not see the problem, but he even gets more unconfortable when she suggests that he means/wants anything other than literally painting
@asyuoli696 how is he horny bro he doesn't lust after anyone except the "hints" at Ann but that could easily be his passion being mistaken for attraction
I'm very much not aro or ace myself and even I got that vibe from him. He has a strong appreciation for aesthetic beauty but seems to have little interest in dating. (Also, some of the most openly horny people I've met have been asexual. They just aren't horny about people. It comes across to me as more of a conceptual or hypothetical horniness. I dunno if that makes any sense but that's the only way I can think of to describe it.)
Something I’ve noticed is that no one really ever brings up is Naoto’s dungeon features a heavy use of tokusatsu imagery. The hidden base and operation references Kamen rider’s transformation surgery into a cyborg, and Shadow Naoto is based off of android hikaider. This adds to the idea of immaturity, as these are mostly children’s media, in Naoto’s character that is never really brought up in popular discussion. Also the shadow not fitting into the lab coat and her whole link.
this video is honestly really great and nuanced. normally when people discuss these things, they let their bias get in the way, but i appreciated how you tried to see both perspectives, even with the most divisive characters like Naoto. i agree that a lot of people get way too heated about this topic, so this was a nice breath of fresh air lol I will say, I think the reason many people blame Hashino for the homophobia in persona is because of an interview he did after p3's release. when asked about why romances were required in the vanilla version, he said it was because he had never been in a relationship with a woman that wasn't romantic (aside from family memebers), which is obviously a pretty sexist view to have, so many people assume he has equally as outdated views on other topics. also, with akechi, in an interview (i believe it was from either the vanilla artbook or the royal guidebook), wada compared the relationship between akechi, joker, and sumi to a love triangle, stating that akechi only cared about joker during the third semester and could care less about sumi. he specifically said it was "like a love triangle" and laughed, so i wouldn't take this as explicit confirmation that akechi is in love with the protag, though it seems the devs were at least aware of the implications and likely played into that dynamic.
Thanks for the feedback! Hadn't found that Hashino interview and tbh him saying that makes a lot of sense, and I actually mention the Royal interview v briefly in the Oversights section at the end, but I don't blame you for missing it since it's just after the conclusion!
So, I’m about halfway through the video, and I have a couple thoughts to share. May have more when i finish the video, dunno. 1. It should be noted that P3’s Male Protagonist (that I’ll refer to as Makoto) and Ryoji, share Japanese voice actors with Shinji and Kowaru (I think that’s how it’s spelled) from Evangelion, a pair of characters with a very similar homoerotic friendship with each other. They also play similar roles in story, more so with Ryoji and Kowaru. This is more obvious with Reload’s Makoto and Ryoji scenes. If I remember correctly but I could be wrong, someone involved with development said the choice of VAs was intentional. This puts more evidence that there is something going on with Makoto and Ryoji. 2. Amazing how discourse about P4 so easily lines up with P4’s themes
I didn't finished Reload but if I'm not mistaken in FeMC route, where Ryoji is a social link, I think he states that he loves her, no matter if she was a girl or a boy
Doesn't matter. Voice acting shouldn't be considered, it's not actually cannon to the story itself. It should always be in-game and never through a meta narrative, intentional or not. Still, I guess that's an interesting fact, but that isn't evidence or shouldn't be used as such.
@@LonelyStar04 I mean, Ryoji's relationship with the male protagonist isn't a canonical thing anyways, no one was claiming that? We're discussing Persona's relationship with queer representation and queer interpretation, the latter is going to focus on aspects that lie outside of the game's canon
@@GlitchyPixExtra Which I do not see the value in. What's outside the game cannon doesn't matter to me, it's what's inside the game that holds my attention. And the comment I was responding to suggested that the Voice Acting choices was somehow supposed to hint something was going on between the characters. So someone was in fact claiming such. It was implied at the very least. I just didn't think that was reliable and declared that it couldn't be used as evidence. It's an interesting fact at most to me.
it is SO strange that a (likely, not totally sure) cishet man would have such a strong opinion about Naoto as being the 'completely typical' cis women experience. Like, my brother in christ, that is not the norm... Chie is literally the 'tomboy' character and shares little to none of the same sentiment as Naoto
one thing i've noticed about The Naoto Discourse (tm) is that people arguing against a trans reading by bringing up misoyny tend to be the same type who argue against the idea that persona is sometimes sexist, which is really something :/ persona 4 and 5 specifically are HEAVILY male centric, partially due to the protagonists being male/ love interests being female dynamic, but also the sexism displayed by and through a lot of the characters (Ann is a whole case study in this, for example). even viewing naoto's arc strictly from a feminist point of view, there are still a lot of pitfalls/gaps in logic the game makes with its argument. i wish people would remember that everything about these games are conscious CHOICES made by the dev teams- if they hadn't wanted to engage with queer themes, kanji and naoto's arcs would be very different. queerness is an intristic aspect of their narratives, even if they aren't (at least with naoto) canonically queer. also, a lot of queer readings of them are depicted in things like fanfiction and fanart, which seems to only be a problem for the fanbase when it comes to those two rather than characters who don't have the same contreversy. amazing video and such an enjoyable watch!! edit: also, i think a lot of the discontent surrounding p4's character arcs (not just its queerer ones) is due to eastern-western dissonance. p5 works a lot better for a western audience because its characters are trying to break out the mold- ie becoming more individualistic and not doing what society expects of them. broadly speaking that's a common story arc in the west, meanwhile p4's arcs are more about doing what's right for the community (yukiko's portrays this very strongly) which resonates more with eastern audiences due to confucian and collectivist values being stronger there, whilst in the west we're used to stories about the individual (yukiko would leave inaba to find herself kinda thing). the small-town way of life in inaba being portrayed as under threat combined with this means that p4's arcs are super collectivist. it makes these discussions a lot more complex, especially from a western perspective.
The Naoto conversation has always been distressing to me, because one side usually analyzes sub-texts while the other side often uses the topic as a tool to scream terf rhetoric. I personally think the continued use of masculine pronouns in the Japanese text is what sways me.
naoto shirogane is like if you wrote a transmasc character but whenever he says "I don't like being a woman" you put a big flashing light on screen that says "⚠️this character is a girly girl who loves being a woman⚠️" just to make sure nobody gets the wrong idea
51:27 I mean, Joker overlooking Akechi's immoral actions can be seen as a narrative flaw or a CHARACTER flaw. Despite being a silent protagonist, Joker has a lot of personality - esp in Royal. His established selflessness & compassion, as well as his attachment to his friends, creates a pretty convincing foundation for why he might want his friend Akechi back, despite everything Akechi did. Additionally, I'd like to point to the Thieves Den caption of Akechi & Joker's Ideal Reality Ending art, which reads "Akechi enjoying a game of chess. As he enjoys his healthy rivalry, there is no trace of darkness in his expression." Given that each of the Ideal Reality arts & captions explain each of the party members' wishes, we can infer that Joker doesn't just want Akechi alive - he wants him to be happy & free from the "darkness" & trauma that defined his life. This additional motivation fits with Joker's characterisation as someone who constantly goes out of his way to solve his friends' problems in their confidants. For the aforementioned reasons, I feel like Joker choosing to overlook Akechi's villainy & wishing him alive is completely consistent with his previous characterisation. What ISN'T consistent is the lack of exploration of the conflict between Futaba, Haru & Akechi. Whilst Joker overlooking Akechi's actions is in-character overall, it wld be the source of a lot of emotional conflict, given that Joker's compassion for his friends extends to Futaba & Haru as well. I do feel that ATLUS missed a trick by not incorporating this more into the 3rd Semester, and if that's what you were gesturing to then I completely agree. I'd also like to say that it should be emphasised just how much people project their own feelings onto Joker. People dislike Akechi for many valid reasons. But players who use this dislike to dismiss Joker & Akechi's homoeroticism tend to forget that - regardless of their feelings - Joker the character feels a strong bond with Akechi if you complete his confidant. He has Akechi's glove in his pocket & thinks to himself that their rivalry isn't over yet during the section where he says goodbye to everyone. He refuses to accept his death, expresses sympathy in multiple scenes IN ALL AVAILABLE DIALOGUE OPTIONS and uses his one wish to revive him. In conclusion: they are not canonically gay. However, there is an ABSURD amount of homoerotic subtext. I mean, even if you dislike Joker & Akechi for being unhealthy (totally fair), Akechi himself only mentions girls in a romantic capacity ONCE in a 100hr+ game - during a Jazz Jin chat with Joker, where he tells him a girl from his class confessed her love & immediately "the only thing on my mind was how exactly I was going to turn her down." I think that can speak for itself; even without Joker, Akechi himself is very much coded as gay, as you implied at 53:06. It's nvr explicitly explored in-game - but it would honestly feel OOC if it was. Akechi's whole THING is dancing around the truth - and why would he spend any time on his sexuality when he has assassination quotas & daddy issues to worry about? He's got other priorities - but it's absolutely delightful seeing u analyse where his personal attachment & feelings start to leak thru. Great video & very balanced takes!!!
While it did handle the subject poorly, I'm very happy that Persona 4 tackled themes of LGBTQ. It's a perfect fit for the narrative and sparked many interesting discussions. Especially for a game that came out in the L A T E THE L A T E THANKYOUFORTELLINGME GRAAAAHHH 2000's, I say that it's an impressive start to what could be...
I get that tbh, like it's far from perfect (as I repeatedly say lmao) but I appreciate that they were at least willing to examine the themes, even if it was flawed.
Ironically, I'd say that Ryuji has moments that make me feel he could be asexual. He just won't shut up about how much he's into girls, but his actions tell a very different story. - he acts super horny for Ann at times, but when she actually flirts back he instantly drops it, both on the beach or on their gym outing - despite his talk about hitting on Haru and Hifumi, he never actually ends up trying - whenever he tries to hit on someone, he always drags Joker and Yusuke with him for company, as if he was trying to show off in front of them rather than actually get a date - and most of all, despite being hyped for calling in maid service, he absolutely freaks out and runs when Becky arrives. Idk, but all that sounds familiar to me. Maybe he really didn't figure it out yet.
i honestly thought that this would be a lighthearted little video but i got absolutely hooked. it is genuinely so saddening that bringing up the topic of queerness or any representation at all tends to get shot down cause this is genuinely some eye-opening stuff- people all over the world and their many different experiences are good to learn about, and from. with that being said, i really love how considerate and in-depth this video is. well done!
Bratsona 6 really got to me lol, I wasn’t expecting it. Great video btw, really covered a lot of my own complicated feelings about this series that I love so much, and also really laid out well why this fanbase has been at each others throats for so long with no sign of stopping. It’s one of the most frustrating fanbases I’ve ever been a part of, and sadly the text of these games makes that sort of unsurprising. Funny enough, the most “queer” reading of characters in this series I’ve personally really felt excited about that was not brought up in this video was the relationship between Akihiko and Shinjiro in Persona 3, ironically because it has very little basis in canon meaning there’s very little baggage that comes with thinking about them as a hypothetical couple. Pretty much everything else you brought up in this game just screams “discourse!!!” to me and makes it all frustrating and impure, but I can enjoy this idea of Aki and Shinji being in love without having to think about any of it lmao
@@lianglianggoh2753 Yeah, that’s kinda the point haha. They’re close friends in canon but I like the idea of them being together in a romantic sense. I feel like they have chemistry and their relationship has depth and intrigue.
Regarding Naoto: I can understand why people may worry that pushing a trans interpretation may detract from the criticism about women societal expectations in japan, but it's not like the game is suggesting that it would be ok for naoto to transition to gain ''Easy respect'' if anything, the game chastise that idea and encourages her to succeed regardless, which is arguably one of the better interpretations regardless of if you think the trans subtext is pro trans or not, since encouraging people to succeed as themselves is fine. What is more iffy, is the underlying subtext that Naoto isn't comfortable with herself even after she admits that she started passing as a boy to get around sexism. She identifies as female in the end, sure, but she isn't shy about how that doesn't mean she likes female gender expression now. And it has to be said that it's possible to interpret it as ''Women should be ok with presenting as more male'' since Kanji's ark is also stating he should accept his more female presenting side. But of course, the game is a bit hypocritical here, since Naoto is pushed far more into gender conformity than Kanji. Kanji's ''cute and girly'' interests are seen as a quirk that makes him likeable, and since these are mostly invisible, since he still present as masculine, it's seen as a tolerable level of eccentricity, but since Naoto goes as far as passing as a boy, the game's cast make it much more clear that they don't want her to continue doing this, that she can be ''herself now''. This isn't that surprising, The other female party members are ALL pushed into gender conformity, even if they skew conformity somewhere. Yukiko is expected to be a good daughter and take up the inn, which upsets her at first, but she ultimately conforms to these expectations by changing her own attitude about her hometown. Rise is also quite valorised AS the more sexualised and ''boy interested'' girl of the group, she clearly takes the leading role amongst the girls until Naoto joins, where then she eclipse every other party member given her background and late joining. Chie is a bit less obvious, she is tomboy-ish, and her demeanour doesn't seem to fit traditional femininity expectations, but there are some elements here. She likes being praised for her femininity at some point, and her social link IS about being less of a hot head, which does seem to fit Japan's norms about how women need to be quiet, apologetic and non confrontational. So yeah, It is not a surprise in this context that Naoto is pushed by the game to just conform. I used ''she/her'' just because the character canonically use those pronouns in english to be clear. If she kept referring to herself as male or asked the others to do so, then I would have as well even if the cast did not. Though what you said about how the japanese text apparently had her use the male ''I'' is interesting, that makes things even more complex. As someone who speaks french, a language where you can't really be gender neutral without telling others explicitly that this is your intention, because by default in french, non gendered entities will conjugate adjectives and other words as if they were masculine, (Which means masculine is both ''male and neither'' for singular or plural words that aren't explicitly feminine or ''both genders'' for plurals words that includes males and females. Yes it's strange, but grammatical gender isn't really about gender in itself most of the time, for example, in french a profession/academic discipline is a female word, but the person doing that as a career was historically a male word that just applied to both men and women, until we feminised those words, a bit how actor can also be used for women instead of actress in english. The same kinds of examples are very common in french yet we didn't see the need to ''masculinise'' the name of those disciplines or professions, only the people doing them to make gender distinction more clear, though this has the negative impact of erasing neutral portrayal of the word, since at least before it was unisex, so to speak) I can understand why that would be much more meaningful in japanese than a language that"s already much more neutral on both actual and grammatical genders like english. I haven't seen the french translation of Persona 4, but I suspect they just do like the english version, refer to her as man until the reveal by also using male conjugated adjectives. It's really hard to read into subtexts when part of that subtext is likely lost due to linguistic and cultural differences, what remains is enough for us to have opinions, but what's lacking in our understanding can make a big difference in interpretation sometimes. In the end I don't fully like the ambiguity in persona 4 portrayal of Kanji and Naoto, ambiguity means it's harder to see if it's truly supportive and tolerant, or if it's not that much. Ambiguity is the same old trick used in queerbaiting to edge off LGBTQ fans about their favorites characters, and it gets irritating to see it used as this eternal plausible deniability for the bigots that would be mad if the creators were more committed to a clear position on these issues. It's a shame because persona *tries* to have serious and principled positions about heavy topics like death, grief, abuse, truth, loneliness, corruption, free will, legality vs legitimacy, etc, but it drops the ball regarding social issues of which the very portrayal is actually more courageous in japan than philosophical pondering (which as a gay Philosophy grad student, makes sense to me. The most offensive topics are those that you CAN'T ignore. You can choose to ignore topics like death or free will if they make you uncomfortable, not so much about the existence of people around you). I did hear that Persona 5 very unsubtle criticisms of the Japanese justice system and P4 criticism of television were met with *some* backlash by conservative folks, but it's nowhere near the uproar an actual gay or trans character (let alone a playable one) causes. Heck, I don't even need to google it to know that rainbow pin in reload upset in Japan the same kinds of folks you'd expect outside japan to care so deeply about such a little detail, like the people that went crazy years ago about that very small trans flag in celeste.
I want to add to what you said about the masculine term for "I," I have been learning Japanese for some time, and the use of "Boku," the masculine word for "I," can be used by women, specifically tomboys. There is no feminine word for "I," so everyone uses "watashi" for normal settings and "watakushi" for formal settings. "Boku" is informal and commonly used in Japanese media to give certain female characters a tomboyish attitude or for other unrelated reasons that have nothing to do with masculine or feminine appearance or attitude. Japanese women often use it to act cutesy, like Harajuku girls or internet personalities. Real Japanese woman will use "boku" as a way to combat stereotypes, though it is not as common as it is in media.
As a straight guy who loves Persona, I can't deny the sexyness of a lot of male characters, Joker, Ryuji, Iwai, Yusuke to some degree, Akihiko, Ryoji, Makoto, Naoto, Akechi, Josuke, Zenkichi, Konoe and Shinjiro
I have to pushback on “there are no differences between golden and vanilla 4” The Golden’s epilogue doubles down on the queer erasure by showing how the characters changed after the story. Kanji and Naoto are shown to have “straightened out”. The voice acting and some lines changed as well. In the vanilla PS2 game they continue to use male pronouns for Naoto even after the dungeon. In Golden they switch to more feminine pronouns for Naoto.
Kanji was always bisexual with a primary focus on romance (hence their one sided attraction to Naoto) and no I played the original P4 they didn't continue to use male pronouns after the dungeon. Hell Japan doesn't even have the same understanding of transgenderism the west has so your point falls completely apart.
@@notthefbi7015 ...the original translation definitely continued using masculine pronouns for naoto after their dungeon. And while transness is a lot less commonly known in Japan, this game was made in 2008. You're ignorant if you really think Japanese people had no concept at all of trans people by the early 2000s.
@@roomtomush Yeah, I don't remember Naoto switching to "watashi' or "atashi" I think Naoto always used "boku" and the characters just referred to her by "-kun"
@@Tenshi6Tantou6Rei that’s not really how Japanese address works though… “boku” is generally used by “good boy” types, but it’s also used by tomboys. And the honorific “-kun” is not used exclusively for men, it can be a general honorific for people close to you. It’s very possible that Naoto just uses “boku” in daily life, and that the P4 protagonist team is just used to calling Naoto “Naoto-kun” and there’s no real point in changing it. And gendered pronouns like “kanojo” or “kare” aren’t exactly common in Japan, so it’s kind of difficult to determine what exactly the original Japanese reading denotes.
You missed the female npc in Persona 4 + Golden who comes to realize her feelings for a girl in the library, ends up being a little obsessive due to the fog, and upon the fog lifting she accepts her love interest falling for a man instead of her. But honestly P4 is the most homophobic LGBT game they have funnily, and I love it despite it. I think that saying Kanji and Naoto are one or another alone diminishes their stories as a whole. There's dialogue in the game that implies Kanji is leaving his sexuality/romantic interest to the backburner as his want to be accepted for his interests is more important to him. Naoto on the other hand is focused more on their want to be a detective but still can't shake being uncomfortable with their body. I don't think that seeing either as LGBT takes away from the focus of their social links being gender roles and how those affect them in their daily lives. I think people who aren't allies or aren't LGBT themselves don't realize that heteronormativity affects them as well as us. Woman in the work place being treated as lesser affects men, woman, straight, gay, cis and trans people alike. Men being made fun of for their interests affects woman, men, straight, gay, cis and trans people alike. If Naoto's a trans man that doesn't change how woman are treated in the work place, treated in relationships and those feelings of wishing to be a man that Naoto has to face as a person with a female body. Kanji being gay/bi doesn't take away from the fact that men in general are made fun of for being sensitive or having certain hobbies. Anyway gotta finish the rest of this video lol
YES!! i like that u bring up that characters can have multiple thematic elements to their stories. it's not like once gay and trans people come out, they are automatically unable to experience any bigotry or hardships outside of their queer identities....
I will say the whole "Beautiful Lady(?)" scene really has other problems besides the dumb joke, namely that that it implies that women don't have body hair, which is demonstrably untrue. A lot of women don't, but many women also do. It does seem to imply that having body hair and failing to meet beauty standards makes it okay to question someone's identity.
The way I see Akechi's matter is: he wasn't intended to be officially seen as a romantic interest, but the romantic undertones that are present clearly weren't accidental. Perhaps it's because of Akechi being a character where it makes sense that it'd be difficult to commit to any explicit romance (for obvious reasons including betrayal and death) that they chose to still include elements of romance. He flirts with Joker in his Confidant, but you can say it's just strategic. Joker wished him back to life, but it could be his guilt and savior complex. Akechi treats Joker differently, but maybe that's because he's the only real connection he has to another person. And so on and so on. You can find alrernative explanations for many of the romantic elements, but that doesn't change the fact that those many romantic elements exist. One thing I wanted to touch upon also since it was brought up in the video is that I don't believe the "I hate you" confession can be used as an argument for Akechi having no positive feelings towards Joker whatsoever since the game itself dismantles the notion that Akechi actually hates him, from both Morgana and Maruki claiming that there's no hate between them (which Akechi doesn't deny either of those times) to Akechi's wish in the fake reality ending being a friendly rivalry between him and Joker.
great video, especially to find someone who doesn’t pretend the tension between akechi & joker wasn’t burning hot. i do think aigis and femc were understated in this video, though. the game quite explicitly mentions the taboo of their relationship; iirc aigis says that ‘she knows you should find happiness with a man’. It’s quite blatantly romantic, and i think not acknowledging it as much as removed or implied romances was a mistake.
I definitley should've given aigis a bit more attention, but tbh I think the reason why I didn't was because it's so obvious and no-one was really disagreeing with it. It's easy when making videos like this to get caught up in the drama of the more obscure representation and pick that apart, and I do enjoy that, but I do agree that I should focus a little more on the positive more straightforward representation included as well! :)
I’ll say this for me Kanji is bi or pan. I know the straight guys get their panties in a twist by saying that because they relate to him in some way so they are thinking we are calling them gay for it. I myself as a gay tween/teenager I related heave to Kanji so hard. That’s why he quickly became my favorite.
Because nowadays people tend to attribute everything outside of 100% traditional male as being gay. Kanji is not that. His whole arc is to understand that even though he likes some traditionally viewed hobbies that are attributed to women, it doesn't mean he's not a man. There would be nothing wrong with him being gay. But that's clearly not what the writers were thinking with Kanji here.
@@BARALover96 cuz is dumb. Men can be good friends and knit without being gay. This is the same argument as Frodo and Sam being gay. Men just can't be very good and close friends without buttfucking each other.
persona 5 Royal where the two main boys see each other in their perfect reality playing chess together not like parents or a girl they like but just their best friend not lover best FRIEND
Third semester is literally just marukis doomed yaoi fic. Like youre telling me akechi and jokers wish was not to have better families, not to have been outcasts of society, but to be with each other?? Youre telling me jokers greatest wish above all was for akechi to be alive?? AND the fact that he holds on to akechis glove after hes presumed dead?? I genuinely thought i was seeing things when i first experienced the game through yt but after playing the game myself i only became more certain
I’m going to be honest the most experience I’ve ever had with persona was watching my buddy play through the yukiko dungeon over discord and my biggest takeaway from that was that chie and yukiko are extremely sapphic for each other
Honestly, great video. I'm a long time Persona fan and got into the series with 4 when I was a queer kid. I saw a lot of myself in those characters and it was very refreshing to see someone both engage with the text as it is and work with its cultural context whilst not becoming excessively vitriolic and homophobic. You did an excellent job being very even handed and explored the topic in a way that had a lot of nuance while still respecting the queer and non-queer fans. I'm shock, shock, frankly to see such a level headed display of discourse. Your sarcasm was delightful as well, you really had me a few times with those transitions (no pun intended). I am very hopefull for the future of Persona and video games in general, not just for queer people but for marginalised people all over. Honestly, the bar is so comically low for Atlus that at this point if I just get a single game without a joke that makes me feel deeply uncomfortable, I will count that as a massive win.
Haha thank you, I'm especially glad you liked the transition gags lmao. So true on your last point though, just one game without an uncomfortable joke would be lovely!
Just another useless comment on Naoto from a basic ass cis/het man who's understanding of the LGBTQ experience is limited to what my friends tell me. I went into Naoto's social link wanting to romance her, and at the 8th link, you ge the choice to say either "I'm glad you're a girl" or "your gender doesn't matter". I don't personally believe naoto is trans, but I fully understand why trans fans would relate to her due to her clearly going through some form of gender dysphoria for years. Because of that I assumed the correct dialogue option was to say that i don't care about her gender. She's clearly sensitive about it and needs more time to think about her identity. Then in her later episodes I was surprised there was no romance option. Turns out saying you're glad she's a girl is a mandatory romance flag. In what world would that be romantics? I'm forcing my views of someone's gender onto someone who has been questioning their gender for years. That's not romantic that's just being a dick. If I went up to an enby friend I have that goes by she/they and called them a girl to everyone they'd quite reasonably get angry at me, not start liking me.
Let's all be honest here, there's a pattern no one ever brings up when discussing the games and that, as you progress through each game, you get more social link options to romance. As if, every game has to one-up the other. To prevent every social link from being female in the next game, I can see them adding gay romances just so they can beat the amount P5 had. Atlus won't add them due to DIE or wanting proper representation or rather it's just so John P. Six can be a bigger fuck boy than Joker P5 and Yu P4. It's almost to the point where I have to wonder if it gets in the way of writing because some of the best social links are with the males from P3 (Sun) to P5 (Hanged, Sun) and that may be because they don't have to use the final 2 links for romance bait but instead just concluding the arc. But, of course, because these games have always had a certain self-insert fantasy to them, a certain group will complain if the new protag can get less babes than the last one, so they have to add more, even if that means with guys,
on the topic of shuake: i have absolutely no problem with people who don't ship akechi and joker, and i completely understand why you might not like the ship for a variety of reasons (for example: they wouldn't be healthy together, you ship joker with someone else, etc etc). i think, though, a lot of the discourse stems from people who are so against the ship that they refuse to acknowledge that the two characters ARE pushed together by the narrative as rivals who care about each other in some way. obviously not necessarily a romantic way (as a shuake shipper myself, i don't actually think it's canon) but in terms of the "i hate you" line or akechi shooting joker, those are arguably invalid as evidence against the ship because the narrative contradicts those later. among other instances: during the black mask fight, morgana tells akechi he doesn't believe he "really hate[s] joker," and akechi saves the thieves; regardless of if you think akechi was a victim of shido or if he had agency in that relationship, shooting joker was under orders; and in third semester, both akechi AND joker's wishes are for them both to be alive and have a health(ier) friendship/rivalryship. you can definitely also argue that atlus was queerbaiting or queercoding with them, such as the "honey i'm home" line etc etc, but overall joker and akechi canonically don't see each other as strict enemies. personally although i really wish you could date male confidants in p5 i don't think akechi SHOULD have had a romance route, because i think if they canonically dated at any point it would undermine parts of the plot and his thematic role in the story in certain places (unless it was done, like, specifically during his detective prince!era and akechi framed it as a ploy to get closer to joker, thus breaking up with him after he betrays the thieves, and making his revival in royal ten million times more awkward. but in that case it would be less of a traditional romance route and probably would have to be written into the game, not a choice the player can make). i do think it adds flavor to canon if you interpret it as the two having feelings for each other though... unrelated but it really confuses me how much discourse is centered around the naoto and kanji interpretations being one or the other. it's not like characters can't have multiple thematic elements to them, and neither interpretation actually undermines the other. it's not like once someone comes out as a gay man, every feminine trait they have automatically is accepted by society or anything?
Personally, I hate shuake as a ship BUT I've noticed that some of the persona 5 fandom, especially on reddit are so quick to shut it down and refuse to understand why people like the ship in any capacity. t's pretty clear that it's not just because of the plot or social link but purely because akechi is a man. Even though I don't like the ship, completely denying that the characters have any chemistry or potential for their bond to be romantic would be stupid.
It’s odd nobody ever brings up how cheerful and sweet Kanji is to the protagonist after his dungeon. From what I recall (it’s been a while since I played either version of the game), Kanji seem very sweet when calling or hanging out with the protagonist, which I always felt was very different how he speaks to other characters and how the other characters talk to the protagonist, especially romantable ones. My personal interpretation is he’s Pansexual (because he seems to like Naoto in any form), but I do want to point out a Asian media trope where a female character disguised as a guy makes a straight guy question if they like guys, because they like the girl disguised as a guy, until they figure out the guy is a girl in disguise and realize that’s why. It’s quite common and I see that somewhat in the story and I really dislike that trope (since it can erase why guys might be gay/bisexual/pansexual and that it’s just sad on all parts, because it’s usually obvious the girl is a girl dressed as a boy). I also feel on the fence about Naoto, because I think trans people should thrive in a Persona game (just like any other queer character type), but at the same time, let a cisgender female character also exist with maybe not being comfortable in women’s clothing or being perceived like girly girls or whatnot (I do know there are women in asian countries that just want to be accepted for being non-conforming as well). I even created a character back in high school who was like this and while I had played Persona 4 at the time, my story for that character being inspired by P4’s story, I never got past Yukiko’s castle (I’ve never really played a JRPG before at the time), so I didn’t even know about Naoto. So I’m always confused how to address her character. But with how Persona 5 added in the homophobic predators (in a game with 4 grown woman who can date a teen, which is totally “normal” and not “creepy”) makes me feel Atlus wouldn’t add in a queer character that identifies that way, because they have issues with queer people. Especially since like Code Geass came out the same year as P3 and that show (while having a messed up queer character) had a queer character that I personally felt was handled with respect. And I’m sure if I recall, there are many queer characters in other anime and manga that came out years before P3/P4/P5, so I personally don’t think the, “it was a different time” argument is justified either. Let alone that, pretty sure queerness was very common in Japan before western influence came into the country and maybe some of that is leaked into the story of at least P4, if not P3/P5 as well. I also forgot, LaLa Escargot is also a drag queen and while we don’t know her sexuality, I’m going to assume she is gay. And I wish they would remove the two offensive gay predators out of all the versions of the game and let LaLa be the only queer character in the game. And I think most people want LaLa (who’s very nice and cares for Joker, especially when he works for her) to be a confident in place of Ohya’s, because most people don’t care for Ohya (who in my opinion just doesn’t offer much outside of romance, like the other characters do).
As a bisexual male, I've never been upset that I couldn't romance a male character. If the MC is written to be straight, then it seems silly to be upset that he won't seek out male characters. The only time I was ever kinda upset that I couldn't explore a relationship deeper was in 3 reload with Ryoji It's just such an interesting concept to me that it would have been neat to see it play out in full.
i know a bunch of other people have left this comment by now but thank you for the level of time and depth you put into this video and the related research! a couple of things i'd love to say- (though for clarification i havent gotten to the extra content yet so sorry if you mention it at the end! it's also very long omg im so sorry) firstly, i definitely agree in saying that it's not fair to blame hashino 100% for the state of megaten's treatment of gay people. there's a lot of nuance there, especially considering (and i'm so surprised this didn't come up in the googling related to other megaten/atlus titles!) one of the games he directed before persona 3 was shin megami tensei digital devil saga, a game which was written partially by science fiction author yu godai and finished off by satomi tadashi, the writer for both persona 2 games. i can't explain the degree to which all of its queerness exists due to being a huge spoiler, but a main character of the first game is coded as sapphic (to the point of another character referring to the object of her affections as her girlfriend in the text) and two major characters in the second are explicitly intersex and nonbinary respectively. the intersex character is not entirely accurately depicted but is a tragically sympathetic villain, while the nonbinary character is met with NPC pushback (much like the demon negotiation in p2) that is framed as being wrong and close-minded. in addition, godai wrote a series of novels finishing her original interpretation of DDS's script called quantum devil saga with permission from atlus, and the protagonist serph is depicted explicitly as transmasculine and has homosexual subtext with another main character (but the details are also spoilers there + novels 3-5 are not entirely translated, though reliably translated summaries exist online). i believe she mentioned writing the sapphic characters' relationship with GL in mind, referencing the word for lily being yuri quite literally in the final novel. obviously, the trend with hashino's work does show him being quite misogynistic especially considering he'd stated persona would "never have a female protagonist under him" and the distaste for queer identity does repeatedly show up, but he's definitely not the sole reason it exists. secondly, i really really feel seen by your video and the way you chose to explore the topic at hand. megami tensei as a whole (SMT especially, but the whole series for sure) is my special interest and as a queer person navigating those fandom spaces can be really difficult. your points are all well-articulated and i especially appreciate how you mention it's unfair the way these discussions are so quickly shut down for being "whiny". genuinely gives me hope that the persona fandom has more people willing to actually engage in discussion about queerness without it turning into slapfighting. thank you so much!
Thanks for all the insight on DDS, I found some smatterings of info about it during my research, but since it was so tricky to find explicit conversations I decided to not mention it since I didn't want to get anything stupidly wrong, so I appreciate you laying it out here! And I'm glad you liked the 'whiny' point since it is frustrating that so many people are so unwilling to have the conversation that they actively get annoyed if the conversation is happening. Thanks again! :)
@garfieldkermit that's totally understandable! it's a bit more abstract in terms of depiction than other games in the franchise so that's honestly a very reasonable choice. and yeah, it's so weird that some people can't seem to stand the idea of not getting involved with somebody else's conversation when it's clearly coming from a totally different POV and set of life experiences. people will be people i guess!
I would like to point out that in Persona 5 Yusuke does actually have a line referring to his sexuality/attraction. When asking Ann to model for him, he says that he "has no interest in her as someone of the opposite sex." At least to me, this is a very clear allusion to the fact that Yusuke is in fact canonically gay, which I think is interesting for the topic at hand! Of course, this does make the later social link interactions with Yusuke have an even more overtly romantic tone to them (which was already pointed out in the video, but one of the notable interactions is Yusuke taking the protagonist to a place where couples normally spend time together, something that gets pointed out by some NPCs in the scene). I've only played through vanilla, so I don't know if this is changed in Royal. Additionally, regarding Persona 3, according to a friend of mine Atlus actually did change some dialogue involving Ryoji in Reload. I haven't finished the game yet (my first time experiencing 3 actually!) but my friend has told me that in the original version of 3, you had the option to reciprocate Ryoji's feelings when he brings up wanting to be more than friends. However, in Reload the option is removed, and you can only vaguely reject him or act confused by what he means. Either way, the convo will progress as normal. Very well made video!! As a queer fan of the Persona series, I do think the topic is something important to discuss, especially with the modern trilogy having a lot of themes revolving around self-reflection (I have not had the opportunity to play 1, 2:IS, or 2:EP). You went through everything really thoroughly and I'm glad to have watched! Wonderful video ❤
Thanks I'm glad you liked the video! And thank you for all the extra details, can't believe I missed that line from yusuke, out of all the potential gay relationships in P5, I really think his would've made the most sense to include, but alas. And that's really interesting to know about Ryoji! :)
as a queer persona fan myself you’ve taken every thought ive had and spit it out into a video. thank you for making the video essay i havent had the time or energy to make myself
This was a wonderful video! As a queer persona fan you’ve managed to sum up a lot of the queer fan experience with these games. I’m of the personal opinion that there are some people in the writers room or the studio as a whole that wants to see that queer representation but there are others (most likely executives) who would wish to see it cut or reduced to stereotypes and jokes that age like milk. I have high hopes for persona six but at the same time as a queer fan who’s been disappointed by other series before (namely fire emblem and their often clumsy attempts at queer romance) I’m not holding my breath by any means. Regardless a lovely video!
What I love about Kanji is that he is so well written that we CAN debate on these things. I myself and an Amab non binary person who used to be of the opinion that Kanji was explicitly queer representation. Then I sat down and replayed the game after hearing the prespective that his arc is more of a commentary on masculinity, societial expectations of being a man and being true to ones self. Honestly I have replayed the game with that mind set and having gone through my personal struggles with toxic masculinity I personally feel more strongly about his arc being about masculinity and how it can shape your prespection of yourself and your sexaulity. Not that my own personal experience and thoughts invaldate anyone else conculsions on Kanji, whats great about well done media is that every person is allowed to consume and take away what they want from it and I know a lot of folks who passionately consider Kanji very important queer representation for their own journeys through sexaulity. I hope if we get a remake they don't change a thing because to me it's important that he can continue to be a topic of discussion and analysis. A good character will have a strong impression and most people will a strong understanding of them the frist time around. A great character has complexity and nuances that can be interpreted in a lot of ways and resonate with just as many people.
why is everyone in the comments just fighting over yes or no its a maybe?(the question mark IS necessary ok) AT BEST i thought we acknowledged this already
When you were talking about the queering of JRPGs, I wanted to mention something about Sylvando from Dragon Quest XI. In the Japanese version, his name is Sylvia, and he uses stereotypically-feminine pronouns. From a quick search on it, it looks like "man using feminine pronouns" is something of a gay stereotype in Japan, but considering how his story has a whole "I ran away and changed my name to be true to myself" angle, it could be said that his character was a trans woman in JP, and this was changed in EN. I...haven't played the game myself, and don't read Japanese, so I don't think I could properly argue in any direction, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
That's really interesting how differently the character is portrayed between the Japanese and English since that really didn't come across at all in the version I played, but thanks for pointing it out! :)
This has to be my favorite break down on queer themes in Persona I've ever seen, though I'm probably biased in that it mirrors a lot of my own thoughts on having replayed 3-5 very recently. I was initially introduced to 4 on TH-cam recommendations (from, as far as Im aware, cishet male allies) back in 2013 specifically for its queer themes, and Kanji and Naoto did a lot to help me explore my own identity and back then, really helped me feel seen when I was an isolated teenager without many outlets for my queer experience. Of course, upon replaying the game, it was a much more mixed experience in that regard as I've gotten older and experienced more nuance in the queer depths. It makes me really happy to hear someone mention how deep a character Naoto is and just how much conversation can be had around her. She may be a cis character in my mind, but I do feel she undergoes a person of questioning her own identity, and comes to the conclusion at the end, that what she's feeling is actually internalized misogyny, something I've heard echoed from many transmascs and GNC lesbians actually. I think her experiences will undoubtably resonate with many queer folks, even if the character herself, isn't trans in text. And I think that's important and should be celebrated! Honestly with how the Beauty on the Beach scene as well as the many other things in Reload, it makes me wonder how exactly Atlus would go about remaking 4, as there's a LOT more explicit and implicit queer themes that could be touched up with a modern lens, or at least handled with more care to get a clearer point across.
Glad you enjoyed it! It'll definitely be interesting to see how they'd go about changing P4, but tbh I don't see us getting it before P6, and I think how P6 ends up will be a pretty good indicator for how they would change P4... if that makes sense :)
@@garfieldkermit Absolutely! I'm definitely excited for P6 too! I'm curious to see what direction they take things, what issues they decide to tackle, and just the themes in general. Whatever the case may be, it'll be nice to have another game in the roster to play and enjoy and dissect
im writing an editorial about how america is seen as very progressive when compared to other countries like japan (duh) but in reality we are also pushing back at them to stay quieter and 'stay japanese' (like some western fans, especially those twitter commenters on the 'diversity is their strength' line) and this video has been such a great help b/c im also comparing 2's openness with tatsuya and jun's relationship vs how 5, which got so much more popular, only paints queerness in a negative light. thank you i have so many more article quotes
yosuke being yosuke is the embodiment of gay persona: straight, but gay, but actually homophobic, but really, *really* gay, but not gay enough that the straight dudes in the audience are able to see it, and if they do there’s enough plausible deniability for them to ignore it
To the people who argue that removing homophobia from P5 removes the Japanese culture from the game: Up yours. Discrimination is not suddenly okay because the animes are doing it, and if you think stereotyping is an important cultural touchstone you need to see in something, then you're just a bigot who doesn’t see Japan as a real culture, and instead as an idealized fantasy reality where everything is scrubbed clean of undesirables
The whole Kanji represents toxic masculinity vs sexuality argument is stupid considering how closely linked the two topics are. Why can't I be both fr.
This was SUCH an enjoyable watch. You informed yourself very well and me as the viewer very well and I agree with basically everything you presented. Thank you for taking the time to do this! Here’s hoping for some more (unproblematic) queer representation to come in Persona
While I don't like the Toxic Yaoi aspect of ShuAke, I can atleast see where it's coming from, which is more than I can say for Ryuji who at multiple points explicitly comes off as straight. Like, no matter what you're opinion of Akechi is, the influence Joker and Akechi have on eachother is undeniable thanks to 3rd semester.
I watched the whole way through and enjoyed it a lot. 👍 If Persona 6 adds some same-gender romance options or just fleshed out LGBTQ+ characters and stories, I'd be real interested in checking that out. If not, then at least there are other developers putting in that work.
I have examples of gay representation in SMT, since you said you couldn't find any. Though it's in spin offs, not mainline. In Devil Summoner Raidou Kuzunoha VS King Abaddon, Raidou is tasked with finding a girl's brother. She gives Raidou a picture of him so he can ask around town. There you can ask this woman if she has seen him. She says she hasn't but not before she asks if the man in the picture is a lover and that he would be perfect for Raidou. She lives near what I think (it's been a while since I've played the game) was some kind of red-light district where male escorts flirt with Raidou. And another instance is where a female friend walks in on an innocent situation between Raidou and his mentor, and jumps to the conclusion that the two are in a romantic relationship. She is surprised but not disgusted or anything, which is nice. There are also male demons who hit on Raidou but that's not really surprising. Female demons do the same. Humans too. Raidou is just seen as good looking by most people it seems. The game is very much not focused on romance at all, so at least it's acknowledged in the game world. But overall, most of the queer interactions are played off as a laugh or just plain crude. Which is typical of Atlus games, sadly. Another game is Devil Survivor 2. MC has flirty dialogue choices with most of the main cast, regardless of gender. Though the males usually respond negatively to it. Most of the gay jokes are played for laughs here, which is typical. While romance is just side content similar to persona, you can raise your "social link" with your companions in this game too. If you raise this particular male characters SL to max, you can pretty much set off together on a trip around the world in one of the endings. (Which is considered the best true ending.) And the game makes it no secret that he cares ONLY about MC and values his opinions very much. So much so that if you side against him in the endings he truly believed that the others brainwashed MC against him. Even ingame, the others know MC is his favorite. They make MC talk for them, since they are too scared to talk to him on their own. All this to say the game is very upfront about the relationship between MC and him. But it's all just implications and never outright says it's anything more than a very close friendship. A lot of people call the game "fujo bait" and it's hard to argue against them. But I digress. I love Persona /SMT. The stories Atlus tells are great and I'll keep playing their games. Hopefully in the future, Atlus won't be afraid to commit to actual gay relationships and LGBT themes in a positive way. As long as it's believable and not forced or shoehorned in. They've done it in the past with Jun, so I'm hopeful. Thank you for the video!
Thanks so much for covering the SMT content I overlooked, I haven't played the series and from what I surmised it was mostly subtext which is only really noticeable when playing the games, so thanks for laying it all out here! :)
I'd argue Anguished One is also very clearly into the MC. Official material even lists his type of romantic partner as "A Shining One"(what he calls MC) and the anime portrays him and Yamato in effectively a love triangle over MC/Hibiki. I think Desu2 actually handles its potential gay romance well, since it's no less canon than the straight options, and the options to flirt with the women are also often taken as jokes with the except of maybe Io and sometimes Makoto (but then flirting with Yamato and Anguished One is also genuine). Joe also flirts back with the MC, from what I remember - but then turns him down because MC's too young for him, not because he's a guy. And there's a drama CD which has Io outright wonder if MC is bisexual.
@sleepygamer6320 Yes I agree very much. Anguished one definitely loves mc if you ask me but I didn't include it because my comment was getting rather long. But I enjoy the love triangle between them. It's very cute lol. All the flirting with the main cast makes me think this was some kind of joke about Evangelion or something since the Mc in that show pretty much almost develops a harem. Which Mc could easily do here if it was that type of media. Not to mention the similar themes and aliens. Also I avoided talking about the anime since I wanted to focus on the game specifically. But I love the game, easily one of my top favorite megaten games of all time
for devil survivor 2 i thought i was just too "gay brained" and seeing things that werent there, so nice to know im not the only one who felt like there was something going on with those 2 characters and the MC lol
14:14 "with some calling the game Wokesona 3" Man i just genuinely dont understand these people. The rainbow pin literally is on screen for like one second, ONE SECOND in a game that is 100 hours long. Imagine being so upset by the existence of gay people that being reminded they exist for what amounts to 0.0002% of the games runtime ruins the rest of it for you. Same with the beach scene. "OMG they removed the 2 minute filler cutscene with no bearing on the story that made fun of trans people the game is ruined" Like if you actually think like this i genuinely dont know what to say to you. Why should you care so much?
Actually, Jun was seen as Tatsuya's canon love interest by the character designer of Persona 2, Kazuma Kaneko, and he expressed that he wws his favorite pick, so I don't think the inclusion of his romance is just a cynical marketing ploy to attract female fans.
i couldnt finish your video because every time you transitioned topic, the phone chime riled my dog up. he thought someone was at the door every. single. time. :(
I will never understand the people who hate on Catherine for having one of the best mainstream representations of a transgirl. I think it's because she's treated like a friend and not given a pass or something. Her struggles are genuine and relatable, and the only one who actually teases her about her past is the protagonist who we are constantly reminded is a scumbag for most of the game.
As a bi man who is primarily is bi for feminine or pretty men rin being romancable in catherine full body made me so incredibly happy even if he is defintely too morally upstanding for what the original catherine was going for which is weighing your options between 2 not super ideal women.
i'm only at 9:47 but i just saw akechi and screamed lol edit because i have things to add: 51:34 is joker ignoring/dismissing akechi's crimes a writing flaw of the game or a personal flaw of joker? i really like the latter interpretation, though i do see how it should be addressed in game, at least by other characters. but akechi's screentime as a whole feels like the only non-transactional relationship joker has in-game, even through he clearly cares about all his other confidants. akechi's just special and messed up and i love him to death lol also, reddit when a character is complex and/or is a minor with issues: *implodes on itself*
unless i missed this being mentioned in detail, p2 IS has the optional scene where if you have yukino stay behind at caracol, her shadow and anna kiss and commit double suicide which effectively lobotomizes her. this is to my knowledge the only gay kiss in the series and it’s the worst of two outcomes in that scenario nevermind the fact that anna might be underage. and they still haven’t been brave enough to do that again! i have a lot of feelings on p2 rep where people glazing tatsujun meant i was shocked at the transphobic writing for those npcs (even if the intersex fortune teller lady seems to be fine). but at the same time there are people who think tatsujun being for the fujoshis makes them bad/fetishistic rep like they’re not one of the best examples of queerness in the series and the series hasn’t had the guts to do more than be coy about it since persona 3! like say i love shuake but they’re never gonna do more than queerbait with those two and it makes me mad 😭😭 Whew. with that out of the way this is a great video and it taught me a lot about the games i hadn’t played:) i had a comment that got eaten somewhere so i can only assume i posted it in the wrong place. oh well!
I remember hearing about the Yukino and Anna scene but tbh I didn't look into it that much so thanks for mentioning it here! And yeah I agree, pandering to fujos is slightly questionable, but if it ends up with good gay rep then it's kind of a net positive imo. Glad you enjoyed the video! :)
I don't think Naoto is a trans character, as teenager I personally behaved basically like her because I grew up thinking being a woman was like being a "second class human being" society back in the day didn't take women seriously and I personally was ridiculed by my brothers whenever I acted like a girl when I was a child so I developed some kind of shame and guilt for being a girl and started using male pronouns, I didn't like how my body was transforming into a woman like body, and deep inside I kind of couldn't believe I was actually a girl I just somehow felt like something was wrong with my body and was neither a boy or a girl... now I'm 22 and feel more comfortable using female pronouns, I fully accept myself as a woman now but I still don't feel so comfortable acting too feminine. So basically struggling with your identity as a teenager is completely normal especially when it comes to being a girl back in the day
You ask Persona if it's homophobic and it says it's gay and avoids answering the question.
Yukari...
oh ghouls.. he's avoiding the question... /ref
Absolutely, next question!
I came here to say exactly this 😂
Kanji, no question.
Smash next question
Especially my goat ryoji
(just incase this a joke)
*not
"For every Yosuke.... there's a Yosuke" sums up the queerness of the franchise so much
Zilxlriffs from the empires discord?!
@@guggelguggel7491 yupp
Honestly the queerness of Persona feels like a gay art school who's faculty is homophobic, like there's a lot of gay clubs but its all in SPITE of the school not because of it and if at any time they stop fighting they'll be snuffed out
This makes no sense
what
yeah, 😔and the only person that you can talk to in the school is the art history teacher about any queer problems because the art history teacher themselves is gay but none of the other faculty know about it due to them not wanting to lose their job. And they have a secret little art club that is a safe space for any gay students on campus, that is off-campus at a local Art Studio.
Homophobic? U mean normal
@@mrizkifadillah121 how old r u
Persona is a little bit queer but always taking one step forward, two steps back.
Persona is in the closet 😂
@@flumpyofdoom Persona is Yosuke???
this is SUCH a nuanced, considerate and well-researched analysis -- as a queer persona fan i've definitely had similar musings and this was such a great summary of many of these thoughts. definitely hoping that persona 6 has even a *crumb* of canon queer representation but at this point hope is all that i can have lol
Glad you enjoyed it! :)
As someone who is Japanese the vibe I got is Atlus devs are warmly open to queer representation but don't fully know how to go about it. Given formal queer education is nonexistent and that until these recent years average LGBTQ people were largely completely invisible unless you intentionally seek out the community; the rep reads to me as attempts when your only frame of reference is stereotypes, or second hand empathizing with queer people but not enough insight into lots of queer people's actual lived experiences to flesh out the themes with better execution.
But I think that's why despite stumbling into straight-cis views of gay/trans tropes many queer Persona fans can still strongly resonate emotionally, and Lala's Crossroads in P5 is a very lovely representation of an "okama bar." Ironic next to the two gay men in vanilla P5, but given how often I use to hear people say Shinjuku Nichome (Tokyo's gay district) is a very dangerous place to be avoided as recent as 2018 when I was last in Japan, I'd be pleasantly surprised if staff members had ever set foot there. Btw it's not dangerous, really it's a night life area and safe haven for gays. Just goes back to that zero education thing making gays out to be those unknown different people. My family also cautioned us never to go there lol not knowing my brother and I were secretly gay and lesbian and already frequenting Nichome. But stigma has rapidly died down and I hear wider LGBTQIA+ awareness in Japan is now a whole world of different since 2018! So just maybe there's hope in P6 yet. Fantastic video a great use of an hour and a half :) thank you
Thank you so much, and it's really interesting to hear that perspective about Nichome, it's funny to think that a lot of the scenes there could've just been inspired by stereotypes. Glad to hear you're hopeful for P6! :)
Sadly even in America, lgbtq education is barely touched, it wasn’t spoken about in my high school in health class, only in a civics/government class when people would ask about it :( your comment had really enlightened me though!
@@garfieldkermit aw thank you I'm glad it was! At the time it seemed a large portion of people going to Nichome were partially or fully in the closet so more often you wouldn't hear what it's like unless you go yourself. So I'm happy to share
In Persona 6 there will be a character who will look directly at the player and say "I'm transgender," and people will still argue that they're not trans and that we don't understand Japanese culture
Bridget Guilty Gear
Vivian Paper Mario TTYD
Yup, and ironically queerness was very common in Japanese history last time I checked. Definitely know people who use the “everything is woke” argument love to skew logic for their petty opinions.
Dude bro's pray
That's because, I think Japan is very Okay with Transgenders VS gay people
I’m glad the comment section is so tame and supportive! As a gay guy and long-time RPG fan, I know how quickly online conversations like this devolve into thinly veiled homophobia/transphobia.
Often not so thinly veiled lmao
the ShuAke deniers obviously have never heard of toxic yaoi
Never understood the recent obsession with ships/romances having to be healthy. They DO realize that literature and drama as a whole has been founded upon years and years of tragic romance, right?
@@supremeoverlord0 youre so correct!!! also fictional toxic romance is good bc its an outlet for expressing those kind of relationships in a way where they can just be fun and not have any irl consequences
i dont mind toxic yaoi but shuake are clearly just friends and rivals
@@kaorinsz damn u wouldnt know yaoi if it hit u in the face. next youll tell me sam and frodo are just friends
@@teeth227 i do know yaoi and shuake feels very unnatural to me as a yaoi couple when they're clearly just rivals them being romantic would ruin the narrative just to appeal to some fans😭😭😭
Another thing: In the third semester of p5r, two young men talk about their wedding date being set and everything is going great. Maruki said gay rights
Completely missed that lmao, Maruki is the woke agenda
@@garfieldkermit damn can't believe the pt are homophobic
HI SORRY do u have a source for this? I would LOVE to see if u do!!!
@ I found it off of a tumblr post, ill see if i relocate it as well as seeing it for myself next time i play royal
It is actually wild that Shin Megami Tensei dx2 has an open lesbian and hinted at a bisexual male but we can't have male love interests in persona anymore
I stopped playing the game, so can you give me their names so I can obsessively search info of them online?
@@TheSuperrenato Ririn Ueda and Jeng Yun Tsai
Another spinoff, Digital Devil Saga, also has Argila as a bi woman... but she suffers from "bury your gays"
There was a gay male romance in Persona 2, back in 99, but that's about it.
Talking about gayness in Persona and then not mentioning Jin “I would do anything for Takaya” Shirato is a little disappointing.
I spent too much time on Shuake, the toxic yaoi overload would've been too much :'(
For Ryoji, it's also notable that if you complete his Linked Episodes, Makoto places his music box at the top of his bed (the only item from a Social Link/Linked Episode displayed in his room). His first Linked Episode is also automatic, and Makoto will always say that Ryoji's piano playing will stay with him forever on 3/4 because of that. These things aren't necessarily romantic out of context, but combined with Ryoji's confession (which, unlike Social Links where you can avoid girls' confessions entirely by not hitting romance flags, is impossible to avoid short of not completing his Linked Episodes) and the lines on 12/31 taken from his romance route, create an interesting separation between Makoto-as-a-self-insert and Makoto-as-a-character. The romantic Social Links are effectively for self-insert purposes, and rely on player choice. But you don't choose to put the music box there - Makoto does that himself. It reminds me of how they originally didn't want to give Aigis a Social Link (and it's not there in vanilla P3), because it wasn't really necessary. Makoto has a special relationship with both Ryoji and Aigis no matter what the player does. I think it could be argued that Ryoji occupies the same space as Aigis once did in vanilla P3 - not a romance option for the player, but one for Makoto who exists outside the self-insert aspect of the game.
It is also a reference to Evangelion and the equally homoerotic piano scene between Shinji Ikari and Kaworu Nagisa.
we live in a society where we watch a feature length video titled “Is Persona Gay” and I love that society
a few fun facts: akechis english VA is a supporter of shuake (joker x akechi) and even made exclusive merch of it, and in the p5r guidebook, one of the game directors refers to the royal trio (joker, akechi, and sumire)'s dynamic as a "love triangle" in a way implying akechi has romantic feelings for the protagonist
I hate how people literally ignore this, is literally the biggest proof that Akechi is gay lmfao
Robbie is the gaot but max also agree with bisexual ryuji headcanon too so idk ,but the love triangle is something that I didn't hear off before 😮,I just know of the fact that the one who made cover art (the movie )or maybe the manga for p3 ships Makoto/ryoji
"MOVE, IM GAY!!!"
I think with naoto its just a bit messy because to me its naotos arc definitely was intended just to be one about sexism but, similar to what was up with kanji and even yosuke, the way they went about the dungeons and story arcs hammed the point up so hard they ended up coding them as queer anyway.
Like no matter what you believe, i feel like there was better way to go about those arcs (if you didnt want coding) than "i want a new body" and "welcome to my mens only bathhouse"
At least we have the canon gay Jun and the canon bisexuals Tatsuya, Kotone, Aigis, Elizabeth and MY BI KING RYOJI
9:44 HEJDHDJHEJRJR AKECHI SLOWLY FADING IN KILLED ME
gay keystrokes feel so nostalgic
The entire third semester in P5 Royal is just “Joker’s wish was for Akechi to live” lmao. And they go on multiple dates. He wines and dines him. The song “Our Light” literally has the most queer-coded lyrics and they literally made Joker, A BLANK SLATE character undeniably treat Akechi as a friend and confidant. That’s not even taking into account all the cut content or the Proof of Justice anime.
It wasn’t really mentioned but in ryojis second(?) linked episode in p3R he mentions wanting to maybe be something more with makoto and yea in the grand scheme it really isn’t important but you can’t look at that scene and say it isn’t queer coded
I actually got round to mentioning it briefly in the Oversights section at the end! Still can't believe I missed it first time round since it's such an obvious thing to include!
I want them to add back in yosuke's cut confession when p4 inevitably gets remaid but I think atlus would be too cowardly to go through with it.
No dude its completely weird when like a massive part of his social link is moving on from Saki's death.
@@notthefbi7015 I don't see what those things have to do with each other, he has the whole year to work through what he had going on with Saki.
@@voiceofthelegion578bro the social link ending with you dating yosuke right after he moved on from his crush dying sounds mad weird lmao like I dont even know if there to describe how that's messed up lmao
@@vernessawashington9007 Dude it is not weird to have moved on to dating someone else a year after your crush has died. I KNEW people in real life that were able to do that and it wasn't because they didn't care about the person that died.
@@voiceofthelegion578 why do you keep saying a year that's misconstruing the events yosuke doesnt naturally doesnt ever truly get over saki's death unless you do his social link and in rank 8 or seven he just broke down and got over saki's death it be weird if you just helped him through the death of his crush one rank then the next start dating him him there's no way to date yosuke in the story without it feeling predatory on yu's side without completely overhauling parts of the story
Hear me out - aroace Yusuke makes me very happy and it makes a lot of his dialog make a lot more sense
He's a lonely horndog how does that make sense
@@asyuoli696 Well things like him clearly not understanding how Ann would be worried throughout that entire painting arc is probably the easiest example. Not only does he not see the problem, but he even gets more unconfortable when she suggests that he means/wants anything other than literally painting
glad I'm not the only one who thought about this!! he is the epitome of aesthetic attraction
@asyuoli696 how is he horny bro he doesn't lust after anyone except the "hints" at Ann but that could easily be his passion being mistaken for attraction
I'm very much not aro or ace myself and even I got that vibe from him. He has a strong appreciation for aesthetic beauty but seems to have little interest in dating. (Also, some of the most openly horny people I've met have been asexual. They just aren't horny about people. It comes across to me as more of a conceptual or hypothetical horniness. I dunno if that makes any sense but that's the only way I can think of to describe it.)
Something I’ve noticed is that no one really ever brings up is Naoto’s dungeon features a heavy use of tokusatsu imagery. The hidden base and operation references Kamen rider’s transformation surgery into a cyborg, and Shadow Naoto is based off of android hikaider. This adds to the idea of immaturity, as these are mostly children’s media, in Naoto’s character that is never really brought up in popular discussion. Also the shadow not fitting into the lab coat and her whole link.
Transman dungeon.
this video is honestly really great and nuanced. normally when people discuss these things, they let their bias get in the way, but i appreciated how you tried to see both perspectives, even with the most divisive characters like Naoto. i agree that a lot of people get way too heated about this topic, so this was a nice breath of fresh air lol
I will say, I think the reason many people blame Hashino for the homophobia in persona is because of an interview he did after p3's release. when asked about why romances were required in the vanilla version, he said it was because he had never been in a relationship with a woman that wasn't romantic (aside from family memebers), which is obviously a pretty sexist view to have, so many people assume he has equally as outdated views on other topics.
also, with akechi, in an interview (i believe it was from either the vanilla artbook or the royal guidebook), wada compared the relationship between akechi, joker, and sumi to a love triangle, stating that akechi only cared about joker during the third semester and could care less about sumi. he specifically said it was "like a love triangle" and laughed, so i wouldn't take this as explicit confirmation that akechi is in love with the protag, though it seems the devs were at least aware of the implications and likely played into that dynamic.
Thanks for the feedback! Hadn't found that Hashino interview and tbh him saying that makes a lot of sense, and I actually mention the Royal interview v briefly in the Oversights section at the end, but I don't blame you for missing it since it's just after the conclusion!
“I’m alone right now” - Akechi at some point and thats all the convincing i needed 😂❤
So, I’m about halfway through the video, and I have a couple thoughts to share. May have more when i finish the video, dunno.
1. It should be noted that P3’s Male Protagonist (that I’ll refer to as Makoto) and Ryoji, share Japanese voice actors with Shinji and Kowaru (I think that’s how it’s spelled) from Evangelion, a pair of characters with a very similar homoerotic friendship with each other. They also play similar roles in story, more so with Ryoji and Kowaru. This is more obvious with Reload’s Makoto and Ryoji scenes. If I remember correctly but I could be wrong, someone involved with development said the choice of VAs was intentional. This puts more evidence that there is something going on with Makoto and Ryoji.
2. Amazing how discourse about P4 so easily lines up with P4’s themes
Both Makoto and Ryoji are actually voiced by Akira Ishida, Kaworu's VA. Shinji's VA is also in P3 but she voices Ken.
I didn't finished Reload but if I'm not mistaken in FeMC route, where Ryoji is a social link, I think he states that he loves her, no matter if she was a girl or a boy
Doesn't matter. Voice acting shouldn't be considered, it's not actually cannon to the story itself. It should always be in-game and never through a meta narrative, intentional or not. Still, I guess that's an interesting fact, but that isn't evidence or shouldn't be used as such.
@@LonelyStar04 I mean, Ryoji's relationship with the male protagonist isn't a canonical thing anyways, no one was claiming that? We're discussing Persona's relationship with queer representation and queer interpretation, the latter is going to focus on aspects that lie outside of the game's canon
@@GlitchyPixExtra Which I do not see the value in. What's outside the game cannon doesn't matter to me, it's what's inside the game that holds my attention. And the comment I was responding to suggested that the Voice Acting choices was somehow supposed to hint something was going on between the characters. So someone was in fact claiming such. It was implied at the very least. I just didn't think that was reliable and declared that it couldn't be used as evidence. It's an interesting fact at most to me.
it is SO strange that a (likely, not totally sure) cishet man would have such a strong opinion about Naoto as being the 'completely typical' cis women experience. Like, my brother in christ, that is not the norm... Chie is literally the 'tomboy' character and shares little to none of the same sentiment as Naoto
Naoto is just like other girls, being haunted by a physical manifestation of gender dysphoria is the female experience
@@garfieldkermit can confirm (coughs)
one thing i've noticed about The Naoto Discourse (tm) is that people arguing against a trans reading by bringing up misoyny tend to be the same type who argue against the idea that persona is sometimes sexist, which is really something :/
persona 4 and 5 specifically are HEAVILY male centric, partially due to the protagonists being male/ love interests being female dynamic, but also the sexism displayed by and through a lot of the characters (Ann is a whole case study in this, for example). even viewing naoto's arc strictly from a feminist point of view, there are still a lot of pitfalls/gaps in logic the game makes with its argument.
i wish people would remember that everything about these games are conscious CHOICES made by the dev teams- if they hadn't wanted to engage with queer themes, kanji and naoto's arcs would be very different. queerness is an intristic aspect of their narratives, even if they aren't (at least with naoto) canonically queer. also, a lot of queer readings of them are depicted in things like fanfiction and fanart, which seems to only be a problem for the fanbase when it comes to those two rather than characters who don't have the same contreversy.
amazing video and such an enjoyable watch!!
edit: also, i think a lot of the discontent surrounding p4's character arcs (not just its queerer ones) is due to eastern-western dissonance. p5 works a lot better for a western audience because its characters are trying to break out the mold- ie becoming more individualistic and not doing what society expects of them. broadly speaking that's a common story arc in the west, meanwhile p4's arcs are more about doing what's right for the community (yukiko's portrays this very strongly) which resonates more with eastern audiences due to confucian and collectivist values being stronger there, whilst in the west we're used to stories about the individual (yukiko would leave inaba to find herself kinda thing). the small-town way of life in inaba being portrayed as under threat combined with this means that p4's arcs are super collectivist. it makes these discussions a lot more complex, especially from a western perspective.
Thanks for all the feedback, that last point contrasting the difference in dissonance between P4&5 is something I hadn't considered at all!
The Naoto conversation has always been distressing to me, because one side usually analyzes sub-texts while the other side often uses the topic as a tool to scream terf rhetoric. I personally think the continued use of masculine pronouns in the Japanese text is what sways me.
naoto shirogane is like if you wrote a transmasc character but whenever he says "I don't like being a woman" you put a big flashing light on screen that says "⚠️this character is a girly girl who loves being a woman⚠️" just to make sure nobody gets the wrong idea
51:27 I mean, Joker overlooking Akechi's immoral actions can be seen as a narrative flaw or a CHARACTER flaw. Despite being a silent protagonist, Joker has a lot of personality - esp in Royal. His established selflessness & compassion, as well as his attachment to his friends, creates a pretty convincing foundation for why he might want his friend Akechi back, despite everything Akechi did. Additionally, I'd like to point to the Thieves Den caption of Akechi & Joker's Ideal Reality Ending art, which reads "Akechi enjoying a game of chess. As he enjoys his healthy rivalry, there is no trace of darkness in his expression." Given that each of the Ideal Reality arts & captions explain each of the party members' wishes, we can infer that Joker doesn't just want Akechi alive - he wants him to be happy & free from the "darkness" & trauma that defined his life. This additional motivation fits with Joker's characterisation as someone who constantly goes out of his way to solve his friends' problems in their confidants. For the aforementioned reasons, I feel like Joker choosing to overlook Akechi's villainy & wishing him alive is completely consistent with his previous characterisation. What ISN'T consistent is the lack of exploration of the conflict between Futaba, Haru & Akechi. Whilst Joker overlooking Akechi's actions is in-character overall, it wld be the source of a lot of emotional conflict, given that Joker's compassion for his friends extends to Futaba & Haru as well. I do feel that ATLUS missed a trick by not incorporating this more into the 3rd Semester, and if that's what you were gesturing to then I completely agree.
I'd also like to say that it should be emphasised just how much people project their own feelings onto Joker. People dislike Akechi for many valid reasons. But players who use this dislike to dismiss Joker & Akechi's homoeroticism tend to forget that - regardless of their feelings - Joker the character feels a strong bond with Akechi if you complete his confidant. He has Akechi's glove in his pocket & thinks to himself that their rivalry isn't over yet during the section where he says goodbye to everyone. He refuses to accept his death, expresses sympathy in multiple scenes IN ALL AVAILABLE DIALOGUE OPTIONS and uses his one wish to revive him. In conclusion: they are not canonically gay. However, there is an ABSURD amount of homoerotic subtext. I mean, even if you dislike Joker & Akechi for being unhealthy (totally fair), Akechi himself only mentions girls in a romantic capacity ONCE in a 100hr+ game - during a Jazz Jin chat with Joker, where he tells him a girl from his class confessed her love & immediately "the only thing on my mind was how exactly I was going to turn her down." I think that can speak for itself; even without Joker, Akechi himself is very much coded as gay, as you implied at 53:06. It's nvr explicitly explored in-game - but it would honestly feel OOC if it was. Akechi's whole THING is dancing around the truth - and why would he spend any time on his sexuality when he has assassination quotas & daddy issues to worry about? He's got other priorities - but it's absolutely delightful seeing u analyse where his personal attachment & feelings start to leak thru. Great video & very balanced takes!!!
Jojo is gay. Hence, Persona is gay. Thank you for your attention.
While it did handle the subject poorly, I'm very happy that Persona 4 tackled themes of LGBTQ. It's a perfect fit for the narrative and sparked many interesting discussions. Especially for a game that came out in the L A T E THE L A T E THANKYOUFORTELLINGME GRAAAAHHH 2000's, I say that it's an impressive start to what could be...
Late 2000's. It was 2008 or 9 I believe.
P3 came out mid 00s and P4 late 00s
Where exactly?
Bruh the 90s had the best queer content for Japan while the 2000s suddenly were full of homophobia and transphobia
I get that tbh, like it's far from perfect (as I repeatedly say lmao) but I appreciate that they were at least willing to examine the themes, even if it was flawed.
Ironically, I'd say that Ryuji has moments that make me feel he could be asexual. He just won't shut up about how much he's into girls, but his actions tell a very different story.
- he acts super horny for Ann at times, but when she actually flirts back he instantly drops it, both on the beach or on their gym outing
- despite his talk about hitting on Haru and Hifumi, he never actually ends up trying
- whenever he tries to hit on someone, he always drags Joker and Yusuke with him for company, as if he was trying to show off in front of them rather than actually get a date
- and most of all, despite being hyped for calling in maid service, he absolutely freaks out and runs when Becky arrives.
Idk, but all that sounds familiar to me. Maybe he really didn't figure it out yet.
i honestly thought that this would be a lighthearted little video but i got absolutely hooked. it is genuinely so saddening that bringing up the topic of queerness or any representation at all tends to get shot down cause this is genuinely some eye-opening stuff- people all over the world and their many different experiences are good to learn about, and from.
with that being said, i really love how considerate and in-depth this video is. well done!
Thank you! :)
Bratsona 6 really got to me lol, I wasn’t expecting it.
Great video btw, really covered a lot of my own complicated feelings about this series that I love so much, and also really laid out well why this fanbase has been at each others throats for so long with no sign of stopping. It’s one of the most frustrating fanbases I’ve ever been a part of, and sadly the text of these games makes that sort of unsurprising.
Funny enough, the most “queer” reading of characters in this series I’ve personally really felt excited about that was not brought up in this video was the relationship between Akihiko and Shinjiro in Persona 3, ironically because it has very little basis in canon meaning there’s very little baggage that comes with thinking about them as a hypothetical couple. Pretty much everything else you brought up in this game just screams “discourse!!!” to me and makes it all frustrating and impure, but I can enjoy this idea of Aki and Shinji being in love without having to think about any of it lmao
Aren't Akihiko and Shinjiro just best friends? I don't like the idea of them in love, just two pals who got distanced.
@@lianglianggoh2753 Yeah, that’s kinda the point haha. They’re close friends in canon but I like the idea of them being together in a romantic sense. I feel like they have chemistry and their relationship has depth and intrigue.
@@silentpartner9957I'm pretty sure they see each other more like brothers but I could see how it make sense if that was the angle they were going for
Regarding Naoto: I can understand why people may worry that pushing a trans interpretation may detract from the criticism about women societal expectations in japan, but it's not like the game is suggesting that it would be ok for naoto to transition to gain ''Easy respect'' if anything, the game chastise that idea and encourages her to succeed regardless, which is arguably one of the better interpretations regardless of if you think the trans subtext is pro trans or not, since encouraging people to succeed as themselves is fine. What is more iffy, is the underlying subtext that Naoto isn't comfortable with herself even after she admits that she started passing as a boy to get around sexism. She identifies as female in the end, sure, but she isn't shy about how that doesn't mean she likes female gender expression now. And it has to be said that it's possible to interpret it as ''Women should be ok with presenting as more male'' since Kanji's ark is also stating he should accept his more female presenting side.
But of course, the game is a bit hypocritical here, since Naoto is pushed far more into gender conformity than Kanji. Kanji's ''cute and girly'' interests are seen as a quirk that makes him likeable, and since these are mostly invisible, since he still present as masculine, it's seen as a tolerable level of eccentricity, but since Naoto goes as far as passing as a boy, the game's cast make it much more clear that they don't want her to continue doing this, that she can be ''herself now''.
This isn't that surprising, The other female party members are ALL pushed into gender conformity, even if they skew conformity somewhere. Yukiko is expected to be a good daughter and take up the inn, which upsets her at first, but she ultimately conforms to these expectations by changing her own attitude about her hometown. Rise is also quite valorised AS the more sexualised and ''boy interested'' girl of the group, she clearly takes the leading role amongst the girls until Naoto joins, where then she eclipse every other party member given her background and late joining. Chie is a bit less obvious, she is tomboy-ish, and her demeanour doesn't seem to fit traditional femininity expectations, but there are some elements here. She likes being praised for her femininity at some point, and her social link IS about being less of a hot head, which does seem to fit Japan's norms about how women need to be quiet, apologetic and non confrontational.
So yeah, It is not a surprise in this context that Naoto is pushed by the game to just conform. I used ''she/her'' just because the character canonically use those pronouns in english to be clear. If she kept referring to herself as male or asked the others to do so, then I would have as well even if the cast did not. Though what you said about how the japanese text apparently had her use the male ''I'' is interesting, that makes things even more complex. As someone who speaks french, a language where you can't really be gender neutral without telling others explicitly that this is your intention, because by default in french, non gendered entities will conjugate adjectives and other words as if they were masculine, (Which means masculine is both ''male and neither'' for singular or plural words that aren't explicitly feminine or ''both genders'' for plurals words that includes males and females. Yes it's strange, but grammatical gender isn't really about gender in itself most of the time, for example, in french a profession/academic discipline is a female word, but the person doing that as a career was historically a male word that just applied to both men and women, until we feminised those words, a bit how actor can also be used for women instead of actress in english. The same kinds of examples are very common in french yet we didn't see the need to ''masculinise'' the name of those disciplines or professions, only the people doing them to make gender distinction more clear, though this has the negative impact of erasing neutral portrayal of the word, since at least before it was unisex, so to speak) I can understand why that would be much more meaningful in japanese than a language that"s already much more neutral on both actual and grammatical genders like english. I haven't seen the french translation of Persona 4, but I suspect they just do like the english version, refer to her as man until the reveal by also using male conjugated adjectives. It's really hard to read into subtexts when part of that subtext is likely lost due to linguistic and cultural differences, what remains is enough for us to have opinions, but what's lacking in our understanding can make a big difference in interpretation sometimes. In the end I don't fully like the ambiguity in persona 4 portrayal of Kanji and Naoto, ambiguity means it's harder to see if it's truly supportive and tolerant, or if it's not that much. Ambiguity is the same old trick used in queerbaiting to edge off LGBTQ fans about their favorites characters, and it gets irritating to see it used as this eternal plausible deniability for the bigots that would be mad if the creators were more committed to a clear position on these issues. It's a shame because persona *tries* to have serious and principled positions about heavy topics like death, grief, abuse, truth, loneliness, corruption, free will, legality vs legitimacy, etc, but it drops the ball regarding social issues of which the very portrayal is actually more courageous in japan than philosophical pondering (which as a gay Philosophy grad student, makes sense to me. The most offensive topics are those that you CAN'T ignore. You can choose to ignore topics like death or free will if they make you uncomfortable, not so much about the existence of people around you). I did hear that Persona 5 very unsubtle criticisms of the Japanese justice system and P4 criticism of television were met with *some* backlash by conservative folks, but it's nowhere near the uproar an actual gay or trans character (let alone a playable one) causes. Heck, I don't even need to google it to know that rainbow pin in reload upset in Japan the same kinds of folks you'd expect outside japan to care so deeply about such a little detail, like the people that went crazy years ago about that very small trans flag in celeste.
Love all your insight here on Naoto and the linguistic differences, thanks for sharing! :)
I want to add to what you said about the masculine term for "I," I have been learning Japanese for some time, and the use of "Boku," the masculine word for "I," can be used by women, specifically tomboys. There is no feminine word for "I," so everyone uses "watashi" for normal settings and "watakushi" for formal settings. "Boku" is informal and commonly used in Japanese media to give certain female characters a tomboyish attitude or for other unrelated reasons that have nothing to do with masculine or feminine appearance or attitude. Japanese women often use it to act cutesy, like Harajuku girls or internet personalities. Real Japanese woman will use "boku" as a way to combat stereotypes, though it is not as common as it is in media.
As a straight guy who loves Persona, I can't deny the sexyness of a lot of male characters, Joker, Ryuji, Iwai, Yusuke to some degree, Akihiko, Ryoji, Makoto, Naoto, Akechi, Josuke, Zenkichi, Konoe and Shinjiro
I have to pushback on “there are no differences between golden and vanilla 4” The Golden’s epilogue doubles down on the queer erasure by showing how the characters changed after the story. Kanji and Naoto are shown to have “straightened out”.
The voice acting and some lines changed as well. In the vanilla PS2 game they continue to use male pronouns for Naoto even after the dungeon. In Golden they switch to more feminine pronouns for Naoto.
Kanji was always bisexual with a primary focus on romance (hence their one sided attraction to Naoto) and no I played the original P4 they didn't continue to use male pronouns after the dungeon. Hell Japan doesn't even have the same understanding of transgenderism the west has so your point falls completely apart.
@@notthefbi7015 oh, a racist and a transphobe
@@notthefbi7015 ...the original translation definitely continued using masculine pronouns for naoto after their dungeon.
And while transness is a lot less commonly known in Japan, this game was made in 2008. You're ignorant if you really think Japanese people had no concept at all of trans people by the early 2000s.
@@roomtomush Yeah, I don't remember Naoto switching to "watashi' or "atashi" I think Naoto always used "boku" and the characters just referred to her by "-kun"
@@Tenshi6Tantou6Rei that’s not really how Japanese address works though… “boku” is generally used by “good boy” types, but it’s also used by tomboys. And the honorific “-kun” is not used exclusively for men, it can be a general honorific for people close to you. It’s very possible that Naoto just uses “boku” in daily life, and that the P4 protagonist team is just used to calling Naoto “Naoto-kun” and there’s no real point in changing it. And gendered pronouns like “kanojo” or “kare” aren’t exactly common in Japan, so it’s kind of difficult to determine what exactly the original Japanese reading denotes.
You missed the female npc in Persona 4 + Golden who comes to realize her feelings for a girl in the library, ends up being a little obsessive due to the fog, and upon the fog lifting she accepts her love interest falling for a man instead of her.
But honestly P4 is the most homophobic LGBT game they have funnily, and I love it despite it. I think that saying Kanji and Naoto are one or another alone diminishes their stories as a whole. There's dialogue in the game that implies Kanji is leaving his sexuality/romantic interest to the backburner as his want to be accepted for his interests is more important to him. Naoto on the other hand is focused more on their want to be a detective but still can't shake being uncomfortable with their body. I don't think that seeing either as LGBT takes away from the focus of their social links being gender roles and how those affect them in their daily lives. I think people who aren't allies or aren't LGBT themselves don't realize that heteronormativity affects them as well as us. Woman in the work place being treated as lesser affects men, woman, straight, gay, cis and trans people alike. Men being made fun of for their interests affects woman, men, straight, gay, cis and trans people alike. If Naoto's a trans man that doesn't change how woman are treated in the work place, treated in relationships and those feelings of wishing to be a man that Naoto has to face as a person with a female body. Kanji being gay/bi doesn't take away from the fact that men in general are made fun of for being sensitive or having certain hobbies.
Anyway gotta finish the rest of this video lol
YES!! i like that u bring up that characters can have multiple thematic elements to their stories. it's not like once gay and trans people come out, they are automatically unable to experience any bigotry or hardships outside of their queer identities....
The persona 6 in brat style made me laugh so hard I spilled the milk all over my breakfast, I blame you.
Sorry for ruining your breakfast it was a worthy sacrifice :)
@@garfieldkermitIndeed it was.
I will say the whole "Beautiful Lady(?)" scene really has other problems besides the dumb joke, namely that that it implies that women don't have body hair, which is demonstrably untrue. A lot of women don't, but many women also do. It does seem to imply that having body hair and failing to meet beauty standards makes it okay to question someone's identity.
The way I see Akechi's matter is: he wasn't intended to be officially seen as a romantic interest, but the romantic undertones that are present clearly weren't accidental. Perhaps it's because of Akechi being a character where it makes sense that it'd be difficult to commit to any explicit romance (for obvious reasons including betrayal and death) that they chose to still include elements of romance. He flirts with Joker in his Confidant, but you can say it's just strategic. Joker wished him back to life, but it could be his guilt and savior complex. Akechi treats Joker differently, but maybe that's because he's the only real connection he has to another person. And so on and so on. You can find alrernative explanations for many of the romantic elements, but that doesn't change the fact that those many romantic elements exist.
One thing I wanted to touch upon also since it was brought up in the video is that I don't believe the "I hate you" confession can be used as an argument for Akechi having no positive feelings towards Joker whatsoever since the game itself dismantles the notion that Akechi actually hates him, from both Morgana and Maruki claiming that there's no hate between them (which Akechi doesn't deny either of those times) to Akechi's wish in the fake reality ending being a friendly rivalry between him and Joker.
this isn't part of the game or anything, but the artist of the persona 1 manga drew a naoya(protag)/hidehiko doujin if that means anything
great video, especially to find someone who doesn’t pretend the tension between akechi & joker wasn’t burning hot. i do think aigis and femc were understated in this video, though. the game quite explicitly mentions the taboo of their relationship; iirc aigis says that ‘she knows you should find happiness with a man’. It’s quite blatantly romantic, and i think not acknowledging it as much as removed or implied romances was a mistake.
I definitley should've given aigis a bit more attention, but tbh I think the reason why I didn't was because it's so obvious and no-one was really disagreeing with it. It's easy when making videos like this to get caught up in the drama of the more obscure representation and pick that apart, and I do enjoy that, but I do agree that I should focus a little more on the positive more straightforward representation included as well! :)
I’ll say this for me Kanji is bi or pan. I know the straight guys get their panties in a twist by saying that because they relate to him in some way so they are thinking we are calling them gay for it.
I myself as a gay tween/teenager I related heave to Kanji so hard. That’s why he quickly became my favorite.
Nobody gets anything in twist as far I’ve seen
Because nowadays people tend to attribute everything outside of 100% traditional male as being gay. Kanji is not that. His whole arc is to understand that even though he likes some traditionally viewed hobbies that are attributed to women, it doesn't mean he's not a man.
There would be nothing wrong with him being gay. But that's clearly not what the writers were thinking with Kanji here.
@wtfdidijustwatch1017 😭 you haven't seen the persona sub reddits that go crazy thinking anything queer of them
@@wtfdidijustwatch1017 thats bs I’ve seen people have meltdowns because of some one just implying that he could be attracted to men
@@BARALover96 cuz is dumb. Men can be good friends and knit without being gay. This is the same argument as Frodo and Sam being gay. Men just can't be very good and close friends without buttfucking each other.
persona 5 Royal where the two main boys see each other in their perfect reality playing chess together not like parents or a girl they like but just their best friend not lover best FRIEND
Third semester is literally just marukis doomed yaoi fic. Like youre telling me akechi and jokers wish was not to have better families, not to have been outcasts of society, but to be with each other?? Youre telling me jokers greatest wish above all was for akechi to be alive?? AND the fact that he holds on to akechis glove after hes presumed dead?? I genuinely thought i was seeing things when i first experienced the game through yt but after playing the game myself i only became more certain
I’m going to be honest the most experience I’ve ever had with persona was watching my buddy play through the yukiko dungeon over discord and my biggest takeaway from that was that chie and yukiko are extremely sapphic for each other
looking back at it i love how casually queer person was before p3! those revelations gays are absolutely fab
Honestly, great video.
I'm a long time Persona fan and got into the series with 4 when I was a queer kid. I saw a lot of myself in those characters and it was very refreshing to see someone both engage with the text as it is and work with its cultural context whilst not becoming excessively vitriolic and homophobic.
You did an excellent job being very even handed and explored the topic in a way that had a lot of nuance while still respecting the queer and non-queer fans.
I'm shock, shock, frankly to see such a level headed display of discourse.
Your sarcasm was delightful as well, you really had me a few times with those transitions (no pun intended).
I am very hopefull for the future of Persona and video games in general, not just for queer people but for marginalised people all over.
Honestly, the bar is so comically low for Atlus that at this point if I just get a single game without a joke that makes me feel deeply uncomfortable, I will count that as a massive win.
Haha thank you, I'm especially glad you liked the transition gags lmao. So true on your last point though, just one game without an uncomfortable joke would be lovely!
Just another useless comment on Naoto from a basic ass cis/het man who's understanding of the LGBTQ experience is limited to what my friends tell me. I went into Naoto's social link wanting to romance her, and at the 8th link, you ge the choice to say either "I'm glad you're a girl" or "your gender doesn't matter".
I don't personally believe naoto is trans, but I fully understand why trans fans would relate to her due to her clearly going through some form of gender dysphoria for years. Because of that I assumed the correct dialogue option was to say that i don't care about her gender. She's clearly sensitive about it and needs more time to think about her identity.
Then in her later episodes I was surprised there was no romance option. Turns out saying you're glad she's a girl is a mandatory romance flag. In what world would that be romantics? I'm forcing my views of someone's gender onto someone who has been questioning their gender for years. That's not romantic that's just being a dick. If I went up to an enby friend I have that goes by she/they and called them a girl to everyone they'd quite reasonably get angry at me, not start liking me.
Is water wet
This is an excellent essay, thank you for making it! I'll keep an eye out on your other stuff and any future work you'll make!
Ah, excellent video! thank you for it
Thanks, I'm glad you liked it! :)
Yes. Next question.
Let's all be honest here, there's a pattern no one ever brings up when discussing the games and that, as you progress through each game, you get more social link options to romance. As if, every game has to one-up the other. To prevent every social link from being female in the next game, I can see them adding gay romances just so they can beat the amount P5 had. Atlus won't add them due to DIE or wanting proper representation or rather it's just so John P. Six can be a bigger fuck boy than Joker P5 and Yu P4.
It's almost to the point where I have to wonder if it gets in the way of writing because some of the best social links are with the males from P3 (Sun) to P5 (Hanged, Sun) and that may be because they don't have to use the final 2 links for romance bait but instead just concluding the arc. But, of course, because these games have always had a certain self-insert fantasy to them, a certain group will complain if the new protag can get less babes than the last one, so they have to add more, even if that means with guys,
on the topic of shuake: i have absolutely no problem with people who don't ship akechi and joker, and i completely understand why you might not like the ship for a variety of reasons (for example: they wouldn't be healthy together, you ship joker with someone else, etc etc). i think, though, a lot of the discourse stems from people who are so against the ship that they refuse to acknowledge that the two characters ARE pushed together by the narrative as rivals who care about each other in some way. obviously not necessarily a romantic way (as a shuake shipper myself, i don't actually think it's canon) but in terms of the "i hate you" line or akechi shooting joker, those are arguably invalid as evidence against the ship because the narrative contradicts those later.
among other instances: during the black mask fight, morgana tells akechi he doesn't believe he "really hate[s] joker," and akechi saves the thieves; regardless of if you think akechi was a victim of shido or if he had agency in that relationship, shooting joker was under orders; and in third semester, both akechi AND joker's wishes are for them both to be alive and have a health(ier) friendship/rivalryship. you can definitely also argue that atlus was queerbaiting or queercoding with them, such as the "honey i'm home" line etc etc, but overall joker and akechi canonically don't see each other as strict enemies.
personally although i really wish you could date male confidants in p5 i don't think akechi SHOULD have had a romance route, because i think if they canonically dated at any point it would undermine parts of the plot and his thematic role in the story in certain places (unless it was done, like, specifically during his detective prince!era and akechi framed it as a ploy to get closer to joker, thus breaking up with him after he betrays the thieves, and making his revival in royal ten million times more awkward. but in that case it would be less of a traditional romance route and probably would have to be written into the game, not a choice the player can make). i do think it adds flavor to canon if you interpret it as the two having feelings for each other though...
unrelated but it really confuses me how much discourse is centered around the naoto and kanji interpretations being one or the other. it's not like characters can't have multiple thematic elements to them, and neither interpretation actually undermines the other. it's not like once someone comes out as a gay man, every feminine trait they have automatically is accepted by society or anything?
Personally, I hate shuake as a ship BUT I've noticed that some of the persona 5 fandom, especially on reddit are so quick to shut it down and refuse to understand why people like the ship in any capacity. t's pretty clear that it's not just because of the plot or social link but purely because akechi is a man. Even though I don't like the ship, completely denying that the characters have any chemistry or potential for their bond to be romantic would be stupid.
Buddy never mentioned Ryoji's feelings for Makoto in P3RE 😢
Actually mentioned it in the Oversights section at the end, it's easy to miss though!
It’s odd nobody ever brings up how cheerful and sweet Kanji is to the protagonist after his dungeon. From what I recall (it’s been a while since I played either version of the game), Kanji seem very sweet when calling or hanging out with the protagonist, which I always felt was very different how he speaks to other characters and how the other characters talk to the protagonist, especially romantable ones. My personal interpretation is he’s Pansexual (because he seems to like Naoto in any form), but I do want to point out a Asian media trope where a female character disguised as a guy makes a straight guy question if they like guys, because they like the girl disguised as a guy, until they figure out the guy is a girl in disguise and realize that’s why. It’s quite common and I see that somewhat in the story and I really dislike that trope (since it can erase why guys might be gay/bisexual/pansexual and that it’s just sad on all parts, because it’s usually obvious the girl is a girl dressed as a boy). I also feel on the fence about Naoto, because I think trans people should thrive in a Persona game (just like any other queer character type), but at the same time, let a cisgender female character also exist with maybe not being comfortable in women’s clothing or being perceived like girly girls or whatnot (I do know there are women in asian countries that just want to be accepted for being non-conforming as well). I even created a character back in high school who was like this and while I had played Persona 4 at the time, my story for that character being inspired by P4’s story, I never got past Yukiko’s castle (I’ve never really played a JRPG before at the time), so I didn’t even know about Naoto. So I’m always confused how to address her character. But with how Persona 5 added in the homophobic predators (in a game with 4 grown woman who can date a teen, which is totally “normal” and not “creepy”) makes me feel Atlus wouldn’t add in a queer character that identifies that way, because they have issues with queer people. Especially since like Code Geass came out the same year as P3 and that show (while having a messed up queer character) had a queer character that I personally felt was handled with respect. And I’m sure if I recall, there are many queer characters in other anime and manga that came out years before P3/P4/P5, so I personally don’t think the, “it was a different time” argument is justified either. Let alone that, pretty sure queerness was very common in Japan before western influence came into the country and maybe some of that is leaked into the story of at least P4, if not P3/P5 as well.
I also forgot, LaLa Escargot is also a drag queen and while we don’t know her sexuality, I’m going to assume she is gay. And I wish they would remove the two offensive gay predators out of all the versions of the game and let LaLa be the only queer character in the game. And I think most people want LaLa (who’s very nice and cares for Joker, especially when he works for her) to be a confident in place of Ohya’s, because most people don’t care for Ohya (who in my opinion just doesn’t offer much outside of romance, like the other characters do).
Funny how persona 4 with the main theme of finding truth left such messy ends
What a fantastic video. I enjoyed it so much and I can’t wait to see more content of yours in the future!
Thank you so much! :)
As a bisexual male, I've never been upset that I couldn't romance a male character. If the MC is written to be straight, then it seems silly to be upset that he won't seek out male characters. The only time I was ever kinda upset that I couldn't explore a relationship deeper was in 3 reload with Ryoji It's just such an interesting concept to me that it would have been neat to see it play out in full.
Ryuji in p3? ☠️
@@critical_6164oops I meant Ryoji lmao
As a bisexual man, I really wanted Joker and Akechi to kiss. Like a lot.
@@nilesstandish1802 lol! You have type then :p I think that would have been an unhealthy relationship imo. But who doesn't love a bit of drama?
@@jamjam445indeed lol.
i know a bunch of other people have left this comment by now but thank you for the level of time and depth you put into this video and the related research! a couple of things i'd love to say- (though for clarification i havent gotten to the extra content yet so sorry if you mention it at the end! it's also very long omg im so sorry)
firstly, i definitely agree in saying that it's not fair to blame hashino 100% for the state of megaten's treatment of gay people. there's a lot of nuance there, especially considering (and i'm so surprised this didn't come up in the googling related to other megaten/atlus titles!) one of the games he directed before persona 3 was shin megami tensei digital devil saga, a game which was written partially by science fiction author yu godai and finished off by satomi tadashi, the writer for both persona 2 games. i can't explain the degree to which all of its queerness exists due to being a huge spoiler, but a main character of the first game is coded as sapphic (to the point of another character referring to the object of her affections as her girlfriend in the text) and two major characters in the second are explicitly intersex and nonbinary respectively. the intersex character is not entirely accurately depicted but is a tragically sympathetic villain, while the nonbinary character is met with NPC pushback (much like the demon negotiation in p2) that is framed as being wrong and close-minded. in addition, godai wrote a series of novels finishing her original interpretation of DDS's script called quantum devil saga with permission from atlus, and the protagonist serph is depicted explicitly as transmasculine and has homosexual subtext with another main character (but the details are also spoilers there + novels 3-5 are not entirely translated, though reliably translated summaries exist online). i believe she mentioned writing the sapphic characters' relationship with GL in mind, referencing the word for lily being yuri quite literally in the final novel.
obviously, the trend with hashino's work does show him being quite misogynistic especially considering he'd stated persona would "never have a female protagonist under him" and the distaste for queer identity does repeatedly show up, but he's definitely not the sole reason it exists.
secondly, i really really feel seen by your video and the way you chose to explore the topic at hand. megami tensei as a whole (SMT especially, but the whole series for sure) is my special interest and as a queer person navigating those fandom spaces can be really difficult. your points are all well-articulated and i especially appreciate how you mention it's unfair the way these discussions are so quickly shut down for being "whiny". genuinely gives me hope that the persona fandom has more people willing to actually engage in discussion about queerness without it turning into slapfighting. thank you so much!
Thanks for all the insight on DDS, I found some smatterings of info about it during my research, but since it was so tricky to find explicit conversations I decided to not mention it since I didn't want to get anything stupidly wrong, so I appreciate you laying it out here! And I'm glad you liked the 'whiny' point since it is frustrating that so many people are so unwilling to have the conversation that they actively get annoyed if the conversation is happening. Thanks again! :)
@garfieldkermit that's totally understandable! it's a bit more abstract in terms of depiction than other games in the franchise so that's honestly a very reasonable choice. and yeah, it's so weird that some people can't seem to stand the idea of not getting involved with somebody else's conversation when it's clearly coming from a totally different POV and set of life experiences. people will be people i guess!
Wokesona era is upon us! Bask in it’s homosexual glory…..
Persona has had queer elements ever since P2. We've always been basing in it.
I would like to point out that in Persona 5 Yusuke does actually have a line referring to his sexuality/attraction. When asking Ann to model for him, he says that he "has no interest in her as someone of the opposite sex." At least to me, this is a very clear allusion to the fact that Yusuke is in fact canonically gay, which I think is interesting for the topic at hand! Of course, this does make the later social link interactions with Yusuke have an even more overtly romantic tone to them (which was already pointed out in the video, but one of the notable interactions is Yusuke taking the protagonist to a place where couples normally spend time together, something that gets pointed out by some NPCs in the scene). I've only played through vanilla, so I don't know if this is changed in Royal.
Additionally, regarding Persona 3, according to a friend of mine Atlus actually did change some dialogue involving Ryoji in Reload. I haven't finished the game yet (my first time experiencing 3 actually!) but my friend has told me that in the original version of 3, you had the option to reciprocate Ryoji's feelings when he brings up wanting to be more than friends. However, in Reload the option is removed, and you can only vaguely reject him or act confused by what he means. Either way, the convo will progress as normal.
Very well made video!! As a queer fan of the Persona series, I do think the topic is something important to discuss, especially with the modern trilogy having a lot of themes revolving around self-reflection (I have not had the opportunity to play 1, 2:IS, or 2:EP). You went through everything really thoroughly and I'm glad to have watched! Wonderful video ❤
Thanks I'm glad you liked the video! And thank you for all the extra details, can't believe I missed that line from yusuke, out of all the potential gay relationships in P5, I really think his would've made the most sense to include, but alas. And that's really interesting to know about Ryoji! :)
Kanji and Naoto were my biwakening, they’ll always have a place in my dumb little heart even if P4 isn’t exactly perfect.
I like the Kanji dungeon, it was like living my own process to start accepting my sexuality.
as a queer persona fan myself you’ve taken every thought ive had and spit it out into a video. thank you for making the video essay i havent had the time or energy to make myself
Persona is straight but they have gay friends.
bro idec if persona is gay or not js the way u talk and the accent are so satisfying to listen to
Haha thank you! :)
This was a wonderful video! As a queer persona fan you’ve managed to sum up a lot of the queer fan experience with these games. I’m of the personal opinion that there are some people in the writers room or the studio as a whole that wants to see that queer representation but there are others (most likely executives) who would wish to see it cut or reduced to stereotypes and jokes that age like milk. I have high hopes for persona six but at the same time as a queer fan who’s been disappointed by other series before (namely fire emblem and their often clumsy attempts at queer romance) I’m not holding my breath by any means. Regardless a lovely video!
Thanks so much, and I'm glad you liked it! :)
What I love about Kanji is that he is so well written that we CAN debate on these things. I myself and an Amab non binary person who used to be of the opinion that Kanji was explicitly queer representation. Then I sat down and replayed the game after hearing the prespective that his arc is more of a commentary on masculinity, societial expectations of being a man and being true to ones self. Honestly I have replayed the game with that mind set and having gone through my personal struggles with toxic masculinity I personally feel more strongly about his arc being about masculinity and how it can shape your prespection of yourself and your sexaulity.
Not that my own personal experience and thoughts invaldate anyone else conculsions on Kanji, whats great about well done media is that every person is allowed to consume and take away what they want from it and I know a lot of folks who passionately consider Kanji very important queer representation for their own journeys through sexaulity.
I hope if we get a remake they don't change a thing because to me it's important that he can continue to be a topic of discussion and analysis. A good character will have a strong impression and most people will a strong understanding of them the frist time around. A great character has complexity and nuances that can be interpreted in a lot of ways and resonate with just as many people.
This is a good video essay, thank you for posting.
Thanks, I'm glad you liked it! :)
I don't think I've ever thought about that question until I saw this video recommended to me
i was expecting some jokes but my god is this so well read
why is everyone in the comments just fighting over yes or no its a maybe?(the question mark IS necessary ok) AT BEST i thought we acknowledged this already
Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed it!
When you were talking about the queering of JRPGs, I wanted to mention something about Sylvando from Dragon Quest XI. In the Japanese version, his name is Sylvia, and he uses stereotypically-feminine pronouns. From a quick search on it, it looks like "man using feminine pronouns" is something of a gay stereotype in Japan, but considering how his story has a whole "I ran away and changed my name to be true to myself" angle, it could be said that his character was a trans woman in JP, and this was changed in EN. I...haven't played the game myself, and don't read Japanese, so I don't think I could properly argue in any direction, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
That's really interesting how differently the character is portrayed between the Japanese and English since that really didn't come across at all in the version I played, but thanks for pointing it out! :)
This has to be my favorite break down on queer themes in Persona I've ever seen, though I'm probably biased in that it mirrors a lot of my own thoughts on having replayed 3-5 very recently. I was initially introduced to 4 on TH-cam recommendations (from, as far as Im aware, cishet male allies) back in 2013 specifically for its queer themes, and Kanji and Naoto did a lot to help me explore my own identity and back then, really helped me feel seen when I was an isolated teenager without many outlets for my queer experience. Of course, upon replaying the game, it was a much more mixed experience in that regard as I've gotten older and experienced more nuance in the queer depths. It makes me really happy to hear someone mention how deep a character Naoto is and just how much conversation can be had around her. She may be a cis character in my mind, but I do feel she undergoes a person of questioning her own identity, and comes to the conclusion at the end, that what she's feeling is actually internalized misogyny, something I've heard echoed from many transmascs and GNC lesbians actually. I think her experiences will undoubtably resonate with many queer folks, even if the character herself, isn't trans in text. And I think that's important and should be celebrated!
Honestly with how the Beauty on the Beach scene as well as the many other things in Reload, it makes me wonder how exactly Atlus would go about remaking 4, as there's a LOT more explicit and implicit queer themes that could be touched up with a modern lens, or at least handled with more care to get a clearer point across.
Glad you enjoyed it! It'll definitely be interesting to see how they'd go about changing P4, but tbh I don't see us getting it before P6, and I think how P6 ends up will be a pretty good indicator for how they would change P4... if that makes sense :)
@@garfieldkermit Absolutely! I'm definitely excited for P6 too! I'm curious to see what direction they take things, what issues they decide to tackle, and just the themes in general. Whatever the case may be, it'll be nice to have another game in the roster to play and enjoy and dissect
im writing an editorial about how america is seen as very progressive when compared to other countries like japan (duh) but in reality we are also pushing back at them to stay quieter and 'stay japanese' (like some western fans, especially those twitter commenters on the 'diversity is their strength' line) and this video has been such a great help b/c im also comparing 2's openness with tatsuya and jun's relationship vs how 5, which got so much more popular, only paints queerness in a negative light. thank you i have so many more article quotes
Glad i could help, let me know when it's published, I'd love to read it! :)
yosuke being yosuke is the embodiment of gay persona: straight, but gay, but actually homophobic, but really, *really* gay, but not gay enough that the straight dudes in the audience are able to see it, and if they do there’s enough plausible deniability for them to ignore it
i identify myself as a mitsuru loving lesbain
To the people who argue that removing homophobia from P5 removes the Japanese culture from the game: Up yours. Discrimination is not suddenly okay because the animes are doing it, and if you think stereotyping is an important cultural touchstone you need to see in something, then you're just a bigot who doesn’t see Japan as a real culture, and instead as an idealized fantasy reality where everything is scrubbed clean of undesirables
Clearly Persona is European.
The whole Kanji represents toxic masculinity vs sexuality argument is stupid considering how closely linked the two topics are. Why can't I be both fr.
Thank you for making this
Glad you liked it!
This was SUCH an enjoyable watch. You informed yourself very well and me as the viewer very well and I agree with basically everything you presented. Thank you for taking the time to do this! Here’s hoping for some more (unproblematic) queer representation to come in Persona
While I don't like the Toxic Yaoi aspect of ShuAke, I can atleast see where it's coming from, which is more than I can say for Ryuji who at multiple points explicitly comes off as straight. Like, no matter what you're opinion of Akechi is, the influence Joker and Akechi have on eachother is undeniable thanks to 3rd semester.
I watched the whole way through and enjoyed it a lot. 👍 If Persona 6 adds some same-gender romance options or just fleshed out LGBTQ+ characters and stories, I'd be real interested in checking that out. If not, then at least there are other developers putting in that work.
Exactly, like I'm not gonna boycott if it's missing, but it would feel like a pretty obtuse exclusion at that point yk
I have examples of gay representation in SMT, since you said you couldn't find any. Though it's in spin offs, not mainline. In Devil Summoner Raidou Kuzunoha VS King Abaddon, Raidou is tasked with finding a girl's brother. She gives Raidou a picture of him so he can ask around town. There you can ask this woman if she has seen him. She says she hasn't but not before she asks if the man in the picture is a lover and that he would be perfect for Raidou. She lives near what I think (it's been a while since I've played the game) was some kind of red-light district where male escorts flirt with Raidou. And another instance is where a female friend walks in on an innocent situation between Raidou and his mentor, and jumps to the conclusion that the two are in a romantic relationship. She is surprised but not disgusted or anything, which is nice.
There are also male demons who hit on Raidou but that's not really surprising. Female demons do the same. Humans too. Raidou is just seen as good looking by most people it seems. The game is very much not focused on romance at all, so at least it's acknowledged in the game world. But overall, most of the queer interactions are played off as a laugh or just plain crude. Which is typical of Atlus games, sadly.
Another game is Devil Survivor 2. MC has flirty dialogue choices with most of the main cast, regardless of gender. Though the males usually respond negatively to it. Most of the gay jokes are played for laughs here, which is typical. While romance is just side content similar to persona, you can raise your "social link" with your companions in this game too. If you raise this particular male characters SL to max, you can pretty much set off together on a trip around the world in one of the endings. (Which is considered the best true ending.) And the game makes it no secret that he cares ONLY about MC and values his opinions very much. So much so that if you side against him in the endings he truly believed that the others brainwashed MC against him. Even ingame, the others know MC is his favorite. They make MC talk for them, since they are too scared to talk to him on their own. All this to say the game is very upfront about the relationship between MC and him. But it's all just implications and never outright says it's anything more than a very close friendship. A lot of people call the game "fujo bait" and it's hard to argue against them. But I digress.
I love Persona /SMT. The stories Atlus tells are great and I'll keep playing their games. Hopefully in the future, Atlus won't be afraid to commit to actual gay relationships and LGBT themes in a positive way. As long as it's believable and not forced or shoehorned in. They've done it in the past with Jun, so I'm hopeful. Thank you for the video!
Thanks so much for covering the SMT content I overlooked, I haven't played the series and from what I surmised it was mostly subtext which is only really noticeable when playing the games, so thanks for laying it all out here! :)
I'd argue Anguished One is also very clearly into the MC. Official material even lists his type of romantic partner as "A Shining One"(what he calls MC) and the anime portrays him and Yamato in effectively a love triangle over MC/Hibiki. I think Desu2 actually handles its potential gay romance well, since it's no less canon than the straight options, and the options to flirt with the women are also often taken as jokes with the except of maybe Io and sometimes Makoto (but then flirting with Yamato and Anguished One is also genuine). Joe also flirts back with the MC, from what I remember - but then turns him down because MC's too young for him, not because he's a guy. And there's a drama CD which has Io outright wonder if MC is bisexual.
@sleepygamer6320 Yes I agree very much. Anguished one definitely loves mc if you ask me but I didn't include it because my comment was getting rather long. But I enjoy the love triangle between them. It's very cute lol. All the flirting with the main cast makes me think this was some kind of joke about Evangelion or something since the Mc in that show pretty much almost develops a harem. Which Mc could easily do here if it was that type of media. Not to mention the similar themes and aliens. Also I avoided talking about the anime since I wanted to focus on the game specifically. But I love the game, easily one of my top favorite megaten games of all time
for devil survivor 2 i thought i was just too "gay brained" and seeing things that werent there, so nice to know im not the only one who felt like there was something going on with those 2 characters and the MC lol
This title sounds like a twitter threat by an SMT Fanboy lol.
14:14 "with some calling the game Wokesona 3"
Man i just genuinely dont understand these people. The rainbow pin literally is on screen for like one second, ONE SECOND in a game that is 100 hours long.
Imagine being so upset by the existence of gay people that being reminded they exist for what amounts to 0.0002% of the games runtime ruins the rest of it for you.
Same with the beach scene.
"OMG they removed the 2 minute filler cutscene with no bearing on the story that made fun of trans people the game is ruined"
Like if you actually think like this i genuinely dont know what to say to you. Why should you care so much?
Actually, Jun was seen as Tatsuya's canon love interest by the character designer of Persona 2, Kazuma Kaneko, and he expressed that he wws his favorite pick, so I don't think the inclusion of his romance is just a cynical marketing ploy to attract female fans.
i couldnt finish your video because every time you transitioned topic, the phone chime riled my dog up. he thought someone was at the door every. single. time. :(
I will never understand the people who hate on Catherine for having one of the best mainstream representations of a transgirl. I think it's because she's treated like a friend and not given a pass or something. Her struggles are genuine and relatable, and the only one who actually teases her about her past is the protagonist who we are constantly reminded is a scumbag for most of the game.
After 9 years, we've finally found the longest yeah boy ever
As a bi man who is primarily is bi for feminine or pretty men rin being romancable in catherine full body made me so incredibly happy even if he is defintely too morally upstanding for what the original catherine was going for which is weighing your options between 2 not super ideal women.
i'm only at 9:47 but i just saw akechi and screamed lol
edit because i have things to add: 51:34 is joker ignoring/dismissing akechi's crimes a writing flaw of the game or a personal flaw of joker? i really like the latter interpretation, though i do see how it should be addressed in game, at least by other characters. but akechi's screentime as a whole feels like the only non-transactional relationship joker has in-game, even through he clearly cares about all his other confidants. akechi's just special and messed up and i love him to death lol
also, reddit when a character is complex and/or is a minor with issues: *implodes on itself*
unless i missed this being mentioned in detail, p2 IS has the optional scene where if you have yukino stay behind at caracol, her shadow and anna kiss and commit double suicide which effectively lobotomizes her. this is to my knowledge the only gay kiss in the series and it’s the worst of two outcomes in that scenario nevermind the fact that anna might be underage. and they still haven’t been brave enough to do that again! i have a lot of feelings on p2 rep where people glazing tatsujun meant i was shocked at the transphobic writing for those npcs (even if the intersex fortune teller lady seems to be fine). but at the same time there are people who think tatsujun being for the fujoshis makes them bad/fetishistic rep like they’re not one of the best examples of queerness in the series and the series hasn’t had the guts to do more than be coy about it since persona 3! like say i love shuake but they’re never gonna do more than queerbait with those two and it makes me mad 😭😭
Whew. with that out of the way this is a great video and it taught me a lot about the games i hadn’t played:) i had a comment that got eaten somewhere so i can only assume i posted it in the wrong place. oh well!
I remember hearing about the Yukino and Anna scene but tbh I didn't look into it that much so thanks for mentioning it here! And yeah I agree, pandering to fujos is slightly questionable, but if it ends up with good gay rep then it's kind of a net positive imo. Glad you enjoyed the video! :)
I don't think Naoto is a trans character, as teenager I personally behaved basically like her because I grew up thinking being a woman was like being a "second class human being" society back in the day didn't take women seriously and I personally was ridiculed by my brothers whenever I acted like a girl when I was a child so I developed some kind of shame and guilt for being a girl and started using male pronouns, I didn't like how my body was transforming into a woman like body, and deep inside I kind of couldn't believe I was actually a girl I just somehow felt like something was wrong with my body and was neither a boy or a girl... now I'm 22 and feel more comfortable using female pronouns, I fully accept myself as a woman now but I still don't feel so comfortable acting too feminine.
So basically struggling with your identity as a teenager is completely normal especially when it comes to being a girl back in the day