It's Not Innocent!

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Pokemon's Not that Innocent!

Pokemon Is Attacked! (2/22/2000)
A leading Roman Catholic archdiocese in Mexico City denounced the Pokemon cartoon series, saying the characters incited violence and sexual perversity among children.

``Pokemon is not as innocent as some believe,'' the Mexico City Archdiocese said Monday in its weekly publication Desde La Fe, distributed on Monday, February 23.

``Behind the huge merchandising phenomenon one finds, as in many Japanese cartoons, a combination of elements that incite violence and sexual perversion among children,'' the publication said. ``This is the tip of an iceberg that could have dramatic consequences.''

The publication also said sexual references in the cartoon series failed to take into account children's level of ''maturity and comprehension.''

The pastor probably saw how Takeshi said lines like "bathing suits, and girls to wear them!" and "You can violate my rights anytime."

Japanese children are more mature than American children, so it's not strange for the show, aimed at Japanese children, is a bit more mature. It doesn't talk below children, it talks on their level. Japanese children don't find it strange that Takeshi is constantly drooling over girls--they see their older brothers (and sometimes sisters) doing the exact same thing. Japanese children learn about sex earlier than American children because they can handle it more maturely at a younger age than American children tend to do. Why can I say that? Because their teen pregnancy rate is so much lower than ours. Because STD's aren't spread as rapidly in Japan as they do in the U.S.

I wonder what the pastor would think if he saw the original-if he saw Episode 18 uncensored or if he saw all of Taasan's comments about women's anatomy (what does a jungle boy know about women anyway?). I think his accusations were hastily put together without any thought at all just to elevate his popularity. By attacking a popular show like Pokemon, he puts himself in the limelight for a short time.

Pocket Monsters was not created by me. It was created by Satoshi Tajiri and the crew at TV-Tokyo. Pokemon is (c) Game Freak, Nintendo, 4Kids Productions, Hasbro, Bandai, and a ton of other companies. When you have a popular anime like Pokemon, lots of people own it so it's impossible to list every company who owns a piece of Pokemon. No infringement of copyrights is meant by the creation of the web site. All images were gotten from official websites (Nintendo, TV-Tokyo, etc.) unless otherwise noted (I don't steal images from other sites!).