Is Masashi Kishimoto Sexist?

[M3J]

Moderator message by: M3J

Keep it friendly and civil, no need to attack others for their thoughts and opinions.

[Brill]

...I think Kishimoto is sexist because He can overcome reality limitations (Discussed all above) ,proved with Tsunade and Sakura, and chooses to not highlight a woman to achieve the same kind of achievements as the ones for men (Sorry for being redundant here) regarding actual plotline and events. Even if I think that it's because He is poor as a writer when it comes to woman, and even if acknowledge that it's marketing decision it doesn't takes out the fact that He can change that with ease...

So not only is Kishi sexist, he's also racist, homophobic, xenophobic and anti-religious because there aren't any accomplished black ninja, gay ninja, powerful animals, or Buddhists ninja in the Leaf village. I'm surpirsed anyone reads this piece of filth. But let's stick to sexism for now. Since Sakura isn't as accomplished as Sasuke and Naruto Kishi must be sexist. Mind you Sakura doesn't have a hax doujutsu or a perpetual chakra machine bijuu residing in her gut yet she has accomplishments. She did take out an Akatsutuki with assistance. If you remove Naruto and Sasuke from the equation Sakura is the most acciomplished Shinobi of the Rookie 11 aside from Shikamaru in Part II. She's better than all the other girls and Kiba, Neji, Shino, Sai, Chouji, Rock Li, And Neji-and he's a jounin.

So Kishi isn't sexist because he is, he's sexist because the women in Naruto aren't reaching the bar that you're imposing on the series. Then again the men aren't reaching the bar either except for maybe Shikamaru. Does Kishi have favorites? Absolutely, but that doesn't make him anymore sexist, homophobic, rascist, or xenophobic than the rest of us. So unless you have direct evidence that he is, you're just blowing smoke into the wind. It doesn't make Kishi sexist just negligant and while lamentable, it is not a sin.

[M3J]

Kishi isn't necessarily a sexist. He made Temari look like a badass whose intelligence was almost on par with Shikamaru. Not only that, she saved Shikamaru's ass, who had difficulty fighting against a girl, Tayuya. We also have two female kage, one who was willing to die to save Naruto and Konoha, and the other who didn't job to weakened Sasuke. Sakura was also a badass in early Part II, and Kishi showed her changing and taking a punch from Inoo during the exams.

Kishi is a dumbass when it comes to females, yeah, but I don't think he's sexist.

[IChallengeYou!]

Kishi is a dumbass when it comes to females, yeah, but I don't think he's sexist.

Moderator message by: M3J
Keep it friendly and civil, no need to attack others for their thoughts and opinions.

kishi wants to keep it civil too, no need to call him a name, or else jiraya is coming to get you son. tip: hair will be involved

[M3J]

Not calling him a name, I'm saying he's clueless when it comes to females. Look at what he did to Sakura, Ino, and some other females.

And I gotz my Sharingan ready for Jiraiya and Kishi.

[Ryr]

I think the thread is no longer civil the moment it jumps onto conclusion about the author of being a sexist simply because he doesn't give you what you want.

It's no different from me calling Uriel a feminist. Just a thought.

[M3J]

The problem is the way you guys attack each other or act towards each other. There's nothing uncivil about calling the author sexist as long as you back up your points in a civil way.

[Ryr]

Right, accusing the author of being a sexist ism't uncivil but accusing a member of being a feminist is.

Meh, when will Mangastream go back up.

[Airgrimes]

Right, accusing the author of being a sexist ism't uncivil but accusing a member of being a feminist is.

Meh, when will Mangastream go back up.

As long as its backed up with a valid meaning then yes. That is the case.

[Depravity]

I think Kishimoto is sexist because He can overcome reality limitations (Discussed all above) ,proved with Tsunade and Sakura, and chooses to not highlight a woman to achieve the same kind of achievements as the ones for men (Sorry for being redundant here) regarding actual plotline and events. Even if I think that it's because He is poor as a writer when it comes to woman, and even if acknowledge that it's marketing decision it doesn't takes out the fact that He can change that with ease.

Sooo you acknowledge or rather admit that the reason some women are not of the same amount of pertinence within the current plot can be due to:

1) Reality and what is prescribed in the real world.

2) He has poor writing prowess when it comes to woman development.

3) It being a marketing decision.

So, because Kishimoto adheres to what is real, what will profit him, and what his own limitations permit when writing about his women, he's somehow a sexist? I find that to be jumping the gun quite a bit. If you take issue with those reasons, then you must also take issue with an immense amount of worldly literature and manga as well as this.

I elude marketing debate because I think that's completely changeable and doesn't FORCE Kishi to NOT write actual plotline with achievements in the same line as the male protagonist.

Plenty of women in Naruto share the same achievements that the men have had within the plot of the story. There are two women currently whom of which are Kage, titles that bear the uttermost leadership within their respective villages. This thus means that Kishi has given two women one of if not the highest achievement one can ever hope to attain in the entire Naruto universe. Women are Anbu, women are Jounin, and women are Chunnin - just as the men are, with the main one being an esteemed medical ninja, and yet he somehow has underachieving women in his story?

That being said, I recognize that He tried to many times with some characters and that makes him not a complete sexist...but a little bit. He could do a better effort.

LOL, wow. Even though you admit Kishimoto tries heavily to give women a momentous place in the story, which is much more than what I could say about other Mangaka's, he somehow ends up as a sexist because you deem his effort to be minimal. That's a completely ridiculous notion. All of your reasoning to deprecate Kishi thus far has been moot, and amounts to nothing more than bashing Kishi for not giving you what you want to see out of the women. Sorry, but that does not mean you or anyone else can simply brand Kishi a sexist.

[Uriel]

But you all took my initial posts and a minimal note as brand while I wasn't doing so. That's why I always keep my first post in mind: I said that compared to other mangakas, He wasn't that sexist. And I said that Manga IN GENERAL is sexist because oriental culture is. Again, generally. But that even so, He did efforts to avoid it, but not successfully achieved.
He's sexist not in the way He hates woman, but in the way He should be doing more effort to break some stereotypes lies in manga. Like I said in the first place: looks is something to be considered into this.

I'll make a comparison with Hiro Mashima in the sense HE DOES fanservice and HE DOES show the stereotype, BUT IN THE SAME TYPE He also shows a counter part of this: there is a leading woman (Erza) who is always achieving things not in the way She's powerful but in the way She involves in the plot not being forsaken NOT ONCE in the story and her development is also part of the story.

In the other hand we have Sakura who was the stereotype and the only way Kishi developed her (And that was once, even when She's part of the three main protagonists) only in the timeskip to Shipuuden only to be shown once and being forgotten later. This is not only bad writing in my eyes, it's also a way to be sexist. Not as hard and actually bad, it's slightly so. Which is what I said in the first place anyway.

The thing is that I feel that when I called Kishi sexist you all took it as I hated him. May I remember all of you that I'm still a Naruto fan myself and that I enjoy the series as much as you do. BUT I'm always trying to be critical in the sense that some facts and theories are debatable and some thing are just opinions. This one, as PROVED on this 46 pages, is something that is an opinion. When you start to critique people as stupid or sexist (In my part I was at fault, too) then you start to derail of the fact that they're still opinions and everyone is entitled to have one. This thread, in the first place, is a sort of poll of the main opinion.
And it has a poll. And the opinion is divided. While "NO" is a close call, then you have lots of "Yes".
In that point you realize that maybe He's sexist, as that is matter or perception as well.

[blackjack612]

But you all took my initial posts and a minimal note as brand while I wasn't doing so. That's why I always keep my first post in mind: I said that compared to other mangakas, He wasn't that sexist. And I said that Manga IN GENERAL is sexist because oriental culture is. Again, generally. But that even so, He did efforts to avoid it, but not successfully achieved.
He's sexist not in the way He hates woman, but in the way He should be doing more effort to break some stereotypes lies in manga. Like I said in the first place: looks is something to be considered into this.

I think that's where some people, especially myself take issue. I agree that there needs to be more balanced gender representation in media in general when there currently isn't much.

And I said that Manga IN GENERAL is sexist because oriental culture is. Again, generally.

You're making a generalization about an entire artistic medium when it would be more accurate to say that 'sexist overtones aren't uncommon in' since not all series are sexist. And by using a generalization, you're missing the opportunity to point towards specific examples as evidence of your argument. And while there are series out there with sexist or questionable depictions of women (Gantz, Air Gear), no subset of a medium can accurately portray the totality of what's in that medium.

He's sexist not in the way He hates woman, but in the way He should be doing more effort to break some stereotypes lies in manga.

This is the part that really bugs me about your argument though. As if the author has any duty to do other than fully articulate his artistic vision. There's arguments that have been made on the merits of film, literature, fine art, and television about how much responsibility the auteur has to effect social change or illuminate the issues of the world. I fall down on the side of the aisle that says the purpose of entertainment is first and for most to entertain so that it can be (like all art) consumed. Occasionally, someone will come along and add deeper subtext to their work that makes you reevaluate the world or question the values you once held, but that's a plus to the package, not a requirement.

The absence of an effort to break stereotypes in a genre reliant on ancient tropes and cliches != making a distinction in favor of a particular gender based on perceived traits of that gender.

There are a couple of characters in the manga who disregard woman like, most recently, Madara Uchiha. But Kishimoto takes particular pains to punch holes in Madara's rhetoric and paint those ideals in an unflattering and incorrect light.

When considering the question of whether or not Masashi Kishimoto is sexist, as framed through Naruto, wouldn't the most relevant issues be whether sexism is a prevailing theme in the world. Does the manga state or even imply the females should be devalued in comparison to males? Now admittedly, everyone is going to read this series differently because we each bring a unique, personal context to the story. But at no point have I personally gotten the feeling that Kishimoto was even implying that woman are intrinsically weaker than men or less suited to certain tasks. I've listed in previous posts why, but to sum up, there are too many counterexamples of strong female types for me to support this theory.

Like I said in the first place: looks is something to be considered into this.

That's an interesting thought. Is it really that bad? Certainly Kishimoto is a male and the images within the manga would be filtered through the male gaze of his, but I can think of only two instances that were particularly bad off the top of my head:

1. Anko, whose unmodest dress certainly seems filtered through the male gaze, but who also tutored under Orochimaru who had a .... unique sense of fashion and strange fixation with the human body.
2. Tsunade, whose unrealistically large bust seems to be mostly fanservice. Though I'm willing to overlook it because there are very busty females in real life and she seems to be the exception to the female body type in the series.
3. That blonde, female, cloud-nin captain.

Otherwise, I'd say that the general female population of the manga isn't unfairly represented in their artistic representation. They're no more distorted in their physiology than the males in the manga, and while there aren't many ugly females present, there aren't many ugly people present in the series period. Sure there is Tsunade, Anko, and that blonde cloud-nin, but there's also Sakura, Ino, Hinata, Konan, Kushina, Tenten, and so on, who are rather moderately depicted.

[Delbi]

So women weren't in the front lines in the past so they should never be allowed on the front lines in the present? They should never have and they will never deserve respect in a combat situation? They're nothing but a burden on the battlefield?

My sister would gut you for that comment. xD

If your sister is in the military she should be quite aware of why females aren't front line soldiers. Never said they shouldn't be in the military, but there are specific, heavily reasearched reasons why the don't go into front line combat situations.

[Uchiha_Blood]

Just sayin', a woman named Uzumaki Kushina in this manga can survive an extraction of a Bijuu, can subdue said Bijuu ( which with half chakra is stronger than 5 lesser Bijuu combined ) at full power even near death, something not even 5 character in this whole manga can even hope to achieve, can create a barrier strong enough to hold said Bijuu and prevent external interference, knowed a lot of long lost Fuuijutsu that made her clan feared to the point of being exterminated and saved the main character's life by guiding him against said Bijuu.
And her progenitor, cousin or whatever Mito was, hinted to have perfect control of the Kyuubi as well, and by all herself sealed the beast within herself without dying or sacrificing his life to seal half of the beast's chakra.

Seems to me that they aren't as mistreated as it seems, except Fairy Tail no famous shounen can claim to be even comparable to the Naruto manga imho

[Dutchy]

I suppose it wouldn't have killed Kishi to have developed an equal female counterpart to Hashirama and Madara or a female sage on the same level as the Great Toad Sage. I'd even go as far as saying that Rikudou Sennin could have been a woman and it wouldn't have changed the outcome of the story. And while I do empathize with the OP, I think it's also important to ask: Why is it Kishi's responsibility to portray kunoichi in any way other than how he has done? I guess we'll have to wait and see if Norihiro Yagi can spearhead the movement.