It’s a lot easier to think of yuri that is mired with controversy. And, to be honest, this is more of a general romance problem. But I’ll be using yuri for the examples since this is The Lily Garden, after all.
Are these relationships considered acceptable despite their rough beginnings which can range from exertion to cheating to stalking and so on? Can the “good” outweigh the “bad,” in other words?
At this point Citrus and NTRap and Kuzu no Honkai have been thoroughly discussed, so I’ll spare you the usual lecture when it comes to those particular titles. What Satou is doing in Happy Sugar Life is considered reprehensible to some and designated as reasonable to others considering how there are many unhinged pyschos in the setting.
Your mileage, of course, may vary, but talking about these series at length when we’ve all had or done our share of criticizing or defending these particular shows sounds a bit dreary to me. So now I want to move on to more general, less-known manga series as examples in which forceful developments take place instead.
For the first chapter of the Chocolat Company Women Yuri Anthology (a yuri anthology about office ladies), the protagonist is belittled and is ultimately sexually harassed by her superior who happens to be a classmate from high school.
But then it turns out her superior held unrequited feelings toward the protagonist back in high school and thus the reader is expected to think that the superior’s forceful approach and desperate confession is supposed to be romantic…?
I personally can agree with the latter, but I’m not quite as keen with the former. I mean, she’s using her position of authority to force herself onto her old crush, which is definitely improper to say the least. Given that the two seem to end up as a couple at the very end, perhaps the superior’s actions are to be overlooked? Whether or not it is, however, truly depends on one’s perspective.
Another manga I had in mind was Cheerful Amnesia, which revolves a protagonist who has experienced amnesia and has forgotten the past three years of her life, which includes her girlfriend, Mari. However, she’s still quite heads over heels for this mysterious stranger she has unfortunately forgotten.
Be that as it may, the protagonist, Arisa, does get around to asking Mari about how they met and the reader finds out that she continued to show up at Mari’s workplace (which happened to be a fast-food restaurant at the time) until Mari accepted her advances.
Arisa’s determination to get Mari to return her love is somewhat cute, but it’s also rather forceful. Of course, Mari did say “yes” in the end, but what if Mari genuinely wasn’t interested? That would have been a very awkward experience and waste of time for both parties involved.
In the end, characters in both of the aforementioned series do act in questionable ways in general, but I still do rather like both. But I want to know what you think. Does love make right? Or am I making a big fuss out of nothing?
Thank you for reading!
The Lily Garden 
I agree with you but just to keep the discussion going, perhaps in some cases the person is embarrassed to show affection and actually enjoys being forced? Then?
Then it’s not against their feelings but… Okay the was a crappy attempt at disagreeing, forget it.
It’s messy and not cool and I agree with you. Done. There.
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Love is love and it doesn’t matter what the genre of anime is. I always love a well-done love story.
Thirty-three years ago I “stubborned” my way into getting a lover who eventually married me. I didn’t stalk her but I did keep calling until I got a date (parents got tired of telling me she wasn’t home) and then I kept calling until I got another. There is something to be said for persistence.
If we assume the object of another’s affections is a fully functional human being, that person has an obligation to say “no” at some point if the attention really is unwelcome. The absence of “yes” or “no” is always seen as “maybe” and allows a suitor to persist. Pursuit is perfectly okay as long as the pursued has the ability to say “No!” and make it stick. It isn’t necessarily wrong if the pursuer has some kind of major advantage. (Fame, power, money, prestige, age, & beauty, unequals CAN have good relationships.) It is NEVER okay if that advantage is being leveraged against the pursued. (Love me and you get a promotion. Say no and you are fired.)
To make things even more confusing, sometimes “no” means “yes, but…” Respect the “but” and find a way to mitigate it – and no MIGHT turn into yes. “Yes” can also mean “not really, but if you insist…” There is a “no” hidden in there somewhere and a caring person will tease it out.
No two members of a romantic couple are ever going to be exactly equal in power. It can still work out – ***if the more powerful partner splits the difference in power*** with the other. Love can almost be defined as different people finding a mutual center.
Trying to carry that over to an employer-employee relationship is a real minefield, even if the two of them really do love and respect each other.
Never mind having to come up with a definition of “forcefully” and whether it was welcome force or not. Sometimes a guy wants to be swept off his feet.
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I don’t really mind either way, but that’s because I’m in Yuri for the attraction as much as I am for the romance story. If I want romance out of Yuri, I can obviously get it. But I also like just watching girls together, so more drama, forced stuff, etc. can be just as good as sweet and fluffy depending on what mood I’m in and how well it’s done.
My opinion generally is, if you want to tell a particular kind of story, own it and do it well. That applies to all kinds of Yuri as well!
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Solid reasoning. I actually rather like bittersweet yuri a lot but I’m usually happy with most other yuri. Still, I’m glad you’re so accepting!
Ah, so no half-baked yuri stories. Understood!
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Aye, yuri subtext deserves to be treated in ways not befitting the ethical standards of a first-world country. And I’ll leave the sick burns at that.
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Yes, it’s totally not cool and can send the wrong message to readers. But if the rest of the story can show that love is involved, I can suspend disbelief and temporarily get over the uncomfortableness.
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That’s fair. Not everything is perfect, I guess!
It’s a bit hard to overlook the beginnings, though.
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Well, I’m going to take a more realistic approach versus an Anime-ish one since that’s the vibe I’m getting with your post 😀
Sexually harassed by her superior is a HUGE NO, even if they end up together in the end, that’s not how you start a relationship. In fact, this is kind of those tropes from Yaoi that I dislike which you probably already know about 😀
Regarding the second manga… Well, if my boyfriend suffered amnesia, I would probably do the same as Mari XD I mean, they have a story together, Arisa have felt in love with Mari in the past, so yeah, I think it’s normal for Mari to enforce herself and try to make her girlfriend fall in love with her again xP
Great post! ^^
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Yeah, I suppose I did!
Mmmm yeah they try to wrap it up quickly since it /is/ an anthology but it’s really a bad start.
Oh, that’s not really the issue in Cheerful Amnesia but I think most of us would probably do the same, haha.
Thank you.
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I wrote a similar post a while back about boys love. Well it talked more about the rape trope but the meaning is the same. I’m gonna take a guess here and say that rape isn’t as usual in girls love as it is in boys love. Anyway, the forcing someone into loving them trope is. No, I don’t like it. It doesn’t matter if it in the end leads to something sweet and cute. The fact that one forces themselves onto another leaves a sour taste. Unfortunately the trope is common in bl too and I mostly try to look past it and enjoy the bits that comes after. But the bad taste of the beginning is hard to get rid of. Sadly.
Sorry about the rambling. Does it make sense?
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Ah, yes, I had wanted to take a look at your post but it was deleted last I checked ;__;
No, you’re not rambling and you’re making total sense. A bad beginning really sets the tone and is hard to ignore even if the end result is fluffy.
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Oh, yes, I had some issues when I uploaded that post, can’t remember what happened now but something technical, so I had to take it down and upload it again and the messed up the url so those who followed the link from Twitter got a post deleted message. That might be the issue. It is still here though: https://tinyuglyanimal.wordpress.com/2018/06/27/the-rape-trope-in-yaoi-a-very-personal-post/
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The answer to this one is so complicated. I’m not a big fan of it myself because it lacks a certain sensitively towards the characters themselves, but what if a character loved another character and couldn’t say it? Uuugh
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It’s quite the touchy subject, yeah. I really feel mixed about it but you bring up great points!
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