Do you think Ninjago disrespects Japanese culture?

Recently, someone sent me a link to an old BZPower thread. Of course, I’ve never bothered with BZPower, but the thread I read was…interesting?

Basically, the person who started the thread had a thesis about how Ninjago Westernizes Asian culture and twists it up for the American/European audiences. I guess the poster on that thread thinks it’s disrespectful that we have ninjas who fight rather than sneak around, use non-ninja names for the characters, and use shrines as weapons caches. The silly part? The poster isn’t even Asian, so it’s kind of ridiculous that they’re getting offended over, this-especially since there aren’t any actual Japanese representatives offended over Ninjago like the Maori were offended over Bionicle.

However, it is true that Ninjago is inaccurate to feudal Japan. I remember back when Ninjago first started, people on the Lego message boards were saying that the sets were “non ninja-like at all.” I don’t entirely agree, since the monastery and the shrines were very accurate to Japanese architecture. Plus, it was only the bad guys using motorcycles and monster trucks, as opposed to the good guys who rode on dragons. But 2012 was where vehicles really took over, and it’s continued to this day. However, when we do see some kind of building or shrine, it looks like it could be Japanese.

I dunno, what do you guys think of Ninjago’s innaccuracies? Do you think it’s offensive, do you think there’s a valid excuse, or do you just not care?

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A long time has passed since I last saw a Ninjago episode, but this doesn’t stop me from joining this debate.
Basically, no. Yes, obviously only Japan will accurately reflect every piece of Japanese culture, including the Ninjas, just like the Brits will be the only ones able to represent Cromwell properly, the Irish will be the only one able to represent their struggle for independence properly, the Eastern Europeans will be able to represent communist regimes properly, Americans will be able to represent Spider-Man properly, etc. Only the culture itself can represent itself the proper way, just like you are the only one that can accurately explain your own opinions.
However, this doesn’t stop other people and other cultures from embracing certain elements and to add their own spin to them. Would this spin be necessarily good? Of course not. It’s like an American company would try to do an anime. The end product would most that likely still be enjoyable, but it would still feel empty, because it was made by a group of people that were part of a culture that might not properly and completely understand anime.
However, to say that somebody adding their own spin to a certain element of a culture means to “disrespect” said culture is straight up false. Everybody can make a ninja movie, or cartoon, or tv show in any way they wish to. As long as it isn’t meant to be offensive, like for example the show being racist towards a culture or a group of people, it isn’t disrespecting it. It’s just trying to make it’s own story based on it.
Hopefully that cleared the things out a little bit.

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Time to watch this topic carefully. Gonna remind everyone that to read the rules again and abide by them. Thank you.

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I see what you did there

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it actually wasn’t intentional

Cultural appropriation is always a shaky topic, because it’s one of those things that so many people have opinions about, and there still isn’t a real consensus on it. Therefore, bearing in mind that this is my theory–and thus an opinion–here’s what I think:

NINJAGO has the benefit of being based upon a facet of culture that is pretty heavily ingrained within society as a whole. The concept of ninjas has, by this point, transcended Japanese culture, becoming something that everyone is familiar with. Think of it like the knight in shining armor, or Santa Claus–everyone knows what a ninja is, what they’re famous for, and how they basically look, act, etc. This does, of course, mean that there are many misconceptions about ninjas, and that they often seep into depictions of them in media. This isn’t generally seen as cultural appropriation, however, because of how prevalent ninjas are (just think of how many things have been inspired by them–everything from NINJAGO to Power Rangers). Similarly, most people wouldn’t bat an eyelash at a slightly altered version of Santa–we know what the inspiration is, and because the figure has become universal, we don’t see it as offensive.

Of course, there’s room for debate on this issue, but generally, I like to consider the general reaction of the culture in question when thinking about things like this. Has Japan expressed a great amount of offense over NINJAGO’s use of their cultural heritage? If so, then it may be worth looking at. If not, I would hazard a guess that it’s fine…

This is a solid point, but I would like to present a counter-example in the form of Avatar: The Last Airbender, a show heavily inspired by Eastern cultures which was created by two white, male Americans that clearly have very deep knowledge and respect for their inspiration.

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The way I see it, if only individual cultures were allowed to produce media reflecting their own cultures, and everything had to be 100% accurate, everything would get pretty boring. I don’t think Ninjago oversteps it’s bounds at all (though I would really like to see them actually behave like ninjas more often)
Personally, I’d be really interested to see a japanese take on the wild west. Is that a thing? I feel like it’s probably a thing.[quote=“Toa_Heatwave, post:7, topic:50807”]
become universal,
[/quote] I would like to point out that for that to happen, some initial cultural exchange/appropriation would still have to take place. Just something worth noting.

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A lot of Samurai movies were actually based on westerns, and vise versa. Also, the film “Throne of Blood” is practically “Macbeth”

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If anyone’s wondering, this is the thread in question. http://www.bzpower.com/board/topic/11907-the-problem-with-ninjago/? But I strongly agree with the points you have all raised.

There are always exceptions. There will always be exceptions. Of course other people that are not part of certain cultures will be able to do a product at the very least comparable with the original.
I never said that it is an universal law that says that only Eastern Europeans can do, for the sake of an example, communist movies. There are plenty of non-EE that can do that thanks to their deep understanding of the life in the Eastern Bloc, and I am sure that there are better American movies about this subject than… let’s say Polish (even tho personally I’ve never seen such a good American movie).
However, and you got to admit, most good movies about a certain culture are either made by that culture itself or by people with extremely deep understanding of said culture, which already differenciates them by the average film maker. [quote=“Sabretooth, post:8, topic:50807”]
everything would get pretty boring
[/quote]

Beg an explanation.
I am not saying that such a world would be a good one, in fact it would be a pretty limited one, but boring?

I say who the heck even cares. I find it ridiculous that people should have to waste their mental energy on this. The Ninjago series isn’t based in Japan. It’s based in an imaginary world that has taken a large amount of influence from Japanese culture. Since Ninjago is its own universe they can do whatever they want with the culture and what a ninja does. Ninjago was made to sell toys to children and that is its primary goal. It’s not here to teach us Japanese history and we shouldn’t expect that from it. Lego has “misrepresented” cultures before in series like nexo knights but no one cares because it’s a fantasy world taking elements from European culture to ease the story writing process and to make it easier to sell. If you want an accurate portrayal of Japan then go to a library and look at the history of Japan not a kid’s toy line.

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Disrespects? I don’t think so. We have to admit it, it was not supposed to be an anime-style show.Though LEGO tries to

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Absolutely agreed.

Very true, but we’re talking about negative aspects of cultural appropriation. There’s absolutely no way to stop cultural exchange from happening in a world as connected and globalized as ours, and–if we’re being totally honest–I don’t think we should be aiming to stop all cultural exchange, which is what some people seem to be advising when they discuss the offensiveness of cultural appropriation. I think it’s a bad move for society in general to hold the opinion that no one can be inspired by, or make art from their own culture, because when you really think about it, that’s the definition of segregation: “You stay over there, and I’ll stay over here.”

Cultural exchange can be an incredibly beneficial and beautiful thing, but of course, we need to be aware that some people will misuse it, and have standards for what crosses the line and what does not.

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If Ninjago is disrespecting Japanese culture, then literally every movie made which has anything to do with another country is disrespecting it as well. Japan is both a country soaked in ancient culture to the point that it’s the most fantasized ancient culture on the planet aside from maybe medieval europe and a country whose modern culture is impossible to pin down in any level of accuracy. Make a stereotypical joke about it and you will invariably miss 70% of it in the process.

The book Bushido: The Soul Of Japan (if I’m remembering the title correctly) is the largest instigator for this fantasy as it paints the history of Japan, the samurai, and ancient culture in unrealistic light, adds clearly false information for the sake of interest, and is all together an uninformative book. And who was responsible for writing it? A man from Japan who flew to America before writing the book about his personal experiences with Japanese history and culture.

So at this point, Japanese culture is disrespecting Japanese culture, and Japan is, for the most part, fine with it.

I just feel like it stamps out a lot of creativity and possibility. That and I assume there are many people out there, myself included, that find other cultures often more interesting than their own, and like to express that interest creatively. It’d be boring to only be able to create things based on one’s own culture, at least in my opinion.

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Fully agree, but there are still a lot of people that do enjoy their own culture more than others (myself mostly included). Plus, if this would somehow be the norm, nobody would cry over other cultures, as they would have no idea about them. Being fully devoted to your own culture would be the norm, a norm that would not be beaten by anything, or at the very least would take a lot of time.

Does it matter? This is the same as when an anime has an American in it; its ussually for entertainment / comedy not trying to be 1 to 1 culturally accurate.
Sure sometimes it can be insulting but This is why stereotypes exists; general comedy like the classic cops and donuts.

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LEGO has gotten in trouble in the past when it comes to representing cultures (I am obviously referring to the Maori Controversy that Bionicle faced in it’s early years) but Ninjago doesn’t really have a whole lot that would directly tie into Japanese culture except for the general elements of the Ninja genre. If LEGO tried introducing words from the Japanese language in the theme that aren’t accurate to their true meaning, the same thing that happened with Bionicle might happen with Ninjago, but as things are right now, I don’t think there is any problem.

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Is it disrespectful that their ‘Ninja Master’ was played by a Hong Kongese actor in the movie?