A Defence of the Magical Girlfriend

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Feb 12, 2018
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I'm a sucker for manga like "Aa! My Goddess." Magical Girlfriend manga are stories in which some ordinary schlub falls in love with an idealized girlfriend-figure, whose origins are supernatural in nature. She might be a Norse Goddess like Belldandy, or an android maid, like "Mahoromatic's" Mahoro, or an extraterrestrial fugitive like Ichika from "Waiting in the Summer." Over the course of the story, her romance with the protagonist propels him into adulthood; he frequently gains in self-confidence, pursues and attains his goals, and takes his first steps into maturity. The magical girlfriend meanwhile, will usually learn something new about herself, or her mysterious origins, which will set her on the path towards her own personal quest, and the final confrontation with the antagonist (if any).

At the same time, there's a lot to be said about the limits of the trope. The Pop Culture Detective made a video about three years ago that took aim at what he calls the "Born Sexy Yesterday" trope, and he specifically calls out Chii from "Chobits" as an egregious example of this. Since there's some overlap between the trope he describes and the Magical Girlfriend, I thought I'd write a response to his video - it's still awaiting moderation, so I thought I'd share it here as well, in the hopes that my defense of the magical girlfriend will be of some value to someone.

Here is the original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0thpEyEwi80

And here is my reply:

No! The trope is emphatically about radical self-acceptance. As a man who constantly struggles with feelings of self-hatred and inadequacy, the message of the trope is that I am not merely the sum of my failures, and that my romantic rejections do not foreclose the possibility of future happiness; in other words, that I too am a worthy human being capable of giving and receiving love.

This is why I prefer the framing of the "magical girlfriend" which is less overtly hostile and politicized. The magical girlfriend is to be interpreted allegorically; quibbling about the mechanics of her origins or her patriarchal signification is like complaining about Rip Van Winkle's lack of bed sores. The point of Rip Van Winkle is not its plausibility. It's a metaphor about loss, displacement, and home. Similarly, the magical girlfriend's origins are frequently surreal, because this very unreality is a signal to the audience that they need to interpret her presence metaphorically, not literally. She reassures the male viewer that somewhere out there is a woman who will accept him as he is, without subjecting him to the relentless pressure to conform, or achieve. It isn't about complacency, but about the positive message that even men who've experienced professional (or other) failures, and who feel themselves to be worthless can still find love and acceptance.

The startling innocence of the magical girlfriend is not to be interpreted literally, but is a metaphorical way of encouraging men to reexamine themselves with fresh eyes and find value in parts of themselves that they may have previously dismissed as unexceptional. When the magical girlfriend is amazed at ordinary things like traffic signals, it's presented as patently silly in order to discourage us from reading it literally. Here, society is presented negatively, as a source of shame, judgment, and relentless self-criticism. The magical girlfriend stands apart from society, and her innocent gaze looks past our flaws and sees the value in our true selves. And the act of her looking gives us permission to do the same - to forgive and love ourselves.

It's also an invitation to reflect on, for example, our own ordinary pastimes and think, "hey, maybe the fact that I like quilting, or video games, or mountain biking can be interesting and new to someone to hasn't had these experiences yet - maybe I'll see my interests in a new light if I share them with someone else." Far from encouraging a kind of dull complacency, the trope leads us out of ourselves and back into communion with others.

These kinds of movies have always been a balm to me, and I hope those who read this aren't shamed into rejecting the things that give them comfort in these dark times.

Afterward
I'll add a few more words so that my meaning isn't misconstrued. I think we can all broadly appreciate the Pop Culture Detective's (PCD) intent. Nobody wants to to return to the gender roles of the dark ages, to violence, child brides, and the idea of women as property. PCD though takes the concept of equality and runs with it, further and further, to an authoritarian place where the only properly constituted forms of desire are those defined by a strict interpretation of equality; what this does is push out traditional conservative values like purity and innocence in female characters, because they automatically become representative of undesirable forms of relationship inequality. His "born sexy yesterday" trope is created by extracting the parts of the magical girlfriend archetype that support his argument, and removing them from their original context distorts their meaning and function within the story.

That is the point I hoped to make. If you've made it this far, thanks for reading.
 
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Many assumptions ahead and not-really depressing thought ahead:

Real Life is boring and stressful. Some single guys want a cute gf who wants to cheer them up. But this is fantastical if they have already fallen dull and depressed before meeting them; ie its much harder/unlikely for girls to have a reason to fall in love with dull monotonous people in the first place. So it's rare for people who want to have cute gf that will cheer them up will get that cute gf.

Thats why magical waifu is received well enough, someone who makes a great disturbance to your everyday life and unencumbered by the monotony of daily life. In their idea this is probably more likely to happen than bumping into a girl around a corner and starting a conversation or having a relationship starting with one of their friends/colleagues. They want their Goddess to appear in their life but know that nothing in their normal monotonus life will bring about that waifu so that waifu must have supernatural origins.

Now remember the salaryman culture of Japan where everything is just a tad busier and duller. This monotony corrupts them and they have given up on on the dream to actively make meaningful relationships instead of just continuing with their boring lives thus ANIME. Capitalism always provides a way; just add money and you can get mental plastic bags to hold your sad broken mind together.

All of the following innocence and self-exploration serves to emphasis that they aren't burden by constraints of real life and are dependant on ONLY YOU to show them the way (obviously because in real life; such high stat waifu deserve better) as you are dependant on them to get away from your monotonous life.

The above is obviously appicable to Husbandos too especially with eastern norms for women to start families.

Transfer students, new kouhai, separated childhood friends and isekai also play on this idea

/rant on why the childhood/close friend keeps losing to the shiny new model.


Tl;dr
People who wants/needs their waifus have fallen so far as to think that only trucks and girls falling from heaven are their only chance of getting a gf.
 
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I think we can all broadly appreciate the Pop Culture Detective's (PCD) intent.
Can't say I do. That godawful comment section was like a window back into the pile of shit that was the state of 2014-2015 "social commentary". Fair response on your part though, and good on you for sidestepping the usual over-discussed hot-button talking points that always get brought up alongside this topic.

For my two cents, I don't think your framing the archetype as a purely constructive and empowering figure for the viewer should obscure the fact that at its core it's still a very straightforward fantasy: girl loves you for who you are (in this case by virtue of being an outside observer). It's still ultimately a fantasy, and getting too bogged down into whether the IRL impacts of these sort of things are good or bad for you/society rarely leads to a conclusive point being made. Other than "they're self-indulgent because that's the point, and everyone has them in some form", at least. It's like when people over-analyze fetishes and go all armchair psychologist.

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Some wants to be loved but don't want to change themselves to become lovable.

"Look upon me as I am"

Some change themselves so much they don't feel that the love directed to them is true.

"Nobody understands me"
 

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