Pop culture as an education toward Peace: Studio Ghibli’s intervention against militarization

Mailys PENE Pop culture as an education toward Peace: Studio Ghibli’s intervention against militarization On the fifth of december, 2015, acclaimed Studio Ghibli’s animation director Takahata Isao visited Okinawa University for a conference about the controversial issue of American bases’ relocation from Futenma to Henoko, the first being considered as the most dangerous military base for population in the world by its location in the middle of the city of Ginowan, the second being more remote but on an extremely precious and fragile natural site. And on July 13, 2015, Miyazaki Hayao attended a press conference in Tokyo, in which he urged the Abe’s government to follow the 70 years of Pacifist Constitution. This events are not only an epiphenomenon among the waves of protestation and reflexion against the relocation, but the continuation of a coherent serie of act on behalf of the Studio Ghibli. Indeed, the commitment of the studio regarding militarism, environmentalism and other has not to be proven, but still, the Okinawan issue brought it to act in various way that are not to be seen only as intervention from popular personalities on political topics. Based on the idea that education is crucial and decisive in the crafting process of positive peace, we might need to understand, first, that traditional school systems in liberal democracies, although supposed to be universal and emancipating, are not systematically teaching about ​ peace​ and how to​ act and​ live accordingly (at the opposite of militarization as an unconscious process among daily life), but nevertheless, peace education is not something that must be achieved only by formal education, and other socialization forces tend to educate people in informal, and somehow less elitist ways. Studio Ghibli shown commitment to allude to and stand for pacifism, nature protection, but as well feminism or drifts of over consumption. And this, not by making pieces of works accordingly in the idea of educating people to those certain ideas, but by making pieces of culture that happened to be loved and educative at the the same time. It is an example of how important culture is to a peaceful and pacifist society, as a force of balance, equilibrium with various education waves; such as journalists or researchers, artists take part in the work toward balanced society and weight of power. And this idea can be even more relevant since those artists are part of popular culture and thus, escape the issues of art and culture as being too hard to understand. In a country like Japan where the “modern” society is characterized by an abundance and overload of popular culture all around, in a society of entertainment such as it is in the so called “developed” countries, the importance of popular culture pieces is not anodyne. Public opinion, and thus, civil society (or the sometimes the lack of civil society) is shaped by media and therefore, it is a tool and a mean from the government and this is why the opposite, free culture and art process, is so important to maintain peace and allow people to think by themselves and stand up for what is fair. First, we are going to see how Studio ghibli took part in Okinawa issues, carrying on their past commitments concerning militarism and nationalism in Japan in more global ways. Then, we will try to understand why popular and visual culture in Japan is not insignificant in political issues, but on the contrary extremely significant as an idea shaping force. And finally, following these thoughts, we will tend to see how popular culture can educate and bloom pacifist behavior, through the works of Studio Ghibli not only by its public interventions but by its creative work. I. Studio Ghibli against Militarism The studio has always been distinguished by its peace related topics, and its public intervention on political issues were not only evoking the last Okinawan questions. ​ In 2008, on the occasion of the promotion of his last movie, ​Ponyo on the Cliff, Miyazaki expressed his disappointment because of an essay defending Japanese acts during WW2, written by the then disgraced former head of the air force Tamogami Toshio. He said that “we must liberate our children from nationalism” and enlightened the importance for Japan to remember its militaristic past. “The nationalistic view suggests the problems in the world come from its multi-ethnicity. It creates for the country we love to turn into something negative for the world as a whole. This is a lesson we learned for the past war and which we cannot forget.” he said. Indeed, Miyazaki expressed himself a lot on the crucial importance for Japan to acknowledge his war crimes and give reparations for Nanjing’s Rape, colonization, Yasukuni, the Manchurian incident, or comfort women, issues that are still discussed intensely today. This aversion of militarism reached its top when Miyazaki wrote an essay against the modification of the constitution and urged Prime Minister Abe to stop “security related” legislative pack. It was named “Constitutional Amendment is Out of Question” (憲法 え る もってのほ ) and published in the studio’s monthly magazine ​Neppu, at the occasion ​ of a special issue on Constitutional Amendment. In it, he alludes to “the terrible things the Japanese military did in China” and gives nuances between loving one’s own country and not agreeing with this country’s government. He evokes as well the issue of school books and how they differ from historical accuracy, and contrary to the political books he shows war as being pathetic, and not something heroic, lyrical, against the esthetics of honour and Japanese warriors. Though, he makes insight toward the Self Defense Force and admires the way they peacefully rescue people, such as during the 2011 earthquake: according to him, it is honourable that Japan has peaceful force for defense and rescuing. Militarizing is a bad idea, and he argues that China would not be contained by military force anyway, and diplomacy appears thus as not only the best, but also the more realistic option. He is concluding saying that “Japan is not a country where war can be fought”. Therefore, it makes sense that he and the Studio Ghibli expressed their views on the Okinawan issues. On the 7th of May, 2015, it was announced that Miyazaki would be a co-representative of Henoko Fund, which was made in order to prevent from the relocation of Futenma. In July 2015, he gave a press conference at Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan, in Tokyo, in which he expressed his will to help the Okinawan people to express itself and to its views to be respected, if it is the will of Okinawans. Then he described Abe’s aim to change the constitution as “despicable”. Concurrently, it was announced that Miyazaki was planning a facility for children in Zenda Forest Park of Kumejima, in Okinawa, and will invest 300 million yen into this construction. The aim of the park would be education to nature protection in an unspoiled island. In 2008, the studio already opened a creche in Tokyo after Miyazaki decried the lack of children facilities. II. Pop Culture is a soft power Those intervention might appear as solely beneficial since it implies famous and acclaimed personalities, but we also have to understand how important can be media and popular culture to shape public opinion. Japan has one of the biggest and most developed popular and media culture. In the 20th century, sociology fields and interdisciplinarity studies such as cybernetics, Neurosciences or Frankfurt School’s Critical Theory of Media enlightened the impact of media. Besides, the birth of “political communication” and political marketing, with books like ​The Engineering of Consent or ​Propaganda by Edward Bernays, following Gustave Le Bon’s works on crowd psychology, allowed governments and companies to use media according to their will. Thus, Japanese government took profit of the importance of Japanese popular culture (especially manga culture in this case) to shape its public communication. The Creative Industrial Complex (CIC) is used by the government to influence perceptions of the military. It utilizes affective aspects of the entertainment culture to touch people rather than talk to them, and thus, communication is getting closer to manipulation. Noam Chomsky once said that communication is to democracies what force is to dictatorships. This way, Abe tried to make the idea of “proactive pacifism” accepted. The CIC produced a large amount of media pieces that strengthened the growing hard power identity of Japan. Entertainment is used as a communication and marketing tool for government’s militarism, just as the Pentagon is funding Hollywood in the US. Manga esthetic is now used in the SDF communication visuals, in order to pacify and negate the violence of army and its potential shift to stronger militarism. Kawaii esthetics are used in the SDF communication and on ships to strengthen this idea of militaries as nice and innocent, helpful and fair, to hide the actual militarization of society. It is a kind of normalization of military to make it more acceptable and so that people can forget the dangers of nationalism and authoritarian governments. The Japanese government is currently using this kind of tools to shape public opinion. If the media are overloaded by government approved content, it will be harder for people to develop curiosity and critical thinking. That is why free, creative and open-minded, independent works in popular culture are so significant. III. How popular culture can educate to peace issues: Studio Ghibli Case Study As we saw before, Studio Ghibli committed to peace related issues, and popular culture can shape political views. What we will see is that Studio Ghibli, implicitly, as a popular culture force, is also working toward education to and for pacifism and thus, teach curiosity and critical minds. Documentaries do not have the monopoly on the visual media education. Storytelling is education. By tellings stories, showing issues and moving people, movies educate in a different but not concurrent with schools. Culture, stories and art can fill the lacks in formal scholar education. By triggering peace related topics, Studio Ghibli opens the discussion on these issues and people receptive and sensitive to political questions. Feeling concerned by political issues is not always easy and reach them through art is a way to make it more democratic and thus make people feel concerned and important in the the political processes. Therefore, it can create a creative social society that know what know what to stand for, or more accurately that everyone is important enough to stand for what is fair according to them, and not to the way they can be shaped by political communication. Pacifism is evoked in a lot of the studio’s movies. The movie ​Nausicaa, that led to the creation of the studio, depicts a post apocalyptic world destroyed by an industrial society that did not manage to be harmonious respectful and peaceful. The main character trans;its ideas of nonviolence even among the war, and forgetfulness to the humans even though they killed nature; nuances are important and although humanity is mainly shown as the murderer of nature, compassion to humanity is shown. ​The Wind Rises depicts a warplanes engineer who is lost in ethics issues concerning his work in a world about to be destroyed by war.​ Porco Rosso is about a WW2 pilot that was cursed because he left the army and wanted to be independent of humanity after the horror of seeing his friend killed in the war. the topic of war is recurrent and a main a idea comes back often : humanity is stupid to make war, nonetheless, we must love humans; just as the Ryukyuan “Life is Precious”. We must criticize the mistakes of humanity in order to make it better, but we must not lose faith in life and the vital importance of believing in life. Militarism and Pacifism are linked with ecology in a lot of their movies. Just as Henoko issue is as much about militarism, nature, and people, the studio is showing that Nature protection is a part of a peaceful society. There must not be a war between nature and men. The movie ​Princess Mononoke enlightens those ideas of civilization against nature, but without it being Good against Evil. it is more about showing both aspects in each side. Princess Mononoke is protecting nature, but she burns with hate for humans; Lady Eboshi is against nature, but she is helping poor young women by giving them jobs so they don’t have to become prostitute. There is no “good character” or “villain” to simplify reality. Such as real life, answers are not easy, we can7t go on any sides and decide there is only one extreme solutions. It is the same idea when in his essay, Miyazaki says that SDF are “magnificent” and admires the good job they are doing and at the same time warns of the dangers of militarizing them, even though he says that zero-militarization would not be totally possible for Japan now. We saw pacifism rejoins environmentalism, and now, following the example of Mononoke, we can see that it is also linked with feminism issues. Most of the main characters are women, and this is good because they are not only “good female character” as “female” but good characters in general, that happen to be girls. There is no “girl power” aggressive revendication, and it shows that being a girl is not is being a human being. Those characters are all mixed up in those issues of pacifism, environmentalism and feminism, with it being coherent and relevant. As we saw in Cynthia Enloe’s book, these are not only “virtuous” various issues but on the contrary, they are all linked and that is why it all makes sense. Studio Ghibli is not making these movies in a political aim, in order to make people think peculiar things. In this way, it differs from media communication made in order to make people think a certain way. Alternative popular culture or acclaimed popular culture, since they bring different approaches, allow people to see different views, and then, to learn curiosity or develop critical thinking. These all raise the question of civil society in “developed liberal democracies”, where rights and freedom seems guaranteed, but this impression might hide slow shifts toward dangerous nationalism. In societies of entertainment, popular culture cannot only be seen as low culture that is not subject to analysis and consideration. Even though education is supposed to be for everybody, inequalities still alter education, thus, scholar system cannot be the only good and funded educational force. Culture is vital, and culture must not be defined by only 2high culture” that only peculiarly educated people can afford. Against the idea of pop culture as being alienating and stupid, some pieces are at the same time extremely popular and mainstream and still transmit ideas that educate people without forcing them into one idea of another. Non exclusive, non elitist education can spread if we acknowledge and favorize culture. Education to peace is not a radical, oriented ideological, and forced education against war. It is more an open-minded, liberal education linking big issues hindering peace; it is about making people conscious about peace and war, as well issues such as ecology and feminism (since all of them, though seemingly different, are actually inter associated and work together). And since, in the case of Ghibli Studio, it can be loved abroad, regardless of cultural differences, it reminds us that peace is not something to be achieved as a country or citizens of this country but as humans, regardless of the nationality. 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