Curse Nobara

Curse Nobara

ruiner elfilis posting 2024 bitch!!!

FORTE.EXE

A really common take is that JJK is a story about the good guys never winning, about good people (or people trying to be good) failing no matter what— and Imma be real, I kinda disagree with this take!

Obviously you can interpret this story however you want and I see how people would come to that conclusion. But I don’t think Gege is passively nihilistic, or making a story like that. I think that Gege is just someone who is pretty critical of modern society and has just personified those critiques in the form of curses and a grimey setting.

Heavy stories or dark stories like JJK kinda fall prone to this “ah it’s just a nihilistic all hope is lost” story viewpoint, and while that can be true sometimes these stories usually are about holding onto hope, brutal but steady change, inner or societal reflection, fostering new generations, or persevering through it. Horrible things happen in these manga, at times it really does seem like a pointless endeavor— but there are always characters that move forward and hold onto hope. Always a flourishing forest after the large fire.

And I think JJK is definitely one of these stories, a story where after that storm there will be new life afterwards. Not everyone will be alive, but it will be bittersweet.

Gege is an author that has never really been afraid to critique Japanese society. Maki and Mai and the result of the Ze’nin are critiques of sexism and heavy traditionalism. Toji, Maki, and Mechmaru could definitely be seen as a critique on ableism and how disabled people are treated in society. Nanami is a critique on the brutal work system. Higuruma is a critique on the justice system in Japan. Hell, a lot of our main characters are the social outcasts of society (due to physical traits or just philosophical outlooks). And the recent critiques of racism, especially anti-blackness, in Japanese with society with the situation with Miguel.

The higher ups of the Jujutsu Society are definitely a way of dissecting the disconnect older politicians or generations often have with younger generations, passing laws that will not better future generations and being stuck in conservative ways (hell Gojo blatantly calls them idiot conservatives).

Suguru Geto is an example of how lost youth without any support systems can get lost in the cracks. He gets so consumed by his depression, the tragedy he witnessed around him, and his anger that no one is doing anything about the fact that youth are dying that he turns to cults and extremist ideology.

While these events seem fantastical due to the existence of curses and people causing city wide destruction via cool martial arts combat, these situations of societal collapse and failing do indeed happen, and are happening and becoming worse at an alarming rate.

Even the nature of curses themselves can be seen as a personification of the anxiety and fears literally consuming and killing humanity, most notably the younger generation. Snuffing out hopes, or any motivation that the world will become better. Curses are literal manifestations of people’s fears and negative emotions, whose strength depends on the amount of fear humanity has of the concept. This literal and emotional consumption of the youth is even seen in the entities from the Heian Era.

Tengen, Kenjaku, and Sukuna all continue to live depending on the body of someone else, erasing who this person was and would have been. Tengen needs plasma star vessels so she does not evolve beyond the form she has now, Kenjaku puts their brain in the body of another, Sukuna needs a vessel to consume his fingers and when they do he immediately subjugates their soul.

All of this to say, I don’t think that JJK is a story about good people failing. It’s about society failing good people, it’s about broken customs and rules sucking the youth out of younger generations, it’s about cycles that need to be broken that CAN be broken. It’s about society that continues to slap bandaids on a knife wound and doesn’t address the fact that it’s still slowly bleeding out—

Yuki was on the right track, finding a way to nip the problem at the root. But look at how she was treated by others, about the rumors that spread of her. She was seen as useless, a dead weight, chasing after naive endeavors. But why is it naive? Shouldn’t resources also be spent on finding a way to stop the problem at the root? Or is the power, the control, the prestige (in the eyes of the higher ups and big three clans) of being a Jujutsu Sorcerer too much to lose if they were able to find a way to stop curses at the root?

This is not a hopeless world. Gojo tried to not make it such a hopeless world, Nanami bet on the future and admitted that was odd for him, love still exists even if it can hurt. People are able to overcome their demons, Maki did, Takaba did. While Maki’s path wasn’t one without hardship, without loss, she quite literally struck down and stopped this toxic cycle in the Ze’nin clan basically for good. And when Naoya came back she struck him down once again, with some struggle, but she overcame a past demon with help from two random ass guys that just happened to be there and happened to be nice enough to want to help.

Gojo took the same action as Maki, brutally getting rid of the higher ups to ensure the chaos and pain that happened after Shibuya would hopefully not happen again. Tough and violent decisions must be made. Happiness must be fought for, a future is worth fighting for.

There is community in this world. There is benevolence. Theres still a chance and choice to hope and dream.

There’s a weird meta aspect to this, to the way readers have let the hopelessness convince them that there can be no happy ending. No one will come back to life, the ending will be bittersweet, there will be more death- but that does not mean it is the end. Maybe we, like Yuuji, have become jaded. Maybe we have also let this pain convince us that we are cogs in a machine. But if that was the case, even if Sukuna were to die, it would all be for naught. The cycle would still continue churning and churning. Have faith.

Systems can be changed, one just has to have the stubbornness to change it. Yuuji just has to realize that once again.

————

Articles to read down below about the issues I mentioned in my yapfest:

Youth Issues in Japan:

- https://online.ucpress.edu/currenthistory/article/120/827/240/118342/Japan-s-Younger-Generations-Look-for-a-New-Way-of

- https://www.nippon.com/en/in-depth/d00800/

nippon.com

Growing Up in the Post-Growth Era: What Makes Japanese Teenagers Tick?　

As Japan lowers the age of adulthood to 18, the older generation continues to puzzle over the seeming passivity and apathy of Generation Z.

- https://www.npr.org/2021/10/29/1050620562/low-turnout-among-young-voters-in-japan-may-mean-the-ruling-party-stays-in-power

NPR

Low turnout among young voters in Japan may mean the ruling party stays in power

Japan heads to the polls soon, and the ruling party is counting on low turnout from apathetic young voters and independents in order to hang

Work Culture in Japan:

- https://pulitzercenter.org/stories/karoshi-deep-look-japans-unforgiving-working-culture

Pulitzer Center

Karoshi: A Deep Look Into Japan’s Unforgiving Working Culture

Warning: The following article discusses severe mental health issues and suicide. If you or anyone you know is experiencing suicidal thought

Radicalization into Extremist Ideals:

- https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/sdr.1749#:~:text=The%20root%20of%20violent%20radicalization,72). (Root Causes of Radicalization: the Terror Contagion Hypothesis)

- https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/why-south-korea-s-young-men-are-turning-conservative.amp

Pursuit

Why South Korea’s young men are turning conservative

The internet is playing a key role in spreading a new wave of right-wing conservatism among South Korea's young men, say University of Melbo

- https://nuts2406.medium.com/why-we-should-worry-about-the-growing-radicalization-of-young-men-8cd6babb8bb8

Cults:

-https://encompass.eku.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1905&context=honors_theses#:~:text=In%20contrast%2C%20cult%20leaders%20develop,disorder%20(Goldberg%2C%20n.d). (The Making of Cults: The Factors that Contribute to Membership and the Leaders’ Influence).

- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8234595/#:~:text=These%20variables%20include%20(a)%20generalized,abuse%20or%20neglect%2C%20(f)

PubMed

Factors related to susceptibility and recruitment by cults - PubMed

Unprecedented escalation of secular and religious cults has necessitated further inquiry into more precise conditions under which individual

Japanese Court System:

- https://www.hrw.org/report/2023/05/25/japans-hostage-justice-system/denial-bail-coerced-confessions-and-lack-access

Human Rights Watch

Japan’s “Hostage Justice” System

The 101-page report, “Japan’s ‘Hostage Justice’ System,” documents the abusive treatment of criminal suspects in pretrial detention. The aut

read @borrelia's transfem metal sonic fic and thought it'd pair greatly with another transfem legend

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