—A response to “Friends, Please Stop the Excessive Rationalization in Your Criticism.”
Aspiring to be someone who can get people off.
Friends, Please Stop the Excessive Rationalization in Your Criticism
Recently, BAKA影—his username on Bilibili—put forward many interesting views in “Friends, Please Stop the Excessive Rationalization in Your Criticism.” His article takes many animation critics, if not all of them, as its targets. His main reason for this attack is that he sees their writing as pursuing a kind of “rationalization” that deserves no praise. This is a decidedly interesting position, though it also has deep intellectual antecedents: Heidegger, whom he mentions, for example, and the Frankfurt School’s critical tradition, which he does not. Readers familiar with intellectual history may think of others. Of course, we cannot hastily conclude that his views must be an elaboration of earlier systems of thought. After all, such an elaboration might itself be a kind of “rationalization.”
His article treats Lab on Roof’s writing as typical of “intellectualized criticism” and thus brings it within the scope of his attack. As one of the writers for this humble publication, perhaps I ought to offer a few opinions, representing only myself. I must acknowledge that I very much agree with the article on many points—for example, that sakuga analysis is not truth-seeking. But I also think many of its views are open to question. Overall, I think the article’s greatest problem is that it takes on too many enormous questions and responds to many of them far too hastily.
One thing particularly puzzles me: the author’s title asks us to “stop the excessive rationalization in your criticism,” while the body seems to target rationalization in every form. With this in mind, I will try to draw some boundaries around excessive rationalization.
1. Can Language Be What It Is?
BAKA影’s “‘satirical’ metaphor” brings us to the first enormous question. He explains it as “…pointing at the mulberry while cursing the locust tree: ostensibly talking about this, but actually talking about that. In other words, the story an anime tells is not really telling the anime’s own story; rather, through some form of concealment, it presents an allusion or reality outside that story.” Following his line of thought, we can indeed find this kind of critical formulation everywhere, across many genres of criticism: “an Oedipal tragedy,” “a Promethean hero,” “a dystopian future,” and so on. When we describe an anime as “an Oedipal tragedy,” we are clearly comparing something that “is not animation” with the anime itself, and even forcibly imposing our judgment of the former on the latter.
Before discussing the particulars, though, I have serious objections to the term “‘satirical’ metaphor.” Criticism of this kind is not always “satirizing” anything. Treating Violet Evergarden as British television drama is also intended to praise the anime. If the author chose the idiom “pointing at the mulberry while cursing the locust tree” merely for its sense of “using one thing to speak about another,” then “satirical” is an inappropriate way to summarize that meaning. After all, “using one thing to speak about another” is not the defining feature of either satire or that idiom; rather, it is the core meaning of “metaphor” itself. At least on a literal reading, then, what BAKA影’s criticism of “‘satirical’ metaphor” actually amounts to is simply this: opposition to writing about animation in metaphorical terms.
As the author recommends at the end of his article, our criticism should treat animation as “what it is.” “Being what it is” is a metaphysical theme running through the history of Western thought. I am not particularly familiar with the relevant literature, so I would find it difficult to explain precisely how this expression should be understood. In his article, however, it should be easy enough to understand: “treat animation as animation.” If I have not misunderstood him, we can restate this position more precisely: When writing criticism of a work of animation, we should avoid using things outside animation as grounds for our criticism. (S1) In this sense, “‘satirical’ metaphor” names a typical form of criticism that violates this statement.
Once we have clarified what this passage means, the enormous question it inadvertently raises comes into view: Can our language itself be what it is?1 Since at least the 1980s, people have become increasingly aware that many of the “ordinary” expressions we use in everyday life are metaphorical. There are plenty of examples. In Chinese, someone expressing anger says wǒ shēngqì le, “I’m angry,” or wǒ fāhuǒ le, “I’ve lost my temper,” yet no actual qì, “air,” or huǒ, “fire,” appears. When we acknowledge that someone’s insight reaches the essence of things, we call it “deep” (shēnkè) or say that it “thoroughly grasps the essence of things” (dòngxī le shìwù de běnzhì), though insights have neither spatial depth nor caves.2 BAKA影 might regard these examples as sophistry: the words have acquired settled extended meanings, and we can understand them easily. Nevertheless, the examples do show that even our most ordinary expressions exhibit this feature of “using one thing to speak about another.”
Let us turn to the more directly relevant metaphors of artistic creation. Animation is a composite audiovisual art, and its visual dimension is always full of metaphors. Even the most basic telling of a story requires metaphor. In the final episode of The Familiar of Zero: Knight of the Twin Moons, the twin flowers wilt in Louise’s hands, symbolizing that Saito has died in battle. This is a very basic metaphor. The same holds for animation criticism. When we discuss an animated work, even fairly basic statements of our views often depend on metaphor: sometimes to avoid long-windedness, sometimes for the beauty of the language (Editor’s note: Impressionistic criticism comes to mind, particularly the ornate critical language found in the history of classical Chinese literary criticism), sometimes for greater precision, and sometimes simply because we have no other choice. Here, too, examples abound. We routinely call a bad anime a “piece of shit,” using the familiar metaphor of excrement. The ending sequence of episode three of Kaguya-sama: Love Is War has recently won praise from anime fans, at least partly because the student-council secretary’s dancing is so “lifelike.” This is a metaphor comparing an animated dance to dancing in real life. There are more complex cases as well. When discussing the excellence of the 1995 Ghost in the Shell, for example, we draw on existing discussions of mind, consciousness, cyberspace, and so on—discussions outside the anime—to explain its profound treatment of those themes. This, too, is entirely natural.
Furthermore, even the kinds of negative examples BAKA影 cites need not be inappropriate expressions. Countless anime fans have praised the fight scenes in Sword of the Stranger. One common compliment is that they reach the standard of “live-action martial-arts cinema.” If we follow the reasoning behind “‘satirical’ metaphor,” this would be inappropriate criticism. Yet most anime fans who know something about live-action martial-arts films can clearly recognize the gap between their action scenes and those in ordinary anime, and how valuable it is for animation to present an action scene comparable to live-action martial arts. Of course, this is not the only frame of reference for judging animated action. Similarly, if we say, “Violet Evergarden is good because it resembles British television drama,” the problem may not lie in the form of the statement. We should ask a further question: “Why should resemblance to British television drama count as grounds for arguing that an anime like Violet Evergarden is good?” If we get a reasonably satisfactory answer, we can accept the statement “Violet Evergarden is good because it resembles British television drama.” Otherwise, we should reject the analogical argument.
There is another point worth noting. The author seems to use some supposedly Heideggerian concepts and expressions. I do not know much about Heidegger, but as far as I know, his own criticism of artworks shows no tendency to exclude things outside the works themselves. Take his famous remarks on Van Gogh’s Peasant Shoes:3
From the dark opening of the worn insides of the shoes the toilsome tread of the worker stares forth. In the stiffly rugged heaviness of the shoes there is the accumulated tenacity of her slow trudge through the far-spreading and ever-uniform furrows of the field swept by a raw wind. On the leather lie the dampness and richness of the soil. Under the soles stretches the loneliness of the field-path as evening falls. In the shoes vibrates the silent call of the earth, its quiet gift of the ripening grain and its unexplained self-refusal in the fallow desolation of the wintry field. This equipment is pervaded by uncomplaining worry as to the certainty of bread, the wordless joy of having once more withstood want, the trembling before the impending childbed and shivering at the surrounding menace of death.
To my mind, the position on animation criticism that BAKA影 displays here is less an elaboration of Heidegger than something closer to Clive Bell’s principle of artistic autonomy. His view that we should treat animation as animation itself, rather than as something else, bears a subtle resemblance to Bell’s separation of art from the everyday world. I do not think Bell’s formalist aesthetics is objectionable. But to what extent can animation be an art of this formalist kind? Among the excellent animated works we know well, at least, there is virtually no rejection of narrative.
In short, metaphorical arguments in animation criticism—or “‘satirical’ metaphors,” as the author calls them—are not, in themselves, particularly unreasonable. At the most fundamental level, human language itself is not “what it is,” but is full of metaphor. In the creation of animation, metaphor is an indispensable device. In animation criticism, simple metaphors are unavoidable—unless the author really can produce a piece of criticism that treats animation as “what it is,” as he proposes. And what makes complex metaphorical statements reasonable is further explanation, whether written or unwritten: for example, a community of critics’ tacit use of certain specialist concepts. BAKA影’s discussion of “‘satirical’ metaphor” therefore has shortcomings that need to be clarified and addressed.
I think BAKA影 has two options for defending his position. The first is to embrace extreme formalism, consistently maintaining that works such as Ghost in the Shell and Sword of the Stranger are not excellent, because explaining their excellence often requires reference to things outside animation. He would also have to maintain that truly excellent—or sublime, or poetic—works have yet to appear. Alternatively, he could acknowledge the excellence of works generally recognized as excellent, but then he would need to show what it actually means to write criticism that treats animation as “what it is.” His second option is to clarify that, by “not treating animation as animation,” he means only criticism that imposes strained personal associations, is muddled, puts on airs, or equivocates. But this would merely restate some common sense: critics should take responsibility for their own writing; they should do their best to avoid using concepts, terminology, and other expressions they do not understand; they should work to refine the details of their critical formulations; and so on. In my view, the latter option is more practical. It would not, however, have the explosive impact of BAKA影’s “‘satirical’ metaphor.”
2. “Sakuga Pigs” as Ornithologists4
BAKA影’s article takes particular exception to technical analysis of animation and direction, something genuinely rare in Chinese animation criticism. I must acknowledge that I think his basic premise is sound: for instance, his objection to nbht’s claim that sakuga analysis pursues truth. But this is largely because, in the remarks BAKA影 quotes, nbht himself—in the relatively relaxed atmosphere of a comments section—did not clearly specify what “truth-seeking” in sakuga analysis aims at. Sakuga analysis might be a confirmable inquiry into “what animation professionals really think about making animation.” It might explore “explanations and evaluations of animation’s expressive effects.” It might formulate theoretical “general principles of animation production,” or even address the more constructive question of “how to make good animation.” Each of these purposes affects the answer to “Is sakuga analysis really truth-seeking?” At least those purposes involving normative facts, for example, cannot be described as “truth-seeking.”
I think nbht’s Zhihu article “The Self-Cultivation of a Sakuga Pig” gives a better account of what sakuga analysis, or this activity of “truth-seeking,” aims to do:
What animation geeks and sakuga fans usually mean by sakuga is the movement: stringing individual drawings together to create a sense of motion is what makes sakuga so interesting. Actually, for most people, all it comes down to is that it feels good to watch. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with just wanting it to feel good. But there are ins and outs to why it feels good to watch, and studying those ins and outs is what sakuga fans do.
This passage is more explicit: sakuga analysis investigates “why it feels good to watch.” That makes the issue much clearer, though there may still be two answers to whether it is “truth-seeking.”5
2.1 When Sakuga Analysis Does Pursue Truth
One possible answer is this: if we treat “it feels good to watch” as a third-person fact, then sakuga analysis does indeed pursue truth. Roughly speaking, when different viewers each say that watching a particular anime “feels great,” we accept that their expressions describe more or less similar mental states, and that saying “feels great” is an outward manifestation of such a state. Without being especially rigorous, we can infer a methodological possibility: at least to some extent, we can use induction to identify which properties of animated works make people “feel great.” I certainly agree with BAKA影’s opposition to reductionism: the expressive power of an animated work as a whole cannot be reduced to its constituent elements and their relations. But rejecting reductionism does not warrant the conclusion that, methodologically, we cannot establish that some properties of animation are more likely than others to make people “feel great.” For example, the fight between Saitama and Boros in One-Punch Man is more likely to make viewers “feel great” than the fight between Touma Kamijo and Terra of the Left in A Certain Magical Index III. We therefore have reason to analyze which properties arising from the former’s constituent elements and their relations are more likely to make us “feel great.” This is entirely natural. Of course, even an exhaustive explanation of how an anime’s various constituent elements are arranged would not explain its appeal as a whole. That is entirely natural, too. Why an animated work has the appeal it does as a whole is something neither sakuga fans nor actual animation creators can explain, however accomplished they may be. (Editor’s note: Nor have sakuga fans claimed that sakuga alone allows them to investigate the full appeal of animation as a composite audiovisual art.) But we cannot declare that analytical inquiry into animation yields no additional knowledge merely because we cannot explain the work’s appeal as a whole.
To make this more concrete, consider a hypothetical but quite plausible example involving the practice BAKA影 mentions of identifying animators by their work—though nbht himself thinks only beginner sakuga pigs are keen on this. Suppose a wealthy sakuga fan introduces an artificial-intelligence program into the activity. As its algorithm is progressively improved, the program becomes highly accurate at identifying which creator or creators were responsible for a particular part of an animation, though it still makes various mistakes. So long as its accuracy in identifying animators is significantly higher than that of the average animation creator, we can say that, at least when it comes to matching a passage of animation with its creators, the program is more reliable—and therefore closer to the truth in this respect.
In short, sakuga analysis can be a truth-seeking activity. It is indeed truth-seeking if and only if sakuga fans offer answers, from a sakuga perspective, to “Why does animation make people feel great?” and those answers can be confirmed in similar situations.
2.2 When Sakuga Analysis Does Not Pursue Truth
Another possible answer is that sakuga analysis may not be truth-seeking. This requires us to accept either of the following conditions: (C1) the mental state of “feeling great” cannot be defined through any outward manifestation observable from a third-person perspective; (C2) the mental state of “feeling great” varies so greatly among subjects that no suitable inductive generalization can be found.
Both possibilities are easy enough to understand. Under C1, “feeling great” is simply a private sensory experience. This means that nobody other than the subject having the experience really knows whether someone “feels great” while watching a particular anime. That rules out the possibility of confirmation in sakuga analysis, so it cannot be truth-seeking. C2 is an extreme extrapolation from a commonsense observation: viewers have different preferences, and thus the anime that make them “feel great” also vary considerably. If these differences are so complex that we cannot infer any regularities or patterns from them, sakuga analysis cannot answer “Why does animation make people feel great?” In that case, it is not truth-seeking either.
2.3 Conflated Questions and a Response
The real problem—perhaps without BAKA影 himself realizing it—is that the entire discussion in this section rests on the question of whether sakuga analysis pursues truth. As a result, it mixes in many unrelated topics and arguments: the relationship between sakuga analysis and actual animation production; how to evaluate criticism based on sakuga analysis; the relationship between whole and part in animation criticism. It even inexplicably locates the source of the error in modern society’s admiration for science. I was taken aback when I reached the rebuttal of the “refrigerator argument”:6 In this particular case of sakuga analysis, the “refrigerator argument” asks whether someone who cannot actually make animation can nevertheless offer meaningful criticism of its production. What does that have to do with whether the activity pursues truth? “Meaningful” has several dimensions here. It should not be limited to what is meaningful to actual animation creators; it can also encompass meaningful statements about animation production from a third-party perspective. Unless one subscribes to a vulgar pragmatism, there is an obvious difference between truth and meaningfulness.
It is therefore equally puzzling that, after discussing only whether sakuga analysis pursues truth, BAKA影 moves on to claim that all it does is satisfy the basic need to “show off.” Even if sakuga analysis is not truth-seeking, it may have other, more definite and richer kinds of significance than this supposed “showing off.” His handling of the issue also contains internal contradictions. Actual animation creators do engage in activities resembling sakuga analysis, rather than simply shutting themselves away and following their hearts. They need to know which elements of animation make viewers “feel great” so that they can make animation viewers might like. Even from a purely artistic standpoint, unless the work is merely private amusement that need never be shown to anyone, its creators need at least a rough idea of what a particular part of the animation will mean to an ideal audience. It is also entirely possible that sakuga fans sometimes see things creators have overlooked or misunderstood. Technological advances in animation production in recent years bear this out. Technologies implemented through algorithms have no practical experience of making animation, yet they can, to some extent, make it better. Clearly, algorithms evaluate certain parts of an animation through deductive systems. Sakuga fans who know the rules those systems follow can make the same evaluations.
Moreover, even if we consider the relationship between sakuga analysis and actual animation production and find that the former has no significance for the latter, this does not mean its only remaining point is “showing off.” BAKA影’s discussion lacks a clear account of this relationship, and I think that is the source of many disputes. I do not wish to overstate the significance of sakuga analysis. But even the most conservative position should, I think, acknowledge this: the relationship between sakuga analysis and actual animation production resembles that between ornithologists and birds.7 Birds do not need ornithologists to tell them how to fly, and ornithologists do not need to be able to fly themselves to understand things about birds. Likewise, actual animation creators need not concern themselves with sakuga fans’ criticism, and sakuga fans need not participate in actual production to understand “why some animation feels good to watch.” Given this relationship, we can reasonably say that the chief significance of sakuga analysis lies in fulfilling the purposes of this kind of criticism itself. The same applies to many other subspecies of anime inquiry, such as “sales studies” and even “the study of shipping-war stock speculation,” provided that condition C2 does not apply to them.8
3. Too Scientific, or Not Scientific Enough?
In BAKA影’s “unconscious metaphor,” the attack is directed at animation criticism that uses psychoanalytic methods. Let us begin with psychoanalysis itself. The author’s first problem concerns historical fact: he really is only “pretending” not to have got anything wrong. The claim that “psychoanalysis was the first step in psychology’s separation from philosophy into an independent science” is historically mistaken. Psychology’s recognized origin as an independent discipline lies with Wilhelm Wundt. It was his establishment of a psychology laboratory in 1879 that marked its independence; some accounts even call that period “the Wundt era of psychology.” Freud’s use of the term “psychoanalysis,” by contrast, can be traced back no earlier than 1895, and the establishment of the psychoanalytic school came later still, in 1900. At the same time, there were numerous other schools, including Titchener’s structural psychology and Dewey’s functional psychology. By the time psychoanalysis emerged, psychology was already a discipline alive with competing schools of thought.
The author’s other problem is his belief that, since psychoanalysis belongs to psychology, which is a science, it has a strong tendency to become scientific—the supposed “tendency to exclude people.” In fact, psychology, a discipline whose object of study is human beings, cannot exclude people. I therefore suspect that what he means by “a tendency to exclude people” is this: psychology as a science treats human mental activity as the outcome of laws or mechanisms external to the mind, thereby excluding human subjectivity. Views of this kind often involve humanistic commitments. As basic values cherished by certain people or groups, I think those commitments are unobjectionable in themselves. What concerns me more is this question: Is it a reliable claim that psychoanalysis has “a tendency to exclude people” because it has a strong tendency to become scientific?
Perhaps the leading figures of the psychoanalytic school in the 1900s did aim to make psychology more scientific, and perhaps psychoanalysis was indeed proposed as a scientific theory grounded in both experiment and practice.9 From today’s standpoint, however, its greatest problem is precisely that it is not “scientific” enough. One of the most famous criticisms of psychoanalysis comes from Karl Popper. In “Science: Conjectures and Refutations”, he writes:
The Freudian analysts emphasized that their theories were constantly verified by their “clinical observations”. … What, I asked myself, did it confirm? Nor more than that a case could be interpreted in the light of the theory. But this meant very little, I reflected, since every conceivable case could be interpreted in the light of Adler’s theory, or equally of Freud’s. I may illustrate this by two very different examples of human behaviour: that of a man who pushes a child into the water with the intention of drowning it; and that of a man who sacrifices his life in an attempt to save the child. Each of these two cases can be explained with equal ease in Freudian and in Adlerian terms. … According to Adler the first man suffered from feelings of inferiority (producing perhaps the need to prove to himself that he dared to commit some crime), and so did the second man (whose need was to prove to himself that he dared to rescue the child).
Popper’s criticism of psychoanalysis rests on his famous criterion of falsifiability. There is no denying that, because of its many shortcomings, falsifiability as a demarcation criterion has long been obsolete, at least within philosophy today. Nevertheless, his criticism of psychoanalysis still offers us some insights. It suggests, to some extent, that many psychoanalytic theories really cannot be accommodated within mainstream scientific research paradigms. This does not mean psychoanalysis is an outright lie. After nearly 120 years of development, it does occupy a distinctive, irreplaceable position in clinical treatment and in the interpretation of social and human phenomena. It pays greater attention to each individual as a particular subject, and to the contextual character of interpretation. Thus, if physics is the acknowledged model of science, we absolutely cannot say that psychoanalysis has a “strong tendency to become scientific.” Rather, it has the strongest humanistic character of any school in psychology.
I raise these issues not merely to discuss historical facts, but to pursue a further question: Is being too scientific what prevents better animation criticism? At the very least, BAKA影’s evidence is unconvincing. As psychoanalysis has spread into criticism of literature and the arts, it has never been regarded as a spokesperson for science. Instead, it has often been seen as an intervention by humanistic values arising from within. In my view, what genuinely harms the writing of animation criticism is emphatically not that our attitude toward animation is too scientific, but precisely that our attitude toward theoretical frameworks is not scientific enough. Serious, honest scientific research rarely attempts to extend a theory to subjects outside its particular field. Even when a natural-scientific theory does offer insights into subjects in the humanities and calls for such an extension, most scientists, at least, would not consider science itself a source of reliability for its application in the humanities—unless sufficiently rigorous argument has established that the application is justified. Thus, if a scientific theory really is applied to animation criticism in a nearly absurd way, that is only because we lack a sufficiently scientific attitude to recognize the limits of its application. Only with a sufficiently scientific understanding can we ensure that theoretical frameworks originating in science are not misused.10 In a particularly dramatic twist, last year’s academic hoax affair even included fraudulent papers that used psychoanalysis.11
4. The Felt Character of Experience and Social Construction: No Getting Around Them
Next I will turn to BAKA影’s “dopamine metaphor.” I actually think this is the most important topic, because it touches on many foundational questions about animation criticism: what its basis is, how it should be evaluated, how it relates to animation itself, and so on. First, I should make clear that I broadly agree with the main points of the “dopamine metaphor” section, particularly its criticism of “traffic-driven rationalization.” I have no objection to animation criticism that attracts enormous audiences and gives people pleasure. I simply do not think such criticism itself deserves to be taken seriously. More diverse kinds of animation criticism also deserve attention, and orderly thinking can give people pleasure too.
The “dopamine metaphor” section, however, primarily attacks various kinds of popular “anime reviews,” without sufficiently discussing the crucial question. Following BAKA影’s formulation, I think the central issue here is this: what is the relationship between the “happiness” we get from watching anime and animation criticism? To put the question more formally: what is the relationship between our felt responses while watching animation and animation criticism?
We can approach this through a simple thought experiment. The author’s admiration for Heideggerian views seems to revive for me the divide between Continental and analytic philosophy, now almost consigned to history. Scholars today rarely declare openly, on any issue, that one theoretical style is more valuable than another. Yet the author takes a clear position: “I think anyone who still wants to watch good animation should understand the importance of the poetic and the sublime.” Personally, I do not think there is anything wrong with this view. After all, “poetic” and “sublime” are unavoidably vague in the vast majority of texts, including my own. We do not know exactly what feelings we mean when we watch genuinely “poetic” and “sublime” animation. But I think an extremely naturalistic thought experiment is possible:
Imagine the following future: in 1995, some aliens secretly arrived on Earth and began using functional magnetic resonance imaging to monitor everyone’s brain. They discovered that, when Neon Genesis Evangelion aired, the brain activity of 100,000 Japanese viewers exhibited a similar pattern, A. When many other anime aired, perhaps only hundreds or thousands of viewers’ brains exhibited pattern A. After decades of monitoring, the aliens found that the brain activity of large numbers of viewers exhibited pattern A when works such as Evangelion, Bakemonogatari, and Puella Magi Madoka Magica aired, while many other anime did not produce this result. Following Earthlings’ language, the aliens therefore called an anime “poetic” if more than 10,000 people’s brains exhibited pattern A while it aired, ordinary if the figure was between 1,000 and 10,000, and shit anime if it was below 1,000.
Our cognitive neuroscience is nowhere near this advanced. Still, the possibility is not inconceivable: defining what is “poetic” through a neuroscientific characterization. But I doubt BAKA影 would accept such a characterization as animation criticism. In fact, I doubt I would either. Where is the problem? The issue we really cannot get around is the felt character of experience.
Readers can understand this, roughly, as follows. When we feel pain, we have a subjective feeling that can be described as “pain.” That feeling is private to us: neither anyone else nor any scientific method can feel the pain itself. Even if our brain always exhibits a particular pattern when we are in pain, that pattern is only neural activity, not the actual feeling of pain. Once this concept is clear, it is easy to understand why the statistics of brain-activity patterns in the thought experiment cannot constitute animation criticism. Whether the words are “poetic,” “sublime,” or other similar terms used in animation criticism,12 what they refer to directly are particular feelings we have as viewers while appreciating it. Only indirectly do they describe features or properties of the animation itself. That indirect meaning, moreover, also comes from our ascribing our feelings to the animation itself as a matter of course: if, while watching anime X, we have the feeling referred to by “poetic,” we say that anime X is poetic. Two further points need to be noted. (1) Using the same critical term, “poetic,” for two different anime does not mean we have the same feelings while watching them. In fact, there are subtle differences between any mental states we describe with the same word. (2) When different people use the same critical term, “poetic,” the feelings they describe are also different, sometimes markedly so. This sometimes makes us particularly conscious of the ordinary process of ascription just described, prompting us to say: “In my personal opinion, anime X is poetic.”
An initial clarification of the relationship between felt responses and animation criticism lets us examine specific questions more closely. What I find deeply puzzling is that BAKA影 supports diversity in animation criticism while opposing “individualism” in it. “Individualism” here means that “as long as what each person thinks, says, and does comes from their heart, it has value.” If we reject this individualism in criticism and suppose that there is a universal standard of truth by which to judge criticism as better or worse, what diversity could animation criticism still have? Perhaps it is precisely because BAKA影 recognizes this underlying contradiction that he recommends we “do less criticism and more creating.”
Once we clearly recognize that many expressions in animation criticism arise from private feelings, however, we no longer encounter this contradiction. It is true that one person’s feelings are not, in themselves, more or less important than another’s. But when we use forms of expression defined by feelings to offer specific criticism of animation, distinctions between important and unimportant, good and bad, reasonable and unreasonable arise through social construction. We should understand animation criticism itself in this way: it is the collective recognition of other members of the community that establishes criticism as good or bad, although their recognition arises from various social or non-social reasons, and collective recognition does not mean merely recognition by a simple majority.13 The central point is this: each individual’s animation criticism is based on their personal feelings; therefore, the criticisms themselves are neither superior nor inferior, but distinctions of superiority and inferiority arise through social construction.
More explicitly, this process of social construction also bears directly on judgments about animation itself. The exception is when we judge animation solely at the level of private feeling—for example, when I consider anime X a masterpiece and tell nobody. That is individualism in the true sense. Once we discuss animation publicly, an individual’s judgment that a work is a “masterpiece” or a “piece of shit” inevitably enters the complex interactions within a particular community. Through these interactions, views about whether an anime really is a “masterpiece” or a “piece of shit” continually solidify or shift with the context. We need not spell out exactly what these interactions involve. The advantage of not doing so is that it leaves room for certain beliefs, such as “genuinely excellent works possess a timelessness.”
The view I have presented looks like relativism, but I think this relativist attitude is constructive in two ways. On the one hand, we can clearly recognize that the persuasive force—or other positive qualities—of all animation criticism and the paradigms it follows comes from social construction. We can therefore feel confident enough to try all kinds of diverse approaches. On the other hand, we can investigate which specific norms, in the present context, account for the persuasive force that social construction gives animation criticism, so that our own critical formulations gain the community’s recognition and thereby become better than others.
Of course, doing so requires us to abandon another inescapable topic: aesthetic realism. BAKA影 does not address this in his article, but some of his particular views faintly suggest realist assumptions. For example, he thinks Evangelion is good because it “did everything an anime could do at the time to express a state of mind that had not yet been expressed.” Or again, he thinks “anyone who still wants to watch good animation should understand the importance of the poetic and the sublime.” These statements seem to suggest that he thinks good animation possesses certain universal qualities that everyone can appreciate. Some people also tend to think that anyone unmoved by “truly good animation” simply “lacks the capacity to appreciate it.” To my mind, such claims are decidedly arbitrary and dogmatic. The only possible way to demonstrate that this supposed capacity for appreciation transcends social construction is to seek its biological basis. Yet any biological basis could establish only whether certain capacities for appreciation persist over time, not whether those capacities are higher or lower. Rather than a genuine capacity, then, what we call the capacity for aesthetic appreciation is, in substance, the degree to which we conform to a community’s norms.
The foregoing does not, however, amount to a refutation of aesthetic realism. Indeed, I cannot imagine any sufficient grounds for rejecting a realist belief about aesthetics. After all, it is a basic belief, and we cannot refute it by attacking its foundations. Nevertheless, I still think that, unless realism about beauty is understood within a naturalistic framework as the persistence and universality of certain biological properties, it borders on mysticism.
5. Conclusion: Excessive Rationalization and Other Views
For an article on a public platform, this has clearly become far too long. I will therefore conclude with my views on “excessive rationalization.” Other topics that BAKA影’s article touches on to varying degrees, but that I have not discussed here, may receive fuller treatment in my planned “Meta-Criticism of Animation.”
As the final section of his article rightly says, the greatest difficulty is how we could possibly give up rationalization. Experience seems to show that as soon as we use language to say anything, we fall into the rut of rationalization. Even following his recommendation to “do less criticism and more creating” would be no exception. If I read his article, abandoned criticism altogether, and devoted myself to creating, it seems that his recommendation would itself guarantee that my creative activity was justified. But to worry that these trends toward excessive rationalization will make animation and animation criticism dull is to worry that the sky will fall. As far as I know, human beings are easily bored and drawn to novelty, whether in animation or in criticism. Almost all animation is aimed at consumers, and dull animation will gradually be eliminated as consumers tire of it. A substantial portion of animation criticism is also written for readers. Dull criticism, at least, will not be most readers’ choice. —Of course, most of the criticism in our humble publication, Lab on Roof, will go on being dull (laughs).
In my view, the only kind of excessive rationalization comes from critics forcing connections—or, more directly, being dishonest with themselves. Some writers of animation criticism may invoke all sorts of novel theories and concepts without thinking them through, regardless of whether their use makes sense in the particular argument. Others deliberately dress up their writing with terminology for various purposes. These are all unacceptable forms of excessive rationalization. Of course, many writers, including those in our own group, also have these problems as a matter of fact. These are things we, too, need to reflect on and discuss with humility.
Editor’s Note
This article is already very long, but I would like to close by objecting to BAKA影’s account of truth as something from which “any person’s influence can be excluded.” This formulation is far too substance-oriented/positivist. I think human beings’ historically situated, objectifying practice should be taken into account when considering categories such as truth. And as for the binary choice of “either sincerity or truth, but you are bound to end up in a predicament”—can’t I reject the choice as it has been set up? We ought to consider whether the alternatives themselves are appropriate. I see Austoria’s relativism as a positive attitude that takes account of human beings’ historically situated, objectifying practice. Finally, among those recently practicing psychoanalytic criticism of literature and the arts on Zhihu, there is fairly broad agreement in rejecting the description of psychoanalytic literary theory as having a “strong tendency to become scientific” and “excluding people.”