In the previous video, we used Japanese anime to analyze the classic character Battle Girl, pointing out the hollowness and unreality of her personality, which makes her suitable as an object for the audience's sexual projection. At the end of that video, we also mentioned that Battle Girls and ACGN culture itself are not the problem; the key lies in the attitude of the parties towards this role. So, in today's video, let's discuss this further: the aesthetic of white, thin, and young in East Asian society and the cute culture behind it. Before the video starts, let me mention that I will post this video in the "Psychology and Education" list. If you have anything you want to discuss with me or consultation topics, you can contact my email to make an appointment. Now, let's get back to today's topic.

On the surface, the so-called "white, thin, and young" aesthetic refers to a fairly standardized set of physical characteristics: fair skin symbolizes purity and being unpolluted; a thin figure means being slender and non-aggressive, arousing people's desire to protect; and a youthful appearance and body directly imply a naive, submissive, and immature state of mind and body. However, appearances aren't what really matter, but rather the spirit, as appearance is merely an externalization of the spirit. What we appreciate is never the isolated physical characteristics of another person; instead, these characteristics serve as signs and symbols for the spiritual meaning behind them. These meanings are usually influenced by social culture and are the results of repeated coding of personal experiences. Therefore, when we think a person's appearance is beautiful, we are unconsciously treating this person's appearance as a shell for her inner feelings. Appearance is a Signifier, that is, visible symbols, while the inner emotions and qualities it represents are the Signified, which is the meaning of the symbol. The reason why "white, thin, and young" can become a powerful aesthetic paradigm is not some instinct engraved in genes; rather, it is inseparable from the shaping by the entire culture for hundreds and thousands of years, and in recent decades, the repetitive coding of the exploding cultural industry. That is, a fairly solid associative pathway has been established between the signifier "white, thin, and young" and the referent "pure, innocent, simple." So, what does the white, thin, and young aesthetic really mean? It is an obsession with spiritual immaturity and weakness.

A typical case is the Japanese idol group AKB48. Their success is largely based on the creation and sale of this "mental childishness." In times of economic downturn, people's consumption concepts also become more conservative. AKB48's positioning is that of an idol you can meet, like the girl next door, embodying a coming-of-age narrative. Their cuteness and intimacy became the spiritual salvation of otaku. This positioning itself brought idols and fans closer together, weakening the traditional beauty of stars that felt out of reach, replacing it with a "cute" and accessible feeling of intimacy. Fans witnessed a group of ordinary girls, whose appearance and talents were not top-notch, achieve success through their own "hard work," "sweat," and "clumsiness," step by step to the center of the stage. Fans' consumption is precisely their imperfection and unfinished state. In order to maintain this sense of "unfinished" purity, they also have strict rules prohibiting dating. For example, in 2013, a member, because she was found to be in a relationship with another artist, had to shave her head to apologize. This rule is essentially an institutionalized way of artificially prolonging their mental immaturity, ensuring they are always, in front of the fans, an innocent girl who fights for her dream and is emotionally " loyal" to her fans, rather than a mature woman with complex personal emotional lives. Their behavior, speech, and stage performance constantly strengthen this naive, effortful, and even somewhat reckless "personality." This allows us to see more clearly the essence of "white, thin, and young": it is not just the physical characteristics that it is obsessed with, but an immature mind, an object that is mentally passive and dependent.

Let's review interesting comments about Steel Roll Girl. For example, someone commented that if she gets shy, how about a slap in the face? This fantasy is not about experiencing the danger of being attacked by a superpowered being; rather, this interaction reflects her coquettishness and shyness. Another comment said, "I wouldn't say a word if a girl like this asked for 3 million yuan in betrothal gifts." This is to regard the other party as an item waiting to be appraised or adopted. Possessing superpowers does not change their spiritual simplicity, passivity, and naivety. On the other hand, if a person is only white, thin, and young in appearance but is a very complex and strong woman, it's not so easy to project this kind of cuteness.

A counterexample is Yuriko, a hero unit of the Japanese faction in the game Red Alert 3. EA, catering to the aesthetics of East Asian players, created a double-ponytail, superpowered beautiful girl wearing a Japanese short-skirt school uniform. However, they just copied the appearance of a Japanese fighting girl but designed an extremely tragic and traumatic history for this role. In the game, Yuriko was isolated since childhood, later discovered by the Japanese government, and subjected to cruel human experiments, eventually being shaped into the empire's ultimate weapon. So, she harbored a huge hatred for the experimenters, and her eyes were full of aggression and weird emotions. This makes the character very three-dimensional, but it's also very heavy, even scary, making it difficult to project cute emotions onto her.

As we said in the previous video, the charm of Japanese fighting girls is precisely because they are deliberately stripped of their trauma. They don't have a complicated spiritual growth history; their hearts are empty, and their self-awareness is not awakened. Only then can fans project their cute emotions onto them. And for the fighting girls of East Asia, even if given some kind of trauma, this trauma usually does not constitute the driving force of their personality development. Instead, it is aestheticized and poeticized, serving as a way to evoke players' love and tools for compassionate feelings—just an embellishment, lacking soul depth. So, where do their superpowers come from? This can only be attributed to the gift of mysterious props or fate's arrangement. The reason can be very simple, there's not even logic, because it's not important. What they want to protect or restore is also the kind of idyllic and harmonious collective. In the United States, or in the eyes of Western creators, an extremely powerful character with no history, no pain, and no struggles is flat and unreal. Superpowers themselves are an abnormal state, and a person in an undifferentiated state of self-awareness within a collective has a still heart. Thus, they also lack the desire and impulse to break the routine. The desire for superpowers or power often comes from compensation for trauma: "Because I was so weak and lonely, so I have to become strong." Behind this desire, there is always some kind of pain, struggle, and other human emotions. Therefore, the character of Yuriko just reflects that American creators are not good at, or perhaps don't understand, this kind of white, thin, and young aesthetic. They seem to be trying to cater to this aesthetic but still instilled in this role a powerful subjectivity and a resentful soul. Although it makes this character more real and layered, from the perspective of product design, this is exactly contrary to the cute culture of East Asia.

So, here I want to emphasize that appreciating things that are childish, immature, clumsy, and cute is not a problem in itself. For example, when we see cute kittens and puppies, we just want to get close and touch them. For another example, when two people are in intimate communication, relaxing each other's personal boundaries, they begin to behave in a childish manner, giving each other cute nicknames and acting cute. These are all very beautiful and interesting emotions. It can even be said that if these things are not present in a relationship, that means the relationship is not intimate, deep, or relaxing enough. Healthy regression allows us to feel held, feel deeply connected, and healed, and then it can also stimulate vitality and creativity in life.

However, what we are going to focus on and discuss here is the motivation behind appreciating childishness and cuteness. If a person can only, or mainly, find a beautiful feeling in the other party's immaturity, cuteness, and innocence, but cannot or rarely appreciates and admires another person's strength, maturity, mysterious, and independent side, then this appreciation of cuteness may become the client's tool for escape and defense against growth. We say that anyone, no matter how mature and independent their thoughts and personalities are, must have a childish, innocent side in their character. Human growth and development never follow a linear order; it is not a complete severance of the previous stage of self to enter the next stage without any residue. Instead, it is based on the negation and integration of the previous stage, containing the wisdom of the previous stage, and entering the next stage in a spiraling upward manner. In this sense, a person can, of course, always keep a simple and innocent, nostalgic, and sad emotion in a corner of their heart. However, when individuals fail to develop an aesthetic preference for being strong and independent, when a person's emotions are fixed on clumsy, pitiful, cute objects, this may reflect that they encountered some difficulties in their growth. In fact, any culture can be unilaterally developed into a tool of escape and defense. Some young people are accustomed to being immersed in cute culture; they like baby things and also like to play the role of a child. In Chinese society, some middle-aged and elderly people may be more accustomed to another way of escape, which is through the so-called big picture, integrating with the emperor's perspective. By pretending to be in harmony with the historical process and merging with state power, they isolate and avoid their true emotions, playing a so-called profound and mature role. Therefore, we are not criticizing the aesthetics of white, thin, and young, but want to analyze it to touch and connect that deep heart seeking stability and control.

But an interesting question arises: if the love for simplicity and innocence is a universal human psychology, why has this aesthetic preference in East Asia, or specifically in Japan, developed into such a unique and systematic cultural industry that is even sweeping the world? What kind of historical heritage and soil has Japan accumulated in this regard to nurture such a unique cute culture? To answer this question, we need to look at it from the perspective of language, tracing the genes of this culture. As scholar Shihoda Inuhiko researches in his book "On Cuteness," the word "cute" (kawaii) has undergone a complex evolution in history. It can be traced back to Kahayushi or Kahohayushi, the latter describing things that appear more colorful, also meaning that the complexion looks better, blushing due to excitement, shyness, or embarrassment. This already implies what we call "cute" today—a cute connotation.

In the early eleventh century, Sei Shonagon in her essay The Pillow Book with a very delicate and sensitive perspective, describes the innocent play of children: a little sparrow jumping over a child's face, a three-year-old child seeing a small object on the ground and using its small fingers to pick it up and show it to adults, or a girl pushing her hair away from her eyes. When we feel this picture, indeed, you can feel a very Japanese aesthetic. Here, all these things called "cute" are young, fragile, innocent, and in need of care. However, it has already been recorded in the literature, specifically in the 12th-century Konjaku Monogatarishu, that the meaning of this word in a sentence is "terrible, poor, worthy of sympathy." This is contrary to what many of us think today, where people feel the word "cute" means "pleasing" or "pretty." But its genes contain meanings of pity, intolerance, and sympathy. This seems like a big contrast, but when we carefully consider and savor the word "cute," it is natural to feel a touch of sadness. Cute culture appreciates those who are slender, fragile, short-lived objects, such as cherry blossoms, fallen leaves, kittens, or clumsy children. Its logic is this: the subject first feels the beauty of the objective object, then thinks of the fragility and consciousness of this object, then feels pity, sympathy, and sadness, and then because of this sadness, produces a subtle sense of beauty of pity. The cycle continues, and this sense of beauty is deepened. This is the commonality between cute aesthetics and mono no aware aesthetics.

Such a perspective has a long and profound heritage in Japanese culture. As the author concludes, cute aesthetics is about emotions arising from small, fragile things that need protection from others, gradually emerging as beauty from others to oneself. When we compare the culture of other nations, you can feel more what's special about Japanese cute culture. The uniqueness of a word is best reflected in translation. When you find a word that is difficult to find a perfect equivalent in another language, this means that it carries the unique connotation of this culture. For example, かわいい is often translated into "cute" in English, but the genes of the English word "cute" are different from those of かわいい. We said the word かわいい actually has the following etymologies: pitiful, meaning of intolerance, sympathy, and shyness. The etymology of "Cute" can be traced back to the Latin Acutus, which means sharp, pointed, intelligent, clever, shrewd. "Cute" did not appear until the 18th century, and its original meaning was "clever and clever." After the 19th century, it was used to describe the cuteness of children and small animals.

In contrast, the Japanese かわいい does not contain the meanings of clever, smart, or intelligent. Describing an adult woman in English as "cute" often implies small, light, friendly, and beautiful, but not threatening, whereas "beautiful" or "elegant" is a more advanced and solemn compliment. In French, one can't even find a word for "cute." As the author concludes, in Japan, if you praise a woman as "beautiful," the other person may feel shy and overwhelmed; they may also think you are joking or not sincere enough. But if you praise her for being "cute," she will probably accept it happily and think it comes from the heart as pleasant compliments. The difference in this social scene reveals an important fact: in the context of contemporary Japan, cuteness often surpasses beauty. It is no longer a second-rate adjective that applies only to children; instead, it has become a more popular and intimate, even the highest form of praise. This kind of putting "cute" above "beautiful," or at least a value ranking that is on par with it, also enables us to understand why the "white, thin, and young" aesthetic can reach such an extreme form in Japan.

So here, some friends may ask: should we resist and deny this cute culture or the aesthetic of white, thin, and young? I think the answer is neither embracing nor resisting, but "integration." As we said before, a truly mature self is precisely one that can integrate all its parts, where no part of her self is abandoned, and all can be fully developed and recognized. This, of course, also includes the inner, innocent "child" self that longs to be held. The real problem, perhaps, is not whether we like or resist cuteness, but whether we still have the ability to love the "unlovable." Do we still have the courage to embrace real, imperfect others, full of unknowns and challenges? Can we appreciate the kind of mature beauty with a rough texture, tempered by pain and struggle? We will continue to delve deeper into this topic in the next video.

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