The Joke that 🅺🅸🅻🅻🅴🅳 an Anime

[@Lowart]

Hey there, folks! This begins the month of videos, which people smarter than me in the comments have dubbed Lowvember! Hope you enjoyed it :) Also, here are the sources I used for the video. Honestly, some of them aren't exactly the BEST sources, but that's, in part, what this video is about. 1. Anime News Network Article, which also contains links to the blogs I mentioned: www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2012-09-04/kokoro-connect-staff-issues-statements-on-performer-treatment 2. The big pastebin post: pastebin.com/EvntSeCV 3. The TV Tropes page: tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/MitsuhiroIchiki 4. ANN article on bluray sales from 2012 (to give a reference for how many copies top series sell): www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2013-01-06/50-top-selling-animation-blu-ray-discs-in-japan/2012 5. List of bluray sales, including low-performers: gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/2000121-anime-and-manga-other-titles/65735054

[@jeremysawa7075]

When you look at the whole story of Kokoro Connect in general, it kinda feels that this 'edgy' joke/harassment meant to inflict embarrassment, isn't that really the main goal of the antagonist all along? horrible things happen for the antagonist's amusement? It feels in a way that the over-arching theme here was present but was just received moderately poorly.

[@braddl9442]

Your video started out strong, then went into hardcore trying to muddy the waters mode half way in. His blog post did in fact look like your standard hostage video style video Japanese companies will force someone to do. And you dont actually account for how Japanese society functions. He blames the internet for the fact that they were upset at how he was treated? Everything points to confirmed the event pretty much happened the way it did. And you want try to throw shade on the pastebin. Yeah there was more info and clips and more out when the incident happened. But just cause you cant find it now you want to muddy up the waters and seemingly defend the actions of the scumbags that caused the incident. Why didnt you do more of a deep dive on the people that perpetrated it, checked if they did things like this in the past etc. You left a lot of stuff off the table here.

[@sahuanitasahu7696]

Me too

[@squirrel670]

@@braddl9442 the lack of sources make it hard to keep pursuing people over it and people have been harassed without any real connection to the incident in part due to that vagueness. Supporting the voice actor is the only action without unnecessary harmful effects to take if any are to be taken here.

[@NekoLilyK]

Hey just FYI this is a great video but I was so confused about whether you were talking about the anime's story or the actual real life incident. It seems like a lot of other people also got confused. Just something to consider for the future.

[@ilovewritingessays2017]

I feel sorry for the writer that even wrote kokoro connect in the first place. Imagine your pride and tears being attached to the dumbest pr stunt of all time.

[@darkelixer2239]

This is why boycotting wasn't enough, stalking was too far but the hate response was absolutely right at the point

[@alpha_9997]

@@darkelixer2239 hell yeah, fuck the producers

[@darkelixer2239]

@@alpha_9997 they need to be scarred a little

[@alpha_9997]

@@darkelixer2239 just a little

[@limitbreak2966]

I HAD ONLY WATCHED AFTER FIRST FEW MINUTES I THOUGHT IT WAS THE PLOT OF THE ANIME, WTFF THAT REALLY HAPPENED?

[@sirstronghold9912]

That "joke" is like something you would see in an anime about a guy who's about to get some kind of powers and get revenge.

[@clarehidalgo]

The way Sugita commented to the Ichiki "I'd remember all there faces" does give off revenge plot vibes

[@greenlitlleman]

And considering that most of the bullies were girls it gives those hentai villain vibes.

[@Archedgar]

@@greenlitlleman Of course. That's literally the plot of 'bullied hypnosis revenge' manga/anime.

[@tanepukenga1421]

Why do you think so many of those manga/anime exist?

[@Morgil27]

It's not just an anime trope. Ever see Carrie?

[@brandonhughes4076]

Regardless of whether Ichiki was ok with it or not, that’s an awful thing to do to a person. They were lucky that Ichiki had thick skin

[@AcidiFy574]

Actually this was cowardice The guy endured the mistreatment but also flamed the internet & called it horrifying for calling their BS out that's not thick-skinned

[@mitsubachihachi9643]

I agree, even if Ichiki genuinely forgave them and has thick skin, it's still a horrible thing to do and I don't blame anyone who still hates the people responsible for the prank.

[@PastelComGini]

@Jim Or maybe it was all staged and he was part of the thing?

[@Nemon9a]

@@AcidiFy574 🤓

[@MathewTheJudge]

@@Nemon9a OK nvm about my previous approach. U is a coksaka

[@cantthinkofagoodname42]

I feel really bad for that guy, he was publicly humiliated, completely ignored for a job he wanted, offered a job he didn't want, and then basically had to take the job he didn't want with the people he was just humiliated by because of social conventions.

[@everythingpony]

What job did he want?

[@CoreyANeal2000]

I understood these kinds of social conventions since I was young. It kind of made me skeptical of taking a chance on a lot of things. Trust in other people deteriorated over time because in my mind, I thought of something. Then people just went and proved it true. It's like when in school a girl confessed to me. In my head they were probably joking due to my understanding of high school social conventions. Then their group proceeded to all laugh as I looked at the girl with a questioned face. The more this thing happened the less I could between someone actually interested and someone trying to prank me. These things don't just hurt people's judgements, but they hurt people's understanding of the world around them.

[@stasyandr563]

he wanted to be a voice actor but what he got instead was a mean prank and then he was forced to promote anime whih he wanted to voice@@everythingpony

[@solidifiedwatergatherer]

@@everythingpony Well he obviously wanted to voice act in the actual show than get made fun of and then force to be pr boy.

[@artyd42]

His fanbase going "Oh... we've notice something wrong." and waiting for the entire thing to run it's course before just not buying it is the backlash the company not only deserved but was light.

[@lrso5152]

To me, public humiliation is never "just a prank, bro."

[@TheUnderscore_]

There's a reason "embarrassment"'s a part of human instinct after all

[@Vecchio_Rhosod85]

For me, public humiliation would be a declaration of war.

[@Takumi_Did_Nothing_Wrong]

If Ichiki genuinely has no hard feelings about the incident or toward the people who were in on the prank, then he's a better sport than me. I would've been mortified if I was in his shoes. I don't think I would've continued pursuing a voice acting career after that.

[@BrutalButtSlap]

or you know is a competitive market, maybe he can't rly say he disliked the prank, there are possibility if he does will just be seem as a "snitch" for other companies, why risk losing other jobs for that, who knows.

[@bluecanine3374]

@@BrutalButtSlap pretty much. If you are relatively new to an industry and the only thing associated with you becomes you being mad at a company, justified or not, nobody is going to want to risk having a toxic employee or all eyes on them for how THEY treat this person. And with other incidents in the industry that i am aware of it seems that the general idea is you don't make a scene or big fuss about things even if you choose to leave and never want to work there again, the expectation is you stay polite

[@braddl9442]

He had no choice to go along with it or he would be blacklisted in the industry.

[@BrutalButtSlap]

@@braddl9442 Again sometimes is just a bad "joke" or a "prank" to the audience, but it doesn't change the act is in poor taste or just bad manners in general, it creates a bad historical of what is accepted. About the VA, i know sometimes it can get to "clean" but they are interacting with a public, there can be strike a balance, that situation in most of lights can only be seem as bullying or just hierarchic out of touch egocentrism, maybe in their ecosystem isn't bad or cringe i can give them that, but there is better ways them just over protect the business and friends and shit on people who aren't in the circle that are just concerned, it can get annoying but there are better ways to explain it.

[@rakhmathadita3917]

ichiki forced to brush it or else but Sugita later ignored all kokoro connect main cast especially takuma terashima, there was an event when they work together, but when takuma tried to handshake Sugita, he ignored him, this was a big deal, especially for someone that friendly like sugita

[@mirusasaki]

The thing with their culture is that if you stood up for yourself against the higher ups, you're more likely be shamed by everyone. Basically killing off your career right there. So they always end up agreeing to anything no matter how ridiculous and absurd they are.

[@DeadMeat991]

Exactly. Thank you for pointing this out.

[@DrachenRitter]

Was just about to comment this exact thing. “Accept that you were made a fool on stage, or never work in this industry ever again!”. And then they hired a group to skew whatever was being uploaded onto the internet, even provinding their own “evidence”.

[@OtepRalloma]

This reminds me of the guy who was forced to survive on lottery winnings on stream.

[@braddl9442]

Yup, the blog post looked like your bog standard hostage video style PR they make you do when a controversy happens. And they blame the people that were upset at how they treated him as the bad guys.

[@SollomonTheWise]

herbivore culture in short

[@Gatherway-Duo]

I think you underestimate just how insanely toxic Japanese workplaces can be. If he wants to continue his career in the industry, he really has no other choice but to say "hey come on guys, it wasn't that bad, let's just forget about it and move on."

[@reivaldoaurelio4895]

Dark side of Japan. No wonder why they have high suicide rate.

[@yukiko6137]

Imo that's when you should go scorched earth on people like these. Literally ask the people on internet to boycott and ruin their dreams and lives even if you have to work at grocery store for the rest of your life.

[@Azzaciel]

@@yukiko6137 Aaaaaand now he gets sued into oblivion for harming the honour of the studio. Japan is hardcore toxic in certain aspects of it's (workplace)culture and justice system.

[@B3an01]

@@Azzaciel he can just say "your honor i didnt harm the studios honor they did"

[@Azzaciel]

@@B3an01 You severely underestimate just how hardcore toxic we are talking about here. It doesn't matter if he's telling the truth, the question is "Have his public statements negatively impacted the companies reputation, yes or no?" If the answer is yes, he's fucked. And wouldn't you know it, calling out your asshole boss and co-workers for being assholes harms the PR of the company.

[@BohemianScandalous]

I remember that rather than the victim of the bullying, it’s was his friend extremely prolific voice actor Sugita Tomokazu (of Gintama fame) and his extremely cold unforgiving response to the situation that helped rally people to the scandal even though Ichiki did not react. I remember reading Sugita’s tweets at the time. I saw the clips on NicoNico. While I don’t remember all the details I do remember how Sugita has completely iced any interaction with Terashima. I do think Ichiki is probably feeling the pressure to let things slide. He still has not become a very big name in the industry and has very little power. Furthermore Japan laws about defamation finds the party accused of defamation guilty even if what is being said is true. But no matter what the truth is I hope Ichiki can eventually move past this incident. Always being thought of as the “poor victim” of bullying must wear down on one’s self esteem

[@bananatiergod]

Sugita was based. He basically gave each and every one of these voice actors a cold shoulder and always showed his dislike to them in public, tarnishing their rep without saying a word. That's a man who knows to use his influence for a good cause.

[@nickzakrath7080]

Sad that this happened to him, but after reading his TV Tropes page, I'm glad Ichiki got more roles and managed to get more work in his career. Plus he married a fellow actress in 2015 so that's a plus!!

[@catscanhavelittleasalami]

Glad to know what. We wish him the best.

[@MidgarMerc]

Knowing how petty the Japanese entertainment industry is I wouldn't put it past them to have pressured him to not speak out publicly about the prank.

[@The_Lunch_Man]

Exactly what I thought after watching this. Its worse than Hollywood, and that's saying something

[@naylisyazwina6836]

@@The_Lunch_Man I'm already aware of this story and it sucks. Inaba and Mafuyu Satou combined is what makes me as a person so it was sad not being able to see an anime version of me anymore. My demeanour is Inaba's to friends and Mafuyu's for distant people. My favourite anime of 400+ are: Re:Zero, Letter Bee, Kokoro Connect, She and Her Cat, Anohana, Tokyo Magnitude 8.0, Guilty Crown, Accel World, 07 Ghost, Spice and Wolf, Noragami, Kamisama Kiss, Kimi ni Todoke, Sket Dance, Uchouten Kazoku, Haikyuu, A Silent Voice, Wolf Children, Erased, BTOOOM!, Death Parade, Karneval

[@QWERTY-gp8fd]

@@The_Lunch_Man i mean thats how japan produce good shit. it can be better but then quality of anime would decrease.

[@ookami5329]

@@QWERTY-gp8fd I don't think cruelty and pettiness increases the quality of anime, bud

[@QWERTY-gp8fd]

@@ookami5329 u acting like thats the only shit. never seen welcome to the nhk? no violence just a unemployed man struggling in society.

[@TeddyAkuma_]

My Japanese husband and I would watch Japanese TV and the pranks that they pull on people would be so heartless sometimes, that I can't help but feel bad. When I express my feelings to my husband, he just says "that's Japanese TV lol."

[@Stryfe52]

Wasn’t there like one ‘prank’ where they basically recorded a guy in solitary confinement, for a few years?

[@Manganization]

@@Stryfe52 that wasn't a prank. That was 100% exploitation.

[@TeddyAkuma_]

@@Stryfe52 not a prank. It’s a show that he volunteered to be a part of but the extremes that he went through to get some money was insane. Fun fact - the producer of that whole thing is still working :)

[@1chibanKasuga]

@@TeddyAkuma_ do you know the name of the producer name or the show?

[@1chibanKasuga]

@@TeddyAkuma_ thank you, i will watch that video.

[@WeebKingdom]

Damn that joke is literally a nightmare for any introvert

[@Cometstarlight]

Heck, that’d be a nightmare for anyone. How could they do that?!

[@Stryfe52]

If that was me, I’d go “Damn brat, I’ll sue!”

[@rumfordc]

allegedly*

[@Dkgow]

Sounds like a Hazing incident for most colleges.

[@yuvalgabay1023]

"The worst thing she can say is no"

[@bananatiergod]

Tomokazu Sugita once again proves he's the real-life version of Gintoki: A chaotic clown making sex jokes on a daily basis but also piss-your-pants-terrifying if you mess with his friends

[@wzx6x6z6w]

Not just friends, Sugibro takes care of anyone who's under his watch, be it his senpai, kouhai or his peers.

[@IsisNiko]

this is honestly just horrendously cruel. stringing someone along with the prospect of finally getting their big break, and then publicly humiliating them in front of a live audience. for no other reason than as a publicity stunt. even worse is that they had the GALL to ask him to work as a different member of the production company. absolutely vile. i cant even imagine what was going through their minds when they came up with this bullshit.

[@vwoeng7477]

Ichiki's bullying only managed to get out because Tomokazu Sugita is a top seiyuu who is friends with him. I interpreted Ichiki's blog post also possibly him being pressured to whitewash the incident.

[@MrNoot39449]

Sugita-san being an MVP as always

[@sheikhjoy9]

Gin chan wouldnt tolerate this bs...

[@tomfoolery7797]

whitewash?

[@AshEshyr]

@@tomfoolery7797 whitewash has a definition beyond the slang term, it basically means a deliberate attempt to cover up something bad that happened to protect someones rep

[@tomfoolery7797]

@@AshEshyr Alright, thank you for clarifying.

[@Grotons]

I remember seeing the news when this happened. In a highlight of the stream he dropped crying and everyone was laughing at him. It's no surprise everyone boycotted the show.

[@randomness4989]

Disgusting,they all deserve to burn in hell

[@leeshapon]

that’s so awful :( i hope he’s doing better now

[@gowlett9091]

only time i will agree with boycotting

[@qoxx]

i don't agree with them boycotting the novel. sure boycott the anime, it's fine, but the author had nothing to do with this. his work is a masterpiece in the romance genre. only 2000 copies sold is such a waste..

[@shira_yone]

@@qoxx only the anime got boycotted didn't it? Around 2000 copies of _anime blu-ray DVDs_ was sold, the source material were doing fine iirc.

[@thatitalianlameguy2235]

The horror of the internet? I'd say the horror of Japan, he had to suck it up and act like it was nothing because being emotionally hurt or offended is bad.

[@Dinoslay]

”Saving face” can cost people their integrity.

[@JohanCruyff-the-Dutch-GOAT]

I think it is horror of the internet even in other countries it’s so bad

[@hiddenflare6169]

Either way, there is a culture clash here.

[@pisaschitt787]

Soo what you're saying is, horror of internet? You think this is just specific in japan? You thought wrong. When you call out other people's bs even in media, bunch of idiots will bully you for being right

[@N1k0L4z13]

@@Dinoslay I mean, if the guy had spoken up everyone around him will think he was the problem, that's how fucked their business society is.

[@pip25hu]

If we know for a fact that the livestream existed, but it is no longer available, that in itself seems like the biggest hint towards this being real (and horrifying). The event is recent enough that the video should not simply "disappear" like that. They took it down because they realized what a PR disaster it had become.

[@everythingpony]

How do we know it's real if no one has it?

[@Giovansbilly]

​@@everythingponyand this just shows how plausible deniability works unfortunately

[@Assasin2]

It ain’t that “recent”, and many live streams are not saved for very long, assuming this stream actually happened.

[@Aisyen]

seeing Tomokazu Sugita's comment reminds me that he got involved in something similar too. In an interview, he was called in to "audition for a role" and so he did pull up just for them to make him a joke and was like "oh, can you do Gintoki's voice?" or something similar to that. Sugita quickly dismissed the story and went along his usual funny segment after that but I find it really sad that people, even a whole production team, would make fun of voice actors for seemingly no reason as if they're not one of the major factors of boosting a franchise.

[@JustaBigMan]

The fact that it even happened to an industry giant like Sugita is crazy

[@historyshaker7412]

Wow, this almost sounds fake. I thought this was the plot of the anime for a minute

[@BMVfilms]

Yeah this reads like an Onion report

[@justagirlwithmouse]

It is NOT???

[@hectornonayurbusiness2631]

@@justagirlwithmouse wow!

[@calixtobrilliantes4435]

@@justagirlwithmouse OH MY GAAAWD!

[@Lovedeep200]

me too. i thought "hey, am i watching a recap of something?"😂😂

[@inanimatesum4945]

Sounds a lot like Ichiki IS subconsciously caring more about his reputation rather than the respect he deserved. The biggest problem seems to be that this "joke" never should have happened. The bad publicity is definitely what killed the future for this series. Even if its sales didn't tank as bad as others(it might have also not met a certain goal), not many companies are willing to put up with that kind of baggage, especially from something that ACTUALLY caused a boycott tanking sales. Absolutely dumbest decision, especially for a well crafted series about bonds and carrying friends through their emotional lows.

[@braddl9442]

He wants to keep getting work. hence the hostage video style blog post, where he tries to blame the people that got pissed off as "horror of the internet". Japanese people dont like to make waves, and he is most likely scared at how it will effect his ability to get work. But it was the show creators that did this to him, not the people it upset.

[@angsern8455]

It's rather ironic that the show is about students looking out for each other

[@randomness4989]

The show premise was so good,yet ruined...

[@Lunk42]

Really tragic that the series suffered as a result. It was one of my favorites.

[@ikari_no_edits]

Bro just imagine the creator of this manga.. He must have been heart broken to find out that those people had ruined his vision because of their fuked up stunt

[@maxisdead2153]

Light novel, technically, and yes, Kokoro Connect could've been easily a top 40 anime of the history, and they wasted such a good history with a "prank"...

[@blackheartzerotheundergrou3225]

_Kokoro broken_

[@shobithmathew5666]

@@maxisdead2153 i saw the anime, it was good. is the light n ovel better

[@maxisdead2153]

@@shobithmathew5666 For me it was better, give it a shot.

[@AcidiFy574]

It's just your usual romcom nonsense

[@prettyoriginalnameprettyor7506]

This is the part of Japanese humour that I really hate. the whole need for some "idiot" to be the punch line of every joke. It's like nasubi, the obsession with publicly humiliating is simply abhorrent

[@redinmolator]

You know shit's very very VERY wrong if Gintoki himself tells you "you should hold a deep unending grudge"

[@arizona_anime_fan]

dude, you sound like a good guy trying to get to the bottom of it so i'll fill in a bit about this for you. I was around /a/ when this happened; I remember the links, translations, did my own translations, the videos and articles. this was covered significantly by periodicals in japan. and it was some cold hard bullying with many of the VAs participating in it. The reason for the vague comments by the victim is because of Japan's team culture in business. He knows if he complains publicly his future job prospects are at risk, furthermore, he has to work with some of those VAs as well, saying things about it will only make things awkward. but there is one thing for sure, it was some grade SSS+ level bulling. one of the main female VAs from my recollection was recorded on tape harshly bullying the guy. just evil stuff. and at the time bullying was a sensitive topic in the news in japan, the public was having none of it. as for sales, 3k or so DVDs sold in japan in 2011ish, was considered the financial break even point, if that was the only merchandise for the anime. Most anime fell short of that number, even popular ones. Some got sequels some didn't; partly because there is more merchandise then just DVDs; and in Kokoro connect's case there was a LN series to sell. what would kill a new season would be if the anime failed to sell more LN's or it was too successful at popularizing the LN, and the publisher saw no need to keep publishing anime. Unfortunately for this series, the bullying incident killed the light novel sales as well, which is the true reason for it not getting a season 2. as for the "ugly side of the internet", well the backlash against the production crew and VAs who were involved in the bullying was horrifyingly harsh. There were stalking incidences, hate posting, boycots... i think they even ran one of the girls involved out of the industry. so i get why everyone involved even a decade later would be downplaying it and talking about how awful the internet is.

[@StarRailingYourMum]

It's karma for those involved in the bullying.

[@idealicfool]

The 1 thing 4chan fears went into full attack. 2chan. Only trouble with them spearheading it tho is their own history of bs with 1 of the guys behind the prank ridiculing them for it considering the hate and death threats they had directed toward the author of Kanagi for writing a pregnancy scene with the female lead character.

[@bhume7535]

Please tell me Miyuki Sawashiro wasn't involved. Inaba was my favorite from the show and I think that would ruin the last 10% of the show I can still think fondly on.

[@misbahnurjaman9490]

@@bhume7535 if i remember correctly Inaban VA doesn't take part in the incident. And yes, Inaban is my all time favorite!

[@miyakothug3142]

> one of the main female VAs recorded on tape harshly bullying the guy spill the beans. who was it from what u remember?

[@SleepyMatt-zzz]

Anime industry version of "it's just a prank bro!" Jokes aside, this just reeks of exploitation of a voice actor who works in a precarious industry.

[@gravls2128]

That's not a prank thats a public execution

[@mysteriousdora6914]

What was the prank exactly, I dont really get it

[@ivnislykun]

​@@mysteriousdora6914...Are we not watching the same video rn?

[@ReigoVassal]

@@ivnislykun what they're saying is that they don't call it a "prank" at all.

[@hydrablaze36912]

​@@mysteriousdora6914the prank, as stated in the video, was that they gave him a fake voice acting role which was revealed to him later in front of a crowd. In addition, he was to advertise the series on social media and meet a certain deadline of sorts, which he accepted. It is said that if he did not meet the deadline which was i think how much people he has to reach, they would use a electric chair on him as a prank. This is what I understood and it is not 100% correct but correct for the most part I think.

[@10pitate]

I can't believe such a wholesome anime was made by a mean producer

[@masters3104]

It's like those twitter people with cute asian boys as their pfp that send you death threats over stupid sh

[@Yurumates]

Well, the producer also got to work on Mushoku Tensei and Oniichan wa Oshimai!, so that should give you a window into the mind of this "jokester". He has other problems.

[@Wade_in_your_water]

Bro this anime is not wholesome. It had a wholesome ending with taichi and inaban but I have severe depression cause of it

[@JayceCH.]

@@Yurumates What kind of leap of logic is this? Those shows have like 4 producers lmao.

[@exmagnae2350]

@@Yurumates this has got to be bait right?

[@baririzqullah5782]

Iirc Sugita once had similar experience where he were invited to do an audition for a voice acting role, then the director ask Sugita to say a joke or two with his popular voice acting, he agreed to it and he did it, but he didn't get the job the reason? 'I just wanted to laugh at your funny jokes'. And he's really mad about it.

[@darkjosem13]

As always, Sugita-sama shows how much of a badass he is and why everybody loves him so much. He has grown so large in the industry that he can protect new commers from the awful culture he had to make his way through. He deserves a star on the Hall of Fame

[@NexxtTimeDontMiss]

This reminds me of the time they did something similar but worse to a guy they forced to live off mail in prizes and he legit lost his mind several times and they even lied told him he won and could go home but in reality sent him Korea to do the whole 16 month bs again and it was the most watched show at the time ; they live streamed torture of an innocent man as “comedy”

[@maxxor-overworldhero6730]

God, I saw a video on that. This/that kind of çřåp is one of the things that if anything Japanese culture needs a firm smacking for and fixed. That, the underlying issues tied to that like "don't rock the boat" and appeasing your bosses, the overwork deaths, etc.

[@NexxtTimeDontMiss]

@@maxxor-overworldhero6730 indeed , and I’m a weeb myself so it there is something to be said about the lack of empathy for others or even yourself

[@voidnoidoid]

Yeah the guy was nicknamed Nasubi. I can’t remember what his real name is but thankfully he’s doing ok now and runs a theatre troupe last I heard. What he went through was incredibly fucked up. He didn’t even know what he was in for, only that he would be winning prizes. I have no idea how this shit was okay in Japan. Have people no empathy and compassion?

[@NexxtTimeDontMiss]

@@voidnoidoid for real tho , like I get a hood joke but one month in it should have ended period “haha ya got me” style thing and obviously pay him better but nope , just pure cruelty

[@randomness4989]

Aniki was the name

[@HomingVibe]

You can practically create an entire anime/manga out of this story alone.

[@shivam5098]

Yes you can lol

[@ravaniphoenix5431]

That do be a villain origin story. It'd be like The Joker (2019) but anime version.

[@haseebbarya8294]

And get sued lmao.

[@imnotgoodwithnames8502]

​​@@haseebbarya8294 "Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. This is a ficticious work." Legally cant get sued.

[@You-are-definitely-right-but]

⁠​⁠​⁠@@imnotgoodwithnames8502Change everybody’s names except Takahiro Yamanaka and claim it’s a coincidence lmao

[@Rannos22]

A lot of this video highlights how much we've lost in the last ten years from the internet Thousands of articles and videos have been forever lost because the services and sites they were hosted on went under as the internet has consolidated onto a few services Did this incident really happen or did just one side survive the purge of information or the language barrier? We'll never really know for sure now

[@superfamilyallosauridae6505]

i know it's a really weird segue but it's even worse for topics like guns or anything else esoteric. there's just stuff literally nobody knows anymore

[@blackholeghost1875]

Yeah, I could find timecodes about what horrible thing was said in the incident, and some screenshots, but the original stream don't work anymore and their youtube reupload were taken down, so there's no way for sure to know what had happened.

[@blackholeghost1875]

I found a Japanese wiki that consulatd all the information ,Atwiki search アニメココロコネクトのドッキリ企画が鬼畜過ぎると話題に Page 2 is the time line and people involved, so I suggest starting from there. Although most of the links don't work anymore, the transcripts that detail what happened are quite something.

[@builder_dahomey]

Reevaluation of the self. What have ye become? You have fallen and forfeited the spiritual inheritance. You'll never find the light to remove the darkness in your unsparked body. You weeb abominations of the archons, no star shall guide you in the clearest of nights, no wind will blow your sail even in the most intense of gales. You and your archonic weeaboo kinds lack Synesis to appreciate the light of the world of the Aeons. You are far away, far away from the light. Ask yourself, ''What have I become?'', ''Will I ever find my place in the sun?'', ''Will I ever find Jerusalem?''. One star rises, one falls from the sky. It is still hiding the way of the true feeling inside. One word closer to things we need to say. One light's burning, another fades away. Don't stand watching your dream go down in flames. One step closer, the door is open wide. Come tomorrow, we'll see the other side. Others sat on a hill retired. In thoughts more elevate and reasoned high, Of providence, foreknowledge, will and fate, Fix'd fate, free will and foreknowledge absolute, and found no end in wandering mazes lost. Of good and evil much they argued then, of happiness and final misery, Passion and apathy and glory and shame, Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy. Then, then shall things, which now confusedly hurled, Seem chaos, be resolved to order's sway, And errors night be turned to virtue's day. Run the great race of faith and take hold of eternal Life. The altar cloth of one aeon is the doormat of the next. For as I turned, there greeted mine likewise. What all behold who contemplate aright, That's Heaven's revolution through the skies. Écrasez l'infâme chair. A person must test him/herself before eating his/her share of the bread and drinking from the cup, for he/she who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgement on him/herself. I wrote I may say, to see how you stood the test. Under the test of this service, you will glorify the Aiōn Teleos by your obedience in acknowledging the Gospel of The Word of Spiritual Intellect. Examine yourselves: are you living the Life of Faith? Put yourselves to the test. Surely you recognize that Sophia the Aeon is among you unless of course you prove unequal to the test. Let each person test his/her own work. Consider the punishment of Sophia; who can make straight what he has made crooked? Which proves more short than waste or ruining? Have I not seen dwellers on form and favor? Lose all and more by paying too much rent, For compound sweet forgoing simple savor, Pitiful thrivers, in their gazing spent? No, let me be obsequious in thy heart, And tell you: May the contrite soul, the humbled spirit be acceptable to Truth as death of rams and bullocks, as thousands of fatted lambs: such let our new sacrifice be with you today, and may it be your will that we follow wholeheartedly, since those who put their trust in you will not be disappointed. Weeaboos are far away from the light, their mind shrouded with instinctive darkness of the material realm dominated by the archetype of the ego. The day of judgement will expose it. For that day dawns in fire, and the fire will test the worth of each man’s work. Otakus will never hold anything dear to their true egotistical selfish wrathful sarkic indignation. Unlike a leaf on the wind, a weeaboo will never land on their place on the sun. Sarkics draining the light of Sophia bringing upon the archons. You shackle the Elpis brought upon by aeons from the tree of life. You drain the pneuma upon the ethos of the Pleroma. Would the tide of change go in favor to the power of the archons? The weeb flourishes free in the modern age with no regards to the pneuma of the aeons. The weeaboo is free to spread their dominion upon the pneumatics. The Pleroma holds against the horde of hylics unleashed upon by androgynous archons forces under the Demiurge. The weeaboo is a seducer like an archon to normalize savagery of the flesh, the lowest of the mind, the instinctive level, the Sarkic weebs. The sarkic abomination of the Demiurge. What wrath shall thee unsleash upon the material world? Weeaboo abomination subjugation of the instinct upon the divine intellect. The Sagrada Familia is an epitome of the power of the divine intellect gifted by the aeons. You and your weeb kinds are unknowingly shrouding the gift of the divine intellect in humanity by spreading lies made by the archons to which you conceive to your marriage with the flesh. You are at the far end of the tether and when your thoughts won't fit together you'll need to deprogram your mind. It's like seeing a new day. Just what you need to make you nearer to the light. Ekklesiastikos Ainos pneuma rejuvenated by the star dust beyond the Material realm. You are a gross group of fetishists of young people. You have made a gross cultural materialist perversion of Gaia's innocents. A core part of the consumption crisis that weeaboos exploit is the perceived lustfulness thought by weebs in children. This subjugation of archonic weebs over innocents that can't express to adults their thoughts is a way for weebs to take the image of children and replace them to become one with the Demiurge. The profound blocking of genetic diversity done by weebs to the nature of the innocence of children is to ensure that weebs destroy the age of consent and weebs would now completely take the image of Gaia's children and fulfill their sarkic desires. The unprincipled exception of archonic transcription to tolerate a hierarchy of The Loyal Society of the Flesh. The metabrain of the archonic weeaboos pervades society to enshroud the inherited light through metagenesis locking human psyche that would guarantee reign of the Egotistical self that the Shadow hold inside our repressed self that reach back to the realm of our animal ancestors. The weeaboo guarantees such a transformation to occur and continue the rule of the Demiurge to block the light from reaching the Pleroma. The principle of natural selection does not require it, selection can operate rapidly. The weebs are a psychological rapid evolutionary deviated offshoot from the Homo Sapiens Sapiens species naturally selected by archonic forces. Geneticist Goldschmidt continued, every once in a while a macromutation might, by sheer good fortune, adapt an otaku to a new mode of life, a "hopeful monster" in his terminology. Macroevolution proceeds by the rare success of these hopeful monsters, not by an accumulation of small changes within populations. The mutant gene produces its effect by changing the rates of partial processes of development. These significant change of genetic phenotype causes the individual to new behavioral changes. Response to external stimuli is drastically changed by macromutations to account for change in the phenotype of the individual. This drastic change leads to the fulfillment of the increase of the darkness inscribed into an individual. The individual loses their control on their behavior which their environmental influences, in this case fandom obsession, takes over and becomes the primary role of the individual's character, metacognition, evaluation of social constructs, perception of reality, fictional precedence over thoughts and feelings, and losing the ability to distinguish different unique precedences. These psychological change of character of an individual is due to environmental and genetic factors inhibiting normal development of the weeaboo. Why would different partial processes of development be a significant factor to a species? Of what possible use are the imperfect incipient stages of useful structures? What good is half a jaw or half a wing? The concept of preadaptation provides the conventional answer by permitting us to argue that incipient stages performed different functions. The purpose of behavioral changes on the Homo Sapiens Sapiens in regards to the creation of an established preconceived behaviors is that these major adaptational changes in behavior is that it serves as a purpose to stall the creative useful potential behavior of the individual to the point that they unknowingly use material and informational capacity and to waste these resources in order for it to be diverted for selfish and anti developmental capacities that which their logos is diverted to the self which makes them economical and genetic burdens to both society and nature due to egotistical restrictions brought upon by environmental and genetic factors. The archons permeate these genetic phenotypes through increasing hormonal inputs of the individual. The environmental factors that change perception and behavior of an individual is because of the creation of artifacts, any medium anime related, that imbues perception of hormonal change that affects metacognitively only to those whose genetic development has been altered through genetic macromutation. The effect of these genetic and environmental changes to a weeb´s behavior is behavioral isolation due to speciation with their egotistical changed cognition. Behavioral isolation occurs when populations of the same species begin to develop different behaviors that are not recognized or preferred by members in another population. This so called behavioral isolation of sympatric speciation that creates changes to an individual from the same member of a species in the same geographic feature. Because there is no mate recognition between a weeaboo and non-weeaboo due to their behavioral isolation and their genetic and environmental deviations and differences.

[@bluecanine3374]

@@blackholeghost1875 yeah, but that's the thing, links don't work anymore. The idea of the internet being this giant network of globally compiled knowledge now rings false. A hosting service that disappears when the company goes belly up, or format changes that essentially wipe out all the old data putting it on users to back up everything rather than assume it will always be there, heck, if youtube went down tomorrow what percentage of videos do you think would be recoverable? Especially if the person who originally posted one left and was unaware they were even taken down st all? Libraries aren't burning but they are filled with gasoline soaked rags and guys waiting outside with lighters.

[@nonopenope]

I remember that Sugita basically cut ties with Terashima after this happened. There were clips of him giving him the cold shoulder, and tbh, they were pretty satisfying to watch. Terashima wasn't worried about bullying a lesser known VA, but he couldn't do shit to Sugita.

[@tanepukenga1421]

Just the fact they removed the livestream vod kinda proves there was something to hide.

[@DaddyDynastic]

Even giving everyone in the situation the benefit of the doubt Japan has more than a few instances of downright sadistic "pranks" especially when it comes broadcasted entertainment

[@braddl9442]

Im actually annoyed at how the presenter of the video gives way to much BOTD to the show creators here. There was a whole ethical conversation to be had here but he hand waved a lot of that and did not delve into the people that did this incident, He spends a lot of time trying to discredit the pastebin which was just a record of events.

[@kasaix_yt]

Yeah I think there was one where they locked up a guy in a room butt naked and asked him to live off of prizes from lotteries. They told him thst it would be edoted but the whole thing was live streamed. After he won they took him to a country abroad as a prize thrn locked him in a new room butt naked again without his password and he needed to win enough money to return to japan. The thing was he did it quite quickly but without telling him showrunners decided that it would have to be first class instead of economy so he had to stay there longer without his consent. When they took him to japan they put him in an empty fake room and without even saying anything the guy started to get naked as this had already happened twice so he was expecting a third time but it was a fake room and when the walls came down to reveal the audience he was sitting there butt naked flabbergasted. And the producers were just laughing at him for his stupidity. The bad thing is the guy was a comedian and thought this would be a break out but after spending so much time away from civilization all alone he couldnt even talk to people let alone do his job. Still I think he got better these days I think he had written a book or something?

[@DaddyDynastic]

@@kasaix_yt I remember that story he was naked for so long clothes were uncomfortable to him for a long time afterward

[@AdolisYT]

Exactly my thoughts. While I understand his point of not harboring ill feelings or intent toward those involved, due to lack of substantial evidence of the definitive version of events- it's hard to just handwave something this petty and cruel. From all i've seen the incident did infact happen, and despite what version you listen to it's still a horrible situation all around. Simply letting it go because it's "normal" or happens regularly still doesn't make it okay. We should be questioning why exactly it's okay in the first place, and why Ichiki really had no way out of this mess. Not just accepting inhuman bullshit and harassments because it's "cultural". @@braddl9442

[@catscanhavelittleasalami]

@@kasaix_yt real life squid games

[@Mahawww]

This is the equivalent of a teacher whipping students. Even if the students come out IN FULL OUT SUPPORT of being whipped, it doesn't change the fact the teacher who did the whipping and anybody that allowed them to do it SHOULD be punished. So that in the future anyone else who thinks about doing anything similar will have to think twice about it.

[@heatsflamesman5353]

Say that to the teachers 7+ years ago. I had an elementary school teacher that was allowed to hit students with a ruler when they acted up and boy did it work.

[@MustacheDLuffy]

You’re probably talking about a school system that actually does think that’s appropriate

[@akhandtripathipyz9888]

Which teacher goes around with whips

[@SHEESHAW100]

@@akhandtripathipyz9888 teachers back in the past

[@SOA_yt]

@@akhandtripathipyz9888 Teachers used to, my mom said her teachers used to hit them if they misbehaved. Aren’t there some old animes that also show it? Why do you think some teachers in anime hold a stick for no reason

[@shanemiller1182]

Ok but Tomokazu Sugita is so badass for what he said

[@UltimatePerfection]

3:35 I remember reading about this at the time, and from my understanding Ichiki needed money at the time badly due to some family health circumstances. So probably that's why he swallowed his pride and accepted.

[@rainbowskin3379]

Ultimately Ichiki's feelings about what happened are completely irrelevant. Ichiki never denied that the event was genuine, just that it didn't bother him. So this means this wasn't a stunt, or parody. I don't care that Ichiki is ok with being publicly mocked to further his career. I care that this company was willing to do something so cruel, that it reads like a gag from mean girls.

[@hariman7727]

Did it not bother him, or did he keep his mouth shut because of peer pressure?

[@ZekeFreek]

Oh boy, this takes me back. This was a big scandal at the time.

[@builder_dahomey]

Reevaluation of the self. What have ye become? You have fallen and forfeited the spiritual inheritance. You'll never find the light to remove the darkness in your unsparked body. You weeb abominations of the archons, no star shall guide you in the clearest of nights, no wind will blow your sail even in the most intense of gales. You and your archonic weeaboo kinds lack Synesis to appreciate the light of the world of the Aeons. You are far away, far away from the light. Ask yourself, ''What have I become?'', ''Will I ever find my place in the sun?'', ''Will I ever find Jerusalem?''. One star rises, one falls from the sky. It is still hiding the way of the true feeling inside. One word closer to things we need to say. One light's burning, another fades away. Don't stand watching your dream go down in flames. One step closer, the door is open wide. Come tomorrow, we'll see the other side. Others sat on a hill retired. In thoughts more elevate and reasoned high, Of providence, foreknowledge, will and fate, Fix'd fate, free will and foreknowledge absolute, and found no end in wandering mazes lost. Of good and evil much they argued then, of happiness and final misery, Passion and apathy and glory and shame, Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy. Then, then shall things, which now confusedly hurled, Seem chaos, be resolved to order's sway, And errors night be turned to virtue's day. Run the great race of faith and take hold of eternal Life. The altar cloth of one aeon is the doormat of the next. For as I turned, there greeted mine likewise. What all behold who contemplate aright, That's Heaven's revolution through the skies. Écrasez l'infâme chair. A person must test him/herself before eating his/her share of the bread and drinking from the cup, for he/she who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgement on him/herself. I wrote I may say, to see how you stood the test. Under the test of this service, you will glorify the Aiōn Teleos by your obedience in acknowledging the Gospel of The Word of Spiritual Intellect. Examine yourselves: are you living the Life of Faith? Put yourselves to the test. Surely you recognize that Sophia the Aeon is among you unless of course you prove unequal to the test. Let each person test his/her own work. Consider the punishment of Sophia; who can make straight what he has made crooked? Which proves more short than waste or ruining? Have I not seen dwellers on form and favor? Lose all and more by paying too much rent, For compound sweet forgoing simple savor, Pitiful thrivers, in their gazing spent? No, let me be obsequious in thy heart, And tell you: May the contrite soul, the humbled spirit be acceptable to Truth as death of rams and bullocks, as thousands of fatted lambs: such let our new sacrifice be with you today, and may it be your will that we follow wholeheartedly, since those who put their trust in you will not be disappointed. Weeaboos are far away from the light, their mind shrouded with instinctive darkness of the material realm dominated by the archetype of the ego. The day of judgement will expose it. For that day dawns in fire, and the fire will test the worth of each man’s work. Otakus will never hold anything dear to their true egotistical selfish wrathful sarkic indignation. Unlike a leaf on the wind, a weeaboo will never land on their place on the sun. Sarkics draining the light of Sophia bringing upon the archons. You shackle the Elpis brought upon by aeons from the tree of life. You drain the pneuma upon the ethos of the Pleroma. Would the tide of change go in favor to the power of the archons? The weeb flourishes free in the modern age with no regards to the pneuma of the aeons. The weeaboo is free to spread their dominion upon the pneumatics. The Pleroma holds against the horde of hylics unleashed upon by androgynous archons forces under the Demiurge. The weeaboo is a seducer like an archon to normalize savagery of the flesh, the lowest of the mind, the instinctive level, the Sarkic weebs. The sarkic abomination of the Demiurge. What wrath shall thee unsleash upon the material world? Weeaboo abomination subjugation of the instinct upon the divine intellect. The Sagrada Familia is an epitome of the power of the divine intellect gifted by the aeons. You and your weeb kinds are unknowingly shrouding the gift of the divine intellect in humanity by spreading lies made by the archons to which you conceive to your marriage with the flesh. You are at the far end of the tether and when your thoughts won't fit together you'll need to deprogram your mind. It's like seeing a new day. Just what you need to make you nearer to the light. Ekklesiastikos Ainos pneuma rejuvenated by the star dust beyond the Material realm. You are a gross group of fetishists of young people. You have made a gross cultural materialist perversion of Gaia's innocents. A core part of the consumption crisis that weeaboos exploit is the perceived lustfulness thought by weebs in children. This subjugation of archonic weebs over innocents that can't express to adults their thoughts is a way for weebs to take the image of children and replace them to become one with the Demiurge. The profound blocking of genetic diversity done by weebs to the nature of the innocence of children is to ensure that weebs destroy the age of consent and weebs would now completely take the image of Gaia's children and fulfill their sarkic desires. The unprincipled exception of archonic transcription to tolerate a hierarchy of The Loyal Society of the Flesh. The metabrain of the archonic weeaboos pervades society to enshroud the inherited light through metagenesis locking human psyche that would guarantee reign of the Egotistical self that the Shadow hold inside our repressed self that reach back to the realm of our animal ancestors. The weeaboo guarantees such a transformation to occur and continue the rule of the Demiurge to block the light from reaching the Pleroma. The principle of natural selection does not require it, selection can operate rapidly. The weebs are a psychological rapid evolutionary deviated offshoot from the Homo Sapiens Sapiens species naturally selected by archonic forces. Geneticist Goldschmidt continued, every once in a while a macromutation might, by sheer good fortune, adapt an otaku to a new mode of life, a "hopeful monster" in his terminology. Macroevolution proceeds by the rare success of these hopeful monsters, not by an accumulation of small changes within populations. The mutant gene produces its effect by changing the rates of partial processes of development. These significant change of genetic phenotype causes the individual to new behavioral changes. Response to external stimuli is drastically changed by macromutations to account for change in the phenotype of the individual. This drastic change leads to the fulfillment of the increase of the darkness inscribed into an individual. The individual loses their control on their behavior which their environmental influences, in this case fandom obsession, takes over and becomes the primary role of the individual's character, metacognition, evaluation of social constructs, perception of reality, fictional precedence over thoughts and feelings, and losing the ability to distinguish different unique precedences. These psychological change of character of an individual is due to environmental and genetic factors inhibiting normal development of the weeaboo. Why would different partial processes of development be a significant factor to a species? Of what possible use are the imperfect incipient stages of useful structures? What good is half a jaw or half a wing? The concept of preadaptation provides the conventional answer by permitting us to argue that incipient stages performed different functions. The purpose of behavioral changes on the Homo Sapiens Sapiens in regards to the creation of an established preconceived behaviors is that these major adaptational changes in behavior is that it serves as a purpose to stall the creative useful potential behavior of the individual to the point that they unknowingly use material and informational capacity and to waste these resources in order for it to be diverted for selfish and anti developmental capacities that which their logos is diverted to the self which makes them economical and genetic burdens to both society and nature due to egotistical restrictions brought upon by environmental and genetic factors. The archons permeate these genetic phenotypes through increasing hormonal inputs of the individual. The environmental factors that change perception and behavior of an individual is because of the creation of artifacts, any medium anime related, that imbues perception of hormonal change that affects metacognitively only to those whose genetic development has been altered through genetic macromutation. The effect of these genetic and environmental changes to a weeb´s behavior is behavioral isolation due to speciation with their egotistical changed cognition. Behavioral isolation occurs when populations of the same species begin to develop different behaviors that are not recognized or preferred by members in another population. This so called behavioral isolation of sympatric speciation that creates changes to an individual from the same member of a species in the same geographic feature. Because there is no mate recognition between a weeaboo and non-weeaboo due to their behavioral isolation and their genetic and environmental deviations and differences.

[@braddl9442]

Yeah, Im annoyed about how the presenter of this video says he cant come to a conclusion cause he cant find the all evidence anymore. At the time there was so much stuff out there. Coming in years later then saying you cant be sure just cause you were not there at the time. Maybe ask people that were there during the time. Someone might even have some stuff saved.

[@ZekeFreek]

@@braddl9442 I don't think it's that unreasonable that he couldn't find definitive answers regarding a now decade-old controversy that happened at a relatively small event in a foreign country. He does a good enough job recapping publicly available information and giving his own take on it, and that's about as much as I'd expect from anyone who wasn't there. And the people who were there have moved on and clearly don't want to talk about it. Some stuff is just like that.

[@TippedScale]

@@braddl9442 booooo get off the stage

[@Ziziwai]

Regardless of all the individuals’ feelings on the situation, I think it’s amazing that some people _still_ decided to do this prank on a fellow voice, likely knowing full well the themes and story of Kokoro Connect

[@NexusVFD]

Japanese "pranks" on Japanese tv are quote literally the "Prank him John" meme mixed with the "The Prank: *something out of pocket*" meme. And the worst of it is that knowing how anti rock the boat Japan is, thats what Ichiki is doing. He's trying not to rock the boat for everyone else's sake and partially for his own job security.

[@vwts]

Voice acting is almost always a very exclusive club of bros in any given country… he’s probably lying to protect the producers and save his career.

[@delayed_control]

​@@vwts That's not how it is in Japan, because in Japan VAs are paid pennies and aren't paid royalties. So it's a struggle to survive.

[@usernameemail]

@@delayed_control "in Japan VAs are paid pennies" lol wut? that's literally everywhere EXCEPT japan. they get paid a shit ton, bro.

[@catscanhavelittleasalami]

Japan's humor be like: torture, humiliate and mentally destroy some random guy haha fuuneh. Guess it's because they're all miserable so they gotta laugh at someone else's misfortune to feel better about their own situation. Sad.

[@carlos155811]

Kokoro Connect was one of the first anime series I've ever seen back in 2012, I was so excited for the next chapter until for some reason they stop launching more episodes. There were articles explaining the reason but in those times I didn't know english nor read it so I couldn't understand what happened. Now I understand everything and I feel so bad for this poor guy. Thank you so much for bring this topic! :)

[@meris8486]

Toxic people being defeated by their own cruelty is honestly cathartic

[@christopherbennett5858]

Yeah, that prank was kind of moronic. And yeah, I bet that due to things being lost and people trying to either be genuine or save their own skin in the industry, it may never have the truth realised.

[@mysteriousdora6914]

What was the prank exactly, I dont really get it

[@christopherbennett5858]

@@mysteriousdora6914 Basically pretending to give him an audition for a job offer. Then broadcasting the fake audition.

[@KYSMO]

Holy shit, my faith in humanity is FUBAR. That was no joke, that was harassments, bullying and instead of taking the job offer, he should have started a boycott campaign himself.

[@rumfordc]

it might be time for you to stop watching youtube. this story amounts to a rumor. it shouldn't have any effect on you and how you see the real world.

[@toolazytorenamemyself]

I have to agree with rumford, furthermore japanese TV often has mean jokes but they're just that. A joke, not meant to be taken seriously. Further more the story is a mixed bag of rumors and truth so it's better to not put our nose where it doesn't belong. (P.S. I might be incorrect and exc, so correct me if so as I usually don't like diving into drama. If things get a bit spicy I might not reply all together.)

[@LoneBeastYT]

unfortunately, in japan... corporate culture sees "standing up for yourself" as a social suicide since it usually is frowned upon even if you are bullied for it corporate companies only like yes men and plan on working long time than short time and hence the way it unfolded

[@toolazytorenamemyself]

@@LoneBeastYT Hell that isn't even the beginning of their corporate culture fuck ups. Let us not forget they treat a lot of manga artists as slaves, working them to death as well. They don't care if they're overworked or literally dying. It's rather a sad sight to see.

[@boshwa20]

@@toolazytorenamemyself Imagine unironically saying it's just a prank bro

[@WickedAnimeTroll]

Correct me if I am wrong but showing that Kokoro Connect was popular by showing its MAL rating and contrasting it to its low BD sales does not work considering that BD sales mainly reflect the interest of the japanese fans and not the international audience which uses MAL. As far as I know, japan has its own dominant database where you get a better grasp of what is popular there.

[@Eclipsed_Archon]

maybe this is unintentional, but it almost feels like that clear contrast was the point being made. It's true that the show was popular internationally, as shown by the MAL page, and true that it lost steam in Japan, as shown by the BD sales, and while this can be true for any number of reasons I think the argument being made is that it became less popular in Japan specifically because of this "prank" that only the Japanese audience got a lot of press for.

[@NeostormXLMAX]

Yeah im trying to find the japanese version of mal, there are some big disconnects especially with light novels, for example empty box and zeoth maria is disliked in japan and popular in the west, and stuff like the zaregoto and ningen series which are popular in japan but obscure in the west

[@digivagrant]

MAL is as rigged as IGN.

[@Luis-kv8zc]

@@digivagrant tell me about it. The fact that the first ep of both Bleach and CSM just launched them to top 5 on MAL is just ridiculous

[@Luis-kv8zc]

@@digivagrant at least they go down with time and Bleach does deserve to be decently high, but off one ep everyone just spams 10's

[@thermophile1695]

The fact that something this terrible would happen to someone and the guy would consider it business as normal really goes to show how messed up Japan is.

[@case_in_point]

So they humiliated a guy and then wanted to make him the PR guy but would punish him if he failed...?

[@mehlover]

I remember this reading about this incident on ANN, even if it was a PR stunt and Ichiki was in on it, that PR "prank" stunt was such in bad taste. I also can't help but interpret Ichiki's blog post as him not realizing how mean this prank was. But then again, I'm doing what Ichiki doesn't want me to do. But still, such a horrible PR stunt and really hope those who thought of it were punished or something, cause it's just too mean to be a prank that it's not funny at all

[@builder_dahomey]

Reevaluation of the self. What have ye become? You have fallen and forfeited the spiritual inheritance. You'll never find the light to remove the darkness in your unsparked body. You weeb abominations of the archons, no star shall guide you in the clearest of nights, no wind will blow your sail even in the most intense of gales. You and your archonic weeaboo kinds lack Synesis to appreciate the light of the world of the Aeons. You are far away, far away from the light. Ask yourself, ''What have I become?'', ''Will I ever find my place in the sun?'', ''Will I ever find Jerusalem?''. One star rises, one falls from the sky. It is still hiding the way of the true feeling inside. One word closer to things we need to say. One light's burning, another fades away. Don't stand watching your dream go down in flames. One step closer, the door is open wide. Come tomorrow, we'll see the other side. Others sat on a hill retired. In thoughts more elevate and reasoned high, Of providence, foreknowledge, will and fate, Fix'd fate, free will and foreknowledge absolute, and found no end in wandering mazes lost. Of good and evil much they argued then, of happiness and final misery, Passion and apathy and glory and shame, Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy. Then, then shall things, which now confusedly hurled, Seem chaos, be resolved to order's sway, And errors night be turned to virtue's day. Run the great race of faith and take hold of eternal Life. The altar cloth of one aeon is the doormat of the next. For as I turned, there greeted mine likewise. What all behold who contemplate aright, That's Heaven's revolution through the skies. Écrasez l'infâme chair. A person must test him/herself before eating his/her share of the bread and drinking from the cup, for he/she who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgement on him/herself. I wrote I may say, to see how you stood the test. Under the test of this service, you will glorify the Aiōn Teleos by your obedience in acknowledging the Gospel of The Word of Spiritual Intellect. Examine yourselves: are you living the Life of Faith? Put yourselves to the test. Surely you recognize that Sophia the Aeon is among you unless of course you prove unequal to the test. Let each person test his/her own work. Consider the punishment of Sophia; who can make straight what he has made crooked? Which proves more short than waste or ruining? Have I not seen dwellers on form and favor? Lose all and more by paying too much rent, For compound sweet forgoing simple savor, Pitiful thrivers, in their gazing spent? No, let me be obsequious in thy heart, And tell you: May the contrite soul, the humbled spirit be acceptable to Truth as death of rams and bullocks, as thousands of fatted lambs: such let our new sacrifice be with you today, and may it be your will that we follow wholeheartedly, since those who put their trust in you will not be disappointed. Weeaboos are far away from the light, their mind shrouded with instinctive darkness of the material realm dominated by the archetype of the ego. The day of judgement will expose it. For that day dawns in fire, and the fire will test the worth of each man’s work. Otakus will never hold anything dear to their true egotistical selfish wrathful sarkic indignation. Unlike a leaf on the wind, a weeaboo will never land on their place on the sun. Sarkics draining the light of Sophia bringing upon the archons. You shackle the Elpis brought upon by aeons from the tree of life. You drain the pneuma upon the ethos of the Pleroma. Would the tide of change go in favor to the power of the archons? The weeb flourishes free in the modern age with no regards to the pneuma of the aeons. The weeaboo is free to spread their dominion upon the pneumatics. The Pleroma holds against the horde of hylics unleashed upon by androgynous archons forces under the Demiurge. The weeaboo is a seducer like an archon to normalize savagery of the flesh, the lowest of the mind, the instinctive level, the Sarkic weebs. The sarkic abomination of the Demiurge. What wrath shall thee unsleash upon the material world? Weeaboo abomination subjugation of the instinct upon the divine intellect. The Sagrada Familia is an epitome of the power of the divine intellect gifted by the aeons. You and your weeb kinds are unknowingly shrouding the gift of the divine intellect in humanity by spreading lies made by the archons to which you conceive to your marriage with the flesh. You are at the far end of the tether and when your thoughts won't fit together you'll need to deprogram your mind. It's like seeing a new day. Just what you need to make you nearer to the light. Ekklesiastikos Ainos pneuma rejuvenated by the star dust beyond the Material realm. You are a gross group of fetishists of young people. You have made a gross cultural materialist perversion of Gaia's innocents. A core part of the consumption crisis that weeaboos exploit is the perceived lustfulness thought by weebs in children. This subjugation of archonic weebs over innocents that can't express to adults their thoughts is a way for weebs to take the image of children and replace them to become one with the Demiurge. The profound blocking of genetic diversity done by weebs to the nature of the innocence of children is to ensure that weebs destroy the age of consent and weebs would now completely take the image of Gaia's children and fulfill their sarkic desires. The unprincipled exception of archonic transcription to tolerate a hierarchy of The Loyal Society of the Flesh. The metabrain of the archonic weeaboos pervades society to enshroud the inherited light through metagenesis locking human psyche that would guarantee reign of the Egotistical self that the Shadow hold inside our repressed self that reach back to the realm of our animal ancestors. The weeaboo guarantees such a transformation to occur and continue the rule of the Demiurge to block the light from reaching the Pleroma. The principle of natural selection does not require it, selection can operate rapidly. The weebs are a psychological rapid evolutionary deviated offshoot from the Homo Sapiens Sapiens species naturally selected by archonic forces. Geneticist Goldschmidt continued, every once in a while a macromutation might, by sheer good fortune, adapt an otaku to a new mode of life, a "hopeful monster" in his terminology. Macroevolution proceeds by the rare success of these hopeful monsters, not by an accumulation of small changes within populations. The mutant gene produces its effect by changing the rates of partial processes of development. These significant change of genetic phenotype causes the individual to new behavioral changes. Response to external stimuli is drastically changed by macromutations to account for change in the phenotype of the individual. This drastic change leads to the fulfillment of the increase of the darkness inscribed into an individual. The individual loses their control on their behavior which their environmental influences, in this case fandom obsession, takes over and becomes the primary role of the individual's character, metacognition, evaluation of social constructs, perception of reality, fictional precedence over thoughts and feelings, and losing the ability to distinguish different unique precedences. These psychological change of character of an individual is due to environmental and genetic factors inhibiting normal development of the weeaboo. Why would different partial processes of development be a significant factor to a species? Of what possible use are the imperfect incipient stages of useful structures? What good is half a jaw or half a wing? The concept of preadaptation provides the conventional answer by permitting us to argue that incipient stages performed different functions. The purpose of behavioral changes on the Homo Sapiens Sapiens in regards to the creation of an established preconceived behaviors is that these major adaptational changes in behavior is that it serves as a purpose to stall the creative useful potential behavior of the individual to the point that they unknowingly use material and informational capacity and to waste these resources in order for it to be diverted for selfish and anti developmental capacities that which their logos is diverted to the self which makes them economical and genetic burdens to both society and nature due to egotistical restrictions brought upon by environmental and genetic factors. The archons permeate these genetic phenotypes through increasing hormonal inputs of the individual. The environmental factors that change perception and behavior of an individual is because of the creation of artifacts, any medium anime related, that imbues perception of hormonal change that affects metacognitively only to those whose genetic development has been altered through genetic macromutation. The effect of these genetic and environmental changes to a weeb´s behavior is behavioral isolation due to speciation with their egotistical changed cognition. Behavioral isolation occurs when populations of the same species begin to develop different behaviors that are not recognized or preferred by members in another population. This so called behavioral isolation of sympatric speciation that creates changes to an individual from the same member of a species in the same geographic feature. Because there is no mate recognition between a weeaboo and non-weeaboo due to their behavioral isolation and their genetic and environmental deviations and differences.

[@alpha_9997]

Well at the end of the day, the producers were assholes ejther way, so in my opinion, they should still be punished because there is a high chance he just wrote that to save his career

[@mysteriousdora6914]

What was the prank exactly, I dont really get it

[@terrenceswiff]

@@mysteriousdora6914 His performance was "bad", they recorded it and then played it to an audience while laughing about how "bad" it was, basically crushing his dreams. Or, it was all fake from the start, but even if it was a fake thing and all an act including the recording and him falling to the ground in sorrow uhhh... is this really the best sort of "prank" to use to resonate with OTAKU? It was garbage

[@andr0oS]

Dang, I really enjoyed the show, didn't know this is why there was only one season - or at least, the bluray sales being that low... yeah.

[@builder_dahomey]

Reevaluation of the self. What have ye become? You have fallen and forfeited the spiritual inheritance. You'll never find the light to remove the darkness in your unsparked body. You weeb abominations of the archons, no star shall guide you in the clearest of nights, no wind will blow your sail even in the most intense of gales. You and your archonic weeaboo kinds lack Synesis to appreciate the light of the world of the Aeons. You are far away, far away from the light. Ask yourself, ''What have I become?'', ''Will I ever find my place in the sun?'', ''Will I ever find Jerusalem?''. One star rises, one falls from the sky. It is still hiding the way of the true feeling inside. One word closer to things we need to say. One light's burning, another fades away. Don't stand watching your dream go down in flames. One step closer, the door is open wide. Come tomorrow, we'll see the other side. Others sat on a hill retired. In thoughts more elevate and reasoned high, Of providence, foreknowledge, will and fate, Fix'd fate, free will and foreknowledge absolute, and found no end in wandering mazes lost. Of good and evil much they argued then, of happiness and final misery, Passion and apathy and glory and shame, Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy. Then, then shall things, which now confusedly hurled, Seem chaos, be resolved to order's sway, And errors night be turned to virtue's day. Run the great race of faith and take hold of eternal Life. The altar cloth of one aeon is the doormat of the next. For as I turned, there greeted mine likewise. What all behold who contemplate aright, That's Heaven's revolution through the skies. Écrasez l'infâme chair. A person must test him/herself before eating his/her share of the bread and drinking from the cup, for he/she who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgement on him/herself. I wrote I may say, to see how you stood the test. Under the test of this service, you will glorify the Aiōn Teleos by your obedience in acknowledging the Gospel of The Word of Spiritual Intellect. Examine yourselves: are you living the Life of Faith? Put yourselves to the test. Surely you recognize that Sophia the Aeon is among you unless of course you prove unequal to the test. Let each person test his/her own work. Consider the punishment of Sophia; who can make straight what he has made crooked? Which proves more short than waste or ruining? Have I not seen dwellers on form and favor? Lose all and more by paying too much rent, For compound sweet forgoing simple savor, Pitiful thrivers, in their gazing spent? No, let me be obsequious in thy heart, And tell you: May the contrite soul, the humbled spirit be acceptable to Truth as death of rams and bullocks, as thousands of fatted lambs: such let our new sacrifice be with you today, and may it be your will that we follow wholeheartedly, since those who put their trust in you will not be disappointed. Weeaboos are far away from the light, their mind shrouded with instinctive darkness of the material realm dominated by the archetype of the ego. The day of judgement will expose it. For that day dawns in fire, and the fire will test the worth of each man’s work. Otakus will never hold anything dear to their true egotistical selfish wrathful sarkic indignation. Unlike a leaf on the wind, a weeaboo will never land on their place on the sun. Sarkics draining the light of Sophia bringing upon the archons. You shackle the Elpis brought upon by aeons from the tree of life. You drain the pneuma upon the ethos of the Pleroma. Would the tide of change go in favor to the power of the archons? The weeb flourishes free in the modern age with no regards to the pneuma of the aeons. The weeaboo is free to spread their dominion upon the pneumatics. The Pleroma holds against the horde of hylics unleashed upon by androgynous archons forces under the Demiurge. The weeaboo is a seducer like an archon to normalize savagery of the flesh, the lowest of the mind, the instinctive level, the Sarkic weebs. The sarkic abomination of the Demiurge. What wrath shall thee unsleash upon the material world? Weeaboo abomination subjugation of the instinct upon the divine intellect. The Sagrada Familia is an epitome of the power of the divine intellect gifted by the aeons. You and your weeb kinds are unknowingly shrouding the gift of the divine intellect in humanity by spreading lies made by the archons to which you conceive to your marriage with the flesh. You are at the far end of the tether and when your thoughts won't fit together you'll need to deprogram your mind. It's like seeing a new day. Just what you need to make you nearer to the light. Ekklesiastikos Ainos pneuma rejuvenated by the star dust beyond the Material realm. You are a gross group of fetishists of young people. You have made a gross cultural materialist perversion of Gaia's innocents. A core part of the consumption crisis that weeaboos exploit is the perceived lustfulness thought by weebs in children. This subjugation of archonic weebs over innocents that can't express to adults their thoughts is a way for weebs to take the image of children and replace them to become one with the Demiurge. The profound blocking of genetic diversity done by weebs to the nature of the innocence of children is to ensure that weebs destroy the age of consent and weebs would now completely take the image of Gaia's children and fulfill their sarkic desires. The unprincipled exception of archonic transcription to tolerate a hierarchy of The Loyal Society of the Flesh. The metabrain of the archonic weeaboos pervades society to enshroud the inherited light through metagenesis locking human psyche that would guarantee reign of the Egotistical self that the Shadow hold inside our repressed self that reach back to the realm of our animal ancestors. The weeaboo guarantees such a transformation to occur and continue the rule of the Demiurge to block the light from reaching the Pleroma. The principle of natural selection does not require it, selection can operate rapidly. The weebs are a psychological rapid evolutionary deviated offshoot from the Homo Sapiens Sapiens species naturally selected by archonic forces. Geneticist Goldschmidt continued, every once in a while a macromutation might, by sheer good fortune, adapt an otaku to a new mode of life, a "hopeful monster" in his terminology. Macroevolution proceeds by the rare success of these hopeful monsters, not by an accumulation of small changes within populations. The mutant gene produces its effect by changing the rates of partial processes of development. These significant change of genetic phenotype causes the individual to new behavioral changes. Response to external stimuli is drastically changed by macromutations to account for change in the phenotype of the individual. This drastic change leads to the fulfillment of the increase of the darkness inscribed into an individual. The individual loses their control on their behavior which their environmental influences, in this case fandom obsession, takes over and becomes the primary role of the individual's character, metacognition, evaluation of social constructs, perception of reality, fictional precedence over thoughts and feelings, and losing the ability to distinguish different unique precedences. These psychological change of character of an individual is due to environmental and genetic factors inhibiting normal development of the weeaboo. Why would different partial processes of development be a significant factor to a species? Of what possible use are the imperfect incipient stages of useful structures? What good is half a jaw or half a wing? The concept of preadaptation provides the conventional answer by permitting us to argue that incipient stages performed different functions. The purpose of behavioral changes on the Homo Sapiens Sapiens in regards to the creation of an established preconceived behaviors is that these major adaptational changes in behavior is that it serves as a purpose to stall the creative useful potential behavior of the individual to the point that they unknowingly use material and informational capacity and to waste these resources in order for it to be diverted for selfish and anti developmental capacities that which their logos is diverted to the self which makes them economical and genetic burdens to both society and nature due to egotistical restrictions brought upon by environmental and genetic factors. The archons permeate these genetic phenotypes through increasing hormonal inputs of the individual. The environmental factors that change perception and behavior of an individual is because of the creation of artifacts, any medium anime related, that imbues perception of hormonal change that affects metacognitively only to those whose genetic development has been altered through genetic macromutation. The effect of these genetic and environmental changes to a weeb´s behavior is behavioral isolation due to speciation with their egotistical changed cognition. Behavioral isolation occurs when populations of the same species begin to develop different behaviors that are not recognized or preferred by members in another population. This so called behavioral isolation of sympatric speciation that creates changes to an individual from the same member of a species in the same geographic feature. Because there is no mate recognition between a weeaboo and non-weeaboo due to their behavioral isolation and their genetic and environmental deviations and differences.

[@andr0oS]

@@builder_dahomey yeah, I'm not reading that. Touch grass.

[@yunogasai1338]

It technically got thirteen episodes then got 4 specials awhile later. As someone who watched it the year it aired , I was happy at least getting those four extra episodes.

[@Mrshoujo]

Count DVD sales also.

[@kolbayada4938]

I liked it for the most part, but that one arc about sexual assault victim and the fact that every male character are as bland as unseasoned chicken really made me put it in "I won't rewatch it but I enjoyed it" category.

[@TwilightWolf032]

I had no idea this had transpired! I enjoyed watching Kokoro Connect, but I never heard of this prank back when it aired... Man, what were they thinking, pulling some crap like that? Why did they believe it would be okay to do it? What they did was just so cruel!

[@bmxgu2361]

This is one of my favorite anime. I was so sad seeing this twisted joke happen

[@cFrogjar]

this story is JAW DROPPING. sitting here with an absolutely disgusted look on my face the whole time

[@ArahabakinoKami]

Truth is, the seiyuu industry is brutal. Many directors act as they please, specially towards newcomers or non famous VAs. Sometimes they have to endure bullying and harassment so they can get better roles and finally become more popular and recognized. Maybe this was Ichiki's case, unfortunately. I feel like he wrote that under pressure, or else he would end completely ostracized by the industry. Since I learned about this incident, I've been specially disgusted by Terashima Takuma, whom I quite liked before.

[@emzzz8180]

Man I liked Kokoro Connect... Sad to see that it won't have another season just because of the stupidity the anime director did... Hope they learn their lesson and got what they deserved

[@yuutaruu4242]

Of course the producer and co learned something. They learned to keep their bullying behind closed doors. You can't be hated if no one knows. People like them don't change.

[@8-random258]

There is a difference between a joke or a straight up humiliation and bullying.

[@terrenceswiff]

I'm surprised you didn't post any screenshots from the infamous stream. I'd watched it at the time, and the image of him being laughed at while on his knees has always stuck with me. Whether it was all an act or not it's not smart to use an "act" of bullying to market to an audience of people who usually go throughout their entire lives being ridiculed. It was all around garbage, genuine or not.

[@everythingpony]

Source?

[@terrenceswiff]

​@@everythingpony Watch the video. Sources are all lost now. You can either believe people who orchestrated the whole thing, or believe peoples' memories. I can't post the reply I want to, but google "Kokoro Connect Controversy" to at the very least find screenshots such as the one I mentioned. They should still be easy to find.

[@vladimirenlow4388]

I can only imagine what would have happened had an American studio done this to a prospective VA. No one would have blamed the offended party for punching out somebody at the promo event, deadass walking out of it, going DEFCON 1 on their socials afterwards, or any combination of the above... and they'd still get roles, unlike anyone involved in the prank. There are many ways I consider Japanese culture superior to my own, but I like how in my country, we're encouraged to stand up for ourselves. The really ironic thing here is that the anime Ichiki auditioned for is about five friends who inexplicably start swapping bodies, and in the course of doing so begin empathizing with each other despite wildly varying personalities and interests. Pity no one else on the cast and crew understood the lesson inherent in the very show they were trying to make.

[@mitsubachihachi9643]

I hope Ichiki is doing okay and even if he genuinely let go and forgave his bullies, that's still a terrible thing to do to him or anyone in general. I wonder how anyone can think that was a smart, let alone funny thing to do to anyone. What a horrible attempt at a "joke."

[@adriannaranjo4397]

I legitimately don't understand _how_ this would *ever* be okay

[@adriannaranjo4397]

​@Candy Someone audition for a role in a show. They legitimately audition and were told they were cast for the spot. Only when they were doing the annoucement for the show with him on stage they told him it was a prank and that he was not ever considered for an actor. But they wanted him to be the public relation manager. Not even a real manager but more like a circus monkey. All on this on stage. If the story is true it is very disturbing

[@frank-2martialoffrankoslav151]

@@user-tf1it5mr2n the Director of the Anime in the vid pulled a Cruel Torture on a VA, one that Enraged Possible Fans into Absolute Hatred for What had Happened To the VA

[@frank-2martialoffrankoslav151]

@@user-tf1it5mr2n was a Dude who got the Joke Played on him. It Kinda worked, it Killed the Anime the Director was Trying to make. Though, aside from That, Nothing More.

[@MrBaydeux]

This is how you start an anti hero manga.

[@ooSHINIES]

redo of voice actor

[@mataschmata]

this situation sounds like the plot of an anime in and of itself

[@l0stndamned]

Regardless of how the victim claims to feel (could be legit, could be stuff he's been pressured to say by the higher-ups) it was still a really bad idea for a prank and I can't see why anyone thought it would have a positive response.

[@MagnakayViolet]

Imagine someone telling you that a party is being thrown with you as a guest of honor, but when you show up, you are told to play as the piñata. 🤨 The actor must be a saint because the public response was very normal (IMO not that I like when people are cruel), but the anime itself really deserved better for the efforts that its producers and staff put into it.

[@destroyer68175]

Bro LITERALLY got Carrie'd (aka the movie and book Carrie), jesus the things people do irl.

[@fernandobarbosa9727]

Damn, I remember this from a couple of years ago, when the backlash was still going hot. Used to play Granblue Fantasy back then. A prominent character (Cain) was voiced by Terashima, and the community was utterly disgusted by his behavior. Truly ruined the character for a lot of folks. Also felt terribly sorry for Eri Kitamura. 2chan mob mistook her for one of the bullies and awfully harassed her. =/

[@ShebaFr]

unfortunately, the producer who have a past record of bullying this seiyuu is still in the industry. On the other hand, Ichiki is now happily married.

[@meeramalhotra33]

Goddamn this is some PTSD-inducing stuff the VA had to go through

[@qualityarsenic3922]

Whether or not he took the joke well doesn't matter. People working on something professionally shouldn't DO something like that, even if at the end of it all it turned out well for Ichiki. Knowing that this kind of stuff can happen to people auditioning and get away with it can lead some people to give up on careers entirely knowing that they just... got away with it. If he was a good sport about it? Good for him, but I can imagine thousands of different people in his shoes who would have been left in disdain over it for the rest of their lives. As sad as I am to say it, thank god this series was boycotted.

[@SabeNo-rh7mb]

"Power and the Position of Power: the ability to reward your family and friends, and punish *anybody* you just don't like."

[@LateBandwagon]

LMAO HE VOICED THE MAIN CHARACTER IN EUPHORIA

[@AcZe1188]

how do you guys find those kinds of information xD. I mean some voices do seem familiar in that side but since a lot uses aliases how do you guys find the confirmation lmao

[@Punchy420]

@@AcZe1188 a site called myanimelist

[@AcZe1188]

@@Punchy420 Myanimelist rarely put the actual people though. I mean, they put the real names of the dedicated H-anime VAs, but famous regular ones, rarely so, mostly aliases. You'd be lucky to find someone to actually point who they actually were.

[@quantumgargoyle3888]

AINT NO WAY

[@yanyan-0000]

deepest lore

[@OtakuUnitedStudio]

1:35 putting everything else aside, holy heck there's a painting of The Undertaker.

[@ZiroWatt]

Feel so bad for the Author and the animators that worked so hard for it all to be ruined by these egotistical nobodies

[@Tera_GX]

I've never forgotten Kokkoro Connect. I watched it as it aired, participated in discussions, and it was from that series that I finally memorized the name of Miyuki Sawashiro as a favorite. I never heard about this story. The lack of getting more seemed normal. Sadly I know what it's like to be on that end of things, being bullied by adults in an environment that requires maintaining a degree of professionalism. No real way to resolve that situation from a position of lower authority.

[@Maethendias]

yo thats so toxic holy shit

[@27ratedrko]

If Tomokazu Sugita a guy that constantly is a nice guy and like gags, taking that like he said... Dudes you got this to far and fucked up.

[@A_Baguette_]

Kokoro Connect was so good! So sad this was how it ended.

[@brightbeyonddarkness]

Ah yes, a delightful prank of bullying someone like that in public and possibly ruining their mentality. Can't wait for the "There is a pipebomb in your mailbox" one, that one is a true banger.

[@Hi-Im-Gib]

I remember watching this anime and absolutely loving it, Inaba became one of my favorite female characters. Now seeing this drama surrounding the anime just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. It's like that time when I found out about the drama surrounding MMO junkie right after finishing and absolutely loving it.

[@iFYMxDRKNSFALLS]

it was the director of the anime, posting nazi rederect and other stats that insults the victims of the camps?

[@Hi-Im-Gib]

@@iFYMxDRKNSFALLS exactly that

[@Snappukingu]

at least Inaba's VA is not involved in that prank, so best girl truly the best.

[@ariffkhalid9473]

@@Snappukingu coz inaba VA is close friend with sugibro. she the good one.

[@Kozoku]

This incident may not have helped but Kokoro Connect is honestly just another anime adaptation in a long list that usually only gets 1 season to promote sales for the manga/LN.

[@braddl9442]

It actually was worse. It killed the LN sales as well.

[@suryakn]

@@braddl9442 what did the author do

[@ravenouself4181]

One would expect that the studios would finally realize that the physical copies are too expensive, but nope, they continue making them expensive.

[@calen3152]

Speaking only for Japan, since their anime on disc is FAR more expensive than any other country I know of - they've found it to be an inelastic commodity. They've experimented with lowering prices and the result is - they don't make more money. The people who buy them end up buying them regardless of the price tag and a lower price tag doesn't entice people to buy them who otherwise wouldn't at the higher price.

[@josephmatthews7698]

Japan really underestimated how much internet people love and defend voice actors. Seriously folks will campaign tirelessly to make sure a voice actor gets compensated and treated fairly just to go work 60 hours a week and never ask for a raise. Its kind of like content creators in that it's one of those aspirational jobs so its easier to put ourselves in their shoes and empathize because we'd really like to try those shoes out sometime. Not to mention how easy it is to connect to the characters they represent, many of whom are people's favorite in all of fiction. There's a 'one of us' type vibe.

[@theotherjared9824]

What I think Ichika means when he said that he witnessed the "horrors of the internet" is that he witnessed the names of others close to him being besmerched by strangers in the name of his honor. Even if he realizes these strangers have good intentions, he doesn't want to rock the boat and ruin the lives of others that honestly deserve it all. It ties back to the Japanese sentiment of acting in the best interest of the community, for acting out often leads to ostracization. He would rather let the people that publicly humiliated him get away with it if it means less controversy.

[@-Raylight]

I heard about this, I thought it's only a bad joke between voice actors... Turns out it's more than that huh I felt bad for the author, they wrote such a wonderful story.. only for things to flop like that. And it's not even his fault

[@yoribluedesu]

Oh man oh man. I remember this incident actually...I think the video taken out of context he mentions was a clip that went circulating around starting from when he got on stage, got made fun of, and ends with (I think if I'm remembering right) it kinda zooming in on his face that looked like he was about the cry. No one talked about the spokesperson bit and people thought they made fun of him for no reason or just because they could and just let him go.

[@Lakefront_Khan]

The only reason this is surprising is because people think the Japanese are some sort sweet innocent puppy people.

[@noisekeeper]

lol who thinks that? Everytime a negative story about Japan comes out you have people slink out of the woodwork saying "well of course, the Japanese are inhuman xenophobic cold bullies just like I've always been saying!" It's never any middle ground about these sort of things.

[@braddl9442]

@@noisekeeper What you said is actually true though.

[@Lakefront_Khan]

@@noisekeeper Well most "weebs" actually do think of Japan as some bacon of everything good. Especially when they misinterpret they way the Japanese handle crime. And to be fair most people who say what you have are just people who remember the Japanese were as bad as Nazties. Or maybe actually know how the Japanese treat most foreigners. Considering they have they still have signs that say "no dogs or foreigners". Not that I really blame them I mean if you don't have that "confrom or be gone mentally" well you get British grooming gangs.

[@MrNoot39449]

Nobody thinks that, but I find it interesting how people in this comments section can generalize an entire country based on something a bunch of a-holes did, I think there is a word for that...

[@acccident3349]

@@MrNoot39449 its not just 1 incident, its a stereotype because of the amount of times similar stuff has happened

[@CMatt007]

This is something you'd expect to see in Oshi no Ko, sad to see this shit happens in real life as well. In fact most shit like this does, but is usually covered up and forgotten about.

[@AncientFoxBlue]

this is an absolutely incredible video man keep up the good work

[@darken2417]

This could have played a part but sometimes anime just don't get sales. An anime could have great animation for its time, a strong fanbase, a popular manga, good emotional scenes and even fanservice but still get bad sales. When this happens the author tends to feel very guilty since if the anime team did everything right and went above and beyond then the failure is in the original work.

[@murderman8578]

Sometimes the failure isn't the OG

[@Lazekillerwhale]

There can be a lot of unpredictable factors. Take the Covid quarantine for example, it boosted game sales and binge watching.

[@onesmileybaldy8303]

Couldn’t believe this incident when I watched this anime a year ago,I usually don’t watch old shows but I kept seeing Inaba clips and she was so captivating that I went in and watched. LOVED IT! The ending with the OVAs made me so happy for my girl. But then when I went to look up why such great show didn’t have a continuation I was met with this absurd story,it’s so stupid…such a great series is now cursed to never have a s2 because of a “joke”. Doesn’t matter if the victim himself says “it wasn’t a big deal”,if the producers and everyone involved in this just DIDN’T DO IT then none of this would’ve happened and the series might even have been a success,who knows? All we know is that this series was ruined because a bunch of self proclaimed “adults” couldn’t take their workplace seriously.

[@braddl9442]

It was not a Joke. It was cruelty.

[@onesmileybaldy8303]

@@braddl9442 if I could put bigger quotation marks I would because that certainly cannot be called just a joke. Back when I was looking up this case I even found an image of the victim kneeling on the floor in disbelief,what a dogs**t situation to be in…

[@shivam5098]

Yeah I remember seeing you many times on another channel named *steakandchips* that posts inaba clips and compilations You really like inaba and this anime , don't ya mate ??

[@Teal_.]

huh interesting story i'd heard there was some controversy surrounding this anime but never looked into specifics, what a strange series of events

[@Giradel]

I remember this incident being talked about quite a lot when the show was still airing. Ishiki was actually going to attend a fighting game tournament because he was a decent player in King of Fighters. Although most of it was blown out of light when Sugita interacted with Ichiki as he was curious about the role he was talking about. To this date, Sugita is still bitter with some of the cast, and this can be seen in mobiles games where the voice actors share a stage like Sugita refuses to attend it if Terashima is there. The voice actors still get harassed to this date, that even including Hisako Kanemoto about this incident.

[@XxTaiMTxX]

It's Japan. Bullying is the norm there. Look how many anime portray the absolutely stupid way they deal with bullying and how often ANY anime portray bullying in general. Most people write things that are relatable... well if almost all the anime out there has bullies in it doing 1000% abhorrent things and never get punished for it... what do you think actually happens in Japanese culture? Anime is one of the few wonderful things that comes out of Japan. But, the way people treat each other there? It's absolutely awful in most instances. Anyone who has ever said, "I want to live in Japan" is doing nothing more than living in a delusion and romanticizing a culture that doesn't deserve it. One need only look at "idol culture" and "black companies" and "bullying" to see how they regard each other as people. One need only see their "shut in" culture to see what's going on there. The rules are simple: Those stronger than you, bully you. When bullied, you should just fall in line and do whatever they want and pretend it doesn't bother you... because if it bothers you, then you lose everything. Really, all you need to know about Japan is in their anime. How many relationships happen in their plotlines just because "someone was nice to them"? Almost all of them. That seems kind of weird and hokey and disney-esque, right? Well, not if you're from a culture where nobody is nice to anyone unless they want something. Then, it seems wholesome and unique.

[@ChaosPhoenix11]

How did i forget about this show? i remember REALLY liking it when i first seriously got into anime 2011-2013.

[@dramaking9559]

Before: Im sure the Joke was nothing and people just overreacted After: Understandable have a great day.

[@johnkenneth8746]

My god Ichiki is such a good person if that ever happened to me I would be so fueled with anger and would have just devoted my life to getting revenge on this people goddamn that's messed up

[@BeaglzRok1]

I got a friend that loves this show, it's one of the cornerstones of his favorite sub-genre of SoL that I've dubbed "ghost therapy," where characters learn more about themselves and overcome trauma through the catalyst of supernatural situations. Guess I gotta add it to the list of shows that he loves that got shot in the foot before a full adaptation could be made, right next to Angel Beats. Even if this fiasco wasn't actually the sole cause of the poor sales, there's almost no way it helped in any way.

[@RanMouri82]

That's a cruel prank if ever I heard of one. Holy crap. I feel bad for the VA, the original author, and all the other staff who had nothing to do with planning the stunt.