Brent Allison (lothar@uga.edu)
Even for Japan, whose animation industry is widely renown for its wide variety of genres that cater to almost any market demographic or taste, few animated series such as Oruchuban Ebichu, or Ebichu the Housekeeping Hamster exist. A noticeable send-up of the animated series Hamtaro, an exceedingly popular children’s show in Japan featuring a loveable protagonist hamster of the same name, Ebichu herself looks almost exactly the same as Hamtaro, but the similarities end there. A program that is certainly not for children, Ebichu earns the dubious distinction of censorship on even Japanese late-night television, a much less restrictive time slot by U.S. television decency standards, through overt sexual and toilet humor, profanity, hints at bestiality, and violence done to the diminutive title character.
One must look both at and beyond this often disturbing content, however, to gain an appreciable understanding of what Ebichu has to say about the construction of gender in both animated media and larger Japanese society. The program focuses on the ways in which Ebichu and other characters use their gendered identities to both understand themselves and interact with others while causing the very conflict that scholars interpret to find the power relations that are central to their analyses. That Ebichu is disturbing is entirely the point. The characters use the extremes of constructed norms of gender to create a universe that is entirely unbalanced, dysfunctional, and serves no greater purpose than temporary pleasure and long-term meaninglessness. An analytical look at the individual characters, their relations to other characters, and their symbolic referencing to gender norms normally acceptable to Japanese society but polarized into comedic yet ultimately tragic hopelessness is worth taking.
Familiar with media portrayals of Asian women that tend to polarize them into sensual vamps or obedient servants of the men they love (Hagedorn 1997), most people in the U.S. are unfamiliar with another stereotype of Japanese women that exists within their own culture, that of kawaii, or “cuteness” (Napier 2001). Like Hello Kitty, Ebichu is kawaii symbolized in a small furry mammal – diminutive, sugary, child-like, innocent and energetic. These traits are in many ways ideals of Japanese femininity, albeit largely constructed by men in Japanese society since the postwar era through the institutionalization of Japanese popular culture by large media and retail conglomerates. This phenomenon, borne out of growing contradictions between traditional gender roles idealized by men and realized gains in gender equity by women, is largely echoed in the rest of the postindustrialized world (Dines 1995; Wood 2001).
Rather than be safely subsumed to the dictates of the kawaii mold, however, it is precisely Ebichu’s extreme adherence to them that allows her to ironically violate these norms. She lives for nothing more than to cheerfully serve her human female master. Closely related to the kawaii model in Japan is the ideal of feminine yasashii, or that which embodies innocence, kindness, and uncomplicated sincerity (Drazen 2003). It is in the means by which Ebichu attempts to meet these ideals that the violation of the kawaii and yasashii models and ensuing hilarity occur. She reads romance novels to her master and the master’s boyfriend while they have sex to “spice things up” a little. When an obscene caller phones in a request for Ebichu to tell him what she is wearing, she innocently responds, “I’m naked with only an apron on.” The caller, unaware that Ebichu is a hamster, anxiously asks her how much (pubic) hair she has, and Ebichu responds, “I have hair all over,” which excites the caller even further. She also cannot keep her mouth shut to total strangers and other obscene callers about her master’s proclivities for revealing lingerie, autoerotic stimulation, or a pack-a-day cigarette habit while at the end naively exclaiming, “But I’ll never tell anyone about these things, ever!” Ebichu kisses her master when the master complains that she hasn’t “gotten any” from her boyfriend lately, which Ebichu takes to mean, “gotten any kisses”. In order to be kind to her master, Ebichu also imitates a cat’s cuteness by licking her face while she is waking up, which prompts the master to punch Ebichu for doing something transgressive to the master-servant relationship, particularly between those of the same gender, human or not.
After each of these and other similar instances, Ebichu is sanctioned in some way, usually by a bloody beating by her master who represents another, oppositional side to Japanese femininity that will be discussed later. The sanctions, however, rarely stop Ebichu from subverting the kawaii and yasashii models that she herself tries to hold onto at the expense of her master’s and other’s sensibilities. Ebichu does not only violate the yasashii and kawaii ideals by her fierce adherence to them, but also everyone’s conceptions of her as an anthropomorphized hamster. Her innocence prevents her from conceptualizing herself as anything but a hamster, whereas the humans themselves vary in their perceptions of Ebichu as animal or human depending on the context. Ebichu is considered an equal partner to her master in a Mah-Jong game when the master seeks revenge against her opponent boyfriend for a previous erotic flirtation with another woman, but then calls Ebichu a “filthy sewer rat” for winning more money than the ten dollars that she was bought with. Ma-kun, a human with a crush on Ebichu, doesn’t see her as a hamster at all, whereas the master’s boyfriend frequently calls her a “rat” when she chastises him for making her master upset with his philandering. As the embodiment of feminized yasashii and kawaii traits, Ebichu’s status as a person or an animal is as precarious as these same gendered models, depending on the advantages or disadvantages of these models to others who are in power to determine Ebichu’s (and by extension, women’s) status.
Unlike Ebichu, whose misadventures garner sympathy from the audience, Ebichu’s master, Office Lady (a common, generic term for young women who do clerical tasks in Japanese offices), rarely enjoys such benefits since her personality contradicts perceived positive aspects of femininity. She constantly punishes Ebichu, often violently, yet exhibits a two-faced personality by being kind and agreeable in public. Evidence of her boyfriend’s infidelity is numerous, yet she manages to be gullible or complacent enough for her boyfriend to soothe her with his false explanations of his innocence; or she eventually forgets his unbelievable explanations, even if she herself finds them insulting to her intelligence – much to the dismay of Ebichu.
However much these negatively-perceived traits of Office Lady abridge the sympathy she might get from Japanese viewers, she is nonetheless relatable as an everywoman. She is aged 25, the last year that Japanese society traditionally considers women “marriage material”, so she responds to the pressure many women feel through her acquiescence to her boyfriend’s misbehavior in the hopes that he will propose to her. Office Lady may be a hypocrite when it comes to her alternating agreeable and vicious personalities, but the audience may in fact alternately chastise and see much of themselves in her at the same time. East Asians in general, and Japanese in particular are well-known for valuing the art of “saving face” highly, even at the expense of their own personal dignity. This goes doubly so for women who, as Office Lady’s boyfriend points out, should be “presentable at all times”, but who also might secretly lash out at others they envy for not conforming to such pressures, such as Ebichu. In this respect, Office Lady conforms to the other extreme of Japanese femininity in opposition to Ebichu’s “natural” girlish honesty and naïve cuteness – that of the self-aware, face-saving gentlewoman who does everything possible to meet social expectations of female behavior; especially in assuming the penultimate female roles of wife and mother (Drazen 2003). Like Ebichu, whose extreme cuteness and honesty brings her beatings and unwanted attention, Office Lady’s adherence to social expectations of outward feminine patience and gentleness ironically dashes her hopes for a fulfilling relationship with her boyfriend and an agreeable coexistence with Ebichu.
As Office Lady’s name is generic and widely applicable, Kaishounashi’s name, translated as “worthless bum” may apply to much of the Japanese male population for some of the female audience. A portion of the lyrics to Ebichu’s theme song, sung by Ebichu’s squeaky, high-pitched voice of innocence, points out how men such as Kaishounashi are perceived:
Wondering
I’m home alone
again today
Housekeeping
When suddenly, I
think of you
I cannot for the
life of me
Figure out you men
You do whatever
you want, whenever you want
If you had to grow
up
Note how the phrase “you men” characterizes all males, perhaps unfairly, as undecipherable, indulgent and immature. Kaishounashi and Ma-kun, who will be discussed later, are the only two male characters with prominent roles in the series, and who both exhibit these masculine traits in markedly different ways.
Kaishounashi, Office Lady’s boyfriend, is every bit the stereotype of the lecherous philanderer. Rarely concerned with Office Lady’s feelings, he constantly cheats on her and covers up his own misdeeds that go so low as seducing multiple women, including high school students, while house-sitting Office Lady’s apartment. Kaishounashi uses Office Lady’s desperation for a potential husband as his best tool for maintaining sexual access to her while keeping his own emotions inaccessible to both her and the audience. While as cruel to Ebichu as Office Lady is, his abuse of Ebichu is impersonal in nature – he only beats her up when she is being an inconvenience rather than for doing things that upset his gendered identity, as Office Lady does.
Unlike broader Japanese feminine characteristics such as sugary kawaii or publicly forced kindness, which can ambiguously lead to tranquility or tragedy, Japanese masculine characteristics tend to be more one-dimensionally negative or positive. Kaishounashi is an unabashedly negative representation of Japanese masculinity – his extreme infidelity and perpetual lying gratuitously emphasize the impact of his both his bad conduct and lack of character it stems from. Similar to U.S. media representations of masculine sexuality as an empowering and often positive extension of masculine power (LeFrance 1995), Kaishounashi’s unrestrained sexuality and the ways in which he satisfies it bear no lasting negative consequences for him. It is in fact an added bonus for him to use it as both the means and end of his relationship with Office Lady while she receives it as an inadequate replacement for genuine love.
Ma-kun, a friend of Office Lady and Kaishounashi, represents an oppositional masculinity to Kaishounashi’s emotionless sexual conquest. Rather than exude the stoic aggressive heroism that U.S. culture associates with masculinity (LeFrance 1995), Ma-kun conforms to a decidedly Japanese masculinity that embodies humility, kindness, determination, and personal sacrifice. In many instances he bursts uncontrollably with emotion, making him seem more genuine and sincere to a culture that idealizes heartfelt expressions of emotions from both genders (Drazen 2003).
However, since Ma-kun is the embodiment of positive masculinity, he must adhere to his cardinal traits in extreme ways to match the dysfunctionalism of the series. This is tightly expressed in his attraction to Ebichu. He is the perfect gentleman to the hamster; he buys her expensive items, responds to her emotions, and defends her from Kaishounashi’s cruelty. However, that he is showering his attention on a hamster demonstrates that he is expressing his masculine desires towards an ideal of kawaii, rather than realizing that any meaningful relationship with Ebichu herself is impossible. He tries to ignore Ebichu’s very simple tastes and desires appropriate for a hamster, and lavishes her with ornate human-pleasing items such as an emerald ring when she really wants ramen noodles. Ebichu appreciates his kindness, but her own innocence prevents her from realizing that Ma-kun is also sexually attracted to her cuteness. He releases his desires for Ebichu during sex with his human girlfriend, who loudly wonders why Ma-kun is so good in bed.
Were Ebichu a human being, Ma-kun’s dysfunctionalism would go unnoticed; a man such as himself and a woman who acts like cute and innocent Ebichu without her hazardous extremes are heterosexual ideals of Japanese society. However, not only is Ma-kun trying to woo Ebichu for embodying the kawaii ideal, but he is also trying to achieve a positive masculine identity by doing so. However, he conveniently forgets that he lusts over a hamster while having sex with a girlfriend who, by those same masculine standards, he should lavish his attention on instead. Nevertheless, like Kaishounashi, his negative traits are rewarded rather than punished. He earns Ebichu’s friendly affection and enhances his sexual performance with his girlfriend who has no idea what his intentions really are.
Watanabe-san appears in one episode of Ebichu, but her relation to Office Lady has ambiguous but notable things to say about Ebichu’s positioning of sexual minorities. In this episode, Office Lady is physically ill beyond Ebichu’s already limited capacities to take care of her. So Office Lady phones in her friend Watanabe-san for assistance, a kind, soft-spoken young women who is helpful around the house, but who appears to be surrounded by a surrealist pink aura with floating flowers and children laughing in the distance. Ebichu’s sincerity demands that she openly call her “Hanabatake-san” (literally, “Ms. Flower Garden”) despite Office Lady’s demands not to. However, Office Lady demands this not because Watanabe-san doesn’t appear to have flowers floating around her, but because she considers it impolite for Ebichu to point it out.
Watanabe-san arrives, politely greets the residents and gets right to work: cooking food, cleaning up around the house, and serving Office Lady meals and medicine. When Office Lady is conscious enough to take note of her surroundings, she is astonished that Watanabe-san has even done her laundry for her – including her underwear. When Watanabe-san says that she washed them by hand, this sends Office Lady into a panicked fit. “You’re a woman, after all. You can’t help but get them dirty,” Watanabe-san calmly says with an open smile and a hand over her mouth. Ebichu then innocently brings in Office Lady’s dildo and says that Watanabe-san cleaned it as well. This puts Office Lady into hysterics – as well as into a 104-degree fever and an extra week in bed.
In Japanese culture, indirect contact – such as a man sharing a glass with a woman – is considered the same as direct contact, such as a kiss (Napier, 2001). That Watanabe-san not only touched Office Lady’s underwear and dildo – but voluntarily had a lot of contact with them via cleaning them is not-so-subtly coded as Watanabe-san actually stimulating Office Lady’s genitals. In this sense, Watanabe-san is a lesbian foil to Office Lady’s offended heterosexuality, and like media in the U.S., confirms her status as a character rightfully marginalized by her homosexuality (Fejes 1993). She is both so polarized towards femininity (doing domestic chores well is coded as feminine moreso in Japan than in the U.S.) and so eerily feminine that her sexuality gravitates towards other women. In this sense, Ebichu reinforces homosexuality as deviant and as incompatible with a harmonious friendship with other women, further adding to Japanese homosexuals’ own sense of alienation from mainstream society (Gross 1991).
Or does it? Larry Gross’ analysis of camp as a tool for subverting mainstream ideology (1991) can lead one to assume that the target in Ebichu is Japanese femininity rather than homosexuality through blowing away the assumption that domestically-inclined women are necessarily heterosexual. In this sense, it is Office Lady, forced out of her dignified persona to become the comedic figure rather than the homosexuality of Watanabe-san that is the joke itself (Fejes 1993). Watanabe-san’s apparently deviant homosexuality in Ebichu is not necessarily portrayed as an act of unseemly perversion as it might traditionally be in U.S. media. That she is gay poses problems for Office Lady, but it is Office Lady’s conformity to heterosexuality that problematizes her friendship with Watanabe-san and keeps her in a loveless relationship with Kaishounashi. Far from celebrating homosexuality or even dignifying it on par with more normalized Japanese heterosexual relationships, the Watanabe-san episode in Ebichu reinforces the idea that Ebichu derives its tragicomic substance from the characters’ steadfast adherence to gender norms. In the case of Watanabe-san, her extreme femininity ironically results in her deviant lesbianism while Office Lady’s own refusal to step out from behind her heterosexual lens of the world causes her more grief.
One could take the character-driven Ebichu series as a critical examination of gender norms in Japanese society and an ultimate rebuke of their hegemonic character that causes the characters to behave abnormally (including Watanabe-san’s lesbianism portrayed as abnormal without question). However, the rest of the world in Ebichu, from office workers to store clerks to delivery boys live normal day-to-day lives within their own gendered identities. The message of Ebichu is that the problems the characters face are psychological rather than sociological in nature. As long as Office Lady wouldn’t feel so pressured to marry, or Kaishounashi and Ma-kun wouldn’t be so extraordinarily bad or good as men, respectively, or Ebichu and Watanabe-san wouldn’t be so feminine in their own ways would their lives be normal. The gender standards they are trying to conform to aren’t the subject of ridicule, but rather the ways by which they try to conform to the standards of gender are the grist of Ebichu’s comedy. The shortcomings are not with society’s expectations of their behavior, but rather are with the characters themselves.
The consequences of the characters’ faults fall hardest on the females’ rather than the male characters’ shoulders. Kaishounashi only faces inconveniences from his insensitivity and womanizing, but still manages to gain sexual and emotional access from Office Lady. Ma-kun stays in his relationship to his girlfriend, and his sex life is enhanced, not diminished, by his fantasizing about Ebichu. Watanabe-san suffers no consequences (her appearance in Ebichu was too short for her to), but Ebichu and Office Lady are trapped in a mutually-abusive relationship with few alternatives presented for their escape. Seen from a perspective not taking gendered representations for granted, Ebichu provides a fascinating commentary on gender norms in Japanese society, but its implicit recommendations like much pop culture in the postindustrialized world leave these norms intact rather than substantially challenged.
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