I like Shiori simply for the reason that Juri would be a completely dull and unfulfilled character without her. *coughmangacough*

reason 1:: I don't quite think people 'admire her for being mean'. Myself, I find her a fascinating character because it provides me insight behind her bad actions. People are not mean simply for being mean. Sometimes it's because of amusement, sometimes it's because of anger and sometimes it's because you're hurting. It's easy to point at Shiori and judge from our objective seat where we can say her actions are wrong. But feelings are not a rational thing and feelings make us do crazy things. It's interesting how people usually don't look for reasons behind good actions. Those exist, too. But they're not as fascinating as trying to 'justify', or better said, explain why is Shiori acting like a bitch. In a way, Shiori serves to relay the message that bad people have their reasons to be bad, as much as bad things can't ever be considered good.

reason 2:: As, perhaps, mentioned before, I don't know would a person do anything if it wasn't for feelings and emotions. Logic helps keep those feelings somewhat in control, but it doesn't erase them. I reply to this topic because I want to. But I think I'm going into a digression here. Whoops. d: A thing to consider is that Juri never really displayed being hurt by whatever Shiori did (not even after episode 17, but after that Shiori can conclude that whatever she has been doing has hurt Juri). When 'answering' to Shiori's letter in episode 7, Juri writes it in a positive and slightly formal way, trying to seem uninterested in the whole situation. It all stops when she comes to the part of feeling a bit envious, thus ending the letter she might have never sent. In episode 17, she doesn't act hurt, just completely uninterested and angry, in a sort of "I have better things to do than waste my time on schemers like you." Shiori did not know how to get Juri's attention back until she found out using herself would give the strongest response from Juri. *theomgfindinglocket*

Erm... *looks at her notes* ...Shiori idolizes Juri too much. If you've (purposely) hurt a person you practically consider perfect, you cannot help but feel inferior in any moment with that said person. You think to yourself: "That person is perfect and I can never deserve to be beside this person, because I will never be perfect with what I have done in the past." In a way, Shiori can't forgive herself (or so I see it), so she tries to somehow bring down Juri to her level, by hurting her and making her hate her. Hate is a feeling close in severity to Shiori's actions. And lastly...

reason 3:: I'd like to think that the difference between Ruka and Shiori isn't in their motives (they both wanted Juri, in a way), but because Juri didn't have any affections towards Ruka (at least not in the same intensity as towards Shiori). Thus, Ruka could help Juri in a way Shiori couldn't, because Shiori herself was the thing she needed to free Juri from.

My two cents turned into into a whole dollar. d: And just for the record, I'm more of a passive Shiori fan, myself.

To be honest, I'm kind of on the fence about Shiori- same with Kozue, actually.

I mean, on one hand, she has a cruel, manipulative streak. She hurt Juri, whether on purpose or no. She wants to drag Juri down so she can feel better about her own self-esteem. That's not particularly friendly..!
But on the other hand, she's really just like any teenage girl- she needs to find her own place in the world and she's struggling to do so. And yes, she's kind of going about it the wrong way, but everyone makes mistakes, right?

No, I'm not going to flip out over this. All I can really think about this is, "Ugh, more Shiori bashing?" It's just getting so repetitive that I'm sick of it. I just don't care anymore. I'm starting to wish that I didn't care about Shiori, but I'm more worried that if I do that I'll stop caring about SKU and eventually IRG as well. So, I might as well take a moment to write up my opinion and hope that I don't sound like a defensive bitch, which I probably will.

Dross wrote:

Reason 1: People hate Shiori because we like Juri because Juri is teh pretty and we like pretty things.

No, people don't generally like people who hurt someone for no actual reason. It doesn't matter who it is, if they're pretty or cool or not. And don't give me because was jealous of Juri and she couldn't handle her own feelings of inadequecy. Just because there is a tenuous motivation for the pain she caused someone who didn't deserve it, doesn't make her admirable. Just mean.

I know that you said not to, but I'm still going to bring up jealousy to explain why Shiori did what she did. I would never say that it's justified, I just think that hurting Juri like that is more of a "human" thing to do rather than "evil." People do horrible things because of jealousy, but that still doesn't make it right. Juri really didn't deserve to be hurt like that, but Shiori was desperate to do whatever she could to put herself of the same level as Juri.

Dross wrote:

Reason 2: One of the reasons so many seem to like Shiori is because they are able to identify with the part of themselves that wants to destroy someone who they perceive as "more special" than they are, or seem to be getting undue attention.

Let's just say, for the sake of argument, Juri's popularity wasn't merited. Not like she wasn't captain of the fencing team and one of the few members on the student council and Shiori wasn't accomplished in anything on her own.

Is it really that interesting to not just WANT to hurt someone as much as possible, but actually DO it. And again, for what reason?

Juri never hurt her. (Not intentionally anyway, and if Shiori had any sense of personal responsibility she wouldn't blame Juri for her own short comings. She would maybe find something to base her personality off of other than hate. It's like she thinks because she can't rise up in some way, she has to bring Juri down.)

I like Shiori because, to me, she is the most interesting and realisitic character. I can relate to her inferiority complex, but not her desire to destroy that which is better than her. She probably does want to bring Juri down with her. Shiori has a very screwed up mind. To some extent, she might even believe that Juri was trying to make her look bad. Does that mean Juri deserved it? No. But I also don't think that stealing that boy was solely done so that she could hurt her. She also did it so that they would be on the same level, which isn't quite the same as doing it out of hate.

As much I love Juri, she has her own moments of cruelty and sadism as well, but they're not directed towards Shiori. She looks very happy at the thought of Saionji abusing Anthy, Touga manipulating Nanami, as well as when Touga manipulated Utena into winning Anthy. Not to mention that she tends to handle her anger by hurting Anthy and Ruka. I just don't see why no one ever brings this up.


I don't blame Shiori haters for hating Shiori, I just don't understand why they feel so passionately about it. Why in God's name should you care if we like Shiori? Would the world be a better place if everyone hated her? It's just sad how humanity feels such a strong need to express hatred. To me, saying, "I hate Shiori," is the same as saying, "I hate gays." Some of you may find it insulting for me to compare such a serious issue with something like that, but in the end, it all comes down to the fact that a vast majority of people hate something, and no matter how much I may want to, there's nothing I can do to change it. I can't change people's minds on anything, and I don't expect to be able to. I just have to accept the fact that not everyone will see things the way I do, and that hate is an emotion that is even more powerful than jealousy.

Believe whatever you believe. I just happen to believe that Shiori is an interesting character who doesn't deserve nearly as much hate as she tends to attract.

Show me a Shiori-hater, and I'll show you a Juri fan!!! I think Shiori haters stem from Juri lovers. I'm neither, just a happy medium.

Because really, like Tamago pointed out, within the context of the series, Shiori really doesn't do anything to be considered an evil bitch. All Shiori did was go out with a guy she thought Juri liked. That's not evil, it's normal. Lots of female friendships split because of one of them going out with the others boyfriend. That's old news! The only difference in Shiori's situation is that her friend happened to be secretly in love with her. That wasn't anything on Shiori's doing, that's all JURI adding the baggage.

In the movie, she's actually DOING what fans imagined she did in the series. Just like in the movie, Utena & Anthy do what fans imagined during the series - hah!

I've deleted 2 posts now because I was trying to let this die quietly for once.

I actually agree with Frosty. I'm completely neutral about this. I'm not a Juri fangirl, and I'm not a Shiori-hater.

But I will say this. Shiori is exactly the same as the other Black Rose Duelists. She's not the only one with an inferiority complex. That's the whole point of the Black Rose Arc, for the secondary characters to have their moment in the spotlight away from the shadow that they live in.

Kanae will never be as important to Akio as Anthy is.
Kozue takes a backseat(ha!) to Miki's obsession with his schoolwork, piano, and to an extent, Anthy.
Tsuwabuki is just a servant to Nanami, he'll never hold the place in her heart that Touga does.
Keiko is an ordinary girl in a sea of other ordinary girls, but the other ordinary girls have already gotten into Touga's pants.
Then there's poor Wakaba, she gets screwed twice. Wakaba is basically Utena's sidekick....or was until Anthy came along. And then it gets worse when Saionji painted that gold leaf and Anthy got it, after all she did for him. At least she gets Tatsuya.

Speaking of Tatsuya, look at him. He's behaving the way the other Black Rose Duelists should have. That's why Mikage didn't want him. Everyone else gave in to their narcissism and self-loathing, and he didn't. On top of that, he told Wakaba how he felt about her instead of letting it get all bottled up inside and twisting his world around. I think Tatsuya was Ikuhara's way of saying, "This is what they were supposed to do...but they didn't."

So can we be done with this now, please for the love of Chu Chu?

I'm probably not going to elaborate on this, since I have in so many other threads, and pretty much everyone has gotten all of my Shiori-opinions that they care for.

I'll say that I agree with Raven on the point that Shiori is the same as the other duelists. Not even just the Black Rose ones-- the Student Council, too. Everyone fights for selfish reasons, because they don't have the world they want. They fight for other people, but to a greater degree for themselves. I think it goes without saying that Shiori gets a lot more criticism for what she does than the others do, and while I know the situation is not a matter of fairness... I still don't think it's fair.

But I'd like to think that my time at this forum has helped me mature from a violent, slobbering Shiori fan to a peaceful, slobbering Shiori fan. You love Shiori and think she's the greatest thing to come from anime? You absolutely hate her guts and want to run her through a wood chipper? You really just don't care one way or the other? It's all okay. It's your opinion, and you're entitled to it. I've always believed that, but I also used to believe that it was my right to defend Shiori and try to force people to understand her, and to give her sympathy, if nothing else. But it isn't my right. So, however you feel about Shiori, it's wonderful. Just, for future reference, you might want to pick a sliiiiightly less controversial way of stating your opinion, especially since the character of Shiori has already proved to be a sore spot for many on this forum. Forgive me if that was crossing over my boundaries, I'm not saying this to be rude, I just don't want anything negative on this lovely forum. I've already made a mess of several threads with my poor choice of words.


Edit: Typo.

Last edited by dollface (10-28-2007 04:37:51 PM)

I don't think that I worded that properly. What I meant was that I don't see why people have to passionately express their hatred, and this was not directed at members of the forum. This was directed at the people in different parts of the internet that feel the need to write fanfictions and end it with comments like "Does everyone hate Shiori now?" or who draw pictures of her as a devil or of her being killed. This forum is the only place that I have ever seen anyone defend her passionately, which implies that the rest of the people on the internet who attack her passionately are doing it out of their own feelings of hatred.

You can never necessarily say that one strong emotion is better than the other, but when has expressing hatred ever been a good thing? Whenever hatred is expressed, then it is inevitable that someone who supports what that person hates will take offense to this.

Razara wrote:

This was directed at the people in different parts of the internet that feel the need to write fanfictions and end it with comments like "Does everyone hate Shiori now?" or who draw pictures of her as a devil or of her being killed.

Wow, I must admit ignorance to that particular bit of action.  I generally avoid fandom (that isn't filled with smart people like here) and fanfiction.

I'm not even going to get into the Shiori discussion; I explained myself once and that was enough.

What I AM going to do, however, is explain to you all what I see happening over this ridiculous business, and hopefully you all will see why things are going the way they're going. I'm not bitching at anyone, and I'm not trying to say anyone should do anything different. This is just something to think about.

Maarika wrote:

Why don't I ever come across threads where Anthy is being bashed especially because she was a much horrible person than Shiori?

This one is simple, short, and sweet. Shiori gets 'bashed' because she has people defending her.

Don't believe me?

How many times have I said that Touga's a complete asstacular bastard? How many times has Gio said that Akio's disgustingly base and immoral? How many times have people pretty much just taken big steaming dumps all over the other characters? Most people on here are pretty well familiar with the flaws of the characters they like, don't mind a little fun being poked at them, and don't get too worked up about it either way if someone doesn't like them.

Shiori, not so much. We all love the Shiori fans. We all think they're intelligent, insightful, and even if I'm just working from my own personal standpoint, I sometimes feel upset with myself because I want to spend time with and get to know them outside the forums and I just can't do it. But the constant defense that never happens with any other character causes people to talk about it more often. It's like after you've gotten a tooth pulled-- you can feel the sore spot, and you just can't help but go back and poke at it and irritate it, even if you don't want it to hurt. It's compulsive, and a part of human nature, to prod at something so heavily defended.

No one bashes Anthy because there's no reason to. We all know she's a gigantic bitch, and even people who adore her are just fine with people bashing her. Shiori is constantly defended. This means that even negative opinions of her, whether rational or not, are being treated as 'bashing'. This also means that anyone who doesn't want to start an argument has to avoid mentioning her or only agree with her defenders.

Razara wrote:

All I can really think about this is, "Ugh, more Shiori bashing?" It's just getting so repetitive that I'm sick of it. I just don't care anymore. I'm starting to wish that I didn't care about Shiori, but I'm more worried that if I do that I'll stop caring about SKU and eventually IRG as well.

Razara, first of all, I'd like to point out that when you came to this forum, you already had the idea that people here were going to be bashing Shiori and you were defending her against it regardless of what was actually being done. I'm not sure why you act like we are attacking her so often, because the worst I've seen people do here is give reasoned arguments for why they think Shiori is a jerk. You've defended against reasoned arguments, and you've defended against people's opinions and gut reactions, but if you've ever defended against the 'Shiori is the goat of satan' crowd, I don't recall it. We just plain don't have people like that here. But it seems like if you say 'I don't like Shiori' on here, you get a reaction like you've just said 'Shiori rapes babies'.

Please bear in mind all that I've said above, too, because that affects this more than anything else. With those two things in mind, can you see how this is happening?

Razara wrote:

I don't blame Shiori haters for hating Shiori, I just don't understand why they feel so passionately about it.

I have not seen any passionate hate here unless it was in the Angst/Gripes threads, or in various scattered outbursts in the forums. I also have to say that I don't recall it ever being directed at any particular character at all except for Movie Akio. That's Gio's fault and she knows I think it's stupid but not unjustified in her case.

Personally, I don't like her. I feel no passion whatsoever about this, and have at times forgotten she's a character in the show at all. I could go so far as to say that I hate her, because I hate that type of person in real life. But it doesn't matter to me, and I probably would have forgotten all about it by now if it didn't keep getting brought up and defended and belabored until you have to seriously consider your stance on this one character if you intend to say anything at all about that particular plot arc.

Why does it seem passionate? Well, because it happens so often. Why does it happen so often? Well, because whenever Shiori gets 'bashed', Shiori gets defended, singling her out from the other characters, who basically get the same sort of treatment but no one cares because no one is getting upset or hurt over it. Should we be treating this one character any differently? Is that the right thing to do?

...also, who is this vast majority of haters? You can pm me a list if you want. And yes, I'm serious; if you're feeling that persecuted, tell me who is doing it. You know I care about you more than any character, and I want to make sure you're comfortable. But you seem to feel victimized. What can I do to help?

Raven Nightshade wrote:

So can we be done with this now, please for the love of Chu Chu?

Unfortunately, this is going to keep on happening and upsetting everyone so long as it keeps on getting set off this way.

Someone says something you don't agree with. You leap in to defend against a perceived insult to your favorite character. That person tries to explain their point of view. You explain yours. The person you've explained to concedes that you've made a few good points, and eventually the discussion ends. That other person then either a) now agrees, b) doesn't talk about it again because they don't want the hassle, or c) brings it up again because while you've made good points, you haven't changed their mind, and they want to discuss it. And when they do, the cycle repeats itself all over again.


Just for emphasis, so long as that cycle keeps on continuing, this discussion, the 'bashing', the rest of it, is not going to end.

So what are we going to do about it?

dollface wrote:

Stuff.

And I think this part is my fault, for jumping on people when it happened before. No, I don't like it when people feel like this. No, I don't want discussion to end because no one is willing to share a point of view. I think what dollface has said is sensible, but I basically stomped her ass in the past over this issue because I'm a gigantic bitch like that. So... is this how we need to treat this issue? Believe me, I'd love to see the problem stop right at its source-- people being willing to accept other ideas without wrestling with them or poking at them, not to agree, but not to get all fired up about it and just... be sensible and comfortable and safe in the fact that no one here wants to be insulting or mean, but just wants to talk about things. But even though it seems to work fine everywhere else on the forums, it doesn't seem to work here. So what do we do? Anything? Nothing?

brian wrote:

I believe the very first thread on this forum was about Shiori, and virtually every thread leads to her sooner or later.

...proof that I'm not a maniac. Anyone got any ideas on this one? I don't want to majorly derail this thread, but I'd like you guys to think about it, even if you don't say anything. It's kind of a non-issue for me, because once the uproar is done, I'm going to go on ignoring the fact that SKU has more than three characters. But what can we do? What's possible? What's going to fix it, or at least help? This has been a longstanding issue. Why? And why is it still so upsetting?



Fake Edit: And yes, little mistress, I know you don't mean we're ravening bastards here. My points, unfortunately, still stand.

Shiori WTF, could have easily been titled "Shiori Fans, WTF?" The way this discussion was phrased, it didn't even seem to be about Shiori, it was about her fans reasoning for respecting her.

So an idea, like Yasha said, she & Gio loudly assert the faults of Touga & Akio, find humor in them, they like those characters with all those parts of their personalities, even the faults. I guess the question would be, is Shiori liked despite her faults, or because of her faults? And if her faults are admired because you can identify with this or that aspect, then it should be fine to joke around about those things. But if there is a fault that the fans feel have been attributed wrongly, then that's a subject for debate.

And yeah, it could be interesting to politely ask people why they respect __X__ trait in fiction; a trait which would usually be considered awful in real life, but if you respect it in SKU, does it not carry over into your real life wants/loves or does it stop when you shut off the show? Not in a rude manner but an inquisitive one, I've never stopped asking Gio about Akio love. Haha! But regardless of anyone's opinion, whether they like evil villains, or like stupid hero, or anything in between, it should never be assumed that we as people have the shortcomings of the characters we like. Sometimes we do! Sometimes we don't! But sociopath is a strong word to prove, in the case of a character, and even stronger to throw out to blanket fans.

Last edited by Frosty (10-29-2007 10:28:26 AM)

She's definitely not a sociopath.  She lacks any identifiable sociopathic trait.

I never viewed Shiori's intro episode as saying that she stole a boy TO hurt Juri.  At most, she convinced herself she liked a boy and set herself to get him out of a SUBCONSCIOUS desire to hurt Juri.  But also out of what Shiori consciously felt was a genuine crush on said boy.  And out of a desire to prove herself--if she'd just given up because she's not as good as Juri, that would have been pretty self-defeating.

Nothing Shiori did in "stealing" a boy Juri didn't care about actually hurt Juri.  Except that in going away from Ohtori, she unwittingly stole HERSELF from Juri.  She made it obvious to Juri that Juri's feelings for her were doomed.  Juri's the one that never said anything, the one that wallowed in her misery, and the one who treated her supposed best friend with cold indifference when she returned to school.  Shiori didn't know what was actually going on and hurt Juri more gravely than Shiori could have realized -- all unintentionally.  (Cruelly innocent)

I'm not a big fan of Shiori.  But she is definitely a sympathetic character--not likable necessarily, but certainly sympathetic to anyone on who has ever been on either side of a similar situation.  It sucks to live in a friend's shadow.

But I'm gonna say that as a fan obsessed with Anthy, I don't view Anthy as a "bitch" per se.  But I see no reason to argue the point.  My personal interpretations are, well, personal... and don't have to be shared by everyone.

Yasha and Frosty have given me an idea.
At the very heart of it, the debates and emotion over Shiori seem to stem from the problem that everyone takes her seriously. She's a polarising character, I'll admit, but so is every single other character in SKU. This thread has proven that - there's even ChuChu hate!

So, maybe the trick is coming up with a General Theory of Shiori: understanding her personality motivation, which I think we have the information to do, and then poking fun at her.

So allow me to be the first to say -

Oh Shiori, your life: so hard!

(This post is intended as a light-hearted attempt to get everyone smiling about Shiori, even if they think she's a bitch. Remember, Anthy's a bitch too. As is Nanami. And Keiko. And Akio. And Juri. And Touga. And Tatsuya (srsly). And Wakaba. And [the author was found dead at his desk, a list of every character in Shoujo Kakumei Utena next to the computer, and suspicious nailbat-wounds on the back of his head. -Ed.]

Last edited by Almaser (10-29-2007 07:54:19 PM)

Jellineck wrote:

New proposed social theory: At any point in a SKU-related topic, the subject will degenerate into arguing about Shiori. Ad Shirorium.

Does this need to join my signature?