Follow-up to this:

The Foreign Ministry of Japan has formally apologized (Japanese link).

Anime News Network does an English write-up that includes the phrase "Muslims' feelings that were hurt by images deemed inappropriate."

Muslim's feelings that were hurt. Wow. Just wow. Could that phrasing be any more dismissive and juvenile?

Meanwhile, the previously quite progressive and open-minded denizens of the ANN forums smear xenophobic, anti-Muslim, and outright bigoted fecal matter all over the board and call it a "discussion." I read the thread, my jaw dropped, and I am never going to look at certain posters the same way again.

Nothing like Islam to bring all of the closeted bigots out in all of their arm-flailing, mouth-frothing glory. Farewell, ANN discussion boards. I hardly knew ye.

Edited to add: And this just showed up in my blog reader. How timely.

Edit the second: In the interest of fairness, a link to Jeffkun's post.

This. This is why sticking random chunks of foreign text in your animation, in your comic panels, or on your spiffy merchandise is a bad idea if you have no idea what the text actually says. (ETA: More here.)

Case in point.

(Also, didn't something along those lines happen in a recent episode of Code Geass? Something about a chunk of some hilariously misappropriated prose showing up, quite legibly, on Lelouche's computer screen. Or something along those lines. Or maybe I'm confusing it with an incident in Haruhi? Argh, I can't remember.)

Anyway, I know it's common practice for Japanese comic artists to use English writing, particularly newspaper articles, as "filler" text in panels, or sometimes even as funky backgrounds in more surreal scenes. I.E., the illustration on the back of Pichi Pichi Pitch volume 02 had Kaito sitting in the middle of a bunch of English text cribbed from the Wall Street Journal. And I've lost count of all of the Japanese stationary items I've collected that make liberal use of random English newsprint for decorative purposes.

But yeah. If you throw that stuff around without having any idea what it actually says? Bad idea. This goes for you native English speakers, too.

Meanwhile, to counter the not-awesome:

HERE IS SOMETHING THAT IS FREAKIN' AWESOME.

Albeit at this point I believe that Tim giving Bruce a swift kick in the balls would be totally, utterly justified.


ETA TWO: Follow-up about JoJo's Bizzare Adventure is here. Warning: Post may induce spikes in blood pressure.