Following the premiere of My Hero Academia Season 4, members of the fandom hurled tired accusations of pedophilia and sexualization of minors at the production studio, Bones Inc. (aka Studio Bones) due to the appearance of Nejire Hado in the season’s first episode.
On October 12th, the premiere of My Hero Academia Season 4 was aired in both Japan and simuldubbed in English. The episode, The Scoop of U.A. Class 1-A, explores the fallout of All Might’s retirement as the Symbol of Peace and his search for a successor, with reporter Taneo Tokuda interviewing Class 1-A and narrowing down the identity of the successor to Izuku Midoriya before leaving and pretending that his investigation was fruitless. Following her first full-fledged appearance in the previous episode, the episode also featured an appearance by Class 3-A student and member of The Big 3, Nejire Hado.
It was the appearance of this character, and a slight exaggeration of her chest made in the translation of the source material from the pages of the manga to the television anime, that drew criticism and accusations of pedophilia from the more vocal members, who view media with a focus on social justice, of the MHA fandom:
hi studio bones can you explain to me how her chest went from this to that pic.twitter.com/133EbXqFyH
– homestuck avi (@dorkamami) October 12th, 2019
studio bones where do you live i just wanna talk
– homestuck avi (@dorkamami) October 12th, 2019
the pedophiles and dudebros have found me this is why the bnha fandom gets no rights bye
– homestuck avi (@dorkamami) October 12th, 2019
Ah yes, very normal thing for animators to do to child characters
– 🗡⛤𝕻ł𝖆𝖌𝖚 𝕽𝖊𝖓’𝖖𝖚𝖊𝖊 𝕹𝖆’ 𝕭𝖆𝖗𝖗ł⛧🍌(@inalovelyrose) October 13th, 2019
boobs aren’t sexual, but have been extremely sexualized. there’s a difference. inflating the tits of anime schoolgirl, age be damned, puts your misogyny on full blast.
– bridgey loves jadenaya (@jadeEnthusiast) October 13th, 2019
One user even suggested to “hunt [Studio Bones] down” and posted an excerpt of the studio’s Wikipedia page with their location highlighted, which some saw as particularly tasteless given the recent attack on Kyoto Animation Studio.
Related: Kyoto Animation Studio Targeted in Arson Attack; 33 Fatalities Currently Confirmed
The accusations of pedophilia towards Nejire’s depiction are unfounded, as Nejire was 17, on the cusp of her 18th birthday, in her first appearance. She is currently 18 in canon. The characters are also fictional, and thus do not depict any real life persons being sexualized or harmed, and thus constitute no legal crime.
These same accusations and arguments are an almost exact copy of the criticisms leveled at Nejire’s depiction in her first appearance during the finale of Season 3, by the same vocal elements of the MHA fandom, a little over one year ago to the day.
Related: My Hero Academia Fans Criticize Female Character Nejire Hado’s Design
These comments are made frequently by this faction of the fandom, with some accusing these users of repeating the same, intentionally inflammatory arguments as a means of garnering attention:
#MyHeroAcademia seems to be being targeted AGAIN by a group of people who are using attacks on the show, the production team, and the fandom, for “likes” and “engagement”. They seem to be operating on the same script even… Take a look; https://t.co/Haocfz5wki
— HeroHei (@_Hero_Hei_) October 13, 2019
> The above RT is from October 12, 2019
> This image is from September 30, 2018You can see they operate on the same points of contention and even the text itself is almost the same. For example “we need to talk…” and the use of buzzwords. pic.twitter.com/gN0G569w1f
— HeroHei (@_Hero_Hei_) October 13, 2019
Literally the exact same tweet, not even a day apart. pic.twitter.com/xKRvYHgtnY
— 『Smuggy』 (@Smug_Legend) October 14, 2019
To the more extreme…
> Posting to “hunt down” Studio Bones and highlighting their location, WTF? This is wack, even if it’s a joke, it’s messed up – ESPECIALLY so soon after KyoAni!
> The other image shows many of the insults and death threats directed at Horokoshi pic.twitter.com/hUTQEVhrVb— HeroHei (@_Hero_Hei_) October 13, 2019
“Oh it’s a legitimate complaint to whine about tiddies in anime! It’s not for clout!”
Then why did I just see another variation of the same tweet fly by my TL with the exact same images as the original but a completely different caption with the same meaning as the original?
— 『Smuggy』 (@Smug_Legend) October 14, 2019
If people just ignored these idiotic posts and didn’t quote retweet them, thus exposing and blowing them up more then they be, we’d be fine. It’s not even MHA fans doing this, it’s people who want attention and easy retweets and engagement
— N🎃AH (@BRlGIDHUNTRESS) October 14, 2019
Further attention was brought to the situation by anime YouTuber Hero Hei, in a video originally titled Hero Academia Season 4 just started and ALREADY MASSIVE rage on social media!!. The title has since been changed to the less inflammatory and more pointed People on Twitter are targeting MY HERO ACADEMIA with RECYCLED arguments to brigade it DOWN!:
Following Hero Hei’s coverage, while some viewers criticized Hei for potentially giving the situation more attention than warranted, the same vocal section of the MHA fandom accused Hero Hei of purposefully directing targeted harassment against critics by bringing attention to the more inflammatory statements and accusations, despite the comments being made in a public forum and by an author who was actively engaging in the discourse.
Calls were made to even report Hero Hei’s video for “inciting harassment” against a teenager. Twitter user dorkamami has no identifying age in their profile, but did indicate they are 16 in a subsequent tweet.
😺✏ — im 16 so the age range would have to be idk 15-17 https://t.co/hucfC1TKN3
— j*lia (@dorkamami) October 15, 2019
You can see a number of people showing their dislike of Hero Hei because of the Twitter user’s alleged age.
Hey if you’re a grown ass fucking adult with 65.3k YouTube subscribers and your response to a random teenager on twitter complaining about boobs is to make a 16 minute video ranting about them without censoring their @ you are the ACTUAL worst https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EGyNxr4X0AIGCjg.jpg
female protagonist (@AigisFricker) October 13th, 2019
Feel free to report the video for inciting harassment since the @ wasn’t censored and it’s causing people to brigade her account 🥴
female protagonist (@AigisFricker) October 13th, 2019
Wtf… they really went and did that about some random teenager on the internet?? Are they okay?
🎃Spooky Song🎃@ Code:Vein (@SongBirdDemon) October 13th, 2019
It’s really messed up to go after one teen over a minor complain about a girl’s boobies. Especially seeing that he didn’t censor that person’s @. Me personality, I like girls of all size breasts. I consider myself as a Titty Connoisseur. But I would never do something like that.
The Spooky Let’s Player (@THESLPLAYER) October 13th, 2019
Imagine being a grown man sending your followers to harass a teenager because she thinks it’s weird you want to sexualise underage characters.
A Spooky Archivist (@EnbyFireHead) October 14th, 2019
What do you make of this situation?