Wondering about the story behind that month long gap between my last two posts? No? Well, maybe you are now...


This is essay is but a glimpse into my mirthless preoccupancy over finals week. It covers the relationship between otaku and the infamous "Otaku Murderer", Tsutomu Miyazaki. To those who are already crying "tl;dr" and "no pics": this is a big boy website, do try to understand.

An Unrequited Engagement

With every modern street, occupied and colorful with the daily routine, there is an underground quietly hustling in its shadows. So too does every culture contain this dualistic identity. On its face, the mainstream sparingly looks at its underground as anything more than a novelty, focused on schedules and deadlines too numerous to allow any diversion. The underground quickly returns the glance with an equal nonchalance tinged with a mild dose of quiet indignation. And so, in this perpetual cycle of balanced irreverence, life continues. However, every so often, the mainstream is made painfully aware of its counterpart’s pervasive existence through events tailored for no other purpose. This is the case of Tsutomu Miyazaki. In the 1980’s, the island nation of Japan became confronted with a powerful subcultural movement referring to itself peculiarly as “otaku”. These otaku blatantly protruded their interests in Japanese animation, comics, video games, sci-fi novels, and any other target worthy of their attention throughout the Japanese mainstream. Causing little more than a handful of curious news stories in contingency with intermittent scorn from the Japanese working class (their parents), otaku continued the practice of their hobbies with little detraction. That is, until the name 'Tsutomu Miyazaki' became a national and household effigy. A serial murderer whose egregious crimes rocked both the Japanese mainstream and the subculture he purportedly found solace in, Miyazaki’s actions singularly attracted Japan’s attention toward this band of science-fiction laden misfits. And, like a gang of moths to the flame, worried parents and a frenzied media launched a judicious assault against anything and everything associated with the word “otaku”, working to enact cumbersome levels of censorship and portraying the movement as a group of mentally disturbed and potentially dangerous youths. Though such vehement attitudes have recently settled down, how is it, twenty years later, a negative image of otaku still persists? Is it valid to crucify the present body because of the past actions of a single hand? The answers to these and related questions are of no simple constitution. Regardless, what is apparent is how Tsutomu Miyazaki, in his heinous pursuits and own accord, instilled an unjustified and divisive national attitude towards both the image and core of the otaku subculture.

In effort to understand how this negative sentiment was first wrongfully enacted, it is important to reveal the general identity and etymology of the word “otaku”, as well as its primary subcultural connotations. While the essential media components of the otaku subculture, arguably Japanese comics (hereinafter manga) and Japanese animation (hereinafter anime) respectively, predate its conception, they nonetheless play a large role in its rise to prevalence. In the 1960’s, Japan saw the artistic medium of manga become increasingly popular as rebellious college students injected new meaning into its amalgamation of picture and word. They did so largely in effort to make known shared feelings of discomfort with the status quo, especially the rigors of university life and pressure from superior society (Kinsella 290). In indirect cooperation with more mainstream manga artists the likes of Osamu Tezuka (Galbraith ##), these first few opened the door for the beginning of widespread anime and manga fandom but, at the same time, elicited critical discourse on the status and future of Japanese youth culture, an element which would be again exploited after the murders of Tsutomu Miyazaki. The following decade saw further development of otaku media, as manga flourished under personal pursuits by means of Comic Market in 1975 , a venue described as “a new institution to encourage the development of unpublished amateur manga” (Kinsella 295), and the critical success of Yoshiyuki Tomino’s robot anime Kidou Senshi Gundamu in 1979 (Galbraith 120). It is from within these two decades that singular pools of fans coalesced to form a substantiated body of anime and manga enthusiasts, continuing their hobbies directly into the 1980’s.

And it is exactly from this decade where the term “otaku” was first launched into the Japanese consciousness. The word itself originates from an archaic yet extremely courteous means of referring to another person’s home or, altogether, “someone you are not overly familiar with and wish to be very polite [towards]” (Schodt 43). It was adopted by anime, manga, and sci-fi fans in the early 1980’s who, when visiting conventions or other social events, would use it to refer to like-minded individuals from different clubs or groups. Contrary to its rather ubiquitous usage, and as a simple matter of fact, no one individual or body can officially source where exactly the term “otaku” derives from, why it came into use, or any other major factors in regards to its etymology. A multitude of histories accompanied by rushed explanations exist to fill the gap. Sources topping the list include Shoji Kawamori’s 1982 sci-fi anime Super Dimension Fortress Macross, wherein the word “otaku” was used frequently by various characters and later adopted by fans, and the local Tottori dialect of the founders of the popular animation studio Gainax (Galbraith 172). Aside from these rather opaque beginnings, a few noteworthy aspects become clear. The word “otaku” came into being largely through communal affairs, manga and sci-fi conventions or even daily meetings with other aficionados of similar media. By its original meaning of essentially a formal “you”, the emphasis on communication and reliance on interaction between early otaku is quite evident, atleast through its primary usage. In total, this is the behavior which readily accommodated the origin and eventual propagation of otaku. As author and PhD candidate at Tokyo University Patrick Galbraith discusses in his summarization of former “Ota-King” (otaku king) Okada Toshio’s stance on current trends of otaku subculture: “…Individuals [otaku] chose to… isolate themselves from society; and they sought to better understand the world through the communal pursuit of hobbies” (Galbraith 179). Though effectively abandoning more conservative structures of society, it is important to note otaku did not jump ship and isolate themselves from human contact. Taking note of this group of deviants causing ruckus over anime and manga, essayist and writer Akio Nakamori is often cited as the first individual to sound the alarm on the revamped usage of the word “otaku” in 1983 with a column titled “Otaku Studies”, first published in the erotic manga magazine Manga Burikko (Schodt 44). The critical importance of Nakamori’s column in affecting the public image of otaku subculture cannot be underscored with greater effort, for it is the first published account that describes otaku in a pejorative tone (“Otaku“). As an excerpt from the article reads:

‘[The fans] all seemed so odd… the sort in every school class: the ones hopeless at sports, who hole up in the classroom during break…either so scrawny they look like they’re malnourished or like giggling fat white pigs with silver framed glasses with the sides jammed into their heads… the friendless type….since there doesn’t seem to be a proper term to address this phenomenon, we’ve decided to christen them otaku, and henceforth refer to them as such.’ (Schodt 44).

Nakamori also used his expectable short-term presence in Manga Burriko to deem the groups he saw active in Comic Market or other conventions as “otaku zoku”, literally “the otaku tribe” (“Otaku”). In describing otaku in such a way as to present them as unkempt, socially illiterate miscreants, Nakamori was at the forefront of otaku bashing, before his time; or more accurately, before the backdraft created by Tsutomu Miyazaki.

While individuals in concordance with Nakamori’s extreme view of otaku were creating juicy fodder for media personnel looking to exploit the incessant and abstract problems with the contemporary generation of Japanese youth, Tsutomu Miyazaki was beginning to prepare for his grotesque entrance onto the national stage. Born on August 21st 1962, as a child, Miyazaki was characteristic of Nakamori’s perceptual definition of otaku: shy, inclusive, aberrant, and without major social interaction, due largely to a birth defect (“Tsutomu Miyazaki“). It was suspected much of his early isolationist behavior was resultant of the improper and careless parenting supposedly symptomatic of the 1960’s (Kinsella 309), yet Miyazaki continued through the Japanese educational system with little impediment. After barely passing high school, Miyazaki attended community college where he studied to become a photo technician, eventually earning employment as a printer in his local Saitama prefecture during the 1980’s (Treat 354).

Being as removed and quiet as he was, Miyazaki’s licentious escapades during this time went largely under the radar until he was arrested for attempting to sexual assault a grade-school girl with the zoom lens of a camera on July 23rd, 1989 (“Tsutomu Miyazaki”). A month after his arrest for this relatively innocuous assault when compared to the catalogue of his past atrocities, police pinned Miyazaki as a prime suspect for the recent abduction, murder, and mutilation of four young Saitama girls. Soon thereafter, police received a confession from Miyazaki himself revealing “he had committed these crimes over a period of several years…and perpetrated them out of ‘necrophilic desires’ ” (Treat 354). At this point, it is interesting to categorize how, when confronted with news of a series of perverted and pedophilic murders from the mouth of the perpetrator himself, the police and media did not immediately associate Miyazaki with the preexistent otaku movement, for there was simply no antecedent reason for doing so. Though a simple conception, such only strengthens how further investigation gave birth to a powerful nexus unaffectionately linking the precedence of Miyazaki’s murders to a separate and autonomous subculture without any substantive logic. This unfounded connection was primarily established through the police’s search of Miyazaki’s apartment where they, along with reporters and cameramen, discovered “a massive collection of videocassette tapes…videos taken of his victims…anime…porn and extremely disturbing slasher films” (Galbraith 153). In conjunction with subsequent revelations uncovering “he [Miyazaki] had written animation reviews in some doujinshi [self-published fanzines] and had been to Comic Market” (Kinsella 309), this stockpile of around 6,000 anime tapes, porn flicks, and snuff films was blasted throughout Japan by media closely following the case and touted as the justification par excellence for the forthcoming “moral panic” (Kinsella 308) that would taint the otaku subculture for decades to come.

After Miyazaki’s apprehension and trial, news of his horrible deeds spread throughout the country. It was revealed how he sexually mutilated, dismembered, and even cannibalized his victims, at the same time stalking their families with silent telephone calls and enigmatic letters revealing how he had tortured their children to death (“Tsutomu Miyazaki”). In the very midst of these unspeakable crimes and the resultant pain experienced by the victims’ families, the Japanese media seemed focused on exploiting Miyazaki’s ascribed identity not as a deranged serial murder, but as nothing more than an otaku; deeming him “The Otaku Murderer” in the process. Drawing from the literal font of negative otaku perceptions from areas such as Nakamori’s “Otaku Studies” column, the media enlisted a full blown assault against what was presented as Miyazaki’s “otaku tribe”. Almost ignoring the singularity of his obvious mental instability, reporters and news teams found roundabout ways to define and redefine what they perceived to be an otaku; what they perceived to be Miyazaki. As Hiroki Azuma, a well-known Japanese critic and essayist, mentions in his expose of otaku culture, Otaku: Japan’s Database Animals: “Right after Miyazaki’s arrest, one weekly magazine described otaku as those ‘without basic communication skills who often withdraw into their own world‘ ” (Azuma 4). Another abhorrent headline read “ ‘the little girls he killed were no more than characters from his comic book life’ ” (Kinsella 309). In a Japan preoccupied with its youth, these papier-mâché headlines and others like them lead to the connotation of otaku as anti-social escapists. However, this idea is in direct contrast to the aforementioned communal nature of otaku, attending Comic Market and socializing with their colleagues. It was only Miyazaki who kept to himself, only Miyazaki who experienced his unfortunate childhood, only Miyazaki who murdered four little girls; and yet, because of the media, the subculture unfairly received the brunt of his identity. In reference to this, Azuma offers a supplementary explanation for the behavior of otaku which the media perceived as that of Miyazaki: “Otaku shut themselves into the hobby community not because they deny sociality but rather because, as social values and standards are already dysfunctional, they feel a pressing need to construct alternative values and standards” (Azuma 27). This works with Okada Toshio’s previously established definition of otaku not as social antagonists, but rather social engineers looking to function outside of the constructs of society’s superstructure of predetermined operation.

Regardless of the early and utter failure to enact critical discourse over the justification for using the word “otaku” in such an irresponsible light, a Japan only cutaneously aware of this anomalistic tribe of sci-fi nerds was force-fed the media’s definition of otaku as solemn sociopathic murderers obsessed with pornography and manga. For throngs of otaku throughout Japan, those who maintained a homeostatic regularity, the ability to speak out against this unfair label slowly faded during the early 1990’s and against the apparent consequence of social stigmatization. Makoto Fukuda, staff writer for the newspaper The Daily Yomiuri and self-proclaimed otaku, was a high school student during the period of Miyazaki’s arrest. He recounts “I well remember being annoyed by widespread and sensationalistic headlines that looked as if they were trying to identify the abnormality of his crimes [Miyazaki’s] and the causes of his acts only with the fact that he was an otaku.” So powerful was the media’s stereotyping of otaku subculture, that the word “otaku” itself was even banned from a terrestrial television station (Galbraith 172). Because of this perpetual association between Miyazaki and otaku subculture omnipresent within the media coverage surrounding the murders, the word “otaku” still retains a negative connotation to this very day, despite the overblown and disillusioned sensationalism it derives from.

During the course of the mid-to-late 1990’s, and at the behest of his defense team, Miyazaki underwent a series of rigorous psychiatric examinations to determine culpability in regards to the planning and execution of his murders (Galbraith 153). The results were released in 1997 and showed Miyazaki as having schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder (“Tsutomu Miyazaki”). However, in that same year, it was decided by the Japanese court system Miyazaki was still fully aware of the consequences of his actions, thereby disregarding his defense team’s plea of insanity and sentencing Miyazaki to death by hanging (Galbraith 153). He was finally executed on June 17th, 2008. In an unrelated and ironic series of events, nine days prior an otaku man claiming to be “The New Miyazaki” crashed a pick-up truck into the otaku-centric Akihabara shopping district of Tokyo, subsequently killing three men. He then exited the vehicle, stabbing and killing four others with a combat knife in what has come to be known as the “Akihabara Incident“ (Fukuda). While media coverage of the event was still critical of otaku, news was more focused on a street-side memorial paying tribute to those murdered. The reason for the media’s increased sensitivity for otaku is explained by some, including Yomiuri Shinbun’s Makoto Fukuda, as resulting from a paradigm shift currently operating in the Japanese mainstream. A 2004 novel, and subsequent television and movie adaptations, titled Densha Otoko pervaded into the realm of negativity surrounding otaku by offering the purportedly true story of a chivalrous otaku finding true love through the internet bulletin board system 2channel. The final episode of the Densha Otoko television series was viewed by around 25.5% of television network Fuji TV’s total national viewing audience (Galbraith 61). Current events such as these are working to patch the tattered reputation of otaku instilled by a single man and carried throughout an entire decade.

So how is it, exactly, a negative connotation of “otaku” has survived? To an extent, the inaccuracy and ignorance of spouting such blanket statements is more understood now than the few years following Miyazaki’s arrest. And still, the unfounded notion has carried through critical thought, as some still harbor an aversion towards the word, in any of its connotations. Perhaps the atrocities of Miyazaki were so blunt, discourse over any of their components was considered too taboo to interact with until the appropriate passage of time. Though this explanation eschews the passionate yet muffled reaction of otaku to differentiate themselves from media bias. It may suffice to say there is no attainable explanation; only the need for the mainstream to recognize its underground, for a parent to know and love its child, and for communication to never dissipate or cease. For if the Japanese media, the mainstream, was able to understand and coexist with the emerging otaku subculture, its mirrored underground, there would have been a unspoken yet profound understanding that the monstrosities of Tsutomu Miyazaki were nothing more than just that.


Works Cited

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Galbraith, Patrick W. The Otaku Encyclopedia: An Insider's Guide to the Subculture of
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Schodt, Frederik L. Dreamland Japan: Writings on Modern Manga. Berkeley: Stone
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Sangani, Kris. "Otaku World." Engineering & Technology. 3.19 (2008): 94-95. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 25 Oct. 2009


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Kinsella, Sharon. “Japanese Subculture in the 1990s: Otaku and the Amateur Manga
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Fukuda, Makoto. “Through Otaku Eyes; Otaku No Longer Equated With Criminals.” The Daily Yomiuri [Tokyo] 18 July 2008: 13. LexisNexis Academic. Web. 4 Oct. 2009.


"Tsutomu Miyazaki." WorldLingo.com. World Lingo. Web. Nov. 2009.