Social Commentary

LOVE IN 2-D

Love has no boundaries. This saying is probably true for 2-D lovers or people who are romantically and sexually interested in stuffed pillow cases imprinted with graphically suggestive two dimensional characters from anime and games. These 2-D lovers who are mostly males are going for fictional cartoon characters and are in love with them in stead of falling for real-life humans. What is more, they even ‘have sex’ with these pillows and carry them. While this may sound freakish and outright-disgusting to most people, the trend has been seen to be wide-spread in Japan. Whatever the case is, the question on everyone’s mind is, “Is this right?”

Ethically, even possessing a graphically suggestive pillow itself seems wrong as it is a pornographic material. So when it comes to people walking about in public, infatuated with these obscene, inanimate objects, 2-D love really does seem like a huge moral sin. Two of the main reasons why 2-D love is wrong are that the graphically suggestive pillows, as the name suggest, are pornographic in nature and the fact that the anime characters they present are usually prepubescent girls makes this child pornography. Another reason is the public nuisance caused by the 2-D lovers’ action of bringing around these obscene pillows as their girlfriends.

In most countries around the world, pornography has been regarded as something unethical and shameful. Even in the highly liberal countries like the US, there are laws prohibiting pornographic material to a certain extent. The graphically suggestive pillows that the 2-D lovers are infatuated with rarely wear adequate clothing and are even naked sometimes. The characters on the pillows cases are portrayed in suggestive and obscene clothes and poses in order for the 2-D lovers to get sexually excited about them, the way they would get “turned on” by real-life women in these positions. Thus, even though these pillows are imprinted with nothing more than cartoon characters, it is right to say that they still serve the same purpose as pornography due to their obscene nature. Therefore, there is no doubt that these pillows are pornographic material. What makes this worse is the fact that the characters imprinted on the pillow cases are usually girls as young as 10 years old which essentially makes these pillows child pornography. One body-pillow cover shop in Japan is even called “Furnace of Child Love”. There is no way that child pornography could be right and the acts of the 2-D lovers who indulge in child pornography are indeed very wrong and even infringing the law.

One of the most disturbing things about 2-D love, or more accurately speaking, pillow love, is that the 2-D lovers not only have sexual feelings for their pornographic pillows but that they also have romantic feelings for them and regard the inanimate pillows as their lovers. This means that they bring around the obscene pillows into public places where there are women and children which they find it perfectly normal as they regard the pillows as their lovers. Indulging in these pornographic pillows is one thing but exposing these pillows to pure and innocent children may disturb them or have bad influences on their way of thinking towards the morality of pornography. Other people will also be exposed to the obscene material unwilling. Therefore, this disturbing act is clearly a case of public nuisance and is not right at all.

Although love may not necessarily have any boundaries, 2-D love is indeed something that crosses the line because of it being pornographic in nature and being a public nuisance which both make it very wrong morally. When their love for the graphically suggestive pillows become too much for the society to handle, may be one should rethink about the saying and restructure it into, “Love has no boundaries as long as it is moral.”