Forum - View topicNEWS: Haruhi Suzumiya in Gaza
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Starakin
Posts: 3 |
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Dear sir, I'm not. Also no one said it has to be American to be valid, that's your own interpretation of what I originally posted. Anyway this is going off the main point I mentioned first which is whether this was fake or not. Regarding credibility was only a response to a following post. Both French newspaper & AFP used the same photo. Now if there was more than one that would be something to look at. Didn't he risk his life already? One can start from what they see with their eyes. Did you check my first post regarding the difference in image resolution and light? I googled and found more blogs about it. However all of them led back to AFP. But this time found a higher resolution one, and there was another thing that caught my eyes: the illumination of the printed text on the shirt behind the girl (Flashlight effect?). Check Anime-su-ki as it seems everything has started from there. Anyway going back to the poster again, Haruhi's hair and head band are so detailed beyond what I'd see in photos. In the end I just found it a fake. Why, who and what would they get from doing so? this topic doesn't handle taking it any further. Now let's leave being a fake or not aside, as it looks it doesn't matter to most. The dominating topic around seems to be "a popular character making appearance in rural/non-urban/violent part of the world". I feel sad as simply without it no one would have talked about the day-after-day worsening situation in Gazaa/Palestine (which has been under siege for the last 6 months at least). Yet a Haruhi managed to bring this matter up here and there and *is* taking the highlight spot. Did I mention before that this wasn't feature in AFP's article? oh right yes I did. I still remember a similar thread, about "Conan Future Boy" being aired in Iraq. The title was something around "Urban reaches Iraq" (very offending imho). People were like "woaah, they have anime!" just because a US soldier reported it. Ignoring the fact that anime dubbing business has been around for over 20 years ago. Thanks for the info Vallen Mindless Watcher: [sarcasm]wow so it was the teacher! If you hadn't point it out we'd be still lost. So obvious that it doesn't add or change anything. oh btw, were you with them?[/sarcasm] |
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Stullz
Posts: 96 |
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The one thing I can say is...
Haruhi is almost the most perfect anime character for that poster. wagging finger and all. And to all those here living in the Middle East, I think many of us stateside know that you do indeed have an anime following and good companies, I think many of us just find it harder to believe because of the power struggles, religious situations, and violence that ensues. Over here all the news we get is about tragic times, never a positive story (at least in my memory). I'm glad though that the anime section of the economy is growing everywhere. |
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ZeroRyoko1974
Posts: 258 |
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Me thinks if they converted from Muslim to Haurhiism they would just start killing in the name of Haruhi instead.
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Vir
 Posts: 33 Location: Central European |
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No. Just no. I'm tired of this cultural and racial determinism which says that people in that part of the world are incapable of taking part in peaceful democracy. Look at Israel. Not only is it a democratic country, with all its failings, but get this: Arab muslims vote there. And they sit in the Knesset. So take your determinism back to the 1880s Norwegian dystopian litterati or something. |
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Mindless Watcher
Posts: 68 |
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I think you don't get my point me and there's no need to become sarcastic. That a teacher printed the pic for her was just an educucated guess. It's not the point if it was a teacher, the girl herself, or her rich uncle. I was merely pointing out that the apparent contradiction "printed CG" vs. "*lousily* hand written with a paint brush" is no contradiction at all and also not suspicious. I just wouldn't expect a little girl to feed the pic into the Gimp and work 4 hours on it until the whole sign has a layout appealing to adults. I would expect a little girl to do what I've already stated, namely take the pic, stick it onto the sign and write some text next to it. I had some doubts about the pic by myself, but the argument I've quoted from you is simply not valid in my eyes. And hearing the details about the source I tend to consider the photo not to be shopped for the moment.
I do not understand what you are getting at. Neither the French not the Japanese text mentioned Haruhi (a point against your fake theory BTW). But this is animenewsnetwork and not middleeastconflictnewsnetwork. What do you expect us to discuss here?
I'm also sometimes annoyed by the conviction of some Americans here that anime is unheard of outside of the US and Japan and that consequently everybody here is American. But the Gaza strip is not Madrid or Stockholm and it's also nor Cairo or Tunis. I found Haruhi appearing there remarkable and if you don't, why did you become suspicious about the photo in the first place? |
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Tempest
 I Run this place.ANN Publisher  Posts: 10426 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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AFP is, along with AP, one of the two leading news agencies in the world. It's possible that they could be fooled, but unlikely enough that I accept the validity of any image either agency publishes without questioning it.
I admit that, when I first saw this photo I thought it might be doctored, but when I confirmed the source, I accepted the chances of it being doctored as minute. -t |
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Vir
Posts: 33 Location: Central European |
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Good call. What would be the motivation, if indeed the source is a new site? Nothing.
For some reason I thought there would be more anime watching in Teheran, for example, than in Gaza. Even Iran doesn't censor everything (American action movies are a big hit I hear so why not anime), and I would guess that as long as you don't offend the local gunmen Gaza may have less censorship than Iran of stuff like anime. |
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MorwenLaicoriel
 Posts: 1617 Location: Colorado |
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What I mean is, it's offensive if Haruhi was put on the poster to help spread "Haruhiism" around the world, as some fans seem to be implying. And the Bert thing was a mistake--the guy who made the poster didn't know who Bert was. |
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littlebuster2120
 Posts: 3 Location: Katy, Texas |
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As much of a rucus is going on about it, I still think that the image is a shop. I don't think that a five-ish year old ismalic girl is going to be brandishing a character from an anime that sports bunny girls, gratitious moe (
 ) and the idea that a 15 year old girl is god. How would she get the fansub down there, anyways?
...Or maybe that girl's a fan, just like the rest of us. 
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Vir
Posts: 33 Location: Central European |
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I suggest reading the entire thread before responding. I know I usually do. Let's tackle your concerns in turn. First, the site where the image appears has been evaluated by the editors here and found genuine. The probability that such a site or photographer would make such a photoshop is almost 0% since this would not serve their political or financial agendas one bit. The girl mentioned in the news story is 8 years old. The girl in the picture could be another one. But all that is inconsequential, because the size of that red hand shows that she didn't make the poster all on her own. That means you've goot a school full of older children, plus teachers, that might have sourced that image for her. Where do they get fan subs (or even fan dubs)? The Internet. You know this global system that's been so popular lately? Before you mention poverty, I can assure you that they have Internet access and ample cell phone coverage although there might be power failures some times. (Doesn't this kind of remind you of much of the United States?) Gaza is the number one recipient of UN money aid pro capita in the entire world. Even though not everybody has Internet access at home there are Internet Cafés and what not. Schools would have computers to, but I have no idea how widespread that is. (We need local knowledge here.) And then there's the possibility that it's been burned on DVDs and sold or given away. Or maybe they only got the image through some site or image search. What do we know? |
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Keonyn
 Subscriber Posts: 5567 Location: Coon Rapids, MN |
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That didn't really address the matters he brought up Vir, when you consider their culture and the status of that country from both a technological and economical standpoint his points are still very valid. The very concept of Haruhi would be considered evil and wrong in their society, if it isn't doctored it's highly doubtful that the child used it intentionally because it is Haruhi and more likely it was thrown on because she liked the picture. As for the fansubs and dubs off the internet, not really something that many people in Gaza have access to, let alone children to watch anime. What internet does exist is filtered and very slow, while it's not impossible one could get fansubs there it is unlikely, especially one with a premise that would be seen in a very negative light in their culture.
I think it's time for a little perspective here. Haruhi is an anime, nothing more and nothing less. This isn't some new world order or great cause that is being pushed across the world, and this is just a single image of her on a sign held by a girl protesting in Gaza. The sheer fact it's generated this much discussion is just strange and if a picture of a fictional anime character matters that much to some people then I really don't know what to say, or I do but just won't. Regardless, it's an extremely sad and poor situation represented in that picture and that article and the reason Haruhi is on that sign is probably the least important factor represented, especially since you can only speculate why she's there and you'll honestly probably never know the real answer no matter how much you debate it. |
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Mindless Watcher
Posts: 68 |
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 "Evil and wrong"? You should not judge people you don't even know. Do you have any first-hand sources that tell you what the common teenager in the Gaza strip thinks? You are aware that many Palestinians are actually Christians? This is not a culture of synchronized fanatical robots. People laugh when they see something funny and don't care about the preacher's rants when they drink their beer. And I doubt that they even theoretically see SHnY as an attack on their belief and "evil and wrong" anyway. Only a rather paranoid mullah - or evangelist - would bother to fight such windmills, and those people probably didn't watch the show.
Travel around in the world a while and you'll see that most of your prejudices will turn out to be void. That said, I also doubt that somebody on the demonstration would have recognized Haruhi as Haruhi. Simply because the show is brand new and although it's amazingly popular among hardcore otaku the standard, occasion anime watcher (let alone the non-anime watcher) probably won't even know it because he only knows what's on TV and wouldn't bother to watch anything that hasn't been dubbed anyway. And that only describes the situation in the rich countries where a large fraction of the population has broadband and a DVD burner. Yes, the Gaza strip probably has internet cafes, but going into an internet cafe to read your yahoo mail is one thing, and being able to download a torrent overnight and make copies for your anime club is another. If I lived in Gaza and had such possibilities I'd rather sell bootlegs of the newest Hollywood blockbusters to make a few Shekel to support my family than to distribute some obscure anime. Of course, I might be totally wrong here. And who for heaven's sake claimed, except jokingly, that somebody is trying to spread "Haruhiism" as new world order in Gaza? |
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W-General
Posts: 280 Location: Ithaca, NY, USA / Taichung, Taiwan |
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I am amused that my find has had such a wide response.
I think the image is legitimate: 1) Source is AFP 2) The photographer is an established middle-eastern correspondent 3) The news story is about a very real conflict That isn't something to 'have fun' and make a random photoshopped image to joke around with. It's not even April Fools. As for why the image is there: 1) Result of random google image search 2) Someone who helped those kids make the signs watch Haruhi Discuss more. |
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Keonyn
Subscriber Posts: 5567 Location: Coon Rapids, MN |
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Okay, so I shouldn't make assumptions, although I didn't as I'm well informed about their society and what's going on in that region of the world thank you. But I did notice that you in fact made an assumption about me, so I guess you can call me Mr.Kettle and I'll call you Mr.Pot. They aren't all extremists, that much is true, but they're not all Joe Shmoe at the local bar either, as I always say, shades of grey. Regardless, there's a lot of violence there targeted at people who've done far less, and even many of the christians in Gaza tend to be of the extreme variety that would still be against what Haruhi represents. Regardless, most would still know better than to try to advertize something of the like in that portion of the world knowingly so I stand by my stance that it's likely little more than clip art to the signs creator. |
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TheWP
Posts: 2 |
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Wow. I'm sorry, but wow. I mean, look at the picture again. Despite being from a news source, there are several things that strike me as odd with this picture. Here's what I think is a fairly good case supporting that this was shopped.
You will need to look at this picture to follow along. (http://img86.imageshack.us/img86/1462/haruhiingazald4.png) Okay, we have an official AFP picture of some Gazaian (?) girl holding a poster with Haruhi Suzumiya on it. However, someone did point out something that first hints at a shopped product. The image of Haruhi is very crisp compared to the rest of the picture. Now take a look at Green Box #2. What I am trying to show here is that this girl did not do a great job cutting the circular symbols. Take close note of the white parts (caused by her not trimming the circle closely enough.) Now compare that to Box #4, where I am trying to point out the cutting job for the Haruhi Suzumiya picture. These lines are almost perfectly straight, yet still managed to not properly trim the picture, since there are still the white edges. Also note that box 2 has a shadow, since the circular symbol is not firmly attached to the paper. Box 4 has no such problem and the lines appear much crisper. As to what I mean by crisper, take a look at Boxes 3 and 4. Zoom in to see individual pixels. Notice how the red paint does not start abruptly. It actually slowly transforms. You start with the white poster, and it gets kinda of pinkish, and darker, until finally it appears as red paint. That is how natural images work. There are no one pixel lines, things like color blend and merge as it goes from one to the next, opposed to a computer drawing where one black line can be right next to a red line, without the black transisting to red. Now if you look at the white trim for the paper printout of Haruhi, the colors change abruptly from white to grey. There is no transistion. Actually, there is a transistion, but its not natural. The white to grey is seperated by a darker grey line. It hints that something is not natural about how Haruhi's pic appears on the image. Now, onto the part I believe is the cincher. Look at Box #1. Above Haruhi, in the upper-right corner, partially covered by the circle, is a logo. In fact if I didn't know any better, it is the logo to Anime Source (http://anime-source.com/banzai/index.php) . Now, I'm not 100% certain on this, but Anime Source only puts their logo on their banners, which are not particuarlly big images. Also, I am almost certain that a few months ago there was a Haruhi Suzumiya banner on Anime-Source. I wish they archived old banners so I could check. But I am positive that the image must be from the banner of Anime Source. In fact, the height of the banner pretty much matches the height of the picture of Haruhi Suzumiya. Now, maybe some people believe that she got this image from there, and put it on the poster. However, the actual pixel size of the banner image is relatively small. To blow it up to the size needed to print that large on paper would degrade the quality. However, the picture is crystal clear in the photo, so the chance of it being resized from the Anime Source Banner is essentialy zero. However, the proportions are just right to photoshop that picture of Haruhi onto the photograph. It explains the high quality of the pic, it shows where the pic came from, and the only possible way that the pic could exist under those conditions is that the Haruhi image is shopped on. As for the possible motives of someone doing this, I have no clue. I can't explain how the image got photoshopped before it was released to the public. The only thing I am certain of is that it's shopped (although, if someone can disprove any of the claims I made, I am willing to listen to them). The only thing I can think of is a anime loving 4-channer hacked them. |
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