Category Archives: Hello Kitty

Singapore gripped by Hello Kitty frenzy

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Singapore gripped by Hello Kitty frenzy

(AFP) – 18 hours ago

SINGAPORE — Tempers flared and police had to be called in Thursday as anxious Singaporeans rushed to McDonald’s outlets to buy Hello Kitty plush toys being sold by the fastfood chain as a promotion.

Hundreds had begun queueing from Wednesday night to get their hands on a kitten in a skeleton outfit, depicting a character from the German fairy tale “The Singing Bone”.

It was the last of a series of six limited-edition Hello Kitty characters dressed in different outfits from popular fairy tales which were being sold by McDonald’s this month.

In some outlets, chaos broke out amid rampant queue jumping as supplies of the toys ran out soon after the stores opened for business on Thursday.”

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I remember reading a similar situation Singapore in 2000. History repeats itself

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McDonald’s urges public to stop profiteering from Hello Kitty plush…

 

Book Review: Pink Globalization Hello Kitty’s Trek across the Pacific

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Pink Globalization

After reading Ken Belson book for a Hello Kitty panel I did at a fan convention, I was made aware of Pink Globalization Hello Kitty’s Trek across the Pacific by Christine R Yano, a professor and Chair of Anthropology at the University of Hawaii, Manoa.  Her thesis concretes on what she called Pink Globalization, how ideas and products like Hello Kitty that is cute and seeped in the Kawai culture is exported and adopted outside Japan.  She argues her point very well using lectures and interview with Hello Kitty Fans, detractors, and artist.  As such, Miss Yano does not dwell on the history of Hello Kitty or Hello Kitty in Japan but how we on the outside imported and adapted Hello Kitty into our own lives and culture.  This book is not a historical narrative but an academic work on Hello Kitty. It is not light reading

I do have a few two problems with the book. First is it’s over long introduction section, I really wanted to dig into the meat of the book. The second on chapter on Kitty Backlash she mentions Landover Baptist Church as a source of fundamentalist Christian opposition but fails to recognize Landover Baptist is a fictions parody site. I would expect Christine You a professor writing an academic would have been more diligent in her research, I see this as an oversight.

Being a social science buff this book gave me very good insight on How Hello Kitty is a popular Icon outside Japan and of my in interest of collecting Hello Kitty and Sanrio items as an 52 year old Male and part of furry subculture; how and how and why I was able to adapt Hello Kitty into my part of the furry subculture.

This book, even with its flaws, is good for somebody wants to look deeper into the social science of Hello Kitty.

Am I a Hello Kitty Rebel?

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As preparation for my Hello Kitty / Sanrio panel, I been reading Hello Kitty The Remarkable  Story of Sanrio and  the Billion Dollar Feline Phenomenon

I came to this section:

 But Hello Kitty is not an insider’s club for stars; she’s a statement for those who want to snub their nose at the establishment.  …She so made her way into the boardroom where women executive have been known to flash Hello Kitty pens as away to add whimsy and  irony to corporate meetings.  “We equate cuteness not with full citizenship” said Christine Yano, the University of Hawaii anthropologist. “As part of our individualism, Americans try to maintain                a healthy distance form Capitalism and from being manipulated.  Showing off Hello Kitty in normal setting affirms one’s independence even if it’s tinged with humor she said. [1]

 

I disagree with her dig on capitalism we cannot have individualism nor independence away from Capitalism, but I thought how this passage relates to my life; how becoming a male Hello Kitty fan has become a way to express my individualism. Even as a child I had a strong sense of individualism, partly out of survival, I was hazed because I was a misfit and in special education. In a trip with my family to San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Warf, we all order seafood cocktails, they all had the crab and I order shrimp. My mother chided me that I was just wanted to be different; she was right it bothered me nobody ordered shrimp.

Latter I became a furry and had a dilemma; I wanted to decorate my apartment turning the studio into my fury den, and stared to buy traditional plush animals and bear items, the problem they did nothing to inspire me. When cleaning up my apartment and found a Hello Kitty plush leftover from and ebay sales campaign.  I thought way not she is anthropomorphic and very cute. The first plush I bought was a 20 in Fairy plush on purpose knowing it gone against all male stereotypes for a guy to buy a girly Hello Kitty Plush for himself.  I found it liberating since then Hello Kitty has become a part of my life as way affirm my own individualism in the face of conformity.  I carry a Hello Kitty wallet, backpack and sometimes one of my 18in plushies in public. I want to play with people’s perceptions; I am not on some grand crusade. nor I want to change the world; I not LGBT or  trying to redefine masculinity, I want o be myself  and Hello Kitty with respect to limits within my Christian faith, liberates me  to my own aesthetic  taste.

Perhaps I am a Hello Kitty rebel a rebel not of your cause.


[1] Hello Kitty  The Remarkable  Story of Sanrio and  the Billion Dollar Feline Phenomenon pg 107

 

Are Brony And Male Hello Kitty Fans Changing The Meaning Of Masculinity ?

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My answer is no, instead style can be expressed by our masculinity and applied to items even if the items is gender specific.  Hello Kitty or My Little Pony is not changing masculinity but we change Hello Kitty and MLP to fit our or in spite of our masculinity.

I been thinking both is late as I am creating a Hello Kitty panel for a convention. I am a guy who been interested in Sanrio / Hello Kitty as a way to express my Fury culture interest. It is a in a way backlash to what I see as sameness of furry media. Most furry media is ether toony flat badge art or gay/straight twenty something with angst or relationship problems. I see Hello Kitty as something different way as a way to express my furriness but not supporting the noting of gender neutrality. I have recently started watching My Little Pony Friendship is Magic and like other guys and like the show. I do not see Hello Kitty or My Little Pony change the notion of gender differences but how style and taste is incorporated and express through our gender difference and even bypasses them. I like girly Hello Kitty items but I am not gay or transgendered, I am simple put personal taste, individual expression, and nonconformity above my own male gender nature.

One item I need to address; my liking of Hello Kitty Girly or not is not an endorsement of   militant feminist notion of gender neutrality. Boys are going to be boys and Girls will be girls. One way I seen how gender differences is played out is two online communities:  Hello Kitty Junkies and Equestria daily.  Hello Kitty Junkies is dominantly female 6000+ women vs. 125 men. Much of the focus is on acquiring items and shopping. While I enjoy the site I can note the difference of interest between me and female members. I would make new group reporting news about Hello Kitty or pictures from various conventions and not receiving very much response, yet pictures of my acquisitions do.   On the other side is the Bony site  Equstria daily which  is mostly male,  and focus is much more different  and broad mainly on the My  Little  Pony  through news, analysis, art, stories, and crafting.  I think the difference between the sexes is why a bunch of guys who like My Little Pony can create an event like Bronycon and attract thousands yet except for a few events The Hello Kitty Convention could not get off the ground in 2008. Do women prefer a trip to the boutique with a small group of intimate friends vs. men by the thousands get together at a Football game? Now substitute   Brony Con for football you get the same thing.  

We men  are not becoming less or redefining masculinity by liking My Little Pony or Hello Kitty but realizing as men can separate masculinity from aesthetics, style and personal taste.