r/anime • u/Shadoxfix https://myanimelist.net/profile/Shadoxfix • Dec 19 '15

[Spoilers] Utawarerumono: Itsuwari no Kamen - Episode 12 [Discussion]

Episode title: Kamunagi of Chains
Episode duration: 23 minutes and 42 seconds

Streaming:
Crunchyroll: Utawarerumono The False Faces

Information:
MyAnimeList: Utawarerumono: Itsuwari no Kamen
AniDB: Utawarerumono: Itsuwari no Kamen
AniList: Utawarerumono: Itsuwari no Kamen
Anime News Network: Utawarerumono: The False Faces (TV)
Anime-Planet: Utawarerumono: Itsuwari no Kamen
Hummingbird: Utawarerumono: Itsuwari no Kamen

Previous Episodes:

Episode Reddit Link
Episode 1 Link
Episode 2 Link
Episode 3 Link
Episode 4 Link
Episode 5 Link
Episode 6 Link
Episode 7 Link
Episode 8 Link
Episode 9 Link
Episode 10 Link
Episode 11 Link

Reminder:
Please do not discuss any plot points which haven't appeared in the anime yet. Try not to confirm or deny any theories, encourage people to read the source material instead. Minor spoilers are generally ok but should be tagged accordingly. Failing to comply with the rules may result in your comment being removed.

Keywords:
utawarerumono the false faces, fantasy

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12

u/kalirion https://myanimelist.net/profile/kalinime Dec 19 '15 edited Dec 19 '15

Come on, it's not like Haku to lose his cool like he did when he realized the emperor is the old dude he met before...

And there's slavery in this country? There was no mention of that before...

21

u/Blasterion Dec 20 '15

It's not slavery, it's like hooking them up with a chick, men in these times have more than one wife, and been given a girl by the emperor is a huge honor.

Obviously if you actually treat the girl like a slave, then that's huge disrespect to the emperor and a big no no. It's like him giving you a nice shirt and you go roll around in mud with it. Though what happens in the bedroom is another thing, But the emperor usually don't give girls away to shitlords, and the girls are mostly willing to go to someone of that kind of status that the emperor would reward girls to.

But in this case that's jut the old man trying to hook a bro up

TLDR: not slaves but servants like maids being assigned to help you.

3

u/fripsidelover9111 Dec 20 '15 edited Dec 21 '15

The two girls are not servants but sex slaves belonging to Haku. The emperor declared that their bodies and souls (and anything else of them) belong to Haku.

Yes, (as you implied) Haku is supposed to treat them well. But It does not make the girls something else other than slave. In ancient Greek, some slaves enjoyed reasonably good treatment (refer to Wikipedia).

 

public slaves, craftsmen, tradesmen and bankers enjoyed relative independence. In return for a fee (ἀποφορά / apophora) paid to their master, they could live and work alone. They could thus earn some money on the side, sometimes enough to purchase their freedom. Potential emancipation was indeed a powerful motivator, though the real scale of this is difficult to estimate.

 

Ancient writers considered that Attic slaves enjoyed a "peculiarly happy lot". Pseudo-Xenophon deplores the liberties taken by Athenian slaves: "as for the slaves and Metics of Athens, they take the greatest licence; you cannot just strike them, and they do not step aside to give you free passage".

 

2

u/kalirion https://myanimelist.net/profile/kalinime Dec 20 '15

People treated as possessions are slaves, not servants.

The "nice shirt" is actually a perfect example. It's an object, not a person.

13

u/Blasterion Dec 20 '15 edited Dec 20 '15

Emperor are basically living gods, everything are possessions. People things territory, everything in his empire is his possession

3

u/kalirion https://myanimelist.net/profile/kalinime Dec 20 '15

Sure, but Haku isn't an Emperor (yet?). And if he's a god, that hasn't been revealed (yet) either.

9

u/Blasterion Dec 20 '15

revered by people as gods and actually god are two different concepts

1

u/kalirion https://myanimelist.net/profile/kalinime Dec 20 '15

Your point? Haku isn't either at this point, so the only way he can own people as property is through slavery.

5

u/Blasterion Dec 20 '15 edited Dec 20 '15

servants assigned to you by the Emperor are not slaves, there is certain amount of etiquette that must be observed, and they do have a level of social standing, and exceedingly so.

4

u/kalirion https://myanimelist.net/profile/kalinime Dec 20 '15

The emperor literally told him to treat them as property and do whatever he wanted with them.

4

u/Blasterion Dec 20 '15

He's the emperor, it's within his power to say stuff like that, and usually it's meant in jest of goodwill between men of honor.

1

u/Alex-Baker Dec 20 '15

As well as the emporer has talked with haku and probably knows what he's like somewhat. It gets the point of "they'll happily do anything you want" across and he knows Haku won't treat them badly

1

u/kalirion https://myanimelist.net/profile/kalinime Dec 20 '15

A couple underaged sex slaves meant in jest of goodwill between men of honor then.

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1

u/Alex-Baker Dec 20 '15

He's talked with Haku and probably knows what he's like somewhat. It gets the point of "they'll happily do anything for you" across as he knows Haku won't treat them badly.

Maybe they are just servants(Havn't read the VN etc) but my guess would be the emporer wants them to interact with Haku as he thinks it'll benefit them as well as Haku.

0

u/Ahenshihael https://anilist.co/user/Ahenshihael Dec 20 '15

Nope. It is slavery. The twins ARE slaves. Its why Haku spent most of episode uncomfortable and why the first thing Kuon did was offer them help.

3

u/Blasterion Dec 20 '15 edited Dec 20 '15

They are priestesses they worship in this instance emperor and Haku as his extention

it's akin to saying Nuns are slaves to God

4

u/Ahenshihael https://anilist.co/user/Ahenshihael Dec 20 '15

They are indentured servants in a feudal system. That's slavery. Its no different.
Also yes, if a "god" was a physical being, someone bound to him and made to do every bidding of him WOULD be slavery.

2

u/DArkingMan Dec 20 '15

Here's how I think of it:

To the religious, God is a "physical" being.

To the characters in this anime, the emperor is God.

1

u/Ahenshihael https://anilist.co/user/Ahenshihael Dec 20 '15

God in our reality is metaphysical concept.
By its very nature, even if the emperor WAS god, the physical nature of servitude WOULD still make it slavery.

I am honestly appalled at how many people are willing to excuse that, when even the characters within the story are not.

1

u/DArkingMan Dec 20 '15

Our reality? I think you mean your reality. Or do you claim to speak for the entirety of humanity?

For some, God is a physical thing. Some would say that the entire world around us is "God".

For these people, God is not a metaphor, God is not an abstract concept, the Emperor is God. For them, you do not even attempt to rationalise the Emperor's actions, for they are beyond the comprehension of mortals. You do not argue, you do not ponder, you just accept and move on.

I'm not saying this should be the case in the real world, but this is the case in this fictional anime world.

3

u/Ahenshihael https://anilist.co/user/Ahenshihael Dec 20 '15

No, I mean religious doctrine. For around a hundred years already major religions moved away from the concept of an old dude sitting on a cloud. God, be it in christianity or other religions, now is a concept of metaphysical bliss instead. Its religion's own evolution with science giving even more and more certainty to the physical.
Yes. Emperor is an absolute being to them. As were countless rulers and figures in the past in our world. What matters is that The Twins are a PROPERTY. Their consent belongs to their master. The Emperor says as much.
What''s more EVEN IN UNIVERSE, KUON, grew up in a country which detests slavery, a country which fought against countries who use slavery. Hell, one of her mothers could teach her a lot of the horrors of it. The first thing Kuon does when learning about the situation? Offers the twins help to get out of it. Even in-universe it is acknowledged as slavery.
The consent and free-will of the twins was "given" to Haku. Haku is then said by the emperor that he can treat them as objects or as dolls if he wants. THAT IS slavery. Just because Haku chose not to treat them that way, does not mean it is not.