I was going to comment on a discussion that was about the handling of Kanji's and Naoto's issues but as i was typing out what i wanted to write it was too long! I also felt like i would mess up the debate inside there so instead i decided to just write what i love about Kanji! and if your reading this.... well hey cool! Now I actually played Persona 4 while in highschool as well as persona 3! I love both those games and it was that love that eventually got me invested in Giant Bomb years later while looking for things to watch.
Kanji since i first met him in 2008 has been one of my favorite characters from any video game. Now there are many reasons to like Kanji but the thing that puts him so high up there for me is what he is going through and it has only a little to do with his questioning of sexuality. The overall theme for Kanji to me was never is he or is he not gay. It was to me would anyone ever truly accept him for who he was.
More than anything Kanji just wanted someone to accept him. During his childhood he was largely ignored by both girls and boys due to doing what he perceived as fun and it is safe to say he never had friends until you enter his life. Eventually he got tired of people mocking him and belittling him to the point where he decided to take action by donning on the persona of a person you would never want to mess with and fighting non stop to uphold that persona. He did it for so long it became what he grew up to be, all the while holding on to those activities he loved as a child. He stayed this way for a long time until the murders happen in inaba and this caused Naoto to come into the picture.
When he first runs into Naoto and gets invited to what he thinks is a date. You see him question the idea of dating a man but he goes through with the "date" anyway. Why? because to him he found someone who was willing to hang out with him. The debate in his mind of do i like dudes is nowhere close enough to stop him from just being with someone who wants to be with him, who wont call him a freak or any other nasty word he had been called throughout the years. When he gets thrown in tv his shadow is very homoerotic and acts this way up until the point you beat him. Kanji is refusing him because he believes he is babbling, even Kanji's shadow is confused by what he is but once Kanji himself tells him to stop his true feelings come out. The shadow Itself admits that it doesn't care who accepts him just wont anybody just accept him for who he is. At this point Kanji punches his shadow and says he has something like him inside him and what he fears most is rejecting and he puts on a tough front to scare people away.
As you get to know him more through social linking the point is brought home exactly what he went through and how tough an impact it had on him. He fears a child may go through something unpleasant he had to go through himself and risks exposing more about his doll making to make sure it didn't happen. Even when the kid exposes his secret Kanji is surprised to learn that instead of being rejected like he had been so long ago, he is embraced for his skill and craft something that had never happened to him before. Its not limited to just his social linking as well, around the group of friends you make in the game he opens up more about himself and isn't afraid to ask to pet Teddies fur because he knows he is with people that already accept him for who he is. The only thing that is still up in the air and is always brought up by yosuke is his liking for dudes. His attitude to me is always shut up idiot as far as i know it was just Naoto and now she isnt a guy so im going through some shit. The only thing that would really answer that question is if an actual guy asked him out and so far that has not happened *Maybe in P4AU*.
So i love the guy! A lot of what he is going through i can understand and accept that he isnt perfect and has a lot of growing to do. He isn't straight, he isn't gay, he isn't bisexual, he is Kanji and that's OK.
Feel free to share about what you think of him if, if you agree, disagree, or just want to say hi!
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