Why does Nanoha serve?

10Mar/0912

Why does Nanoha serve?

I am delighted to hear the news of forthcoming 25 year old Nanoha. Because it means the possibility of seeing MOAR Nanoha x Fate yuri love love.

In a timely note, DKellis posed and explored a fascinating question: Could Nanoha refuse to join the TSAB?

Join the TSAB! Travel to exotic, distant worlds, meet exciting, unusual people and *befriend* them.

My initial reaction was: Why the heck wouldn't she join?

I agree with the first part of DKellis' reasoning, that:

The TSAB provides substantial support and resources, as well as a convenient way for the protagonists to meet and work together as a team: because they are ordered to.

The TSAB gives Nanoha and her merry band the legal right and the logistical might to go out and blow stuff up for great justice. But I disagree with the latter part and call on his analogy between the TSAB and Star Trek's Federation because it seems to me that, like the Federation, the heroes seem to have a lot of autonomy; they don't seem overly worried about being outright insubordinate which is normally a military death penalty offence in times of civil emergency or war.

This wasn't really an issue in the first season; then Nanoha and Yuuno were civilian associates. Or in A's; Lindy would always cover for them. But the issue comes into its own in StrikerS where there's some pretty lovely bureaucratic politicking between the group led by Chibi-Tanuki Hayate, Carim and Chrono (Church/Navy) vs Regius (Army), the subtlety of which I have not seen since the second season of Stand Alone Complex. Hayate's relentless quest for the truth ruffles the feathers of some pretty big shots, uncovering conspiracy and corruption all the way to the top of the TSAB. Take that, Section 31!

It seemed to me that the cast wanted to Do The Right Thing and were willing to go against the higher-ups of the TSAB in order to save the values that the TSAB was supposed to stand for. The series was weighed down by huge expectations, cast bloat, problematic pacing, dodgy art and animation (in the TV broadcast), the howling of lolicons (LOLOLOL) and Not Enough Signum-neesan but, together with NxF, this aspect of the series really endeared itself to me.

To pose DKellis' question more generally: Can magical girls refuse to be militarized?

The standard Weberian definition of the state is an polity that is able to claim the monopoly of the legitimate use of force. From this perspective, magical girls have to either keep their identities secret or to get some sort of credentials from the state's organization for the deployment of the legitimate use of force, that is, the military. I suppose Nanoha could have remained a civilian associate (but still licensed by the Main Office nonetheless); it was a bit harder for Fate and Hayate because of how they were performing military service as penance for their criminal records.

Or this was just a brilliant excuse to dress up magical girls in exquisite combat costumes and sexy military uniforms. Just look at Signum-neesan in the No.5J and overcoat in one of my rotating banners. FWOAR.

No real conclusion but in another timely note, the Mar 2009 theme for the Touching War series of seminars is "Women: Armed and Dangerous?"

Full announcement:

TOUCHING WAR: MARCH EVENTS

The Touching War activities I am directing at Lancaster University with the Politics/IR department, under IAS and LU Film Society sponsorship, continue. March's theme is Women: Armed and Dangerous? Join a new
generation of feminists in international relations to reconsider issues of war and masculinity and the war question for feminists. Events are open to all.

For the schedule through April 2009, see the Touching War website:

http://www.lancs.ac.uk/fass/events/touchingwar/

Professor Christine Sylvester, Politics/IR

I. ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION AND DEBATE: RECONSIDERING WAR AND MASCULINITY
Thursday 19 March, 4:00-6:00, IAS room 2/3. Wine reception following.
Sponsored by IAS

War has long been viewed by feminists as the ultimate masculine arena of international relations, one that involves women and children mostly as victims of violence, sometimes as combatants, rarely as perpetrators.
This roundtable introduces the theme of Women: Armed and Dangerous? by featuring a mostly new generation of leading international relations analysts interested in probing, challenging, enlarging, and reframing the war and masculinity equation in ways that bring in "women's" agency and politics.

Participants:

Megan MacKenzie (Women in Public Policy, Harvard). Has interviewed women soldiers in Sierra Leone about their war and post-war experiences. Author of "Securitization and De-securitization: Female Soldiers and the
Construction of the Family," Security Studies (2009), "De-Securitizing Sex: War Rape and the 'Radicalization' of Development in Sierra Leone," Feminist Journal of International Politics (forthcoming), and co-author
of "Silent Identities: Children Born of War in Sierra Leone" in Charli Carpenter ed. Born of War: Protecting Children Born to Sexual Violence Survivors in Conflict Zones. (2007).

Cristina Masters (Politics, Manchester). Interested in feminism, masculinity and practices of (in)security in international politics, with special attention to the US military and the role of technology in war and security practices. Author of several articles related to this month's theme, including Femina Sacra and the War on Terror," Security Dialogue, 2009), and "Bodies of Technology II: Cyborg Soldiers and Militarised Masculinities," in Rethinking The 'Man Question' in International Relations: Sex, Gender, and Violence in International Relations, eds. Jane Parpart and Marysia Zalewski (2008).

Elina Penttinen (Tampere Peace Research Institute). Interested in experiences of war, security, and insecurity as dailiness in women's lives, and feminist theory about the body and subjectivity. Author of
Globalization, Prostitution, and Sex-Trafficking: Corporeal Politics (2007), "Providing Security: White Western Feminists Protecting "Other" Women," in Mark Haugaard and Howard Lentner, eds, Hegemony and Power:
Consensus and Coercion in Contemporary Politics (2006), and "Whose Voices Matter: Feminists Stretch the Boundaries of the International Relations Discipline," in Subhash Durlabhji, ed., Power in focus: Perspectives from Multiple Disciplines (2004).

Laura Sjoberg (Political Science, Virginia Tech). With both a PhD and a JD, she is interested in gender justice in wars, violent women, and gender and international security. Authored Gender, Justice, and the Wars in Iraq (2006) and co-authored Mothers, Monsters, Whores: Women's Violence in Global Politics (2007). General editor of the Gender and Political Violence book series from New York University Press, and
author of "The Gendered Realities of the Immunity Principle: Why Gender Analysis Needs Feminism," International Studies Quarterly (2006) and "Gendered Torture? Feminist Insights into Abu Ghraib and Gender in the 21st Century," International Feminist Journal of Politics (2007).

Professor Christine Sylvester (Politics/IR), Seen as raising the war question for feminism and pursuing it in "The Art of War/the War Question in Feminist IR, Millennium: Journal of International Studies (2005). Author of two theory books in the Cambridge series on International Relations, two books on the political economy of Zimbabwe, and lately Art/Museums: International Relations Where We Least Expect It (2009). Author of War, Feminism, and International Relations and editor of Major Works in Feminist International Relations (four volumes), both forthcoming with Routledge.

II. WORKSHOP: THE WAR QUESTION FOR FEMINISM
Friday, March 20, 9:30-5:30, IAS room 2/3. Sponsored by IAS

Many feminists have been disinclined to study the social institution of war, because to study war has seemed to mean accepting it or even endorsing it over feminist goals of peace and war protest. The neglect
of war studies even in feminist international relations is changing rapidly with the advent of a new generation of feminists researching war without necessarily supporting it. This workshop showcases their
thinking about the war question for feminism and enables us to see realms of politics, agency, emotion and physical violence that have been whispered about in the past, or sensationalized in the media, more often
than researched.

9:30-10:00 Christine Sylvester, "Introducing The War Question for Feminism: What Are The Issues?"

10:00-10:30 Elina Penttinen, "The Possibilities of Finding Joy Through Feminist Research on War"
What happens to us as feminist IR writers and researchers when we choose to focus on life, joy and empowerment in places usually seen through feminist lenses as victimizing for women, such as war? I will talk about what I call hopeless feminist problem-making in regard to the war question and look for solutions.

10:30 Break for coffee

10:45-11:15 Discussion led by Megan MacKenzie

11:15- 11:45 Laura Sjoberg "Women's Sex Crimes in War"
Addresses questions of women's participation in sexual violence in wartime, particularly their participation in and instigation of genocidal rape. It looks at theoretical and legal implications of women's sexual violence as well as media and scholarly reactions to those acts.

11:45-12:15 Cristina Masters "Does Homo Sacer have a Sex? Women, the Feminine and War"
An attempt to provoke critical feminist inquiry into the figure of homo sacer in Giorgio Agamben's philosophy, and reveal how the category may serve to obscure the modalities through which practices of war render
women as bare life in particular ways.

12:15-1:00 Discussion led by Christine Sylvester

1:00-2:15 Lunch

2:15-2:45 Corinna Peniston-Bird (History, Lancaster), Co-author of Contesting Home Defence: Men, Women and the Home Guard in the Second World War (2007), and co-editor of A Soldier and a Woman; Sexual
Integration in the Military (2000).

'"I'll be Part and Parcel of the Great British Army": Women's Constructions of Service in the 'Good' War."
Takes as its starting place women's retrospective personal testimony on serving in the British Armed Forces in the Second World War, a periodisation which permits examples to be drawn from the experiences of
female conscripts and volunteers, but as construed from a contemporary perspective.

2:45-3:15 Megan MacKenzie, "Women: Armed and Dangerous in Sierra Leone"
Insights and stories of over fifty female soldiers in Sierra Leone are the foundations of this presentation, which challenges fundamental assumptions about what women "do" during and after conflict.

3:15-3:45 Swati Parashar (Politics/IR Lancaster), Author of "Feminist International Relations and Women Militants: Case Studies from Sri Lanka and Kashmir," Cambridge Review of International Affairs (2009) and
co-author with Christine Sylvester of "The Contemporary 'Mahabharata' and the Many 'Draupadis': Bringing Gender to Critical Terrorism Studies, in Critical Terrorism Studies: A New Research Agenda (2009), eds.
Richard Jackson, Marie Breen Smyth, and Jeroen Gunning. She edited Maritime Counter Terrorism: A Pan Asian Perspective(2007) and co-edited Terrorism in South East Asia-Implications for South Asia (2006).

"Militant Women in South Asia: Case Studies from Sri Lanka and Kashmir"
Women as perpetrators, planners and patrons of violent militant activities in the conflicts in Sri Lanka and Kashmir.

3:45-4:00 Break

4:15-4:30 Discussion led by Laura Sjoberg

4:30-5:30 Theorizing the War Question for Feminism -Sylvester, Sjoberg,
MacKenzie, Penttinen, Masters

For information on these and future Touching War events, contact
Professor Christine Sylvester: c.sylvester@lancaster.ac.uk

The Nanoha franchise would be sooo ripe for some discourse analysis. Likewise for Strike Witches. And Simoun.

Posted by Zyl

Filed under: All Purpose Cultural Category Leave a comment

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DKellis
March 10th, 2009 - 17:10

I admit that my point of view is influenced by the backstory of my MMORPG of choice, City of Heroes. I’ve always seen Nanoha and co., even from the first season, as being more like superheroes (in the more idealistic times of American comics), righting wrongs with superior might. (Yes, I don’t always agree with superior might, but that’s another topic.)

In the CoH backstory, superheroes have to register with the government, but thanks to what amounts to special interest groups and lobbyists, the registration is mostly to provide them with support and make sure that they follow the same general code of ethics law enforcement officers do. (This is to explain the game mechanic of making a new character.) In Nanoha-verse terms, this is basically Nanoha signing on with the TSAB to get all her cartridges and official sanction and maybe even a salary.

The question of whether she can refuse, theoretically speaking, put me in mind of another part of the CoH backstory, the Might for Right act. This is essentially like Marvel’s Civil War arc, where superheroes have to work for the government and have to follow orders, or be branded criminals; essentially forced conscription of superheroes with the reasoning that their powers are the property of the state. This got overturned later in the backstory, but it informs some of the plot points in the game itself.

In Nanoha-verse terms, this means that if the TSAB really wants to, it can order Nanoha and co. to do some dark grey area and black-ops stuff. Or maybe just orders that the cast disagrees with, but aren’t really illegal; an example tied to Real Life would be, say, the issue with China and Tibet.

That was why I figured that mages in the Nanoha-verse may not be willing to officially join the TSAB. Registering with the TSAB as civilian mages, however, seemed like a possibility.

Besides, if a mage really doesn’t want to join the TSAB, it brings up the possibility of other mages being brought in to force the issue, and then we have newspaper headlines about the massive street battle and high collateral damage just to conscript the guy.

The situation in CoH relies on an optimistic view of human nature, which I would argue is also present in the Nanoha-verse (considering Nanoha befriended the antagonists of the first two seasons). Still, I mentioned in the post the cases of Watchmen and Kingdom Come, which are rather more pessimistic about superpowered beings getting involved in politics.

( REPLY )
Steven Den Beste
March 11th, 2009 - 02:14

Hayate and Fate might have trouble quitting, because both of them are serving in TSAB as conditions of parole. (By age 25, Fate’s parole might have come to an end, but the TSAB pretty much owns Hayate for life, don’t they?)

But Nanoha hasn’t committed any crimes, at least in the first two series. (I haven’t seen Strikers.) So legally the TSAB doesn’t own her soul, and legally she could quit.

The question, as you pointed out, is whether she would want to, and since that’s where all (or most of) her friends are, and that’s the only place where she can use her magic legally, I would think she would want to stay in.

( REPLY )
Steven Den Beste
March 11th, 2009 - 02:16

Of course, a different point is that after all the repairs and upgrades that were done to Raising Heart in A’s, the TSAB could make a plausible claim to part ownership, and might try to take Raising Heart away from Nanoha if she did quit.

( REPLY )
Zyl
March 11th, 2009 - 07:24

@ DKellis

I haven’t read any CoH before though I’ve heard about it from a friend. When you talked about ‘massive street battle and high collateral damage just to conscript the guy’ I couldn’t help but smile at how many battles and damage Nanoha partook in when befriending Fate and then Hayate.

@ SDB

Though if TSAB treats intelligent devices the same way that Iain M. Banks’ Culture does (i.e. as legal persons with full rights), it might get a bit tricky. The same argument discussed by the Major in Ghost in the Shell too. And there’s the whole issue about Nanoha adopting Vivio too, post-StrikerS. Latter is in a similar position to Hayate.

But the bottom line IMHO is that as long as being in TSAB doesn’t conflict with her personal values/life mission, Nanoha will continue to serve and quite happily too.

( REPLY )
Haesslich
March 11th, 2009 - 10:04

I suspect part of it is that Nanoha doesn’t trust TSAB – or that she doesn’t trust them to respect her viewpoints with regards to befriending. Given how Fate came around (and then what happened in StrikerS), she has good reasons not to trust them fully – she can work FOR them, but not be a part of them. By maintaining her independence, she can at least determine what sorts of missions she is used for, and thus the things she will be forced do to during those missions.

Either that, or else she’s just a total maverick who has enough power to get away with being effectively a licensed vigilante.

( REPLY )
Zeroblade
March 11th, 2009 - 12:53

I figure she serves to put her powers to good use, and the first organization to approach, I suppose, is the TSAB, given her experience working with them is from as early as her childhood years.

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-Z-
March 12th, 2009 - 00:49

point 1: I must have missed something. what record does hayate have, in actuality? the Book and the Knights were acting autononymously and against her orders, and furthermore, the entire situation was the work of the now retired admiral graham, whose entire purpose was to use her as a sacrificial lamb to destroy the Book. when hayate herself awakened as a mage proper, the first thing she did was aid in the destruction of the Book, so… can it really be claimed she’s done anything wrong?

point 2: they could TRY to claim ownership of parts used in repairing raging heart, but getting it away from nanoha is another story entirely. short of dropping an AMF on her and throwing rocks or calling lightning, they have little that would make them a threat.
Regius and his fellow obstructive idiots pushed for limiters on N/F/H because they had very little means of stopping them if they, at full strength, were to turn against the TSAB. of course, that still ends up depending on chrono, but I doubt he’s stupid enough to stand in their way.

( REPLY )
Zyl
March 12th, 2009 - 11:41

@ Haesslich

The A’s to StrikerS manga has her designation as ‘TSAB Armed Corps Training Division Combat Instructor’.

The first line in her official StrikerS bio gives additional details: she’s under the TSAB Main Office and her Instructional brief is Aerial Combat. The paragraph in the pink part lists her length of TSAB service thus far as 10 years 0_0

The Riot Force Six mix of Nanoha, Fate and Hayate is actually a classic tri-Service Air Force / Navy / Army combined set-up.

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Xellos-_^
March 13th, 2009 - 01:55

@Z, Hayate took the all the blame for the action of the knights in plea bargain for the knights.

Hayate is a bit of a special case for the TSAB. Sure she is serving the TSAB because of past crimes but she is a SSS level mage with more spells at her access then 10 school of mage combine. She has enough power to potentially blow up a entire world. The TSAB when handling matters dealing with Hayate and her knights have to tread very softly as she is both tremendous useful and extremely dangerous at the same time.

@Zyl, besides a new manga with a 25 yr old White Devil there will also be another manga focus on Vivio call Vivid.

Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Vivio here we come.

( REPLY )
Zyl
March 12th, 2009 - 01:03

But with that blue-and-white uniform, by the time of StrikerS, didn’t Nanoha join the TSAB (Air Force)?

( REPLY )
Zyl
March 12th, 2009 - 01:14

re: Point 1, yes it’s boneheaded and stupid and unfair but apparently Hayate did have a record from the Book of Darkness incident. If you recall from StrikerS Ep 12, Regius calls her *that* Yagami Hayate and called her a former criminal.

( REPLY )
Haesslich
March 12th, 2009 - 10:32

She’s officially a member? I thought she still was working with them, rather than being completely subordinate… since she still didn’t seem like a joiner to me, especially not after the revelation about the origins of the cyborgs, and their links to TSAB.

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