User blog comment:KatDWolf/I wonder..../@comment-2004850-20100516205555

The Korean-Chinese-Japanese tensions seem to be the main source of racism in Japan, I agree. It's pretty unfortunate, yet manga doesn't bring it up a lot (from my experience), which leads even more to this feeling of "Japan has no problems". In Western literature, we have several books about racism, rape, child abuse, etc. While Japan has a great array of manga, I don't often see these subjects played upon that much. A character may have been abused a child, but there isn't much psychological healing going on, and often times they become dependent on a romantic interest. There are exceptions, but not too many...I'm not well-versed in Japanese books, though, so maybe they're found more in those than comics.

Yeah, I would never use Hetalia as a history lesson, even with the research put into it. Some general events are alright, but character relationships, responses, and stances may be different. I know some people go around claiming themselves to be history buffs/nerds because they watch the series.

A split personality would work. There could be another character, but the only ones who have died so far have been older (Germania, Rome, etc); no recent events. They could be like the Italies, of course, but Himaruya has only mentioned one Vietnam, and having the other die could be very unsettling to some. I'm guessing whatever happens will apply to America during the Civil War as well.

Apparently Mongolia isn't doing great in modern times either. But with Mongolia, you can't just have it appear and not mention its fairly brutal past (hey, it did give China a really peaceful existence for awhile!). I'd love to see the rendition of when the Mongol Empire tried to invade Japan, got close, and were defeated by a giant wave. Would that cause controversy do you think?