Merge "Shoujo Ai" tag with "Yuri" :planned:

[GoggledAnon]

A temporary confusion is better than an indefinite confusion. It's what happens with any change, most likely including some of the features you have planned for the rewrite. It's fine if it's not something you have time to impliment right this instance because of technical issues and schedules, but the discussion in this thread (which the mod said we were free to do, as it was very much phrased as a "not right now" than a straight up "no") has pointed out the flaws of leaving things the way they are. Namely that:
a) There are too many personal definitions of these terms to be consistent, leading to confused uploaders and even more confused readers
b) It is redundant to have an extra tag for "it's X but with Y" when you have a seperate "Y" tag to pair relevant releases with
so it's still something worth discussing and contemplating for the future rather than dismissing on the basis of "they don't call hentai "hentai" in Japan".

 

[crazybars]

@Teasday

Teasday, can we just get a moderator to lock this thread? It's serving no purpose because the proposal was rejected so it's basically turning the Suggestions threads into the GoggleAnon show over a subject that was already long decided.

 

[GoggledAnon]

This is literally the only thread I've made in the entire forum...

 

[Granitefish]

It has been filling the Latest Posts on the main page for quite a while now.

 

[GoggledAnon]

I feel like it has been with good reason. Even if it's something the devs aren't interested in working in for now (if for no other logical reason than "they're busy"), it is still an issue that has had some very valid points made about it.

 

[Teasday]

_{@GoggledAnon posted:}

A temporary confusion is better than an indefinite confusion.

Even if I granted for the sake of the argument that the current situation is in fact confusing to anyone (instead of this being just a transparent objection to the tag name), some people are always going to mistag things. To me thinking that turning Shoujo Ai into Girls' Love would somehow solve it sounds optimistic in the extreme. They're literally the same phrase in different languages on a website where every weeb knows what the words mean anyway. Every problem associated with the tag remains the same except there would be one or two more.

_{@GoggledAnon posted:}

so it's still something worth discussing and contemplating for the future

I would agree if this thread weren't already 7 pages of the same point being made over and over, just in response to new people coming in - especially when you already know full well our current position on this.

I can't speak for the mods, but I don't want to lock this thread. Instead I'll keep reading it and see just how tired of the whole subject I can get.

 

[kenx]

So, from what I've seen, Zephyrus and Teasday already gave their answers halfway into the thread and the rest of it is people expressing how their own opinion is objectively better than others'.

Ah, imageboard culture, ever present in forums. Even Teasday just wants to watch the world burn.

To help lit the fire.

Spoiler

The entire thread can be resumed in memespeak with "the tags are confusing for normies, cater to them instead of the weebs" and admins saying "later, busy ensuring this place doesn't crash"

 

[Granitefish]

I'm just tired of seeing this in latest posts, since it's been filling it up. should check the mega thread to see if there's any intention to reduce repeated forum posts in that. or the ability to block threads from showing up there.

 

[GoggledAnon]

@Teasday

To me thinking that turning Shoujo Ai into Girls' Love would somehow solve it sounds optimistic in the extreme.

At the very least, it would be a term that both sides can somewhat agree on, since it's already a term used by the Japanese and is the literal meaning these "weebs" believe shoujo-ai to mean. Heck, even just changing the present Shoujo Ai tag to Girls' Love would be a million times better.

I would agree if this thread weren't already 7 pages of the same point being made over and over

Trust me, I would've been much happier not having to explain the same points over and over too, ESPECIALLY to the same people trying to make the exact same points in return. Sometimes you're just compelled to reaffirm your arguments when the argument against them make no sense.

@kenx

and the rest of it is people expressing how their own opinion is objectively better than others'

To be fair, my arguments were mostly focused on the functional benefits (y'know, if you ignore that whole "it's 2019 and y'all gotta" remark in the OP...).

 

[Excelsior]

tl;dr

"weeb terminology get out, give linguistically accurate tags"

"but that would mean warping the entire readerbase into going with your whims and it's just not viable considering applying tags are mostly up to users"

"yeah but it's not accurate tho, better to be confused short term"

repeat until page 7

Yuri is a wide genre of everything girl's love related, not just the explicit stuff, and Shoujo-Ai isn't even a real thing. Having these as two seperate categories just makes it difficult for uploaders and confusing for readers. If you want a tag for the really low end of the yuri spectrum, may I suggest "Yuri Subtext" as an alternative? Maybe also consider similar options for Yaoi/Shounen-Ai.

my arguments were mostly focused on the functional benefits

what functional benefit is there in trying to bend at least a decade's worth of understanding on the existing tags that have existed since Fakku was still free real estate, probably even longer? Cause I'm sure you can't even prove other users aren't going to be annoyed by the change btw, and then it's the mods again that have to deal with them.

I tried to read the past 6 pages a while back but I already forgot so if you don't mind giving a summary.

@GoggledAnon

also mods if you're already tired with this might as well lock the thread don't ya think? Even some people (including me) is kinda bored seeing this

keep filling the latest forum posts over the last several days.

 

[P0ck]

You read all the pages and didn't notice that we pointed out multiple times that thanks to two overlapping tags we need to search by both of them?

If you want to get sports manga, you need to click one tag. Action, one tag. Comedy, one tag. Yuri? Be a dear, and click two tags and compare the lists to see if you missed something.

Here, pure functionality issue distilled to the core without opinion on shoujo-ai being a thing or not. Would you be annoyed if you had to do the same for any of your favorite tags every week?

 

[Yatsuki]

@Teasday @Zephyrus +1 for mods to close the thread please. At this point it's literally just the same points repeated over and over. It's a good time to accept that it's already been marked rejected.

Maybe re-suggest this idea in the future with a different proposal if you want, but if you continue like this, it only makes people more annoyed and resistant to the idea.

 

[yahooeny]

A random stranger dropping into to support the removal of the shoujo ai tag.
I've never understood the line between Yuri and Shoujo Ai and I'm sure I'm not the only one. Tagging is a mess with yuri/shoujo ai and yaoi/shounen ai and there's many pages that use both tags on the same series so this idea that people are using the two tags as a makeshift content filter of sorts doesn't even work.

 

[BestBoy]

@yahooeny I'm fairly certain yaoi and shounen ai have always been considered separate things.

 

[sterven]

Can we please lock this thread already.

 

[GoggledAnon]

@Excelsior
pl0k pretty much covered it. To sum it up ONE MORE TIME as concisely as possible:
*"Shoujo ai" and "Yuri", regardless of definition, are both about lesbians, with the only difference between them tagwise being a vague level of sexual content.
*This site has content tags specifically for content (these being Ecchi, Smut, Gore and Sexual Violence)
*Thus, having two seperate tags for lesbian manga when these content tags also exist is redundant and only serves to make categorising and finding yuri works more difficult.

Since this site was initially created as a speedy replacement for Batoto when it closed down, it brought most of those tags over to form the default. Batoto didn't really host hentai or overly explicit works, so SA and Yuri likely served its purpose in determining content. But since Mangadex not only hosts explicit content but also has a variety of ways in which users can both define and filter works by the level of content, that purpose no longer exists.

 

[Excelsior]

@GoggledAnon yes I've read the entire thread. I understand your reasoning and I'm sorry for replying that way earlier and I hope it can get a fix when possible. But for now let's just put this to rest, flag & report tag misuse when finding one and keep the thread down.

I'm sorry but as far as I'm concerned we only got this far after settling down on page 4 because for some reason the whole thing just went back to square one in the page after. Didn't seem exactly like the level headed "further discussion" that was hoped to be when Zephyrus posted their last reply in the thread. The result, as you can see, is that some people (including me) ended up missing important points and could only see the thread running down to the ground.

+1 for just locking the thread for the time being tbh. I'm sure staff have noted this in consideration and see what can be done from their side when possible.

 

[pikokola]

I wants to forget about this thread existence but it's persistently visible on

*"Shoujo ai" and "Yuri", regardless of definition, are both about lesbians, with the only difference between them tagwise being a vague level of sexual content.

f/f romance/sismance = shoujo ai
f/f romance/sismance with sex = shoujo ai + smut
lesbian porn = yuri
which part of it that vague?
and yes, by default yuri and yaoi should be hentai, that's the entire point of the split anyway.
one of the reason for the split was because some people are ok with girl loving girl but despise porn, hence they don't wants anything related to hentai at all, even terms. So long as Yuri associated with hentai, these people will prefer using shoujo-ai, just like how at some point japan prefer using GL to distance the genre from porn (eventhough they stop doing that anyway).
it's like people saying bromance is fine but gay is no. gay as joke is ok but actual fencing is no.

*Thus, having two seperate tags for lesbian manga when these content tags also exist is redundant and only serves to make categorising and finding yuri works more difficult.

it's back to up there, shoujo ai was meant to label non-porn lesbian anime/manga.
there are non porn manga tagged by yuri instead of shoujo ai? blame the uncultured swine who tag mere girl x girl romance with yuri eventhough there's different terms available, blame people who get horny and wants girl x girl porn from the slightest hint of pure girl x girl love.

so what to do? who's wrong here?
I don't wants to elaborate more about some persistent pro merge guys. From my point of view, while their point is technically right, they sounds like whining prick which makes it hard to associate with their effort here. (I'm sorry if that sounds rude, I just wants the point to come across)

First of all the caretaker of the site split them and don't wants to merge them even after you vigorously (and correctly) explain where they are wrong, get over it.
While shoujo ai is just another term for yuri is technically correct, MD is also not wrong either by splitting them. Shoujo-ai terms as a genre is exist. You can preach that they don't and just another terms for Yuri, but the distinction is there and documented by some.

MD also not entirely without fault here. let's just agree that whatever tag we have, all of them have no documented meaning here, that's the main reason of all this confusion. people bring their own meaning citing external site when they decode the tag's meaning, staff also cite external site as counter-argument into this discussion, there will be no end of it. It is partly MD's fault when people miss tag series following only what they understand and believe of what each tag means, without any official reference.

Also, by the time MD didn't enforce that yuri must be hentai, the split lose it's meaning.
But, enforcing wouldn't be easy without the documentation. Without any official guidelines people will rage when they can't find any girl on girl romance when they search for yuri. Make a documentation of what's what, officially declare the meaning of each tag on MD. Panda site have verbose wiki documentation about each of their fetish listing, anidb explicitly categorize Yuri as pornographic tag and shoujo-ai as romance tag. Surely it won't be hard to implement the same, as a temporary patch up put the meaning on pop up when people hover on the tag for example.
If you're going to stand with the split, make it official and unambiguous.

 

[GoggledAnon]

f/f romance/sismance = shoujo ai
f/f romance/sismance with sex = shoujo ai + smut
lesbian porn = yuri
which part of it that vague?

Pretty much everything following the word "sismance". The fact you put that as an equivalent to f/f romance while simultaneously claiming "bromance" isn't gay just hurts the brain.
Even the people who swear by the shoujo-ai terminology don't generally restrict yuri to just porn. From my vague understanding, it's the midpoint between fluff and porn (ie. softcore/nipless sex scenes, reoccuring make-outs/fanservice, etc.) but again, that vagueness is why people who adhere to the modern definition of yuri struggle so much . And I'm fairly certain the argument they've been making is that shoujo-ai is intended to be "yuri without the smut" so you've basically just created a category that's "yuri without the smut with the smut".

 

[blackyawgdom]

This topic needs to die. So heres how mangaupdates/Baka-Updates has the tags.

THEY ARE SEPERATE TAGS. END. OF. DISCUSSION!