In March of 2008, the Foreign Ministry of Japan appointed a certain cartoon character Doraemon into an anime ambassador. While it can be argued what exactly an anime ambassador does, it is a great honor for a cartoon character – and only those with such high status in the popular culture of a country (in this case, Japan) are usually given such recognition. And if a cartoon character is awarded such distinction, it tickles the imagination what would happen if Doraemon would become a head of a certain state?
Doraemon has been around for quite some time – December of 1969 to be exact. His recognition as a Japanese ambassador of the animation style and culture of the anime is attributed to the popularity of the franchise spawned by this character from a simple Japanese manga. For those not in the know, Doraemon is a robotic cat who traveled back from his time in the 22nd century to help a lost schoolboy Nobita Nobi. The rest as they say is history.
As far as history is concerned, Doraemon has a rich background indeed. The character was created by Fujiko F. Fujio (Hiroshi Fujimoto) and it spawned about 1,344 original stories which were archived into forty-five volumes. The volumes are in the Takaoka Central Library in Toyama, Japan.
Doraemon normally has the answers for everything and generously gives help to Nobita. If we magnify this relationship by a thousand fold, we would get a capable leader who can solve all the problems of his subjects. This would be the first premise should Doraemon become a leader. And well, he will be the first robotic cat to be the ruler of a state. It can be an interesting case study of what happens in a society when its leader has the answer to all the problems of its people.
However, Doraemon is at best an enabler. He may be able to teach moral lessons such as integrity, honesty, truthfulness and camaraderie – but most of the time Nobita and his other friends learn about these virtues the hard way by enduring mistakes. Doraemon has no hard hand when it comes to discipline. Whatever the people wants, the people may get. That’s a scary thing because absolute freedom often equates with chaos.
But on the bright side, should Doraemon become the head of state – suspension of disbelief notwithstanding – the society he supervises can expect an immediate and drastic boon of science and technology. Over the years, the manga and television episodes of Doraemon have explored a variety of sci-fi possibilities ranging from environmentalism, endangered species, wormholes, dinosaurs, and even the flat Earth theory. Doraemon also introduces a lot of gadgets which may look silly but are highly innovative and pragmatic at best.
However, while the promises of advanced science progress are very enticing should we have a blue robotic cat as the head of state, it is scary what could happen if the whole world can get everything they want. It is similar to everyone winning the lottery prize – with each person ending up with loose change. It will be a very chaotic setting just in case and with the global recession already gripping the entire world, we can’t afford any more trouble.
Although the thought of Doraemon as the head of state is a very adorable one, it can raise questions about the credibility of such a leader who will instantly bend to the whims of all people. Not to mention, how can the macho guys learn to respect a blue robotic cat as their leader. There is tons of promise for such an advanced leader but the world will never be ready – so stay as an anime ambassador, Doraemon.
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