ZUN's 2hu morals(?) thread

[Failure McFailFace]

Might as well.

I think this is closer to the truth. There are overarching themes across the games, of course, but individual games can also have their individual "messages". Some of these messages you might have to squint at to see, because I don't think ZUN overall tries to deliberately insert a specific message very often. But they do happen.

Would be a fun topic to explore in its own thread, too, I think.

Honestly, I really don't go into the story of Touhou games, other than the general gist of them.

So, a possible TL;DR of all the games so far: Invasions from two alternate dimensions, invasions from alternate dimension (with a ghost!), mysterious ruin, invasion from an alternate dimension, invasion from an alternate dimension (now with devils!), a vampire that makes red fog to go outside, ghost is curious about a cherry tree, loli oni wants a party, lunatic Lunarian lunacy, too many flowers, crow takes pictures, new gods of the mountain, celestial is bored, geyser because of god-eating raven, interdimensional flying ship because geyser, a dream/ice fairy adventure/fighting your ancestor, two crows take pictures, more adventures with ice fairy, resurrections because of interdimensional flying ship, religious wars, contrarian and midget vs. everyone, just contrarian vs. everyone, occult stuff, and more lunatic Lunarian lunacy (now with invasions!).

So have fun!

[Mеа]

One of the more non-trivial ones I can think of is how IN turned out in the end, what with the Hakurei Barrier having not required the whole earth in a pot in the first place. And to a lesser extent, their not yet having acclimated to earth and staying alienated because of mixed reasons, one of which was the typical lunarian supremacist stance they still had.
The message being, alienating yourself from others isn't the best thing to do, because they may be able to help you and what not if you're stuck in a rut.

The other half of the message extends into the basic plot of SSiB, where the haughty ones tend to eat their own face in the end.

[Romantique Tp]

I miss it when 2hu was only used by shitposters, and rarely outside of 4chan.

[Hello Purvis]

Yeah really.

Anyways, I repeat that if there's a basic moral, it's don't kill people because you disagree with them, in defiance of usual video game logic. This always struck me as the "point" of the series.

[Hannibal_Kills]

For EoSD, I think the moral is don't be so goddamn selfish, that it troubles other people. Yeah, it is a childish one if you hear but there is a lot of that today.

[CyberAngel]

The other half of the message extends into the basic plot of SSiB, where the haughty ones tend to eat their own face in the end.

More specifically for the end of CiLR: even if you're the smartest person, you're NOT omniscient.

I already mentioned PoFV in general, but individual stories have their points too. Like Medicine's is about needing allies whatever your agenda is and Tewi's is about the loss of trust due to thoughtless deceit.

I also like how Sanae's story in 10D makes a point about written history not necessarily being 100% accurate.

[Chefir]

EoSD: don't be so selfish
PCB: curiosity is not the same inquisitiveness
IaMP: MAKE PARTIES. MOAR PARTIES.
IN: don't be so paranoic
PoFV: don't be so lazy
MoF: BE. STRONG.
SWR: DON'T ROCK THE LAND.
SA: don't be so paranoic x2 & BE. HOT.
UFO: don't resurrect Jesus again
Soku: don't be so paranoic x3
TD: like SA and UFO but idk
HM: don't lose your mask
DDC: REVOLUTION.
ISC: REVOLUTION x2.
ULiL: "Whatever".
LoLK: never fight against immortals

[the old guy]

Some people suggested that a recuring moral relating to WAHH's depiction of Reimu is "Old Fashion People are foolish".

It seems easy to accuse Touhou and ZUN of being overly nostalgic or pro-tradition given the setting and the way ZUN chooses to do business. Is that actually the case though? Most Touhous ultimately seem to be fools, or at least prone to foolishness, and I get a vague impression (particularly from Forbidden Scrollery and Wild And Horned Hermit, which are definitely the print works I'm most familiar with although I'm not quite caught up) that the old-fashioned characters (Reimu in particular)  are the ones who come off as fools most often. Maybe that's just because ZUN favors that kind of character so we see them the most and therefore see them make the most mistakes, but comparatively the more modern characters (the Moriya crew and maybe the Kappa) seem to come out on top more often.

To add to that, i would like to point out Futo as being a good example of this theme as well, she talks in old Japanese, and is not very bright. However, the opposite can also be seen with Byakuren, who is depicted as being naive for believing that Youkai and Humans can have any friendly relationship other than an Cold War style peace agreement. And not realizing that her Youkai drink beer and have wild parties behind her back.
But then again, she is pretty rude towards Miko, which iirc is against Buddhist morality, and a little selfish as well. So maybe her character is a living massage against religious hypocrisy. (Which Miko is as well, as she actively meddles in the affairs of things when Taoism emphasizes action through non-action. And is also very unhumble.) Or ZUN could be saying "Don't be old fashioned but also don't be too new fashioned as well."

Also, Youmu, she is a samurai. The samurai was an former class in japan that was disgraced, thus it is old fashion. She is often depicted as being very "half-baked". Coincidence?

There's my .02. I guess.

[OtakuGray]

I've noticed that one of touhou's overarching moral concepts is the conflict between science and nature. This is mostly talked about in the discussions between Maribel and Renko, but its also mentioned a bit in the comics and SA backstory. There's also the Lunar Capital, which is a strange combination of technology and nature working in harmony.

Maribel and Renko kind of represent these two forces, where Renko is science and Maribel is nature. Maribel sees the magical and unexplained while Renko can see the numbers and physics/math behind things. The two make a good pair, but only because they have learned to compliment each other's differences.

An example is the discussion Mari/Renko have in Magical Astronomy:

Mari: "What's the matter? Are you saying there's nothing fascinating on Earth?"
Renko:"It's just that there are hardly any mysteries left on Earth."

haha perhaps I'm over thinking it though, but I do like to see this kind of moral in the touhou games. I'm pretty sure I remember ZUN doing an interview where he discussed his thoughts on science and how we are "forgetting the awe of the unknown" but I can't find it on the touhou wiki atm.

[Hello Purvis]

I would say it's not really science and nature so much as science and faith, or rather science and believing without objective proof. But also modernity and traditionalism.

[OtakuGray]

Yeah, I see what you're saying. It's not exactly religion, but believing in things that aren't scientific. Though, I do find the anti-theist characters really interesting because it runs sort of counter to the rest of the Touhou narrative, excluding maybe the Magicians because magic doesn't rely on religion or belief in the touhou-verse and is more like a trade or a skill. 

[Hello Purvis]

I'd say magic relies on faith insomuch as enough people have to believe in it for it to work, but it doesn't rely on worship.

[Toushiro Scarlet]

Yeah. According to my own theory and some research, Belief (and thoughts overall) can somehow produce a kind of energy that is related to dark matter, which somehow can be used to power some sort of magic. Don't put too much hope in it though, the definition is still very vague. But, I can say, all sort of magic requires the use of dark matter, which is something that human science will need many years to explain.

[Clarste]

For what it's worth, the ultimate conclusion of SoPM seems to be that religion, magic, and science are all fundamentally the same: methods of trying to make sense of the world. There's a superficial conflict where the advent of science has caused belief to fade in the outside world, but they don't have to be in conflict, and a lot of series is meant to reconcile them, to varying degrees of success. That's basically Kanako's whole gimmick, everything she does is meant to create a modern world that still respects the power of faith. Magic is simply science in a world where the existence of gods and youkai is common sense.

[C27]

An example is the discussion Mari/Renko have in Magical Astronomy:

Mari: "What's the matter? Are you saying there's nothing fascinating on Earth?"
Renko:"It's just that there are hardly any mysteries left on Earth."

haha perhaps I'm over thinking it though, but I do like to see this kind of moral in the touhou games. I'm pretty sure I remember ZUN doing an interview where he discussed his thoughts on science and how we are "forgetting the awe of the unknown" but I can't find it on the touhou wiki atm.

I find this somewhat ironic, because the notion that science is somehow removing all the mystery and wonder from the world springs from people taking on blind faith in the results of science without understanding the process behind it. Someone that actually understands the purpose and methodology, if not actively participates, would argue that scientific investigation only reinforces the mystery and wonder in the world.
Faith on the other hand tends to suffocate inquisitiveness by giving the assumption that what's important is known and what's not known is not important - whether this faith is placed in religion, arcana, or an ignorant misinterpretation of "science" is irrelevant to its effects.

This might imply that Renko is in fact the more faith-driven of the two, to a certain degree, because she seems to have more trouble with being inquisitive and investigating things from a neutral position even though that's integral to the personality that she presents on the surface.

[Helepolis]

The thread "died" more than a month ago, though. Don't necro bump up threads.