We might make a list of how many ways this is a creepy.
From Fox:
Man, 35, reportedly marries computer hologram
Surrounded by nearly 40 people, a 35-year-old man reportedly married a virtual hologram earlier this month.
Akihiko Kondo, who works at a middle school in Japan, wed Hatsune Miku, a hologram that was created by a computer as singing software, on Nov. 4, Reuters reported Wednesday.
The hologram, which takes the form of a teen performer, “is a singing voice synthesizer featured in over 100,000 songs,” according to an online description from Crypton Future Media, the company whose program the character is modeled on, Reuters reported.
The company did not immediately return Fox News’ request for comment.
While acknowledging the traditional path to marriage, Kondo said he feels “the shape of happiness and love is different for each person.”
[…]
Two points.
Will Fr. Martin, LGBTQSJ, write a book about building holographic bridges to the other-metaphysiked?
Will Fr. Rosica, Arbitor veritatis, put his stamp of approval on the practice?
Who will help us out?
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eLGBTQ
Prime example why Japan’s population base is crashing. No immigration and men marrying illusions…
The most disturbing thing to me is that he is a teacher of middle school aged children.
This man clearly has issues with drawing a line between fantasy and external reality.
Just as in the case of “building bridges” with homosexual persons, I don’t know how really interested holograms would be be in anyone’s efforts to make them feel more welcome in the Church.
one wonders, did he marry her for the money?
It’s not so much as being creepy as it is being an example of pure stupidity. This guy will be the first castaway to be eaten on a desert island….unless he rapidly develops and maintains a skill in collecting firewood.
—“Surrounded by nearly 40 people…”— Laughing and pointing, I would assume.
Can you say, “irregular union”
I work with young people and was told by one teen he had an actual relationship with an anime character. He got very defensive when I told him this is not the real world and that is not a real person. Today’s “games”, with virtual reality and interactive play, blur the line between the real and the illusion. Kids play games that would boggle our minds, they role play, even role play being the opposite sex…er…gender…no…it’s sex. One of my kid’s characters tells him he loves him, HE, loves HIM. Kids often play these games for hours after school. When do you see children out playing? Not often, they’re all inside working out their thumbs. If I had a child today, I would have no games in the house. All those wires are ugly anyway.
@atra dicenda.
True.
William Gibson’s novel Idoru.
Before we freak out, let’s examine what’s actually going on. Which is stupid stuff, but not actually immoral.
1. He’s not Christian. A Western-style wedding is a common affectation for non-Christian Japanese, but it doesn’t “count” the way a Shinto or Buddhist wedding does, or even the way it counts to get a civil wedding.
2. He didn’t do this in a church, or even a wedding chapel. He hired a reception hall.
3. It’s an advertising gimmick. The Vocaloid company offered to put on a “wedding” for any fan that would pay 2 million yen to “marry” one of the Vocaloids, with all sorts of special merchandise included. (Because there’s an old joke tradition in Japanese fandoms of calling your favorite character your “waifu” or “husbando.”) So at least ten Vocaloid collectors grabbed the opportunity to pay big money for a very small number of very expensive toys. He’s just one of them.
4. So he didn’t “marry” anything. He bought a desk-sized hologram machine, and did what the company desired about publicizing his toy buy. Unlike the others, he rented a hall and invited a lot of fellow fan friends to come to his “ceremony;” or possibly he just made a better show out of it.
5. His parents think he’s wasting money and trivializing the institution of marriage, which is a fair cop.
Actually, the freaky thing about this guy is that his house/apartment is really really clean. And big.
I mean, most Japanese fans and most Japanese people have a lot of stuff accumulated in their houses, even if it’s all kept in cupboards and cabinets on the side. His place… you can see the floor and everything. And it’s color-coordinated, even if he sleeps in the bottom bunk of a big white metal bunkbed.
So yeah, he has a lot of money, and it looks like his expenditures are mostly either virtual or kept under control.
No… the creepy bit was the terrible speech synthesized Vocaloid version of a wedding speech. Bleh. And that was all the corporation’s idea.
Finally – he’s not a teacher at all. He’s a school administrator.
Yup, HR strikes again.
Apparently this is all an elaborate middle-finger to his school system as well, because he says he was harassed by female supervisors earlier in his career. Since he feels free to embarrass his school publicly now, even without it being named, he must have gotten some serious monetary compensation and reassurances of perpetual employment.
Anyhoo, technically it’s not the Vocaloid folks doing these “weddings.” It’s the Gatebox people who make the little desk hologram thing, using their licensing of the Vocaloid stuff. Since the Kondo video came out, they’ve sold about 200 more “weddings” with Gatebox goodies. So there’s your business model — sell something expensive as part of something even more expensive!
For video of the $18000 ceremony:
https://globalnews.ca/video/4661799/japanese-man-marries-computer-character-in-18000-wedding-ceremony