/jp/ - Otaku Culture

Gender roles also play a huge role in character development. Whatever our personal views of Makoto and his promiscuity, he plays a key part in demonstrating what can happen when those gender roles are taken to an extreme. Taisuke mentions "climbing the ladder to adulthood", which in this case means having sexual experience; from this we can only infer that sex validates Makoto and Taisuke, who stand up to impossibly high standards of what it means to be a man in Japan today. Faced with the idea of being a breadwinner and supporting a family, as well as working hard and contributing to the all-important reified society, these boys turn to the only refuge they have in order to feel like they are men.