Shy friend · 2d
Something I noticed is that ibuki is never really given a place to be a child in canon. In akatsuki he's more or less babied but when you factor in literally everything its not a good place for him. Then people say he should join mdu but he's 5 years younger than their youngest member so that isnt a good place but purely for age reasons. Even in esupuri where he would have been surrounded by people his age he would have had to play the role of someone that's there to watch the group rather than be their peer and this also ties to his backstory where he was always taking care of other kids around him. Most of the fandom probably doesnt even know about these things but its interesting to see how a lot of people tend to treat him as if he's older than he actually is when in reality he's just a kid.
If I understand correctly, you're assessing how Ibuki isn't really allowed to just be a kid on safe terms in the canon, right? I agree. Though, I don't think it's just the fandom projecting maturity onto Ibuki. Precociousness is part of Ibuki's character, even if it's something he feels remorseful about. Ibuki's desire to get to be a kid isn't straightforward. It's qualified by how he in certain ways distances himself from people his own age, and instead tries to validate those feelings by proximity to people older than himself as a form of reassurance. In an effort to find dependable adults, he actually ends up in an adult space: the idol industry, specifically in a Unit where the other members are adults. Though we have seen minors participating in the industry since the beginning of the franchise, as of !! Era, we have seen much more adult issues come to surface. Namely, corporate overreach, adults abusing authority over children in much more explicit ways, and imperialism have all become important to the ongoing storylines. These themes appeared earlier, as well, but I feel they have been more prominent in the past six years. The point is, this is one of the tragedies of Ibuki's writing. His current circumstances don't actually meaningfully alter his social positioning. They give him some older figures he can look up to, sure. But the dynamics within AKATSUKI are deeply problematic on another level and, moreover, fail to actually break the cycle of adultification he is experiencing as he is now embroiled in the idol industry. If Ibuki's end goal is "get to live freely like a child," joining AKATSUKI is a strange way to go about that.
