the current Vocaloid Discourse(tm)
i don't really like weighing in on petty fandom discourse (since the act of doing so is tantamount to swinging a bat at a hornet's nest) but this current blip on the drama radar is something i wanna at least straighten my thoughts out on in a mostly private setting (so the real ones can read it)
the setup: vocaloid producer hiragi magnetite (previously known for hit song "tetoris") released a song called "zako" (noob) featuring voicebank kaai yuki which featured sexual themes and innuendos. admittedly i only listened to the first half of the song before i got bored but that's the general narrative that has been going around.
the point of controversy involves the voicebank: yuki, whose samples were famously recorded by a then fourth grader (kept anonymous for obvious reasons). people in general are repelled by the idea of using the voice of a minor, even if fragmented in a vocaloid, to be used in songs involving themes inappropriate for minors. "zako" allowed this repulsion to take center-stage as soon as the song got popular.
i agree that using yuki, in her specific circumstances, to sing sexual lyrics is definitely strange and questionable. but i think, more than anything, this puts into perspective the questionable ethics of having a voice synth's samples involve a minor at all.
the point of vocaloid/vocal synth as a whole is to give people a unified mask (the characters) that musicians can creatively play with in their own style. the point is creative expression. even the darkest, cavernous corners of creative expression.
people call into question the ethics of using hatsune miku to sing similarly sexual songs since her character bio states she is 16 years old. nauseating vocaloid age discourse aside, people are generally more amicable towards miku because she was/is voiced by an adult, and therefore it is generally more acceptable with being more floaty with her age and appearance. that doesn't stop people from taking miku's character bio information as total gospel and shuns anyone who doesn't (me personally i can't take it seriously, no way she's shorter than me. she should be tall as fuck), this distinction in voice provider makes her case much different from yuki.
yuki as a piece of vocal synth technology is just like all the others. her voice provider's samples have been immortalized in a digitized form under a cute mascot, one who's a total blank slate outside of their design (if you wish to acknowledge it at all), that can be freely manipulated to sing whatever an artist pleases based on their creative vision. some people may be inclined to use yuki over other voicebanks for similar reasons as others: they may like her visual design or tone of voice (tone of voice in particular is very important since that is the entire crux of the product).
one may ask why yuki was used to sing "zako" out of all the others that could be chosen (even ones the center of some age discourse like miku and rin), and i think, without immediately assuming bad faith reasons (such as 'hiragi magnetite is an actual predator' which is an accusation flung around a LOT), he might have just liked yuki's voice and thought it would fit the vibe of the song, and did not really consider or care about the implications of using her voice, sampled from a child, for the song despite the adult themes. this interpretation would still be careless on the producer's part, but concluding that he is a pedophile feels like a bit of a mental leap i think.
but yuki, unlike many others, is burdened with the baggage of involving a minor in her samples. now certain topics that can be sung about are a lot more questionable, not for the simple fact that The Character Kaai Yuki is an elementary schooler and looks like a child but because now the voice of a real child is being used to sing those topics. which discomforts people--it's completely understandable. i don't blame people for rejecting the song.
but controversially, the main problem i have has little to do with the song to begin with, and more for the fact that a voicebank like yuki even exists.
"zako", its ensuing hate train, and other songs like it that didn't get nearly as much attention are just a consequence of the strange ethics of releasing a synth product with a child's voice.
i just don't think vocaloid voicebanks should be voiced by minors to begin with is what i'm saying.
if vocaloid (and vocal synth but i just like using vocaloid as the catch-all word) is meant to encourage creative expression, even the bad icky gross kind, then voicebanks like kaai yuki (and i guess oliver for that matter but i don't think he's gotten nearly this much controversy) should not exist. thankfully, as far as i know, there haven't been any voicebank releases with the same voice provider conundrum. maybe some obscure utau recorded by a teenager tinkering with their laptop may qualify but utau voicebanks are kind of the wild west.
just have 'em voiced by adults doing voice acting.
now, the next logical step that people might take in the discourse is, "even if yuki was voiced by an adult but still maintained her original visual appearance (that of a young girl), it would still be problematic to have her sing sexually-charged lyrics."
i won't deny that a character that originally looks like a child singing adult-themed lyrics is a bit weird (there's a whole other discussion about the ethics of aging up characters for sexual purposes to be had here, made even muddier with vocaloid characters being blank slates that are meant to have floaty ages, but uh i do not feel confident in assessing that whole can of worms so No Comment), the connection to a Real Ass Minor is not there. it's very weird, even emotionally repulsive, but no real minor is hurt, which is why the ethics of using yuki a certain way were so precarious to begin with. Adult-Voiced yuki would now be in a similar state to vocaloids like kagamine len, 14 years old, famous for his many songs about dick. people question those too, but not nearly as much as similarly themed songs voiced by Minor-Voiced yuki. do you get me?
that's just my thoughts on the discourse. i will try not to make much use of the "discourse" tag i have now created for this blog because as someone who has gotten deeply entrenched with it in the past, i know how annoying, soul-sucking, and time-wasting it is. however, the conversation that sprung up around this song did get me thinking about my previous thoughts on Vocaloids Voiced By Minors in general, so i thought to just use the drama cycle as a springboard to get these thoughts out there.