The History of Hentai & How We Enjoy It 

People around the world enjoy porn and have for millennia. However, the way people consume porn constantly changes as technology and societies do. Hentai is the perfect example of a fairly recent emergence of porn enjoyment. While erotic art is not new, hentai places a specific spin on it that creates both an extremely niche audience and a worldwide audience simultaneously. Enjoying hentai tends to be a fairly solitary experience, but like any porn, it can be enjoyed with others and shared online. In fact, the internet has played a vital role in the dissemination of this growing and popular form of porn. 

What Is Hentai? 

Hentai is a Japanese word that translates to “perverse” or “perverted” porn. This is not the general word used for porn, and thus, indicates a difference between Hentai and other forms of porn, including other animated porn. In general, hentai tends to deal with taboo or sexually deviant kinks and topics. It can range from tentacle porn to beastality to rape to simulating sex with underaged girls. Hentai—it should be noted—is not necessarily considered a bad thing. While it certainly can take on a negative connotation, the immediate assumptions in Japan and abroad do not necessarily condemn a hentai consumer immediately. 

However, hentai is not always horribly perverse and does often explore more “accepted” forms of kink such as BDSM, roleplay, and supernatural creatures (remember our article on why monsters turn us on?) There is also an exaggerated nature to hentai that indicates an unrealistic and unachievable standard for both men and women. From extremely large breasts to penises the length of a sword, hentai’s exaggeration does show how it is not necessarily supposed to be “real life” like other porn featuring real humans. 

Emergence & Popularity Of Hentai 

Modern hentai emerged in 1984 with Lolita Anime, a BDSM-focused hentai with prepubescent characters, and Cream Lemon, a siblings incest hentai. These concepts were generally considered too much for normal porn in Japan and so they had to be self-published or published in non-traditional ways (in this case traditional refers to print). However, the concept of “hentai” goes back further. 

The word originally was used in psychology to address certain conditions and supernatural abilities. It was only used within the medical community at first. Due to the natural development of language, hentai began to take on a sexual connotation throughout the 1920s and 1930s because of an association with a word referring to abnormal sexual desires. Ironically, it was originally used to discourage these sorts of activities. 

Early hentai mostly took the form of fiction in books and magazines. Essentially, graphic novel adaptations of or inspired by erotic German tales were among the first glimpses at modern hentai. However, erotic art always existed in Japan. Shunga refers to erotic art and it has held an important place throughout Japanese history at least since the Heian period. Commonly printed on woodblocks, Shunga depicts everything from typical copulation up to lesbianism and even a sexual encounter with a squid from Katsushika Hokusai’s 1814 print, Pining for Love (Kinoe no Komatsu). 

The expansion of technology—namely the internet—increased the popularity and accessibility of hentai. What once had to be published and distributed underground could not more easily reach its audience and be distributed worldwide. This brought hentai to the phenomenon it is today. 

How Western & Eastern Audiences View Hentai Differently 

Western audiences of hentai tend to view any anime porn as hentai. However, this is not entirely correct, as the term implies some sort of abnormality or perversion. Therefore, anime porn without these elements is generally considered in roughly the same category as normal porn in Japan (with some exceptions). But, the growing Western audience does not necessarily know the difference. 

With that said, both anime porn and hentai have become extremely popular in Western countries. Like Japan, hentai does allow Western audiences to explore taboo or perverted kinks in a relatively safe format. Also, it opens them up to new ones such as tentacle porn which is not overly common in Western porn. 

Contribution To Asian Fetishization 

Unfortunately, the globalization of hentai has had consequences such as furthering and contributing to Asian fetishization, particularly of Asian women. With many female hentai characters portrayed as small, young (often extremely so, but not explicitly underage), and quietly submissive, this has led to Western men believing these generalizations, stereotypes, and fantasies to be true of Asian and Japanese women. This fetishization has had real-life consequences with Asian women suffering abuse, violence, and even death due to not fitting (or perhaps fitting) the fetishized versions seen in hentai. 

Simply enjoying hentai or anime does not make someone automatically fetishize Asian people. But, gone unchecked, enjoyed as the only porn someone consumes, or in combination with other racist forms of media makes the spread of hentai, unfortunately, makes hentai less of a culture providing the world with a new form of art and porn, and more of a co-oped artform used as a weapon against said culture. Even though most of this is done unconsciously, Western audiences still have a long way to go to undo years of harm that fetishization has done. 

Hentai vs. Human Porn: How It Affects The Individual & Society 

Scientists are beginning to study if there is a difference between those who consume hentai and those who do not. So far, one study has shown that while the desire for human relationships does not differ, attachment styles do. Female hentai consumers were more likely to have an anxious attachment style than those who only consumed human porn or no porn at all. Curiously, this appeared to not be true for the male participants in the study. 

Consuming hentai often takes place alone. It could be in the form of erotic manga, anime, or even just gifs or images. Like all forms of porn, masturbating while enjoying hentai is common. Hentai does also tend to include sex toys quite frequently, making it a very sex toy, fetish, and kink-friendly type of porn. We highly recommend powering up your Erosscia to pair with your favorite hentai. 

Popularity Among The Generations 

Hentai is popular among all generations because the “perverse” sex it focuses on is not limited to a single generation. However, the internet has become a haven for hentai. Thus, hentai has become exceptionally popular among millennials and Gen Z as well as some younger Gen Xers. Some have begun to worry that the animated nature of hentai may lead to the accidental consumption of porn before it is appropriate. 

With that said, hentai continues to experience a renaissance in Japan and abroad. This is due in some part because of the increased popularity of Japanese and Asian culture in the West. From anime to K-pop, the West consumes more Eastern media than ever before. Naturally, this also translates to porn—of which—hentai is the stand-out. The new generation of porn consumers will inevitably come across hentai on their computer screens. 

Censorship Laws 

Japan has strict decency laws that require censorship of genitals in most media. While there are no strict guidelines, most hentai distributors in Japan will censor it to a degree. This includes digital and print hentai. Ultimately, the degree of censorship will depend on where the hentai can be bought or consumed. The strictest censorship is of the manga and hentai sold at convenience stores in Japan. Specialty stores like sex shops have the least censorship, though there is often still some censorship. However, independently produced and distributed hentai—normally sold directly by the artist—is subject only to rules of wherever they sell their art. 

Generally, censorship is applied after the rendering of the art. Therefore, uncensored versions do exist, and international distributors can choose not to censor the hentai or manga. However, the internet has made it easier to disseminate uncensored hentai. 

Enjoying Hentai In The Modern World 

Hentai is an art form that explores and expresses sexuality in ways that may not be possible in real life. It is subject to criticism and censorship like all pornographic media, but hentai’s taboo subject matter has given it a unique place in porn. Hentai makes the forbidden available. Fantasies and kinks that may not be possible to play out in real life are possible in hentai. For some, this allows for the safe exploration of potentially deviant desires; others believe it promotes harmful sexual deviancy. Beyond that, others find the artwork beautiful and view the sex acts outside of a real-world lens. 

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