For the first release of Licca Fansubs' 2nd Birthday Celebration, we felt it was appropriate to release a movie about birthdays.
Happy Birthday - Inochi Kagayaku Toki is a movie that uses birthdays as a framework for its main themes: disabilities and bullying. As everyone knows, bullying is still a problem today, although with schools beginning to use more things like audio and video surveillance, they are more likely to catch incidences of bullying happening. Bullying also does not just stop at school; the home and the workplace are also places where bullying can be rampant.
With several notable cases in the past few years (such as the suicide of
Tyler Clementi), it should be patently obvious why bullying is not acceptable in any shape and form. What people may think "as good fun and a joke" is often not acceptable, and depending on where it happens and the result of such activities, often will come with consequences that may potentially ruin someone's life forever.
In addition, the treatment of folks with disabilities is a very interesting topic in itself, and depending on the disability, often will tie into the bullying angle (which is very reprehensible in my opinion). There is a reason why there are laws such as the Americans With Disabilities Act exist. Just because someone has a disability does not mean that the person is a less of a person. Personally, I have not had very many personal experiences with working with people with disabilities, but the few experiences I've had were very enlightening and enriching on the whole.
I would like to thank all the people who I've talked to about their experiences with being the victims of bullying. Without their experiences, this translation would not have been as good as it could have been.
