I felt like drawing a little more attention to this after seeing dressrouba’s Vivi fanart. We’re all used to characters in manga/anime receiving massive wounds yet never keeping scars from them, but nonetheless there is a huge gender discrepancy in who receives/shows scars in One Piece. There are over 70 named male characters in OP with visible scars, and that’s not even counting the literal hundreds of zombies. While on the other hand, the only women in OP with scars were a few zombies. There isn’t a single living women in OP with visible scars.
There is no character who shows this more obviously than Nami, who has received numerous serious wounds, yet carries no scars for them. Nami did have a scar from her self inflicted wounds where she tried to remove Arlong’s tattoo from her shoulder (which were NOT covered up by her new tattoo)
However, this scar disappeared after their meeting with Laboon and has never been seen again.
(Just for one example of its noticeable absence.)
As I said, there are all sorts of characters in OP who receive massive wounds and don’t show scars for them (Luffy and Zoro would be 90% scar tissue if they kept scars for all the wounds they’ve received). However, the problem is that while men receive some scars from their wounds, women receive noscars from them. Even a wound as devastating as the stab wound Robin received from Crocodile between her right breast and shoulder produced no lasting mark.
It’s not that there aren’t women in One Piece, and it’s not that those women don’t fight or don’t get hurt (Vivi’s been wounded multiple times, Madam Sharlay was run through with a water-bullet, Nojiko was shot, Violet was hit with shrapnel, Rebecca’s been bashed in the skull, Monet’s been slashed by Tashigi while Tashigi almost had her entire shoulder ripped off by Monet, Miss Doublefinger/Kalifa/Baby 5 have all been struck by lightning (which also leaves scars), and more). Oda simply doesn’t want his women to have scars.
Just like the lack of women with visible muscles (Miss Monday only), and the overwhelming prevalence of women with near identical faces, pencil thin waists, and massive breasts, I think the lack of women with scars is a problem. This is Oda’s manga, and he can do what he wants in it, but when your work has as many readers all over the world as Oda’s, helping to expand what is represented as beautiful, respectable, or desirable in women can do a lot for a lot of people out there. That’s why I always appreciate it when artists like dressrouba, whisklash, undeadseanbean, lorabird, and askcaptaintashigi create things that cast characters in a more diversified light.
Edit:
After this post I received comments and additional asks about this. For a look at them and my responses, take a look at these posts here, here, here, here, and here.
Cheloneuniverse 