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The story
Former AKB48 member Tomomi Itano (35) shared a new one-piece dress from her self-produced lifestyle brand on Instagram, but the tagline — “can be worn for every formal occasion, even funerals” — drew a wave of etiquette complaints on social media, with people saying things like “that’s not appropriate funeral wear.” After the backlash, the copy was quietly revised to “can be worn for formal occasions,” simply dropping the word “funeral” from the original four-part phrase. On the 5ch thread, discussion ranged from the core question of whether the black dress actually works as mourning attire, to a side debate over the grammatically “improper” way of saying “can be worn” in Japanese, to jokes about whether you can really fix a set four-character phrase for life’s major ceremonies just by deleting one character.
“That’s not appropriate for a funeral” — Tomomi Itano’s New Dress Reveal Sparks Social Media Firestorm Over Etiquette: “It’s really lovely, but…”
Former AKB48 member and TV personality Tomomi Itano (35) updated her Instagram by the 2nd.
She introduced a new one-piece dress from the lifestyle brand she directs, and it has become a major topic on social media — both over the wording used and questions of etiquette.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Read the original article here
What people said
She doesn't get the point of a funeral.
Probably thinks the point is to dress herself up.
Something like this?
https://youtu.be/qdewMnfrYiQ?si=WA6SHM8JkMjyz22k&t=75
Ruri Miura: "That's me!" (a commentator infamous for her flashy outfits at serious events)
We could stand to send people off a little more cheerfully.
The dropped-ra grammar police strike again lol
None of the four occasions work for this dress, honestly
The top looks kind of like a T-shirt, so it wouldn't work for a wedding either.
It's dressy enough for a nice lunch out, but not formal enough for an actual formal occasion.
Jealous.
That's Haruna Kojima you're thinking of
Things like coming-of-age ceremonies, that kind of event
I get the argument that "dropped-ra is totally normal in everyday speech now," but by the rules of standard Japanese grammar it's still considered incorrect.
And to people who are bothered by it, someone using dropped-ra can come across as uneducated.
So in public writing, it's safer not to use it.
Wait, sorry, what's wrong with it? It's black, so isn't that fine? Is my sense of this just off…
Dunno how old you are, but have you never actually been to a funeral or wake?
'Kirareru' ◯
Sticking the 'ra' back in is such a try-hard 'yutori-generation' move (overly by-the-book)
That's exactly the joke this time 😂
They should've made the pufferfish on her head black and white too, to match
How many heads tall is she supposed to be?
Nice try nitpicking.
No body-ratio editing here.
Background and Key Points
At Japanese funerals, general etiquette calls for avoiding shiny fabrics or revealing designs and instead wearing subdued mourning wear or semi-formal black attire. Itano’s new one-piece was marketed as a versatile piece that could go from everyday wear to formal ceremonial occasions, but opinions on the thread were mainly split over whether it actually holds up as mourning attire. Also discussed was the backstory of how the mistaken phrase “kankonsai” — missing one character from the proper four-character term “kankonsōsai” (the four major life ceremonies: coming-of-age, weddings, funerals, and rites) — was corrected after being flagged on social media. A second, unrelated thread of conversation was a long-running grammar debate over whether “kireru” or “kirareru” (both meaning “can be worn”) is the grammatically correct form — the so-called “dropped-ra” issue. This kind of derailment into Japanese-language nitpicking is a common pattern on threads like this, and this one was no exception. Note: several unverified posts about Itano’s personal life and relationships also appeared in the thread, but since they couldn’t be confirmed, they have been excluded from this article.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou/Sports News+) thread ““That’s not appropriate for a funeral” — Tomomi Itano’s new dress sparks etiquette debate, wording changed from “can be worn for every occasion, even funerals” to “can be worn for occasions” after criticism.”
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