A big point of progressive ideology is to be accepting and see people for more than their labels, but Persona 4 actually completely destroys the idea that many people actually believe this ideology. Because it shows that these people only look at surface level or what benefits their movement.
Persona 4 is actually quite a progressive game buts not a woke game and that enrages the people who need Kanji to gay or Naoto trans. And you can make the argument for Kanji being bi but you can’t use his shdaow. Thats completely missing the point and those people are doing exactly what the shadows in the gamw want.
If you think that Kanji is gay, then you gotta believe Rise is also a whore.
The point of the Shadow is that it is the manifestation of a person's insecurities of how society regards them, should they be perceived. Chie's Shadow is a dominatrix ruling over her, representing how she feels like her relationship to Yukiko dominates her life. Naoto's Shadow is a robot, an "artificial man", because that's literally what she's constructed her identity as. It's only by defeating their Shadow that they create the Persona, transforming the darkness and shame into a weapon that they can use to fight.
Chie learns to recognize that she isn't secondary to Yukiko, and their relationship is equal as friends. Naoto learns to accept that she's a woman and will always be a woman. Rise's entire arc is recognizing that she is not a commodity that is bought and sold, she ISNT a stripper. Kanji is not gay, he learns that just because he has interests and feelings which he considers feminine, it doesn't make him gay.
I remember watching pc building guides 5 or 6 years ago and RAM was THE cheapest part, by far. Everyone was like "yeah you can get away with 16 but you might as well get 32 if you can fit them because it's like 20 bucks for a pair of these things" now we live in hell.
The whole "Persona needs to be about adults" argument gets so much funnier when you realise none of the people asking for that actually buy any of the games.
"respect my headcanon, which intentionally misinterprets a character and it's existence basically soiling said character's entire lore, arc and message in the story, because i personally think she should be trans !"