(Ichi-F 69)

Katsuma Susumu’s Devil Fish and Tatsuta Kazuto’s Ichi-F depict the precarity of the workers in a matter of fact way that borders on brutal honesty, and that humanizes them at the same time. Their lives are steeped in precarity not just because of their hard, manual labor, protective measures that do not protect them from exposure but are merely intended to prevent them from spreading contamination, and the acceptance of their risk and of protective protocols that cannot protect; the conditions of their work alone are not what makes these workers into nuclear gypsies. Their exclusion from society as something other, something to be feared, something dirty, adds to their precarity. Within this situation of precarity however, both mangas take great care to also depict the community and comradery between workers. This is what humanizes them and may help identify the precarity of their situation. Additionally, the medium of the manga also serves as an important vehicle for the depiction of the unrepresentable that allows us to identify the precarity of these laborers.

One of the most basic elements of precarity, the lack of stable work and steady incomes is apparent in Ichi-F but not directly addressed as such. Throughout Chapter 0, the reader learns why Kazuto Tatsuta decided to work at the plant in spite of not being from the area. Among other reasons, he was attracted by the high pay, but quickly learns that he and his fellow workers don’t make enough money to afford more than cheap fast food. This is accentuated by the fact that every worker is very restricted in the amount of work their can do for the company, not by the company itself but by he amount of exposure that’s permissible, resulting in some workers being out of work for several months after they have reached the maximum amount of exposure. Additionally, the high pay (with hazard bonus) is only awarded to the most hazardous jobs, meaning that in order to make a lot of money, the workers also have to incur a lot of risk to their health. In Devil Fish, this risk to their health becomes apparent when two workers discuss another worker who looks ten years older than he is (36).

The precarity is worsened by the lip-service to control and protocol that do not protect the workers from exposure but are primarily prevent them from spreading contamination. Both mangas depict these measures with almost eerie similarity. The companies that employ these workers in precarity and government try to conceal the risk of the work conditions with meticulous protocols. In both mangas the protocols are so elaborate that both writers spend a significant amount of time and panels depicting them. The nuclear protocols, albeit more sophisticated in Ichi-F seems almost timeless due to their overall similarity in both mangas. E.g. in spite of new developments in nuclear detection and hopefully protection, all workers know to use of two pairs of socks as if they decrease the risk. Still, the laborers adhere to the protective measures with practiced regularity but in the awareness that these measures are not intended to protect them from exposure to radiation, e.g. “APDs set to our planned exposure amount for the day.” (Ichi-F 18) In Devil Fish, the “trainer” worker is even more explicit in his explanation to his student: “Don’t think of it as protecting your body . . . It’s so you don’t take radiation out when you leave” (Devil Fish 34) This awareness also becomes particularly apparent when the injured worker in Devil Fish and another worker with a heart attack were not taken to proper medical care because immediate evacuation would have spread the nuclear contamination. In Ichi-F, the description of the protective measures is so practiced for the narrator that he switches between narrating the measures and prescribing them almost as if he’s writing a training manual for people seeking to join in the decontamination efforts. By following protocols of protection, the companies have convinced the workers that they do whatever possible to keep them safe, and the workers, following said protocols, have accepted that this is the least worst option in their situation. This is what defines their precarity, their willing or rather unwitting acceptance of the risk they incur because they have no other option.

In their precarity, though, the workers have found ways to cope and support each other with something akin to comradery. The narrator in Ichi-F proclaims that he finds the mantra-like statement “Stay safe!” reassuring (22); the workers eat together and share a sense of purpose and revelry in their work; due to their close quarters and the necessity of protocols help each other adhere to them and remind each other; and the narrator becomes almost defensive when he points out that “’The Reality of Fukushima’ that the media rarely ever bothers to show” (36) also includes relaxation in the break room. When one worker has a headache, the whole group returns to the break room because they would be understaffed in an emergency. And even when the coworkers assume that the worker just wants a smoke, they don’t seem to exclude him but they share a laugh, which manifests their bond because they all share this state of precarity. In Devil Fish this comradery and support comes out throughout the teacher-student relationship which is, simultaneously, also the vehicle to tell the reader about the work conditions and protocols of the nuclear laborers.

The visual medium of the manga adds a significant dimension to the discussion about precariarity, namely that of representation, or rather of the attempt at representation that is impossible but nevertheless necessary. As Butler argues “There is something unrepresentable that we nevertheless seek to represent, and that paradox must be retained in the representation we give.” (144) In Devil Fish, this representation happens, for example, by visually representing the impossible to represent radiation exposure (13).

The radiation is counted by a radiation counter that emits a ping and doesn’t leave a visual impact. Yet to represent this impact in the workers, the illustrator adds the radiation to the worker who’s in the process of cleaning. Using a popular, visual medium like the manga to portray the nuclear laborers also serves to humanize the laborers and the subject matter. Although the protocols of decontamination attempt to control the uncontrollable, there are human beings behind said protocols, which become visible through their portrayal in these manga.

Works Cited:

Tatsuta, Kazuto. Ichi-F a Workers Graphic Memoir of the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant. Kodansha Comics, an Imprint of Kodansha USA Publishinh, LLC, 2017.

Katsumata, Susumu. Fukushima: Devil Fish. Edited by Asakawa Mitsuhiro and Translated by Ryan Holmberg. Breakdown Press, 2015.

Butler, Judith. Precarious Life: the Powers of Mourning and Violence. Verso, 2006.