Why Animated Characters Have Four Fingers-Except In Japan, The Gruesome 'Tin Nose Shop' of WWI, And The Origin of 'Baker's Dozen: Why Empathetic Decision-Making Matters
The 3-Word Quote: “Empathy Is Everything”
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1.
Pay attention the next time you watch an animated show or movie.
Not to the plot or the characterization.
But pay attention to the animated characters' hands - and note how many fingers are on each of their hands.
You'll quickly notice that most characters have only four fingers on each hand - especially in older movies and shows. Usually, it is three fingers and a thumb.
SpongeBob SquarePants? Four fingers.
The Simpsons characters? Four fingers (one notable exception was when animators gave God five fingers per hand).
And Mickey Mouse? Also, four fingers.
So why four-fingered hands in animation?
The missing digit dates back to early animation, before Computer-Generated Imagery (CGI).
Drawing a four-fingered hand was much easier than drawing one with five.
It was not just a tiny time-saver either - hands are apparently tricky and time-consuming to animate, so eliminating a single finger was beneficial.
And four fingers are so close to five that our brains often don't register a difference between a five-fingered hand and one with only four.
But three fingers were too few. According to one article, humans see a three-fingered hand and equate it to a non-human life form.
So four it was.
Disney princesses, however, always have all ten fingers. Look at Snow White - all ten fingers intact, but each of the seven dwarves have eight fingers.
And when Walt Disney had Mickey Mouse appear in Steamboat Willie, the trend continued. For that eight-minute film, over 11,000 drawings were created.
Most animated shows require twenty-four drawings per second of film.
So, while Disney took great pride in his work, eliminating the fifth finger did save time.
And eliminating that digit also improved Mickey's looks.
When asked about Mickey's four-fingered hand, Walt Disney replied, "Using five fingers would have made Mickey's hands look like a bunch of bananas."
So, four-fingered hands became the norm in the majority of the animated world.
Except in one country - Japan.
Japan's animated characters have all ten fingers.
And the reason for this likely involves death, the Japanese Mafia, and empathy.
2.
During World War I, soldiers on the frontline were worried about their hands and all parts of their bodies.
But one part of a soldier’s body was being destroyed at an alarming rate not seen in previous wars.
It was the face.
The war brought in a new wave of weapons that caused carnage on all sides.
Nine million were killed, and approximately twenty-one million were wounded.
And many of these wounds were to the head and face - and they were devastating and gruesome.
Much of the devastation was coming from the fully-automatic machine gun. This new weapon resulted in a massive number of gunshots to the face.
One surgeon said of the wounded soldiers, "They seemed to think they could pop their heads up over a trench and move quickly enough to dodge the hail of machine-gun bullets.”
The surgeon said the men, "...failed to understand the menace of the machine gun."
But the machine gun was a monster, not a menace for these men as the newly automatic weapon fired 450-600 bullets a minute.
A Smithsonian article said the men, "…had half their faces blown to pieces with skin left hanging in shreds and jawbones crushed to a pulp that felt like sand under your fingers."
It was said during the war that "mankind's military technology wildly outpaced its medical technology."
However, one surgeon, Sir Harold Gillies, dedicated his skill to helping these soldiers with devastating facial injuries.
Sir Gillies is known as the father of modern plastic surgery, mainly for his work with those who fought in World War I.
So common were these facial injuries that Gillies worked at a hospital whose primary focus was to treat these injuries.
In fact, on a single day in July 1916, 2000 patients arrived at the hospital - most missing "half their face."
The men came "without chins, noses, cheekbones, and eyes." Many were incapable of moving their tongue, talking, or eating.
Gillies did pioneering work for these men, often completing bone and skin grafts.
Mirrors were banned in this hospital as many wounds left victims so disfigured that some collapsed in shock after seeing their own faces.
Medical historian Lindsey Fitzharris noted that these men were often shunned in social life because of their disfigurement.
Fitzharris said, "This was a time when losing a limb made you a hero, but losing a face made you a monster."
But what happened to the men whom Gillies couldn't successfully help?
This was where a few artists came in, and a particular studio called 'The Tin Noses Shop' was born.
3.
You may not know any laws from England a thousand years ago.
But you might have appreciated this one if you were living in 1266.
It was called The Assize of Bread and Ale Law.
And despite being a thousand-year-old British law, it probably impacts you today.
Put simply, it's also why the phrase 'baker's dozen' means 13 of something instead of 12.
Ask for a baker's dozen donuts, and you'll get thirteen of them instead of twelve.
But this isn't because bakers are incredibly generous or because they aren't exceptionally gifted at math.
It goes back to the Bread and Ale Law.
And this law was taken seriously. If you were a baker and were caught breaking it, you could have been beaten, imprisoned, or perhaps both.
But why the law was passed was helpful to consumers then - and today.
The Takeaway:
So what do animated characters' fingers, World War I soldiers with facial injuries, and the phrase 'baker's dozen' all have in common?
They are all examples of how making decisions with empathy first is crucial.
Information often guides action, but empathy should infuse every decision.
But as four-fingered hands became the norm in animation everywhere, why then did Japan not follow suit?
The answer has a lot to do with empathy.
Some believe animators draw five fingers on Japanese characters because of tetraphobia, the fear of the number four.
According to several articles, this fear and dislike of the number four occurs more frequently in East Asian countries, particularly Japan.
One explanation for the dislike of the number four is that the Japanese word for the number four sounds much like a word for death.
Could animators have used this knowledge in deciding to draw an extra digit? Perhaps.
Another more popular reason has to do with the Japanese mob, the Yakuza, which has roots in 17th-century Japan.
Members are known to be involved in numerous illegal activities, and they are known for their strict code of conduct.
And they are often violent.
If Yakuza members commit an offense against the organization - that doesn't warrant death- they traditionally will chop off one of their fingers as a punishment.
This ritual, known as yubitsume, calls for the disgraced member to amputate one's little finger to pay for the misdeed against the organization.
Those with the missing finger are easily identifiable as a member of the Yakuzu and are often judged and feared in society.
And this leads us back to Japanese animated characters.
Most American animated characters drawn with four fingers will be edited to have a fifth finger for the Japanese market.
So, Bob the Builder has five fingers in Japan, partly because four fingers could imply membership in the Japanese Mafia.
Perhaps few would make the connection, but the thought and empathy toward viewers is a reason why many believe animated characters have all ten fingers in Japan.
***
It was something far more critical than animated fingers that Sir Gillies was thinking of at his hospital.
It was the faces of soldiers - and how to repair the horrifying injuries to them.
But there were many soldiers that Dr Gillies couldn't successfully operate on.
And this is where a few artists came into play and how the 'Tin Nose Shop' was born.
The official name was 'The Masks for Facial Disfigurement Department,' and it was where some soldiers would go after Sir Gillies.
"My work begins where the work of the surgeon is completed," said Francis Derwent Wood, the department's founder.
Wood was an artist, a sculptor.
His main job was to recreate the look of a soldier's face as closely as he could using his artistic ability.
To do this Wood often had to create lightweight metallic masks that served as facial prosthetics.
These masks were to try to hide the effects of the war's brutality.
The masks also tried to allow the soldiers to return to society.
Wood said, "I endeavor by means of the skill I happen to possess as a sculptor to make a man's face as near as possible to what it looked like before he was wounded."
The masks were painstakingly painted to match the soldiers' skin tone, and great care was used to ensure the mask fit correctly.
And details like eyebrows and mustaches were carefully painted to resemble reality. In some cases, real hair was used.
He took the job seriously.
He was an artist.
But he practiced radical empathy and did whatever he could to make the men look like they did prior to the war.
But the masks didn't solve problems when a soldier needed to eat or talk; the mask couldn't accommodate these skills.
Despite the masks’ limitations, the men who used them were eternally grateful.
Few of the masks survive today, as many who wore them wished to be buried in them.
In one letter to Anna Ladd, who Wood trained in a similar organization in Paris, a soldier wrote, "Thank you… I will have a home… the woman I love… will be my wife."
The masks were groundbreaking.
The empathy was life-changing.
***
And what of a baker's dozen?
Well, The Assize of Bread and Ale Law came about because many consumers were being taken advantage of in the markets a thousand years ago.
Baking bread is a bit of an art and science.
Loaves sometimes turn out differently - some rise more, some are smaller, and they rarely weigh the same.
But bakers back then had a reputation for short-changing their customers. Many bakers charged more for bread than what customers had received.
Some Bakers began to even hollow out loaves of bread to cheat customers.
Apparently, paying more and getting less was common, so the King stepped in.
King Henry III required that bread be a specific weight for a particular price. It was the first law in British history to “regulate the production and sale of food.”
Bakers caught cheating customers would endure beatings, and imprisonment could occur.
But since no two loaves of bread weighed the same, the bread makers began throwing in an extra loaf to ensure the bread weighed the required weight.
They did not want to break this new law.
And this thousand-year-old law is why we now get thirteen of something for the price of twelve; it is a baker's dozen.
Even a thousand years ago, thinking about customers was good for business - and good for your own safety if you were a baker.
In different ways, these examples all demonstrate genuine care for customers.
The animator, the artist, and the King all showed the ability to understand the feelings of others.
And no matter your business or creative field, showing empathy for people is everything.
3 things before you go:
Share this newsletter with someone, if you found it intriguing. I’d appreciate it.
Listen: Yarn- This Is The Year: regardless of your goals, this (upcoming) year is the year to do it; a song that sounds timeless
Watch: Ethan Hawke- Give Yourself Permission To Be Creative: great 10 minute TED talk; my wife, who is wildly creative, loves this one
Have a great next 10 days - see you then!
-Jeff