In light of some recent events that have been happening on the internet, ExR, as a whole, decided that we needed to say our side of things since apparently this whole thing is because we, well… exist?
First and foremost, throughout this lengthy post, we will give a small English lesson, some words of the day.
Translation: The process of translating words or text from one language into another. This process isn’t perfect and will depend on the translator’s interpretation of the said text. Chinese is not, in any way, similar to English. While some more western languages have closer origins, Chinese and English are very far apart.
Translating requires a balance of both cultures; you keep something, and you have to lose some (魚與熊掌不可兼得). The words in the brackets mean you can’t have both the fish and the bear paws. We can’t say that it is a perfectly correct translation, but those with no Chinese knowledge won’t know what it says anyway. If we say it means, you cannot have everything, then a normal reader would know what the translation means, but is that actually a “correct” translation? This is one example to show how there’s no such thing as a perfect translation; please do understand that.
We are not saying our translations are perfect, nor are we saying that ours is the best in existence. We did this for fun, for free, and because K loved the original GDC novel.
Some say that ExR did not leave others with any other options other than reading our translation because we “bullied” other translators into dropping the project? Is it okay if we translate something that another group is working on? Is it okay to start from chapter 18, 45, 66, 90, or any chapter and not from the beginning? If it is, then there are loads of novels which we love and would like to translate, so is it okay for us to snatch it?
No, because then you would say we are creating drama and poaching. That is exactly what happened. We asked those who wanted to translate GDC to start from the beginning and to not start from the middle of the novel. We never bullied anyone into dropping a legitimate translation they did from the start.
To comment on some of the posts we have seen from others about certain translations, and we would like to comment on our translation for 夫妻. 夫(husband)妻(wife) is literally translated to “husband and wife” or “married couple.” Even if someone else translated it as plain “couple” (this is the Bing translation BTW), it doesn’t mean husband and wife is wrong, because, in this case, the Chinese is quite literally husband and wife. While fansubs have the constriction of not being able to discuss with the author on what to change, official translations do. In this case, other translations used a different interpretation than the literal translation, that’s all.
So, how is saying 夫妻 a nasty thing? Is it just because it is not gender-neutral? Is it because we did not change the original 夫妻 into 夫夫? In Chinese, 夫妻 is basically the only way of saying a married couple. Any language itself is fucking sexist.
The problem here also is that language is never clear, that’s why definitions in dictionaries exist. However, if you do know Chinese and disagree with any of our translations, it would have brought better results to give constructive criticism in an email rather than biased hate on a social media platform. Also, jumping the bandwagon thoughtlessly when you don’t know diddly squat about Chinese or ExR is pretty low.
Fujoshi (Fujo): Girls who enjoy yaoi (a genre in Japan that contains sexual and/or romantic relations between two men). Fujoshis do not always think of yaoi as something sexual or something to “get off” on, which does not make it a fetish. Fetish: A form of sexual desire in which gratification is linked to an abnormal degree to a particular object, item of clothing, part of the body, etc.
How does adoring homosexual love make us homophobic, exactly? Also, being a fujo and being a homophobe at the same time is nonsense. Are all of the other groups getting sudden hate for being fujos as well? Doubtful.
There are some who are saying we are gross, racist fujo fetishists because, somehow, in another translation (be it from another fan translation group or random commenter), there were parts of the original sex scenes missing. (We would never make up sex scenes cause we respect the hell out of the author. That’s what fanfiction is for.) This just means that they used the censored version to do the translation.
In Chinese social culture, it is illegal to publish anything featuring homosexual relationships. It wasn’t until 2018 that China even acknowledged that someone could love another person of the same gender… And if the problem is that you do not see a sex scene in the DongHua (animation), or if the DongHua has anything different content-wise from our translation, it just means that the DongHua trimmed the content or was censored to fit Chinese television.
If someone was to call anyone homophobic (having or showing a dislike of or prejudice against homosexual people), it should be most of China or those who are saying we changed the original text to fit our “fetishes.”
It’s a translation of a novel we did not originally write and doesn’t reflect our views, and even if it did, none of it is homophobic (our views). Were others saying the novel is homophobic because there’s only one gay couple in the entirety of the whole GDC novel? It’s a world where MXTX decided to focus on just that one homosexual couple. There could be more gay couples out there, but it’s her work, her novel, her own characters, and how she wants to write it is up to her. Plus, she’s already done writing it, your words can’t do anything to change it now.
Cyber Bullying: The use of electronic communication to bully a person, typically by sending messages of an intimidating or threatening nature. We were called white, fat, racist, cunts, bastards, assholes, etc. by people who don’t even know us. K, the translator for GDC, is a small, cute, Chinese teenager, and yet people are saying that she’s a “fat white smelly bitch who should be set on fire?” Isn’t this the real bullying? Do most of you even realize that in today’s society, more people commit suicide due to cyber-bullying than anything else? Isn’t there an old saying that goes along the lines of “if you have nothing nice to say, don’t say anything at all?”
The bottom line is, no-one deserves to be bombarded with this kind of hate and vitriol for providing a translation of a novel for other people for free. The panel on the manhua was a joke, and ExR didn’t drop the manhua because of that “one bully.”
No, we dropped it because of the hate that had been piling unnecessarily as it was thrown at our feet, in our faces, and into our personal lives. All for something we did for free. Let that sink in.
Don’t jump onto the hate bandwagon so quickly because “everyone” is doing it. Every story has two sides, and if you’re mature enough, you would want to try and get both sides of the whole story before actually jumping into your own conclusions or, you know, parroting something you saw off of someone’s tweet or post. We do hope you see this and decide to clarify all the misunderstandings you have about ExR and the drama that’s taking place right now.
We still will not pick up the GDC manhua again.
People have already started talking about how we dropped GDC manhua, and they went to flame the main instigator, however, please do not do this. By doing so, you are just like them. It is the same thing others have done to us, and we do not want others to feel the same hurt we do.
Be nice to each other, send love, not hate. ExR was not created to sow discord or to cause people to want to give up their lives. It was created because we are those rotten (homophobic?) fujoshis that love yaoi more than a regular harlequin novel.
As we are a BL and yaoi only site, expect more lovely BL from us.
Thanks for all the love and support.
Exiled Rebels Scanlations
I wasn’t aware at all of what was going on. Man, human nature can really be despicable sometimes.
I just can’t understand all the hate towards yaoi and people who like it. I mean, you don’t like it, fine, just leave those who do alone, let us be. when you don’t like something isn’t the logical way to just ignore it? There’re many things I don’t like but I don’t feel the need to bully people who do. What’s wrong with the brain of people who think and do otherwise? Unfortunately, you guys aren’t the only team being victim of such disgusting behavior. I know many others who receive hateful comments such as “go die” on a regular basis.
I feel really sad for K-san who had to endure all of that nasty bullying. Of course this will not erase what she and you guys from ExR go through but I want to tell you THANK YOU SO SO VERY MUCH for all the hard and amazing work you poured into providing us with such great scanlations. I read GDC novel and apart from it being a great story thanks to the original author, it was K-san’s translation that made it so enjoyable as well as the manhua. It’s sad that you guys decided to drop the manhua but I understand where you’re coming from and I definitely support your desicion. Thank you very much again for the hard work with this manhua until now (=^w^=)
And as for people criticizing your translations, why don’t they try and learn a foreign language and then try and translate something?!! English is not my native language so I perfectly understand that there’s not a single possible way to translate something from a language to another and that you often can’t avoid losing parts of the meaning in the process. A language is not just a conbination of words that you put together! A language is alive just like the people who speak it. It’s a mix of words, grammar and above all CULTURE. and that’s why when you translate something it’s extremely hard to keep true to the original text and at the same time make it intelligible for the reader. And if you’re not aware of that then just don’t go running your mouth and start being grateful to the people who try their best in doing so.
Anyways, I’m going to do just as you said guys and send you all of my love. Please keep up the great work you’ve been doing with your projects until now. Hopefully, there’re more people like me who do appreciate what you’re doing for us than those haters. I LOVE YOU GUYS SO VERY MUCH (=^w^=)
Poor K. I hope she isn’t internalizing the comments from the social troll.
I’m concerned about cyberbullying on a personal level. I witnessed friends of mine participating in a flame war with a troll and was shocked at the behavior of many of my friends. It’s making me revaluate those relationships sadly.
I’m shocked to know how you’re bullied, and shocked by the stupidity of people.
I agree with everying you wrote: especially now that I’m studying Chinese, I understand perfectly what are you saying – it’s a language on it’s own.
I’m so sorry that you have to go thru all that!!! You definitly didn’t deserve it!!!
I think you guys are one of the best&most hart hard working scanlation groups out there, from my expirience reading manga for the past 18 years (yes, I’m old ;__;). You release DAYILY, always in HQ, and you fishied your projects fast!! ❤ Even without all of that, you didn’t deserved to be bullied!
Sending you my love and support!
Forgot to add that K is a goddess for translating GDC novel. I’m forever and ever gratful to her, and thanks to her (and Addis for editing) I got to read the masterpiece that changed my life~ ^___________^
too bad… i binge-read the novel, patiently waiting for updates and now it’s dropped because of rude and insensitive people.
anyways, thank you, ExR for your hard work.. I respect your decision, and I’ll go enjoy the novel translation instead. I hope you won’t delete it. I loved the story so much.
This was difficult to read. That a group of intelligent and dedicated people should have to suffer at the hands of the sad and ignorant leaves me cold.
The amount of work needed to translate any novel has to be daunting, but a novel with the scope and complexity of GDC being translated from Chinese to English Is mind numbing. I studied French for four years at school and I still can do little more than order a beer in a Calais cafe.
It’s easy to say “take no notice,” but it sounds like these bullies are verbose and viscous in their vitriol. So it has to be really difficult to deal with.
Please know that there must be thousands of people out there who value and trust the work you do.
I look forward to seeing much more. Thank you again.
Be unapologetically yourselves and thrive.
To be honest, I think the ‘people’ (are they individual people or just one person with several accounts?) targeting you have their ulterior motives… It definitely looks fishy.
I can’t believe that some person or persons are really buying the word of mouth or text in this case. As someone who doesn’t limit themselves to just one translation group, I can tell that this group is telling the truth. I’m one who likes to get all the facts before making a decision. I comment on chapters that I enjoy and thank the translator for their work. I don’t show such negativity to someone’s hard work. As someone who has to verbally switch between on language to another, I know how you feel. Even a person in a language class that has a test on a different langauge would at least have an understanding of it. It’s no picnic. I don’t think rumors last long and hope that this group comes out stronger from it.
Hi everybody!!
Wow, I’m reading all… this entry and the previous one. What happened?? I know that you dropped the manhua now, but why? I haven’t been on the net these days and I don’t know anything, but how strong……. are people really sending hateful messages to you? Why?? In my opinion, and of course I don’t understand Chinese/Japanese, even English isn’t my native language… K did an extraordinary work translating the whole novel… even to me, who was able to read it in English easily… and the same thing with the manhua and the other projects.
The quality of your works is amazing, the translation process as you say, cannot be perfect, due to the title, the translator, the language level… so many circumstances!… but regarding the manhua in this case, you all bring us wonderful projects, and for free… Disrespectful readers, remember this: ‘for free’… all the staff have, like the rest of us mortals, their own Real Life…. and could do other things, but dedicate their time, and most of times, their deserved free time to work on these titles… for us to read and enjoy them.
Why this hate then??? – what are you complaining for?? – what do you want?? Don’t you like BL??
Well, go to other sites quietly… there are many shonen, josei and shojo titles outside there—- what do you really want?? – The manhua being dropped??
Woooow… congrats, you achieved it!…
Again, and definitively, human stupidy knows no limits.
I see the majority of my opinion on this matter is already expressed. I’m sorry there are control freaks out there that have decided how we all should act and believe. It’s very obvious that the people flaming have little idea of how to work with others peaceful. It’s sad that they’ve painted everyone with the same brush without seeing the differences. The EXR group is my first interaction with scanlations and it’s been positive thanks to your hard work.
I want to thank you for your extraordinary hard work. I really don’t understand such hateful people and their way of thinking. I think they are really blind and couldn’t see how amazing work you have done and how much time and effort you had to dedicate to make all of your translations. I’m very grateful I could find your website. Because of you I had an opportunity to read such great stories. I can’t even understand anything in Chinese or Japanese. I know how difficult are such languages. Even English isn’t my mother tongue, so I’m double owe you my respect and such kind of admiration. Thank you again! I hope that such stupid people can’t destroy your passion and energy to do what you love. In my opinion, languages are flexible, so there isn’t such thing like “perfect translation”. We can see how many editions of books we had received – according to person who made a translation. Even classic old literature have lots of translations. However, your work is really professional, neat and careful. It is very understandable why such topic is so important to you. Finally, I send you my support and love! Please, remember there are lots of people who are thankful for your work and who respect you no matter what! You are the best! <3
Seriously just leave these people alone and let then do their job that they enjoy, translating works for people who like myself like this type of genre. They like it so much that they are doing it for free.
I’m so sorry you’re getting so much hate, I really enjoyed reading your novel translation of MDZS. There’s sometimes a margin of error with translating especially with languages as complex as Chinese and people should try to understand this and empathize with the translators that are just doing the best they can.
I usually do not comment on post, but I think it’s really necessarily to say that I agreed with the comment below and I always have found K’s translation to be quite good. Like many people, I read about GDC novel from this site and love it enough that I brought the actually book series. Since I can read Chinese, I can compare the translation and the book version. Aside from new text that the author added in later, I believe both are pretty much the same. So, I do want to congrats K for a job well done even thought it was a while ago.
I don’t blame you for not picking up the manhua version because no one deserve this kind of treatment, paid or not paid. It’s too bad that one person ruined it for everyone. I hope that you would know that for every one troublemaker, there is ten time supporters who appreciate your work. Thank you for everything.
I’ve been reading stuff from you guys forever. Never would have thought there’d be people out there complaining about you guys. All the hard work you all do, I can’t imagine the time and effort put in. I love reading the translors pages from your conversations. They’re hilarious. Please know, your work is seriously appreciated. Thank you for all your hard work.
All I would like to say is “Yeah!!!!” Thank you for posting this. I wish everyone would just understand half, if not all of what you just said. Or at least the last part. We all live in the same world people. What would your mother say if she reads half the s**t you trolls are spouting? As my mother always to taught me “do unto other as you would have them do unto you.” Remember that as you type your next text, would you like that text to come back to you. Here is another one “DON’T F**K WITH A GOOD THING.” I think what these people do is great and I for one would hate it if they stopped completely. I for one can read/write any foreign language and I love my BL which is rear in the US.
Thank you for all your hard work! I’m sorry that you all have been suffering from any of this. Please know that a lot of us love and appreciate you 💜
I am both angry and upset. Angry at how callous and arrogant some people can be and saddened at the while those wonderful people at Exiled rebels have been treated.
When I found Exiled Rebels I was over the moon to discover a new gateway to fantastic novels that as an English reader and writer I would have no chance to read. I am very grateful to everyone who has put so much effort into translations. I have been learning to read write and speak Japanese for the past 2 years and I have just started on a very long journey. My gratitude to all at Exiled and I can only say the best thing to do is ignore toxic people like that.
Thank you, once more
Sadly, from what I’ve seen, the official translations aren’t up to par with the fan translations(in this case your translations). People have to understand that x language is not the same as English and the way words are conveyed are also different. Some have to use certain different words to convey the meaning that the author has given in their original language, or else it effects the immersion of the english reader. Surely, not everyone understands the proverb that was written/translated from Chinese so the translators change the wording and put the western/english version of it instead.
Twitter is full of self-absorbed, hypocritical, entitled and self-righteous SJW twittertards that care and nitpick more than they should. It’s a shitty site full of shitty people. They’re also heavily prone to bandwagoning, much like reddit.
Said something twitter no likey? off to the homophobe/racist/pedo chute for youuuu. They bully people by saying they’re a fat bitch when they’re fat fucking bitches themselves. When they get bullied themselves, they cry to the internet and try to get everyone to get their ego-dicks sucked. “Oh, woe is me :(((” Fuck off.
K, and all the ExR members, if you’re reading this, I really hope you’re all ok. Ya’ll are really chill people and you don’t deserve the hate you get. Been here since 3-pun and never leaving. Love ya’.
my god. this is sad. I am sad to know that the bullies went this far.
worry not! we still love you. those bullies can stay rot and we still love you.
you got us the rights to read, something we would never get if you didn’t translate.
thank you very much and don’t lose hope! as much as you say that there are 2 sides to everything, focus on the good side <3
love you EXR. now and forever.
don't lose hope, we are still here, supporting you all.
Whaaaaat?! I had no idea this was happening. How awful!
I’m furious. I can’t believe the so called fans are behaving this toxic. You don’t deserve critics or even bullying. You’re giving your hard work for free. You just deserve rewards and love…
I’m really sorry. I wish there was something we could to to shut up those people. Sadly, there isn’t.
Just know there is many others who only has praises for your great effort. Thanks so much.
As a person that tried translating I can tell it’s sometimes really hard, some word, sentences can be translated in many ways and here You translate from chinese which is quite complex language. I truly enjoyed Your work, so it pains me to see You get treated like that… I’ll never understand why some people are that mean to others. Unfortunatelly drama can sometimes be created out of nothing… Remember, there are people in this world who love You and are grateful for what You’ve done for them. Thank You for everything.
I am beyond disgusted at the people who don’t think of the consecuenses of their words when sending hate on the internet. We’ve lost so many people to cyber bullying cowards.
You guys do an amazing work expecting nothing in return and the bare minimum you should receive is both respect and thank yous.
These people that have nothing better to do with their lives, that can’t achieve what you guys have, truly do not deserve a second of your attention. It is truly deplorable that you have to deal with such… such an uncivilized and uncultured people. Empathy and compassion are truly lacking nowadays.
I am forever grateful for your work and hopefully this situation will change for the best. I only wish for happiness for all of you. Stay strong. I will make sure on my side that no hate towards you gets acknowledged, because that’s what these people want, some recognition over their existence.
I am sorry you had to go through this…
honestly I don’t understand the world of the web these days…I have years and years of following various scanlation groups and the things that have been happening for a while now I don’t understand…attacking members of the teams for such stupid reasons is incomprehensible…
All the best for the the team and specially those who were ill treated and please don’t let these things bother you too much…for every hater (or troll as my kids say) out there there are two or three people or even more who appreciate what you do…I for one appreciate all of your work! Thank you for all that you do!
I’m just finding out about this but OMG!! I’m so sorry all this happened. People can be so rude sometimes and it’s unfortunate that you guys had to deal with all of this. I’m sad that you all will not be completing the GDC manhua, but I 100% understand you guys decision to drop it. Thanks for all your hard work!!! As someone who only knows English, I highly appreciate what you all do and I will continue to support you guys. Thanks again.
“Be nice to each other, send love, not hate”
Hugs ExR tightly! Sending tons of love your way ❤️❤️❤️