There’s a lot to comment on in the world and entertainment media has always been one of the best outlets for social commentary. Anime has been no stranger to the potential to discuss social issues. Silent Voice was iconic for portraying the real-world effects of bullying and different aspects of mental health struggles.

Psycho-pass commented on the criminal justice system and criminality as a whole. Now Black Clover can join that select few anime with highbrow messages about social issues. The series addresses the themes of cultural bias and systematic inequality, but does it do it well, and how does it go about it? Let’s find out.

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What are Bias and Inequality?

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Cultural Bias can be seen as prejudice towards or against a certain group or individual. It’s been seen in one form or another in shonen hits like Naruto, My Hero Academia, Jujutsu Kaisen, and others, usually directed at the protagonist. The same can be said for Black Clover, where most peasants or less magically-inclined individuals experience prejudice.

Systematic inequality can be more challenging to address and resolve because it’s on a macro scale compared to cases of individual bias. With systematic inequality, there’s a system in place that unfairly benefits certain groups more than others. In Black Clover, the scales are tipped towards those with greater magical ability. Magical ability and power can be closely correlated to real-world economic status. The least magical towns of the series are also the poorest and least respected.

One common stance to take in addressing bias or systematic inequality is to rise against it and prove it wrong through success. Another is to acknowledge it as a problem and try transforming the system itself. Black Clover focuses on the first stance, although it does also slightly attempt to change the system.

These Tokens Aren't For Arcade Machines

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There are three core characters who start as common peasants, but then fight to earn the acclaim they deserve, counteracting bias in the process. The show uses them as token characters of low status to show viewers the world through their eyes. Asta, Yuno, and Zora all start as peasants who are looked down upon because of their humble beginnings. Asta has absolutely no magic ability at all, Yuno has insanely proficient magical ability, and Zora is somewhere in between. Each of them has different experiences based on how the world responds to them, their power, and their backgrounds.

Asta constantly gets trashed by nobles or even relatively common peasants who have higher levels of magic than he does. He works hard to excel in other ways, and he also lucks out by gaining a demonic anti-magic power. He’s essentially the proverbial “rock” to most magicians’ “scissors”, but like typical shonen protagonists, his real strength is boundless willpower. Even after showing how powerful and capable he is, it still takes a long time for him to dispel some biases directed toward him.

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Yuno starts out similarly to Asta in his economic and social status since they come from the same village, but things change pretty quickly for him. As soon as he shows his power to anyone of those biased haters, they change their tune.

Zora is a little different from Asta because the bias directed at him is more for him simply being a peasant since he isn’t powerless. Like Asta, the biases directed toward him don’t disappear as soon as he shows his power, but he still doesn’t face prejudice as badly as Asta does.

The Winds of Change

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So far, the series still has some way to go in completely resolving the bias present in the Clover Kingdom, but it’s on its way. Some bias about peasants being less capable or less deserving of respect has faded away. A large part of that is due to Asta, Yuno, and Zora wiping the floor with nobles at the royal knight selection exam. From the beginning of the story, there have also been attempts to diversify the magic knight roster with peasants. The wizard king, Julius Novachrono, even visited Zora personally to convince him to become an official magic knight.

As everyone knows, diversification is one of the biggest antidotes to implicit bias and systematic inequality. Next would be education, which there hasn’t been too much of in the Clover Kingdom. It also has to be said that Noelle, one of the unpopular Black Bulls squad and an originally biased person towards peasants, has come a long way. When Noelle was first introduced to viewers, she was shown to be a very narcissistic person with rude prejudice towards peasants. She believed nobles, like herself, to be superior to them. Since then, she’s taken a really hard look in the mirror and come to terms with her implicit bias.

Onwards to Progress

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Black Clover addresses implicit bias and systematic inequality better than many series with those themes or similar ones. Granted, the series can be heavy-handed with the messaging at times and tends to make their peasant status a large part of Asta, Yuno, and Zora’s identities. Still, their character arcs include rising above their peasant status to achieve what they know they deserve, so it’s not unreasonable. It would still be nice to see the society in Black Clover make more efforts to change the system itself since implicit bias is only the beginning.

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