Translation with an Agenda: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
{{quote|''Traduttore, Traditore.'' ("Thou translator, thou traitor.
Translators are professional people who would never put their political ideology, religion or other such opinions above their job, and would never violate the text in order to advance their own views.
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Well, most of them anyways.
This trope is about the exceptions. Translators or editors that would, yes, and do, yes, ignore or twist the original meaning of a word or text in order to advance their point of view. Serious translators consider this an utterly unprofessional and even evil breach of ethics and of the reader's trust. Unprofessional ones, however, couldn't care less, and the result is a [[Translation
These are translations that gleefully ignore or twist the original text in order to pursue a political agenda either of the translator or of the editor/employer of the translator. Whereas a [[Tactful Translation]] is meant to smoothen the edges of a situation, a [[Woolseyism]] is essentially a distilled translation and a [[Cut and Paste Translation]] tends to have cultural or logistical reasons, a [[Translation
Needless to say, fans, translators and translator fans who realize what's going on get quite furious, with good reason.
{{examples|Examples:}}▼
== In-Universe Examples ==
* One episode of ''[[Torchwood: Miracle Day]]''
* In ''[[Knights Of The Old Republic 2]]'', the HK-50 droids masquerade as protocol droids (who among other things work as translators) to spread anarchy and war by ruining diplomatic confrontations. Judging by some of the cut content (where you see the place they're manufactured and trained), they are not at all subtle about it, often opening conversations with vile insults and overt threats they attribute to their "masters".
* In the Christopher
* ''[[Mad Magazine]]'' ran a series of [[Newspaper Comic]] strips which had been (allegedly) adapted by the Soviet Union, re-
* The final ''[[The Critic]]'' webisode showed an alternate ending to ''[[Pearl Harbor]]'' for the Japanese market.
== Real Life Examples ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110218011151/http://www.bleedingcool.com/forums/showthread.php?35676-Now-It
* While the book has never been translated fully, at least some of the controversy regarding ''[[The Satanic Verses]]'' in the Arabic speaking world can be attributed to the fact that the title was sometimes deliberately translated using the word "ayat", which specifically means the verses of the Quran as opposed to its more general English title.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110811004730/http://www.fakku.net/viewonline.php?id=6014&page=1#page=15 This very NSFW page] of the hentai title "What is Islamic Fundamentalism?" ([[Rule
* In his [[Let's Play]] of ''[[Metroid Prime|Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
{{quote|
* There's an [http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v374/miniaa/ch228.jpg infamous scanlation] of ''[[
** In all fairness, there is a case that the fact that both of the pair are notably underarge might be a factor.
* In an inversion, many Chinese films will have lines altered when exported to the US to remove any pro-Chinese political messages. With some films, this not only means taking out overt references, but anything that can be construed as even vaguely political. Suffice to say, has become a [[Berserk Button]] for fans.
* [[The Franco Regime]] had a board of censors to make sure Spaniards weren't exposed to foreign filth and dangerous political ideas. This extended to movie dubbing, and some efforts of the censors are still legendary in Spain, the most egregious one being turning the protagonists of the adulterous affair in ''[[Mogambo]]'' to an innocent-looking brother and sister, making their visually hinted relationship [[Incest Is Relative|incestuous]] instead in a spectacular backfire. Another straightforwardly political one was omitting Rick's past as a fighter for the Spanish Republic in ''[[Casablanca]]''.
* Progressive/Social Justice activist crowd played gatekeepers by attaching itself to translating companies and harassing those that don't bow to them. Eventually, some localizers (Treehouse is particularly infamous) got so bad that they attracted serious backlash.
** ''[[Dead or Alive]] Extreme 3'' [[Beach Episode]] attracted enough of nuisance that developers announced «We do not bring DOAX3 to the west and won't have any plan change in the future. Thank you for asking.» Then Play-Asia announced that «#DOAX3 will not be coming to the US due to #SJW nonsense. However, we will have the English Asia version[3] available». This move evidently worked great.
** [[Nintendo]] had problems with translations from Treehouse decreasing in quality and increasing in volume of censorship and "adaptations" (it's hard to tell which part covers "''[[Tetris]]'' harassment" thing, but it's not good either way). Same crowd was up in arms when Nintendo fired one of them for PR disaster. Nintendo of America was a part of problem, as it allowed such things to happen more than once. [[Gamergate]] crowd began "#TorrentialDownpour" — addressed Nintendo over their heads. [http://thegg.net/opinion-editorial/did-treehouse-butcher-fire-emblem-fates-with-their-sjw-nonsense-it-leans-towards-yes/] [http://thegg.net/opinion-editorial/has-nintendo-treehouse-injected-sjw-nonsense-into-puyo-puyo-tetris-for-the-switch/] As the article here [http://thegg.net/opinion-editorial/fire-emblem-fates-a-broken-trust-a-personal-take-on-the-terrible-western-localization/] says —
{{quote|If I hire a translator, I expect that person to translate what I say. I don’t expect him to make something up. I have to trust that person. If I learn that what I said was not translated correctly, would I re-hire that person? Of course not. There are real-world implications and consequences. Why should video games be any different? If the video game industry is supposed to be an adult, grown-up industry, why does it accept less of something so important that is basic in the real world? }}
*** In a surprising twist, Nintendo eventually fed up with lost sales and announced that it's not something that should be their business. [https://web.archive.org/web/20200328152255/https://www.exclusivelygames.com/nintendo-says-censoring-games-is-bad-for-the-industry/]
=== Real Life Examples in [[The Bible]] ===
Some translations of the Bible are considered by some people to have an agenda. This not only makes this trope [[Older Than Print]], it also earns the Bible a section of its own!
* The [[wikipedia:Septuagint|Septuagint]] is a translation of the Old Testament from Hebrew into Greek, which was completed in 132 BC. Overall, the Septuagint [http://www.doxa.ws/Messiah/Lxx_mt.html agrees with the Dead Sea Scrolls] more than the Masoretic Text does, but some renderings aren't quite exact. For instance, each instance of ''YHWH'' (God's personal name) was replaced with ''kyrios'' (Greek for "lord"), and a Hebrew word meaning "young woman" was translated as a Greek word meaning "virgin". A couple cases of bias in Bible translation can be traced to the Septuagint:
** Some Jewish people accused
** The New World Translation, produced by
*
* The line translated in the King James Version as "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live". Though [http://biblehub.com/exodus/22-18.htm many modern translations of Exodus 22:18] use "sorceress", an equally valid translation would be "poisoner".
** There was no real distinction between the use of malign magic and poison in the culture at the time. Both made people fall dead with no visible reason. In any case, "witch" in the context means "a person who uses magic/poison to harm others", rather than "person who uses magic, period".
** The difference between "poisoner" and "witch" is that women were more likely to be accused (and executed) for witchcraft than men. "Poisoner" is a far more gender
* Speaking of English translations of the Bible, the [
* A New Testament example is the common practice of translating the Greek word
* The Temperance Bible [[Frothy Mugs of Water|altered every instance of Jesus drinking wine to drinking grape juice]].
▲* The New World Translation, produced by the Jehovah's Witnesses, changes most instances of ''Kyrios'' ("Lord") in the New Testament to "Jehovah".
* The ending salutation in Romans 16 references Junia, a female deacon or church leader. Nearly all English Bibles (minus the more scholarly ones, like NRSV) render this name as "Junias" in an attempt to make it masculine and disguise the fact that many early church leaders were women.
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[[Category:Translation Tropes]]
[[Category:Language Tropes]]
[[Category:Translation
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