Yubitsume: Difference between revisions

{{tropeUseful Notes}}

[[File:Hardcore_Business_MangaHardcore Business Manga.jpg|frame|link=Bucho Shima Kousaku]]

'''Yubitsume''', also referred to as "yubi o tobasu" (meaning "finger flying"), is a ritual from [[Yakuza]] tradition that is performed when saying sorry just isn't enough. If a [[Yakuza]] were to dishonor himself or his superiors, he is required to cut off the tip of his left pinky finger and offer it up as an apology to the offended party. And if a yakuza continues to screw up, it might not stop at one pinky tip.

Sometimes in fiction the exact ritual isn't followed, but the idea is the same: self-mutilation for the sake of honor or an apology.

See also: [[Honor Before Reason]], [[Seppuku]], and [[Fingore]]. May invoke [[Major Injury Underreaction]].

This is the reason that [[Four -Fingered Hands]] are [[Values Dissonance|a rarity in JapanJapanese animation]].

* In ''[[Higurashi no Naku Koro Nini]]'', instead of having to cut her finger off, Shion Sonozaki has to rip her own fingernails off, one for each of her sins, to earn repentance from her family, who are the Hinamizawa equivalent of the Yakuza. After that, her twin sister Mion was [[Heroic BSOD|so shocked and depressed]] that she willingly ripped her own fingernails off.

* Referenced in ''[[Gokusen]]'' after the Family lawyer, a close friend of the [[Mafia Princess|Yakuza Princess]] heroine is shot by a member of an opposing group. Two of the Yakuza who are her friends/subordiantessubordinates comment that it wouldn't be enough for the rival group to make amends by sending her the shooter's pinkies and little toes; she'd demand his life.

* A Yakuza boss in the seinen manga ''[[Homunculus]]'' did this almost constantly. Most of his gang members were missing pinkies because he would remove them for insignificant reasons like interrupting a meeting. Turns out he has a [[Freudian Excuse]] from accidentally slicing his brother's finger off as a child. When the main character helps him realize his problem, the boss slices his own pinky off.

* The titular character in ''[[Kabuki (Comic Book)|Kabuki]]'' is made to do this after killing the [[Big Bad]] against her bosses' orders.

* The first ''[[Battles Without Honor and Humanity (Film)|Battles Without Honor and Humanity]]'' movie has a yubitsume scene. Since the film is a ruthless subversion of Yakuza movies, they lose the finger. In the chicken coop.

* In ''[[Showdown in Little Tokyo]]'' one of the [[Big Bad]]'s subordinates does this because he fails to prevent the heroes from rescuing [[I Have You Now, My Pretty|the girl his boss had kidnapped and planned to molest]]. Too pissed off, his master just drives his katana through the lackey's chest afterwards.

{{quote| '''Cath''': How come you got all your fingers, then? I thought you had to chop one off every time you screwed up.<br />

* In [[The Devils Arithmetic (Literature)|The DevilsDevil's Arithmetic]], the woman in charge of the prisoners at the concentration camp gets a finger shot off every time someone escapes or things get out of hand.

* Referenced as kind of a joke in the ''[[Layer Cake]]'' novel. [[Villain Withwith Good Publicity]] Eddie Ryder is telling the protagonist about his business dealings with Japanese businessmen. The [[Villain Protagonist]], knowing Eddie is a [[London Gangster]], and that the business deal involves drugs assumes (likely correctly) the "businessmen" are [[Yakuza]], angering Eddie. While the protagonist apologizes for the assumption, he makes a sarcastic reference in his narration about (paraphrased) "perfectly legitimate businessmen covered in [[Tattooed Crook|tattoos]] and missing their pinkies".

* In [[Charles Dede Lint]]'s [[Cyberpunk]] novel ''Svaha'', {{spoiler|[[Yakuza]] attorney Fumiko Hirose}} does this shortly before {{spoiler|setting out to avenge the murder of her lover}}.

* In ''[[Kamikaze Girls (Light Novel)|Kamikaze Girls]]'', Momoko's father is an incompetent low-ranking yakuza member who was supposed to get his finger cut off after a screw-up, but cried and begged so much that the boss let him off the hook. (Momoko has nothing but disdain for his cowardice.)

* The ''[[Tales Fromfrom the Crypt]]'' episode "Cutting Cards": a pair of compulsive gamblers are determined to compete and find out who's the best in the world, but they wind up even in every game they play. They eventually come down to playing "Chop Poker," where every time you lose a hand of cards, you lose a finger from your hand. At the end of the episode {{spoiler|neither one has any limbs left, and they're stuck in a hospital playing checkers with their noses}}.

* Referenced in one of the early episodes of the fifth season of ''[[Burn Notice]]''. Michael is trying to intimidate a wounded [[Yakuza]] member into revealing where the group has stashed a group of abducted women being smuggled into the US and [[Sex Slave|forced into prostitution]]. The Yakuza guy laughs in Mike's face, then holds up his hand, which is missing half of his ring finger, and explains that he did that to himself as a punishment for falling asleep on guard duty. He says that Michael can't scare him, and that there is no way he'll betray his own people. Sure enough, he proves to be a tough nut to crack.

* Sorta used in [[One Thousand1000 Ways to Die]]. A high-ranked Yakuza boss gets pissed with a karaoke singer and has the dude's finger cut off... [[Too Dumb to Live|and then swallows it whole]]. As he chokes, one of his mooks attempts the Heimlich maneuver... but does it incorrectly and kills his boss,

{{quote| "Young Yakuza, but none of my fingers cut,/So I can still sip Red Zinger with my pinkies up"}}

* In one of the ''[[Battle TechBattleTech]]'' "Blood of Kerensky" novels, the oyabun of a yakuza organization loyal to the Coordinator (ruler) of the Draconis Combine on the planet Edo orders an underling to do this after he takes the 'initiative' to blow up a bar that the invading Clan Warriors frequent, kills far more civilians than invaders, and in the end, allows a Buddhist monk to take the blame and sacrifice himself in order to prevent further lives lost in retaliation.

== WebcomicsWeb Comics ==

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