I have a weird relationship with anime (blog-ish post)

[Sylux]

I watch anime a lot but that's only because I'm grounded from the computer so I have nothing better to do than watch shit on Funimation Channel and Netflix Instant Queue. I'm probably a die-hard anime fan, but I don't wear it on my shirt. You'd probably never guess I was into anime from a normal conversation with me or by looking at me, because I don't inject anime into everything. You see a lot of fans (I'm not going to say weeaboos, but weeaboos) who wear stupid kawaii anime hats and dumb T-Shirts that say Getsuga Teshou on them or get some moe-chan desu nee socks and eat Pocky and drink Ramune all the fucking time. There are lots of anime fans who aren't total dumbasses, Fenn, you just gotta believe and search for them. You make a new friend. Ask him if he's into anime after getting to know him pretty well. If he likes it you have another fan-friend. If he doesn't, no harm no foul.

[CypressDahlia]

I never understood the entire "weeaboo" thing.
How is "wearing stupid anime hats" different from sports fans wearing their favorite jerseys around?

The term "weeaboo" is one of those really stupid self-justified internet things. A weeaboo is bad because they are a weeaboo, not because of some concrete reasoning as to why what they do is bad. Just that, one day, someone on the internet decided "this is bad", made a word for it and let it carry. You said it yourself: the only difference between you and a "weeaboo" is that you don't wear your fandom on your sleeve, despite sharing similar interests. lol In other words, there //is// no difference.

But that internet peer pressure is really something, huh? Will make people ashamed to be //interested// in things, for chrissakes. There are a lot of people out there with absolutely //unhealthy// obsessions with things that "internet folk" find absolutely acceptable to spend hours of your day mulling over like pornography (or H), hacking into young girls' photobuckets for nude pictures and stalking jailbait over Facebook ie. the reason why /b exists. I don't see a derogatory term for that. Yet there is one for people who have a healthy interest in anime and Japanese culture?

Honestly, Sylux.

[Hayashida]

Cypress makes a good point. I have to say, I kind of agree with him. Displaying your favourite anime is pretty much the same as displaying your favourite sports team on an item of clothing. I dunno why such a stigma has been placed on the former though.

[Fenn]

You should try some martial arts or sports anime then. They're really big on techniques, training regimens, and all that usually.* But yeah, I get what you're feeling. I hardly watch anime anymore and if I do watch, it's only because I liked reading the manga that I check out the animated version.

* Some recommended titles:
Kenji - details martial arts movements, history, and techniques
Capeta - kart racing.. and later F1
Ookiku Furikabutte - baseball; read the manga, it's much easier to follow than the anime as far as tactics and strategy go
Fantasista - soccer
Hunter x Hunter - martial arts (by the same guy who did Yu Yu Hakusho)
Rurouni Kenshin - martial arts (by the same guy who did Buso Renkin)
Battle Angel Alita & Battle Angel Alita: The Last Order - martial arts/sci-fi

Kenji sounds awesome! I've always been interested in martial arts. How's the blood/gore factor? I'll deal with some but it's not my preference. I'm still totally checking this out.

I watch anime a lot but that's only because I'm grounded from the computer so I have nothing better to do than watch shit on Funimation Channel and Netflix Instant Queue. I'm probably a die-hard anime fan, but I don't wear it on my shirt. You'd probably never guess I was into anime from a normal conversation with me or by looking at me, because I don't inject anime into everything. You see a lot of fans (I'm not going to say weeaboos, but weeaboos) who wear stupid kawaii anime hats and dumb T-Shirts that say Getsuga Teshou on them or get some moe-chan desu nee socks and eat Pocky and drink Ramune all the fucking time. There are lots of anime fans who aren't total dumbasses, Fenn, you just gotta believe and search for them. You make a new friend. Ask him if he's into anime after getting to know him pretty well. If he likes it you have another fan-friend. If he doesn't, no harm no foul.

...I get what you mean but that wasn't really my concern.

I never understood the entire "weeaboo" thing.
How is "wearing stupid anime hats" different from sports fans wearing their favorite jerseys around?

The term "weeaboo" is one of those really stupid self-justified internet things. A weeaboo is bad because they are a weeaboo, not because of some concrete reasoning as to why what they do is bad. Just that, one day, someone on the internet decided "this is bad", made a word for it and let it carry. You said it yourself: the only difference between you and a "weeaboo" is that you don't wear your fandom on your sleeve, despite sharing similar interests. lol In other words, there //is// no difference.

But that internet peer pressure is really something, huh? Will make people ashamed to be //interested// in things, for chrissakes. There are a lot of people out there with absolutely //unhealthy// obsessions with things that "internet folk" find absolutely acceptable to spend hours of your day mulling over like pornography (or H), hacking into young girls' photobuckets for nude pictures and stalking jailbait over Facebook ie. the reason why /b exists. I don't see a derogatory term for that. Yet there is one for people who have a healthy interest in anime and Japanese culture?

Honestly, Sylux.

I was under the impression "weeaboo" defined someone who, through anime fandom, obsessed over Japanese culture without actually knowing anything about it. I do have a problem with people claiming to be educated on something they have no clue about.

Simply being a super-dooper-anime fan, and being outward and passionate about it, is completely acceptable.

Anyway, I feel like, for me, anime will always be about the art before the actual show. Oh well.

[CypressDahlia]

Naw, part of being a weeaboo is going out of your way to learn //more// about Japanese culture. But learning is hardly harmful, especially if it transcends cultural barriers.

You might like shows like Grappler Baki that really delve into things regarding techniques (some, of course, exaggerated well beyond plausibility), a lot of mid-fight analysis and a variety of martial arts. TOUGH is a great manga that is similar, but also goes beyond the ring and talks about things like efficient dieting, healing and nursing methods including things like acupuncture, massage and regurgitating poison and other relevant shit like this. There's some magic/mystical kung fu type stuff thrown in there for good measure. But it's rare.

[jubeh]

I don't want to turn this into a semantics thing but I've always understood a weaboo to be somebody who feels japan is superior to their country of origin either due to ignorance or superficial reasons.

If it's just a person who is interested in japanese culture and history then I am a super weaboo since I own every eiji yoshikawa book that has made it to america and I eat an unhealthy amount of ramen.

[Hayashida]

Oh yeah. Isn't the term for someone who really likes anime and manga an Otaku rather than a Weaboo?

[CypressDahlia]

Not on the internet, apparently. A weeaboo, according to the common netizens, is just a person who is obsessed with anime/Japanese culture. Yet I fail to understand how wearing T-shirts with Japanese phrases, using Japanese pronouns or wearing anime themed attire constitutes "obsession". It's one of those things where they take a generally harmless thing and try to apply as negative an inflection on it by carefully picking and choosing the most convicting words. Yet, it's extremely easy to be labeled a "weeaboo", despite the fact that "obsessed" seems like a very high order of interest that most people wouldn't qualify for. If you even admit to liking anime on some forums, they'll call you a weeaboo.

It all really makes no sense. It's kind of like anti-furdom in a sense where they KNOW there is a --small-- target demographic within a large group of like-interest people that the term "furfag" addresses. Yet they try to clump even the most mildly interested people together with the "furfags" (ie. "I wear fursuits in public and fantasize about sex with animals") based on extremely general likenesses (like having one or two anthropomorphic OCs) that otherwise wouldn't qualify you for such an exclusive label. They just want to villainize everyone in that field of interest.

So what you say may be true. That MAY be the definition of weeaboo, in truth...but people sure do use it loosely.

[Ozzaharwood]

This is an interesting turn of topics... O____O

I suggest Darker Than Black and Ghost in the Shell. But iunno, that's just what popped into my head when I thought of the stuff you like.

[Hamachi]

Most Southeast Asian countries would probably have entire segments of their youth designated as weaboos in that regard. Seriously, every self-respecting bookstore will have at least several shelves stacked full with mangas, and every family-oriented TV station would have at least a few animes in their repertoire. I'd want LVUER's and Commander Naz's affirmations on this, but I'm pretty sure the phenomenon is fairly widespread.

I dunno. Maybe Asians associate with Japanese culture more readily than Westerners? Having lived there, I'd say that even most adults would hold the same kind of nostalgia towards anime as Americans have towards Saturday morning cartoons. So it's really funny to find that something held normal where I grew up would be seen as socially awkward elsewhere.