#like americans struggle with the more indulgent aspects (fanservice) AND the more hard-hitting confronting portrayal of violence and trauma

[superbeeny]

The ‘American Feelings Yakuza’ article reminded me of something that’s been brewing in my head for a couple years about Japanese media and the rise of antis.  Like, there's always been inflammatory bad faith criticism of characters and ships due to ship wars, but I think antis in the modern sense started to really gel when we started getting really obviously anime-inspired American cartoons by creators who actually grew up on anime and the fandoms that emerged around them (See Avatar, Korra, Steven Universe, and Voltron: Legendary Defender).  

Like, it’s not wrong to like those shows, but I do think they tended to be especially efficient spawning vats for modern anti rhetoric and behavior for some reason, and I think the way the Japanese cartoon aesthetics were removed from their original context (Japanese culture, especially their post-war period) and sanitized for the consumption of American viewers that lent itself to batshit, self-entitled fandoms who spread their attitudes like a mind-virus.  

#like americans struggle with the more indulgent aspects (fanservice) AND the more hard-hitting confronting portrayal of violence and trauma #imo voltron is an especially egregious case because it's a reboot of an already heavily altered and Americanized dub #but then look at disney. maybe appropriating and sanitizing art from other culture's is kinda american animation's original sin #decline of people actually travelling to japan doesn't help (plus covid) #antis #anti discourse #proship #proship discourse #shipping #fandoms #fandom discourse #geek culture #nerd culture #animation #cartoons #anime #weebs #weeb culture #manga