[Pool Boy]

Yo guys,

So I'm not sure if any of you guys grew up with it or noticed it where you live, and its probably not intense at all if you live in Asia or the Pacific Islands, but where I grew up in east coast America, there's a stigma for being a fan of anime or manga especially when you're not Asian. I'm white, and in middle school, I was more open about liking Spirited Away, Inuyasha, Princess Mononoke, .//hack, etc etc, like early 2000s animanga.

At the same time, nearly everyone but my best friend (who enjoyed it with me) sneered me for liking these things. Eventually in high school, it became a secret, and I stopped casually talking to people about that aspect of my life even though when I was in middle school, I was so passionate about it that I wanted to become a manga artist. (Which was how I'd gotten into drawing.)

So I was wondering if anyone else has noticed this stigma or if it doesn't exist where you live. If it does exist, have you struggled with it? I've always felt like I have to keep a huge part of myself hushed up.

[GMOT]

I never got the stigma personally. I know a lot of people who were "in the closet" about liking anime because apparently it hurts someone's image?? I got a lot of "how can you like that so openly?" or "you better tone it down, someone might think youre a freak." I just don't care about how people think of me.

I know this one girl who came to my school who chatted me up about my KH shirt, but eventually shooed me away and she said I was making her look bad? idk. but yeah, there is a stigma.

[I'm a Melon]

Oh man, it was real bad at my middle school. I was reading a manga book once and a kid was like, "Hey can I see that? It looks cool." And, excited hoping to help someone form a same interest as me I said yes and handed it to him. He then destroyed the book by cutting up with scissors and told me reading stuff like that was weird. So, after that I hid my love for Animanga until high school, in which I transferred to an art school and all the kids where nerdy and a lot of them liked Animanga.

So, I dunno. I don't think you should be scared to be yourself though :/ Mostly because the people who mind don't matter and the people who matter don't mind, you know?

[dream eater]

... Erh yeah, I have experienced it. Honestly, it's worse now for me than it was in elementary school, hell, even middle school for me was a little more tolerant of animanga than they are for me right now in high school. Maybe it isn't as bad as someone who would cut up my manga and destroy it, but there's a clear distaste.

And tbh, I guess I experience it more than others since I moved from the bay area to the two full of no asians and all white/mexican people. And they really aren't as excepting to it. It was a little tense during middle school but the people I hang out with could either tolerate or like it so it was alright.

Starting high school though people started to be mean about it. And although a lot of friends and people I hang out with like animanga, a lot of people don't like it. Someone even said to the then president of anime club that it was stupid and that the club shouldn't exist >.>

To be honest that was very harsh especially when the prez was real nice and timid and shy. Lololol but now the club's just a bunch of guys who like hentai. So yeah. People don't like animanga really because those people give off a bad reputation especially when they're a bunch of dipshits who represent our community and screw up.

[makola]

Jul 24, 2013 0:11:43 GMT -8 I'm a Melon said:

Oh man, it was real bad at my middle school. I was reading a manga book once and a kid was like, "Hey can I see that? It looks cool." And, excited hoping to help someone form a same interest as me I said yes and handed it to him. He then destroyed the book by cutting up with scissors and told me reading stuff like that was weird. So, after that I hid my love for Animanga until high school, in which I transferred to an art school and all the kids where nerdy and a lot of them liked Animanga.

Wow that is so fucked up. Forget that guy and anyone who bullies in general. Everyone should be free to like ANIME/MANGA (of all things) without being persecuted like the ways you guys are describing. Who the FUCK does that?! Appalling.

I went to a school in the Bay Area. 33%Latino/33%Black/25%White/etc and this was never an issue. But this was almost 7 years ago lol. If anything, I thought the animanga community was getting stronger :o. I mean, the anime conventions are getting bigger and bigger every year. So what gives?

It's a real shame that this is happening to you guys, but I really hope you guys can pursue watching/reading animanga without assholes bothering you in the future.

[FLANNEL]

I can’t really say (or remember if) I’ve experienced the stigma, but I’m certainly aware of it, definitely. I had been watching anime since I was a kid with my brothers before I was even aware of what it was (DBZ, Toonami and adult swim were all the rage back then for us), but I didn’t start reading manga until my last year in elementary. I didn’t get picked on really, but there was this one time when another kid ‘told on me’ for reading a volume of Naruto where he does the sexy jutsu and that was just a plain mild, little embarrassment.

I guess I also vaguely recall some conversations in middle school where people would see me reading manga and were like “You like that stuff?” and I’d say yeah, and that’d be it, so I suppose by then the thing I received the most from people was indifference.

These days I go to high school in the bay area (high-five, dream eater and makola?) and I have a handful of friends who are really into animanga (like, more than me. They’re dedicated. Video games are my main thing) which is nice. I do hear the occasional “shut up” muttered under people’s breath because they/we have conversations out loud in class about stuff we watch/read so that sucks, but other than that, I (luckily) can’t say openly appreciating animanga has ever affected me negatively.

...These stories are kinda making me sad though. xD

I love you guys, you’re all cool! Don’t let any jerks you meet get you down!

[darth vader]

i'm far too uh...i don't know the word--self-possessed? idk that doesn't really fit, still--to have ever bothered hiding what i liked. i think i aggressively inflicted my taste in mecha and other shit on people actually. i'm kind of like a personality hurricane irl.

#tsunout

[Egao, Egao Everywhere]

Media is very powerful in the Philippines. People are accepting of anime, but it remains to be a discussion that would be out-of-place in formal situations xD we also have Alodia Gosiengfiao who is an international sensation in cosplaying, and the Philippines is always proud of any Filipinos who are recognized abroad (if they notice them in the first place anyway lol)

I've even talk of Kino No Tabi once in my class during my "free talk." And text-based roleplaying xD I didn't really garner that many interest but no one judged me. Some people simply isn't into anime and all that. It's not a bad thing here.

DotA did gain a negative reputation here for a while. The country's quite religious. I've had a friend who even refused for me to talk about it because the parish priest preached once of its similarities with God and the Devil, and how the players were being taught to protect Satan (the Scourge) from the forces of good. It annoyed me especially since I'm apparently not enough to convince her of how stupid that was, but as a friend, it wasn't worth it for me to push it.

Oh, and DotA became huge among the guys here. A lot of students skipped just to play them and I guess there are ragequits and all that. It's pretty addicting and can make you act on a short fuse. Honestly though, anything technological does that. Happens to me with coding.

A lot of Filipinos have good memories of anime. My generation did grow up watching Tagalog dubs and they were fun. Anime is more of the culture of the...middle-class and below here. You'll see them in our public vehicles called the jeepney and rappers even add anime reference to their songs like Dragonball. I think it wasn't until Alodia was recognized that anime was elevated to the level of art and fashion. It remains to be a culture that isn't "high-class" here but I think even in Japan that's the case xD

So compared to the ones you guys have there in the states, it's pretty cool here.

[skull]

Wow. Some of those stories.

I naturally keep to myself, but I grew up with like Toonami and stuff so my drawings took on that style. I'd be drawing in class, and no one ever said anything except how good it looked--impressed. Up through high-school I had always been "the best drawer" in class. No one ever teased me or anything about it, and some people would even talk to me about how they secretly liked watching Naruto or thought Inuyasha was cool. And I would just be like LOLYEAH, I used to watch that all the time. It never seemed like much of a stigma, the older generation didn't like it--especially my art teachers, but then her aesthetic was realism.

In high-school, my art teacher then didn't like it either, but he was more accepting of personal style as long as we knew how to really draw it. At the beginning of high-school, and a bit in the middle, I gravitated toward the weeaboos and otakus in my class (because there was a boy I liked u///u). And the only reason people thought they were weird was because some of them actually were just really weird or annoying, but then they were only avoided. LSS: I've never experienced or seen this sort of stigma in my community. Most of the well-liked kids in high-school were really into anime and videogames, myself included. So no one really judged? Not to the extent of some of these stories, anyway.

Actually, there was a girl that transferred to us that could inexplicably speak Japanese and everyone thought that was super cool. Idk. I guess the people here either mind their own business, or just keep to themselves. Except the chollos, but they fight amongst themselves for the sake of conflict.

[habs]

yeah...there was definitely a stigma where i live. i live in a very small town made up predominantly of white people. i had gotten in to anime and manga when i was in middle school and like some said, i was more open about it back then. i'd read manga for reading time, wear shirts with anime characters, etc. my friends and i all talked about anime at lunch.

unfortunately my anime friends graduated a few years before i did, and i could tell people thought it was weird. i don't have any horror stories like some people, but i obviously understood that what i liked wasn't really accepted.

also, like...me and my friends weren't the calm animanga lovers, we were straight up weeaboos and that makes me cringe. just thinking back to how annoying i was makes me wanna cry. T.T

i guess it wasn't horrible but it still made me feel like an outcast and i know people just posted in this thread saying "who cares about what others thing" but as a very shy person who cares a lot about what others think, it was a big problem for me. even after i stopped really liking anime/manga i still went to cons for cosplaying and because i like video games, it was hard trying to tell my college friends why i was "going home" for a random weekend.

[SEADRA]

Oh yes, I've experienced the stigma. Not necessarily towards me, but towards some people who really enjoy it. It seems all of my friends have the idea of animanga being associated with "weirdos", as in incredibly socially awkward (like, borderline-autistic socially awkward, etc.) and straight up freaks. like, you can sort of tell in school who openly watches anime and plays final fantasy and such.

It's not that I "hide it", because if you talk to me about it I'll talk back, it's just not something that I really shout to the world. I'd go to anime-con if I was invited with people and etc. I don't mind secretly watching it in my room and then when I get closer to people (somehow I end up picking really good friends) who don't give a flying flip about what I like. :'D Hell, I have so many pocky boxes on my shelf it shouldn't be allowed I like the art okay. I've also felt the same stigma for liking any sort of Asian music or watching Asian dramas. I have also seen some people ridiculed for wearing Lolita or even band shirts of Kpop bands that weren't Asian.

I personally don't see how it's any different than people being obsessed with teen wolf or once upon a time or pretty little liars or whatever it is that you hip people are into these days. I'm starting to care less about what people think now that I'm older, idk. Like, it's not worth freaking out if people "judge you" - I've never faced any of the issues you guys have talked about, I live in the South (East Coast). I mean, of course, I wouldn't bring it up in a job interview, but you do you sistah. You do you.

[/justify]

[pascaline]

I was bullied a lot when I was younger, and also had to transfer schools a lot because my family was always moving. I kinda kept the fact I liked anime a secret for most of the time because I didn't want to be bullied for it. I started liking anime when I was 9 or so, because that's when Pokemon and Sailor Moon and Toonami hit Cartoon Network. I got into those shows because a lot of girls in my class loved them. But I stayed loving anime and then manga as I got older, while it faded away from my friends. People started to think I was weird for liking it so I kept to myself. Usually I had friends who were just into Pokemon, or just into Yu-Gi-Oh because that was a trend at the time, so it was okay to like those.

I was fortunate enough to meet friends who liked anime-manga, too. I remember one school where I hadn't really made any friends for the first two weeks. Then I saw a girl reading a manga in class, covering it with her text book. Once class was over I nearly tackled her, and then I started sitting with her and her friends, who for the most part were all into anime and manga, and this one girl who was also into J-Rock and visual kei bands like me.

Generally I try to gauge whether or not someone is into the anime-manga culture, but I always assume most people aren't into it. But it definitely has become much bigger and more acceptable than it was when I was a kid growing up.

[THE LEVIATHAN]

I got lucky. I started liking anime with the typical Pokemon, yugioh, gundam, etc. that aired on Toonami when I was about... 11.

I went to a magnet school for both middle and high school and if you're unfamiliar with the term, they're basically schools that allow you to pick a certain field or subject as a "major". I took Japanese and my class was small (about 11 kids, including me). Naturally, anime was a big topic in class. My sensei was an anime fan and kept manga in the classroom that was all originally in Japanese. We were allowed to read manga in class so that we could practice reading and comprehension and tbh, I think it helped us a lot.

I never felt alone in liking anime because my entire Japanese class did and I had that class every day for 3 years. Eventually, we got a study abroad opportunity. We were all about 12 - 13, but my school's sister school was in Japan. Me and my entire class all went to Japan together, stayed with host families, and also stayed in a dormitory. We loved Japanese culture in general so liking anime was to be expected.

When I got to highschool, I couldn't take Japanese because magnet high schools don't offer foreign languages as a major. Luckily for me, I met a friend in my P.E. class who had an Akatsuki wristband from hot topic. Found out they were into anime and suddenly, they introduced me to people from other schools who liked anime. We even had an anime club in my school every week and a local library offered one too.

So I always hung out with people who liked anime and never felt awkward. My family knew that I understood Japanese and enjoyed the culture so I never got the, "Can you understand them?" question if I was listening to a song or watching anime.

I'm from the east coast (mid atlantic region) and I'm curious to know if reactions differ based on where you're from.

[/blockquote][/blockquote][/justify]

[KOI KOI]

damn, sounds like some of you guys had it rough. my story's a bit different but that just might be considering the area i grew up in. i live in houston (texas) and went to school in a middle-class ghetto school (idk how that works but it does). highschool was the same and the general census was like 30% hispanic, 60% black, 8% asian, 2% white. there was also a magnet school that was predominantly asian but even outside of that anime was pretty okay. except it wasn't considered anime, it was just high quality cartoons. no one really got any flak for liking cartoons or comics (l0lmanga). if anything, you wer a bit weird if you didn't like them. typical "yo wtf you don't know who goku is? wtf is wrong with you, son?" and "naruto is pretty dope tho, no lie. ain't no one got a ten thousand fist move like my home boy." but that was only with the mainstream and mostly with the guys.

occasionally people would get ripped on for pokemon/yugioh but that wasn't too often. the only people who really got bullied were those that came off as weird, like weeabos and neckbeards. the people who would only talk about anime, used japanese words and honorics because it's "sugoi" and all the junk. also, anime was highly stereotyped. a guy who watched clannad might as well be watching a daytime soap opera or cross dressing. so i guess you could say we had gender roles and expectations but that's still pretty lax compared to what some of you guys had.

this doesn't apply to the mostly asian magnet school tho. everybody knew what anime was (no surprise, i guess). about 40% of the school body would openly talk about manga/anime and some of them even read them online during their free time. sometimes it got bad enough where 3/4 computers in the library were being used to read manga when we only had like twelve. so i guess we did frown upon those people but that was for good reason, we actually did need those computer since we had a shit ton of work. also, our manga department was really shitty. go across the street to the normal school and you had fucking barnes and noble over there. like wtfffff. it makes sense tho cause we're like 400 students and they're like a few thousand.

but all anime clubs were lame as hell tho. and, for the most part, everybody there was pretty weird. like really thick on the weeabo scale. you like anime? you do it on your own time and with your buddies.

[habs]

in what other people are saying, about it depending on where you live, i agree w/ that wholeheartedly. like i said i live in a very small town that has a very low asian demographic. like, very low. nonexistent. the only asian students i've met were foreign exchange students.

my town has less than 3000 people in it and there are about 600 kids in my high school (grades 7-12, most kids are rural kids too) so yeah, i think its a lot different from people who grew up in a bigger, more diverse city, because there's more stuff going on than you know, snowmobiles and farming and getting drunk in someone's barn on the weekends.

i could be wrong but that's my take on it.