this website will be updated periodically when i have time, but my writing has been moved to a more unserious blog format at thisiswherethedambreaks.blogspot.com

“Entering the village, obey the village.” – Japanese Expression

if you are watching me update this page.. talk shit to me at wahamisha@gmail.com

INTRO: THE DEATH OF AZUMANGA DAIOH

I've loved anime for a long while. I wouldn't call myself an absolute anime addict, but I would consider myself an otaku. I've always had a facination for Japanese culture and Japan's beautiful rural life. Despite popular belief, western otaku culture is not about anime, it's about Japan. It's about what we can learn from Japan and adapt into our own lives, without exact copying and giving credit to the Japanese of course. It's about having a community of other like-minded people that genuinely appreciate something special in this world. Although, that being said, anime is a huge part of Japanese culture. My favourite anime of all time? Azumanga Daioh. From the mind of Kiyohiko Azuma, Azumanga Daioh is a comedic slice-of-life manga turned anime about schoolgirls having daily optimistic adventures and overcoming the hardships of school life with an unbreaking bond of friendship.

This work was one that held a special place in my heart, and it still does! Having going through your teenage years loving a specific anime and hitting all of these life milestines whilst simultaniously re-watching and talking about and making fan projects for a show really reserves it in your heart as cherished or loved. I have been happy to enjoy this show for so many years, publically! Inviting conversation and inviting fan art and inviting fan projects. That was until 2020. 2020 was surely an interesting year. The coronavirus pandemic raged about, stay-at-home orders, and disorder plagued every country. During this time, more and more people turned towards the internet to relieve their stress and boredom. According to statistics, nearly 4 billion people were using the internet at this time! That's half of the world's entire population! Millions of young people turned towards the internet as entertainment.

...and that's where the trouble began.

well, for the most part.

During 2020, I slowly noticed a change in my close-knit fandom of Azumanga Daioh. An imageboard that only had a few people on it began to grow to 50 or so. A subreddit that I use began to expand and expand. Playing online games I would see steam avatars change to Osaka. I would see catchphrases from the show slowly appear in different forums and chat mediums. Fan art was appearing everywhere. Youtube videos I uploaded of Azumanga were suddenly getting upwards to 50,000 views "What the hell is going on!?" I asked myself, looking into the matter. What happened? Where are all of these people coming from!? Why are they doing this!? Is this a test from God?! Why is my close-knit community of people who love a show turning into a giant cesspool of strangers!? I concluded the matter, I knew what was wrong now. It all fell into place. Which can be surmised into two words:

Twitter. Memes.

How could this happen? Why did this happen? What did I do to deserve this? Why my community? Why my show? Somehow or another, people on twitter had found Azumanga Daioh. As with all things twitter gets ahold of, like a rabid dog shaking a toy, it deteriorated. Slowly, nonstop ironic memes came flowing in. "Azumanga is based!" "Osaka is schizo!" "Chiyo is cringe!" "Soramimi Cake is a banger!" These are the four horseman of the apocolypse for a show: Based, Cringe, Schizo, Banger. I had known that already. This means some teenagers had found my little source of happiness and are trampling it. Memes about osaka being a "BASED SCHIZO WITH A LOBOTOMY!!" came in nonstop. Ironic memes and ironic youtube videos had plagued Azumanga. I'm already beginning to see my youtube feed full of ironic azumanga videos at this point. Any conversation I attempt to have about the show is with a 15 year old that describes things with based and cringe rather than a longtime fan of the show with a genuine care for it. They had found it from ironic twitter memes. My quiet community in the mountains was taken completely over by teenagers who were breaking windows, stealing things, and completely ransacking the place. A beloved family member was being killed infront of my eyes. My favourite pet was being slaughtered infront of me. This is genuinely how I felt. I was watching this all unfold. Ironic Meme. Ironic Meme. Ironic Meme. stab wound. stab wound. stab wound. Everything I had worked for and built up with my community is getting defiled. This is awful. This is terrible. This is the worst feeling I have ever had in my life. Why not speak out against it? Why not say something? Why not do something about it?!

"...umm, that's gatekeeping"

GATEKEEPING!? My community is being destroyed infront of my eyes and they think they have a right to do it!? Do they genuinely believe they're in the right for killing something I love for fun?! What sort of attitude is this!? What sort of uncaring, brainless idea is that!? Why are young people thinking this way!? It may be fun for a kid to break windows and steal in a community you're just visiting, but to think you genuinely have a right to do it!?

"ummm, you can't gatekeep boomer, why do you even care? cope and mad bruh it's lowkey cringe you care about anime this much ngl lmao"

This is genuinely, no joke, the typical response I got when I brought up the issue. A bunch of pre-disposed meme garble sentence-fragment comeback that poorly defends themselves from their action. They do not think twice about this because they believe they have a right, and you're bad for caring. You are a bad person for caring about what we do to your community. Haha, you are mad because we are ruining something you care about. Why do you care so much about anime? It's just a write-off form of entertainment, pay it no more than seconds of thought for years and years of dedication and creation. You are bad and we are good.

...at this point... I realised the broader picture here.

It's not just memes. It's not just anime. It's not just manga. It's not just twitter. It's not just tiktok. It's not just the internet.

Japan itself is being invaded.

CHAPTER 1: WHERE DID IT REALLY BEGIN?

In the modern era, there are two types of internet anime fans: The "Weebs", and the Otakus. The "weebs" are a spawn of the negligence of the founding otakus to gatekeep properly, as they probably had no clue what the internet anime climate would become. The self-proclaimed "Weebs" (and yes, they will be always written with quotation marks) are people who purely watch anime for the group identity. These people can be 15 year old homosexuals on discord pretending to like whatever flavour of the month anime to feel like they're in the group, or they can be 25 year old women who buy demon slayer posters and have crunchyroll accounts and only watch dubs. Otakus, on the other hand, are people who have a genuine love and appreciation for japanese life, customs, traditions, history, and not to mention... media! Otakus are not just anime fans, otakus are fans of japan as a whole. They love Japan out of a real admiration, out of a real love. For an otaku to be an otaku, there must be no alterior motive to loving Japan. That is what seperates the "weebs" from the otakus. You're probably asking yourself, where did these two groups come from? Well, lucky for you, I have drawn out a simple graph to help you see the certains species of "weeb' and otaku and the years of their creation.

Sometime in the 1970s, there began a small subculture within the subculture of nerds. An interest for Japanese imported media began. Not only were nerds watching shows like Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica, they started to watch new animated shows that were translated from Japanese, shows like Astroboy and Gundam. There friends would send them VHS tapes, and they would spread around like wild fire. Soon, at different conventions, fansub vhs became a hot attraction to a niche community of enjoyers of japanese animation. Anime fanclubs began to form, the first organised fanclubs and communities came together for a love of Japanese animation. This became ever more so throughout the late 1980s, when various studio ghibli films would be highly praised by not only Anime fans, but overall by fans of animation and film in general. This would be the time that it was decided that anime fans need not be seperated by borders, and the first Anime forums were founded online through usenet. In these forums, Anime fans were able to post pictures of anime merch, screengrabs, and all sorts of Japanese media to each other. The late 1980s to mid 1990s were a great time for the founding otakus. Finally, from the comfort of our own home and no awkwardness of going to conventions or fanclubs, we could discuss anime together through the power of this newly utilised technology of the internet.

In the late 1990s, thanks to the power of the internet, this small collection of Anime fans began to accrue more and more followers. According to data (that i myself) gathered on various Anime club websites, the average college anime club held up to 400 members! Anime fans would gather in specific rooms of colleges and show whichever tapes they could recieve of shows like Evangelion and Bubblegum crisis. They would put their money together to purchase expensive fansubs to play on the projector in the anime club room. I mean, look at all of these western clubs!:

January 1998 Anipike Anime Club Directory - over 200!

Anime Pitstop Feb 1999 Club Directory

Anime Pitstop Feb 1999 International Club Directory

These clubs turned into conventions, most notible being Otakon, and the O.G Otaku was born. Anime Music Videos began to get featured on-screen, contests were held, fun was had. In the late 90s, AMVs became far more popular than in the 80s, from which they originated.