So now we have a few ideas about where we like to take our next project, but we’d love some input. Two big things that jumped out at us were women in fandom and anti-fandom. The women in fandom one seems rather obvious, but when we thought about how few women we really got to survey in our Otaku Diaries (only 11), we felt like there wasn’t enough information about them coming to the surface. Then there is anti-fandom, the act of being devoted to the hardcore hatred of a series. This phenomenon of actively disliking a show and/or its fans has been ever present especially in anime fandom. But if someone else has an even more spectacular idea, we are all ears!

Personally, I’m proud that we were able to see this project through to its conclusion almost a year and a half after it came into existence. It wasn’t always what we expected it to be, and it certainly wasn’t flawless, but I’m glad we were able to follow through with it which will hopefully set a standard for any upcoming projects.

I must say overall I think the project was a huge success. We got a great response from people all through out the anime and manga community. We received tons of help from blogs and podcasts who got the word out about the project when it was starting up and needed the most help. We got great responses from the wonderful people who filled out the numerous extremely personal questions. As the posts came out, I saw several posts where people picked up ideas we had presented in the Otaku Dairies and either built on what we said or presented intriguing alternate ideas. We even got some constructive criticism which is often more important than praise. I think no matter what we got people thinking about anime fandom. We got them to question the way they looked at their fellow fans and maybe even themselves. I have seen other people trying similar experiments outside of academia and look forward to the results.

What was really successful for the project was our overall goal, we wanted to see and show others how diverse yet how connected fandom was and we wanted to do this through more than just a percentage and a cookie-cutter answer for questions. I think by going in with a positive goal, it really helped to keep us in the spirit of the project and enthusiastic about the posts. And I have to agree it was really rewarding to see people mentioning Otaku Diaries on their own blogs or podcasts or even just talking about it on Twitter. I think certain sections of the survey were clearly more popular reads, but that also stems from asking the right questions, in the right way, and getting wonderful, thoughtful, and revealing answers. And in this way making it anonymous was certainly the right decision.

As with any major project mistakes will me made. The biggest mistake oddly enough was the instructions for the part of the survey called the “Otaku Diary.” We wanted to see how much the average anime fan watched and did anime related activities over the course of the week. If you notice there is nothing from that section in the posts because most of the time that section was not filled out and when it was it was incorrect. Our instructions for that section were horrible. We should have gone into more depth of what we wanted and provided a sample so people knew how to fill it out. In hindsight, that section should have been a project in of itself. Considering how many questions were in the main part of the survey it was too demanding to ask anyone to also catalog what they did for a week as well.

I completely underestimated the amount of time that would have to be devoted to this project. It is almost a blessing that we had a solid pool of 40 participants, I think too much more would have really made things unwieldy. The sheer amount of information gathering, reading, and re-reading took a couple of months. This also dictated the schedule of posts to once a month, I think this may have flagged some readers which was unfortunate. As for the wording on the “Otaku Diary” part, yeah, I don’t know what we were thinking. But to that end, I wish we would have put more examples in the entire survey as a whole. We came too late to realizing our errors in the vagueness of certain questions and then getting a myriad of answers because of it making connections between them all became much more difficult. Even a simple “If yes, please explain,” would have probably helped at points.

Even more than what we did wrong there were things that we would change if we ever did a similar experiment again. First and foremost we would narrow the focus of the next experiment we do. We would look at some smaller groups or aspects of fandom with less questions but more participants. We also got some great insight into how to phrase our questions to get better answers. Also some questions immediately gave way to ideas for follow-up questions that we did not think of when we wrote up the survey. We might also try doing the next experiment with interviews over Skype. We would lose some of the anonymous candor but in return gain the ability to be more probing when asking questions.

In a perfect world this survey would be collected digitally. But the fact that neither of us really have the technical skill required to do that and the places that do it for you, we were worried about security issues, it just wasn’t going to happen. But of course this would have helped the organization of information and probably cut some of the time down throughout the process. And even though of course I would shorten it, this long survey was actually able to help us understand what topics and focuses might be viable for further study. We literally didn’t know how any of it was going to go or how people would answer and react, so really the wide range was both a good idea and difficulty.

I’m not sure what other people have taken away from the Otaku Diaries but I took a greater appreciation of my fellow anime fans. All the participants impressed me on some level with their answers. Even if I can’t attach a face to most of participants (and I’m sure some of them appreciate that) I was touched by the intimate look they allowed us to have into who they are and how their hobby has affected them. The experiment also confirmed and dispelled some of my conceptions of fandom. It confirmed the fact that anime is a young fandom with enthusiastic fans of both genders. I was relived by the diversity of the fandom although unsurprised that it tended towards the geeky. All of the results made me wonder if someone were to do a larger survey with say 1000 participants how much our data would match theirs and how much did our small sample size misrepresent the truth.

I want to doubly point out that this was an amateur experiment, we don’t have degrees in sociology, psychology, statics analysis, or anything else that might be relevant. We were just two people who wanted to know more about our fellow fans and thought others might enjoy the journey as well. It wasn’t a perfect project, but I learned a lot and I think the many people who participated and read along enjoyed the results of the project. I am certainly interesting in doing more in the future.

The most important think I took away from the Otaku Diaries was what an amazingly diverse, beautiful, passionate, and even a bit frightening group of people the anime and manga community is. Everyone who participated in the project gave us a fascinating insight into what types become fans of this hobby. Each entry was like a self portrait in its own unique style and pallet of colors. But all of the images could be put together to give partial insight into the giant collage that is otakudom. I hope that the project helps anyone to look at the big picture of anime and manga fans in a new light.

Special Thanks: The Otaku Diaries were mentioned by Anime World Order, Anime Roundtable, The Ninja Consultant, Dave and Joel’s Fast Karate for the Gentleman, and Ain’t It Cool News and we must thank them very much for helping us to find participants. Ogiue Maniax blogged about each entry, Anime Diet discussed otaku dating in regards to our article on it, Fuzakenna was a participant and even posted his Otaku Diary survey publicly, and Anime3000 invited us on the A3K Panel to discuss the project.

• 8 people mentioned Gurren Lagann or characters from it as inspirations, characters they admire or are like. It was the most mentioned show by name. 1 has a Gurren Lagann tattoo.
• 1 person is a twin.
• 3 people work in libraries.
• 1 man noted that he can have multiple orgasms and has had as many as 8.
• Many people didn’t know the term “shipper.”
• 1 person suffers from cluster headaches.
• The most mentioned anime directors in order of most popular are: Satoshi Kon, Hayao Miyazaki, and Akiyuki Shinbo.
• 1 girl said she had a huge crush on Dave Riley (from Fast Karate for the Gentlemen). Likewise 1 guy said he had a man-crush on Daryl Surat (from AWO).
• 1 person takes their lunch to work in an Neon Genesis Evangelion tin.
• 3 people named AMV Hell 0 as something they had watched in a group for laughs or otherwise.
• 1 person ended up breaking up with his girlfriend after he canceled a date to watch Yu Yu Hakusho.
• 3 people mentioned owning anime character body pillows.
• 1 person’s mother said she was “too older for cartoons,” but watches Pixar movies.
• 1 man’s fiance broke off the engagement because he wouldn’t have sex with her before the marriage.
• 2 people were army brats.
• 1 girl has a great love for Germany and plans to move there.
• 2 people mentioned they are most like Madarame (from Genshiken).
• 1 person’s father is bi-sexual, married but has a long-term boyfriend in another state.
• 2 people describe themselves as weeaboo.
• 1 person is home-schooled.
• 2 people are in open-relationships.
• 13 were/are officers in an anime club.

We hope everyone enjoyed the unique flavor of this post. Next month will be the last post in the Otaku Diaries. We will be looking our of experiences and feelings on the project as a whole. What did we learn? What preconceived notions did we have that were validated and which were overturned? What would we do differently and what would we expand upon in another similar experiment? Also expect requisite thank yous to everyone who made this possible and maybe even some insight into future plans. See you then.

#0091
Anime has been a part of my life for this long; I can’t imagine not being entranced by anime.

Speculating on the future can be very tricky and the more complex the system you are trying to predict the harder it becomes to be accurate as anyone who understands chaos theory and the butterfly effect will attest. But as anime fans we continually try to speculate on the future of our hobby. What shows will come out next season, what trends will become prominent, what fads will fade away, what will get licensed outside of Japan, who will be voice actors on what shows, and a multitude of other topics are constantly a part of otaku conversations. We may be wrong and we may be right in varying amounts but we are always trying to see if we can guess where this crazy train called anime and manga is going.

In an surprising turn of events everyone said they’d more than likely still be watching anime in 10 years.  . . . well, I should hope so! This is the OTAKU Dairies afterall. But beyond the initial response, I found something interesting and possibly (unintentionally) pessimistic. A number of fans responded in the conditional form of  “yes, . . . if there are still good shows.” or something similar to that effect. At first it seems like an obvious response, but at the same time it makes me think “what makes you unsure there will be good shows?” However, it must be said that many more people said plainly “yes,” “absolutely,” and “why wouldn’t I?” And then there were a few in the affirmative but with a theory that they would be a more casual fan in the distant future. So while the short answer was a resounding aye, the things ticking below the surface were still diverse.

#0094
Even if I get married, have kids, move, get a new job, or the such there will always be room in my life for anime.

I suppose that anyone willing to fill out a survey this long is in it to win it. Therefore everyone seeing themselves watching anime in the future should be unsurprising. I see this hesitancy to say anything without caveat being partially to do with the chicken little syndrome that tends to be a part of anime culture. There is always someone going around saying that anime as we know it is dying forever. Compounded with a weak economy and some turmoil in anime production companies in the present, it can be easy to make people wonder in 10 years down the line will they still be making shows that will interest them. F0r most people taking the survey there will always be something from them to watch but I understand where this fear comes from.

#0019
The people who are kids now don’t really seem to be growing up into fans like me over time. They seem to just grow out of it entirely, replaced by new kids just like they were.

#0034
Once the current recession passes and they figure out how to [make] money out of online distribution, I think the industry will stabilize at a level where there’s still plenty of good stuff being produced.

#0080
I think fandom will continue for all of eternity . . . there will always be a new generation to pick [up] where the last one left off. It may be possible that the “older” anime fans will dwindle but there will be people like me to pick up for them.

#0060
The advent of a generation that is internet savvy will only lead to more access to anime with less appreciation for it.

#0045
It will be a little less the “in thing to do” that it seems to be now, and fall back into the hands of the fans who loved and supported it from day one.

Asking what the future of anime fandom is is a very broad question to put to people because it partially depends on where you think anime fandom currently is; whether it is health or not or what that even means; and how you yourself fit into the whole scheme of things. I actually learned a lot from the answers in this section. One sentiment that really got me thinking was this theory that the gap between older fans and newer fans would continue go widen, age-wise. There was a prevalent idea that young fans are coming into anime fandom and then instead of becoming older fans they are becoming non-fans; they stick with it for a while but drop out soon after college. So while I didn’t myself think of this, I really found myself following the logic behind it and was able to apply it to what I’ve seen and experienced.

#0079
As long as acceptable strategies are found for legal distribution for new series shortly after their broadcast in Japan, fandom might contract for some time but never lose its appeal. Maybe.

#0029
. . . then in fifty years our fandom will die of old age like sci-fi fandom is about to do.

#0049
I think there’s going to be a point where things all balance out. The moe fans will have stuff to watch, and the not-moe fans will have plenty to chew on, too.

#0011
Some of the short term fans who liked it because it was trendy are starting to drop off from what I’ve seen, and the popularity is starting to diminish slightly.

#0021
. . . a majority of these young fans will eventually grow to become financially independent and upwardly mobile adults who will have children of their own creating a generation of people that are more receptive to anime and more likely to disseminate anime throughout the culture.

An important question is how long do most people stay in any hobby when push comes to shove.  All hobbies will have fans who come in and leave due to a wide variety of factors. Is the ebb and flow of anime fans any different than fans of stamp collection, basketball, or even American comics? I can’t say what if any the difference is but I would be curious to see the numbers. As long as there is a steady stream of new fans there will always be some people who stick around to mature and expand their tastes. Opinions on the future of anime fandom ranged in optimism. There were predictions of everything from growth to utter collapse. Most of the participants felt that the bubble of anime and manga had burst and that there was still some normalization in the market to take place. Everyone seem to agree that anime adapting to online distribution was the key. How effective that would be and how quickly and effectively it could be profitable was a major point of contention. Most participants agree that the casual viewers would ebb and flow but there would always be a dedicated fans base that always carry the torch.

#0040
If it’s an idiosyncratic ecchi harem show. I’m sure there’s a blueprint somewhere and they’re all using the same one.

So I gotta throw out a question that’s been nagging me, a good portion of anime fans denounce the harem genre. However, harem shows have proven time and again to be good sellers, they spawn tons of merchandise, and they make a ton of these stories! So who exactly is watching them? Are people just secretly doing so? Is there a large silent majority? I always wonder about this! Other than that it comes as no surprise that people are picky and have every right to be. This reared itself in the top 4 as fetish based things: harem, yaoi, moe, lolicon/shotacon. If anything divides people of course it is going to be these. Shonen fighting being high is both surprising and not, perhaps it shows up so high only because it is a very prevalent market. What was interesting to me was while reading through it seemed like for any person who said they watch everything, all the other people on the survey who had preferences made up for it three fold. Again in the genres that people will always give a chance, the numbers overall are lower because I think people don’t have a blind devotion to genres. Unless it is mecha apparently, this sentiment may be coming from the huge decline of mecha series in recent years. But really I see fans are being picky in what they exclude and include.

It seemed like no matter how beloved or hated any genre was there was someone else who had the exact opposite opinion. I have to wonder if the sales for harem and fan-service shows reflect the fact that while hardcore anime fans might by quick to dismiss those genres that casual fans are more willing to embrace them. The sheer number of mecha fans on the list clearly shows that our small sample size can lead to some misleading conclusions. I am certain that a large number of the participants coming from Anime World Order in part had to do with this unusually high mecha support. The high numbers for people always watching action shows and fantasy shows was unsurprising considering the best selling titles in the English speaking world. They seem to be the genres that comes as close to universally beloved as you can get. When people mentioned that they followed certain directors the three names that unsurprisingly came up consistently were Hayao Miyazaki, Satoshi Kon, Mamoru Oshii. If people followed one company it was almost invariably Studio Shaft. In fact almost no one else was even mentioned which I found most intriguing.

#0085
I’ll always give Gundam a chance, though in practice I come to like very few series. Any Nagai remake gets a chance automatically.

Of course there are no guarantees for anime’s future, but for the most part people believe the medium to be moving forward and still saw themselves as a part of the fandom for it. Whether or not everyone could agree on the future was impossible taking into account personalities and outlooks on the world. There was a little pessimism as I mentioned in an earlier paragraph, but really the fact that most people went out of their way to really deeply contemplate anime’s future position and its fandom says alot about how much they value it. So while few could agree on what genres should be ousted and what types of shows are always worth a look, it does go to show that anime includes something for just about everyone looking at the diverse collection of taste present in just these few fans.

I am always optimistic about the future of anime fandom myself. I know that due to a variety of factors people will drop out of fandom including some of the people who took this survey. Everything changes. Anime from every decade has a distinct look and feel as a whole; anime fans have changed in what they want, watch, and buy; and even how anime is distributed has changed radically over the decades. This will not stop. At the same time individual fans are changing as well. People grow older, their tastes change, the demands of their lifestyle are altered, and their experiences change how they interact with their hobbies as much as an external factors. But anime is vast and a varied enough adaptable beast that some fans will always stick with their love of Japanese cartoons. Individual otaku may come and go but the otaku spirit is here to stay.

#0099
I still have a few friends that I knew before I was heavily into anime, but they are few and far between. Most of the people I consider my friends I did meet, in one way or another, through this medium.

Thomas Wolfe said “The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief that loneliness, far from being a rare and curious phenomenon, peculiar to myself and to a few other solitary men, is the central and inevitable fact of human existence.” As an anime fan that is also a lonely person I think on that quote and wonder how alone am I in feeling alone? Is the otaku by nature a lonely beast? How much do anime fans have friends? How often do they watch anime with others? Do anime fans still go out there and try to recruit everyone they meet to get the word out about these amazing Japanese cartoons? Is there still reason to do that? I don’t think this will answer all of my questions but I do think we shed some much needed light onto how social the average otaku is.

#0019
Several days often go by wherein I don’t actually vocally speak at all. Before, back when I didn’t use instant messaging, I more or less had zero interaction with anyone.

#0042
I talk to my forum friends at least once a day. I feel that they are close acquaintances that I would get a long with if I met them in real life.

Ah, camaraderie. It was one of the first reasons I came to love the Internet in my youth. The ability to find like-minded individuals with your hobbies from all over the world and you didn’t even have to leave your room was a rather enticing prospect. And it certainly made many times less lonely or even expanded my knowledge. It also had the greater effect of making me appreciate when I could have those people or conversations face to face or watch that anime with another. Ideally you get to participate in both experiences because they both have positive attributes. I think anime fans want to be social for the most part, atleast social within a circle of people who they feel think like they do, and with the combination of technology and real life meetings, there is an outlet for it.

I found it fascinating that the answers were all over the board with the number of close friend people had. We had a good range of answers with unfortunate people who had no close friends to social butterflies with a vast pool of people they considered close. The largest group were people with only one or two very good friends. I myself can’t see having more than 3 or 4 close friends outside of college but that is a personal constraint of how I am. 48 percent of the survey had 5 or more close friends so I feel there is no sense that being an otaku doomed you to being friendless. When people did hang out with others in real life they would only do so a few times  a week at most. So while there might have been a few people who were in constant contact with their friends most people spend at least half there week or more alone. I do wonder how this relates to the average person. Do otaku go out more or less than the average. I don’t see anything to say that is would be radically different from anyone else as well.

#0030
It’s always changed the relationship in a good way. We talk more and get along better after meeting in person, and the friendship feels much less awkward.

#0009
Even with a real-time voice program like Ventrilo, it’s not the same as interacting in person because of the artificial constraints or voice-only or text-only communication.

#0016
I recently met one of my best online friends at a convention, and I can’t say anything has really changed — we were just very happy to finally be able to meet in person.

#0049
All the friends I make now, I make over the internet.

There is a desire that I saw throughout the survey of wanting to solidify an online bond by meeting, many times at gatherings like conventions, and talking face to face. It was great to see so many people that had gone out of their way to do this had a positive experience. Though it wasn’t without folly sometimes and some people even said that wouldn’t want to meet people. As an aside, I only really started meeting people online when we started the blog. But everyone’s comfort levels vary and so there is really no right or wrong when it comes to such preferences. But because there was an abundance of desire to seek people out, I felt it further went to show that otaku want other otaku around, even if they are complaining about them.

#0081
Knowing the person behind their Internet persona is always a nice thing to try and do, and most of the time, the people I’ve met haven’t been disagreeable with me, and I hope that I haven’t been disagreeable with them.

#0014
. . . I find I express myself more fluently and eloquently with written text than with the spoken word.

#0040
People AFK bore me more than people online. I just don’t feel like getting to know people anymore. I just know that there are people who are articulate and share my interests online so I don’t have much of a social drive anymore. I really don’t mind being alone.

#0065
Conversations can get pretty intimate online, but I’d say I have more close relationships in real life than I do online.

The most intriguing part to me was the divide on online friendships. Only 17 percent pretty much avoided the rest of anime fandom online. Most everyone else regularly talked to a few fans online and has a decent bond with people over the ether that is the Internet. But even more interesting was that when asked the younger the respondent was the more likely they were to regularly chat online and the more likely they were to consider their online friends just as good or better than their real life friends. As people grow up more and more with online communication being part of their lives I think people finding friends they really connect with being more and more natural. I think this goes doubly so for tech savvy people like anime fans tends to be.

#0096
I am always trying to get someone into anime. I prefer to watch with other people who enjoy it.

I wish I would have asked out right how many of the close friends people mentioned were also into anime, it would have been a further look into its significance to everyone’s lives. But the fact that so many people atleast attempt to share the joy of anime with those around them is quite nice actually. I think both of us here at Reverse Thieves heed such a call to arms, we even run a panel about bringing people into the fold! I don’t know how many other hobbies boast such a large amount of people spreading gospel. Even if there were not as many success stories as one might hope, there was still a feeling that they were able to show people exactly what their hobby was and making it less foreign to non-otaku.

#0027
I tried to get a friend into anime, but they were too entrenched into American culture to fully embrace otakudom.

#0015
I’ve been more successful with my aunt, though she is already a SF fan. Originally she was under the impression that most anime was pornographic (I’m sure her only previous exposure to it was some of Manga UK’s release in the mid 90′s, stuff like Overfiend).

3/4 of the participants had actively tried to get someone they knew be it a family member, friend, or coworker into anime this reinforces my conviction that as much as some anime fans might reject the fandom they want other anime fans to talk to. How easy this is can be very different from person to person. But while many people had tried to get people they knew into anime over half the participants still ended up watching anime by themselves most of the time. So while anime fans might want a constant viewing companion it is a task that is easier said than done.

#0063
More emotional anime, I want to be alone to watch since I tend to be much more of a joking and conversational person when I’m watching with others.

#0044
I consume anime at a rate that almost no one can complete with. So while I do often watch anime with other people, it makes up a small percentage of my anime viewing because I simply watch so much.

Personally, I can’t image being an otaku without the interaction between other fans, even in my earliest moments, I was right there on the Internet trying to find people and this has only expanded since my fandom has. And I have to agree with Hisui’s statement earlier, with newer and younger fans continually coming in with the Internet as a central part of their lives, there is only going to be more and more interaction without leaving your house. But as fans grow, so too has the convention scene, proving that just as much fans want to come to face to face and embrace their love of anime with like-minded individuals in toe.

I do feel a bit better about the situation of anime fandom in general. It seems that no matter what forums might have you believe being an otaku does not set you on the road to be a lonely hikikomori. You can make friends inside and outside of the fandom. Let us not forget that there were some people who were sadly lonely and isolated. I felt their pain and wish them well. But it was not anime that forced them into that lifestyle. It was always some other unfortunate factor that has kept them cut off. My real question is how will the Internet impact this. It seems to make it easier for people to find people with similar interests but can promote an odd sense of disconnect without direct physical interaction. We have already seen the Internet take the place of anime clubs for bringing fans together. Forums, image boards, blogs, and a million other places have formed for people to talk about anime and sometimes even meet up in real life. But is it a true substitute for the social bonds that were formed with an anime club? Only time will tell. But no matter what I hope anime fans use what ever means to continue to connect and spread the mutual love of animation.

#0047
Anime factors in because I would like to be able to share things I love with a person I’ll share my life with.

We start off the new year with what everyone is really reading the otaku diaries for: dirty sex secrets.  Who is doing what to whom and if farm animals are involved. Well, actually, that is no where near what this part is about. This is mostly a look at the romantic relationships or lack thereof of the various participants. Like it or not there is a stereotype that otaku are mainly lonely, dateless losers who know more about how to win hearts in visual novels than they ever will about talking to a member of the opposite sex. But the survey found a wide variety of people answered from hardcore 2D girl proponents to those who were happily married to love em and leave em Lotharios. The only commonality most people had was that their stories were always extremely emotionally involving.

The answers in this section may be the most varied of them all. Our group of participants ran the gamut from new to the dating scene to downtrodden, rejection of dating to belief in true love, and still much more inbetween. And what resulted were answers that certainly are very personal but still they will resonate, some views more than others, but very much every type of person can be seen here. Heck, this may be the portion of the survey that goes to show most how much fandom is a mix of many different types of people.

#0015
Obviously an interest in anime would be a big plus, or even just someone who would be willing to be introduced to my interest, and in return I’d be interested in hers.

#0009
My ideal mate would be someone I would want to be friends with, not just lovers. Sexual compatibility would be necessary. I’d like a good sense of humor, too. Looks are not really important. God, that sounds so fake and self-effacing, the kind of thing you’d expect in a personal ad, but in all honesty I’d probably settle for anything with two X chromosomes and a heartbeat.

#0049
A young cute girl who’s totally accepting of all my flaws and willing to take care of me.

I was amused that no one said that they would not date another otaku. For all the posturing that some people put on their surveys I think everyone wanted someone to share their hobbies with. I think it is the clearest sign that the otaku who hate otaku idea is merely a defensive mechanism. 70 percent of the participants had a strong preference for dating someone who also liked anime and only 30 mentioned that it did not factor into who they would date but they always said that they would date another otaku if they liked other things about them. Other fans might occasionally annoy us but in the end we want to be with someone who understands that aspect of our lives.

#0079
In considering dating though I would give more weight to “long-term” versus “short-term”; perhaps I am merely naive on such matters, but I wouldn’t consider a “short-term” liaison a relationship in this sense. For various reasons, I’m far more interested in mutual respect than mutual lust.

#0014
I don’t consider “dating” at all. It is an entirely abhorrent concept and one that exists in American movies and TV shows. No one actually does that bullshit in real life, do they?

I would really have liked to see, concretely because we certainly had some more indepth answers, whether the people who listed anime fandom as unimportant had mostly dated non-fans. No one in this section seemed to be adverse to dating a fellow fan which is interesting because of some of the answers given in the section about the word “otaku.” Though there were no answers, or questions to answer, about how deep their mates love of anime should run. Perhaps some wouldn’t want to date another engrossed like themselves, just open to it. While others made it quite clear they wanted to share this passion, for good and ill, because it was such a huge part of their lives that there was no getting around it.

I was a little heartbroken by some of the stories in the dating section. There were several people who had truly been beaten down by the dating world. There were confessions of rejection, misery, and loneliness that would move even the most callous of hearts. There were some people who had basically just given up all together. But they were balanced out by people in happy ongoing relationships as well. New love, casual flings, and even a few mature relationships were present, too. We also had several people who were happy or positive about being single. They might be alone but they had great hope for the future. It is the best sign that otakudom is not this barrier to love as some might think. It is just another aspect of a person’s personality that may or may not draw the attention of the people they meet. That did not make the sad stories any less sorrowful and meaningful but I did take some comfort in the joyous stories.

#0069
I’ve never been rejected, but only because I’ve never gone out on a limb.

#0030
I’ve been rejected enough times that I’ve lost count, and have never rejected anyone since no one has ever asked.

#0019
I’ve never been on a date in my life. The average person my age has not only had several dates, but at least 3-5 significant long-term relationships and possibly gotten married. Even “The 40 Year Old Virgin” managed to get dates.

#0034
I’ve never been rejected in a relationship context, nor have I rejected anyone, which is probably a pretty good sign that I’m not putting myself out there enough.

I wonder if these results broken down between men and women could be any sort of leveler. True there are really too few women as a whole for our survey, but the percentages are still engaging. They are closer to their male counterparts in terms of number of relationships than I would have thought. There is certainly a lot of talk about women having an easier time when it comes to finding a relationship, and it still looks that way here but maybe not so vastly different than many believe. But then I will reiterate that there are so few women on here to make any of that solid. Both genders spoke similarly of their trials and triumphs in love. I often found myself smile, even if it was sometimes a bit melancholy, that I could interpret so many people’s desires down to basically seeking someone who just loves them for them.

#0080
I’ve technically dumped every boyfriend I’ve had. Somewhere I’m restless. I enjoy the feeling of wanting something else even though I already have what’s in front of me. At some point having a boyfriend becomes boring.

#0045
She’s pretty much all I could ask for in a woman. Understanding and kind, also very giving. She lets me have sex with other women and doesn’t ask for anything more than my love and dedication in return. She knows I’ll always come home to her.

#0094
Anytime I have ever dated it has been the girl who has initiated. So it has given me this weird sense that maybe I should just sit back and hope that people I like will ask me out instead of trying myself.

We were going to put up a chart about people’s virginity but that got scrapped because we never asked the question point blank. We has assumed people would go into detail when we asked about how many serious relationships but since we were vague so too were many answers. However, much like everything else even the the most pessimistic interpretation had almost the same percentage of virgins in both genders. This combined with other questions goes to show that dating is hard for everyone it is just a little harder for otaku guys but otaku gals are hardly getting a free pass to love.

When starting this portion of the Otaku Diaries, I was looking for patterns that hearkened back to other portions of our results, I was looking for correlations in other questions, and I was thinking that fandom would show me something just a little bit telling. However, that didn’t happen here which really threw me. I thought surely there would be some pattern for the people who found anime an unimportant factor, perhaps they hid their fandom or perhaps they had dated a lot as the result, but it was a mix without any clear signs. Other results and my subsequent look back at previous questions further eluded my grasp on any sort of pattern to be had. Of course this could all be chalked up to our small 40 people, but with those 40 people other sections showed pattern and equality in certain issues. Perhaps dating is just that personal and different between each person.

#0021
Being 32, it is rather difficult to meet women who are of at least legal age at anime conventions . . .

I hope if nothing else that people who read this section take away a little hope if they need it. It is easy to fall into depression when you are a lonely anime fan assuming you are doomed to be alone. But this does not have to be the case. Hardcore anime fans were able often able to find some companionship with either their fellow nerds or people who were sympathetic to their interests. Also most of the people who responded to the survey were young so they still were finding their way in the world of romance. I assume that a good deal of the young and inexperienced participants will eventually make their way into the world of dating. This does not mean you ever have to stop trying to improve yourself or connect to other people. It is just a reminder that finding someone who you can find love with is still possible.

There were so many questions I wish we had asked in this section! It is as if when I saw people’s answers, I know exactly how to follow them up. For example, after seeing how much of an essential quality liking anime was, it would be wonderful to know how many people had/were dating other otaku and vise versa. This was answered by some people in their paragraphs, but obviously not as a whole by the participants. If ever there was a part of this survey I would like to dig deeper into, it is this.

#0096
You cannot set foot in a convention without being ashamed of fandom.

This is sort of a follow up post to the Otaku! Threat or Menace? article. However, this time around we delve a little deeper into those little pieces of fandom make you just that much more otaku. And still another post will follow this one soon about that question of just what do otaku think of fandom past and present and where is it all headed. But here you will see that anime is this creature that affects people in different ways and has a draw for people that runs both shallow and deep. And amidst all that is the wonder how the community gets along at all!

I see more and more a very disturbing attitude among anime and manga fans. This idea that they are “too good to be anime and manga fans.” The idea that them and maybe a few other people are above the hoi polloi with their horrible taste, bad manners, and overall immaturity that makes people have a bad impression of the fandom. The problem is that so many fans now a days have this feeling it means at least some of them are wrong. Either the majority of anime fans are not as bad as they think or some of the people are that part of the problem see themselves above. We are going to try to see how prevalent and pervasive this feeling is in our participants.

#0039
I don’t really feel disgust towards fellow fans because I did the same things they’re doing. I can just hope that they try to turn themselves around as I’m slowly doing.

#0016
It generally goes along with adding ‘-chan’ to everyone’s name and asking boys to kiss each other.

#0094
Sports fans can be just as sad as anime fans. I just happen to be an anime fan so shitty anime fans piss me off more. I mean there are a laundry list of reasons to be proud of anime fandom and to be ashamed.

So, the sexy statistics. You might assume that anime fandom is made up of horrible people with sickly fetishes seeing how some people talk on the Internet. But overall most people had rather mundane tastes. Guys were unsurprisingly into large breasts and oral sex. In fact that was so mundane and ubiquitous we did not bother tracking it. The most common fetishes were uniforms and glasses which were popular with both sexes. We did have 4 self confessed lolicons, 2 people into futanari, and 2 people who said they preferred 2-D girls to real ones. But they were mostly the same people. So while there were people that get much negative attention they were in the minority. I was surprised that women went into very little detail about their fetishes in anime. Also there were only 2 women who said that she was into yaoi in the fetishes question despite the fact that several women said they were fujoshi. I had always assumed that we reached the point were women were just as comfortable talking about what turns them on as much as men but that might not be as true as I thought.

Okay, can I just say that large chests and oral sex are not fetishes. They mean you are a dude. It would be a fetish if you DIDN’T like those things, thus why we listed flat chests. The only real knowledge gained from this question was that most people are still run of the mill when it comes to their fetishes. Anime otaku aren’t just made up of a bunch of sexual deviants. But just the same with only a sampling for 40 people, prominent tastes like lolicon stand out with about a 10% cut. I, too, was blown away by the lack of yaoi mentions. I am not even sure why it happened because plenty of people mentioned yuri, so it’s not as if people just overlooked these things. However, with our sample of females being very low (only 11 participants) perhaps it just wasn’t large enough to show a more open manner with regards to sexual proclivities.

#0015
. . . being a yaoi fan I often feel quite ashamed of my fandom. I know that yaoi isn’t exactly high art, it’s a pandering genre meant to be instantly gratifying, and so it’s not surprising that it doesn’t attract the most intelligent people. Still, I wish that most young yaoi fans weren’t quite so loud and obnoxious, it really makes the rest of us look bad.

#0079
If I’m ashamed of any sort of fan, it’s the fans who hate what they don’t like with a passion equal to how they like what they like.

#0019
The behavior of other fans tends to irritate me . . . and it’s only recently that I realized that the “at least I’m not a fucking loser like THOSE PEOPLE!” defense is just a defense mechanism that redraws the line a lot. I’m so far over the line of normalcy without ever having crossed the line and become “one of those people” that the line I drew may as well have been meaningless.

Almost everyone who took the survey felt that other people in fandom disgusted them at some point but only a third of the people surveyed ever felt any disgust with themselves. These results can be used to paint two different pictures. The first is there is this small group of anime fandom that gives everyone else a bad name. The second is that there is circular finger pointing at everyone else who they think is the problem. The fact of the matter is both are true. There are people who are just outright embarrassing fans. Only the most lenient in the survey did not bring up people behaving badly at cons. The other problem is best summed up with “Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own eye?” There are lots of fans who are overall good fans but have distinctly nasty habits. They see the bad habits of their peers but gloss over or ignore their own faults.

#0040
I’m a crusader against 4-chan culture. It’s disgustingly base and I’m a slave to the good and beautiful.

Most telling is that almost all fans were ashamed of other fans, but most not of themselves. So either most participants were upholding their high ideals of fandom or people don’t always see themselves as they actually are. The “it’s not me, it’s them” defense is what us and most other people probably think off the bat. However, that idea contrasts with much of the other answers we’ve gotten for other questions in the survey. People have been rather open about a myriad of personal things. Is it possible there is a disconnect when it comes to their fandom? Are people so caught up in it (otaku afterall) that they can’t really take a step back to evaluate that part of their lives? Or is it that other common happening of a few ruining this for the many?

#0014
Helped me be a better person? Find solace in a shared experience? Provided a comforting, reassuring presence when all around is chaos? . . . Been an inspiration helping me to discover new ways of seeing and thinking? Absolutely.

#0060
I don’t think there are too many good life lessons in anime. Sure, shooting a woman after sleeping with her may work for Golgo 13 but I’m thinking I just can’t pull it off in quite the same way.

Both the internet and cons have similar situations that become out of hand and can cast a shadow on anime fandom as a whole, and have cast a shadow as the opinions here express, which has many people fed-up. Biggest problem, as I see it, it too much information syndrome. And screaming it at the top of your lungs to anyone and everyone who is even remotely involved in your hobby. In a day and age where everyone is comfortable talking about anything, people just wish you wouldn’t. This coupled with, how many participants put it, the younger fans running wild in any anime meet up setting is making fellow fans cringe. But at the very same time, the internet and conventions is what has brought so many fans together. It even made doing this survey possible and as many people mentioned it allowed them to finally connect with others. More than a few people met friends and significant others through this very hobby. And as much as everyone complained about the anime community, almost everyone on the survey wants to continue to be apart of it. Just look at how many fans go one step further and create fan works or write about anime.

Overall I think this trend of anime and manga fans who hate anime and manga partially comes from this idea that people are surrounded by nothing but vile idiots. They enjoy anime and manga but see it as a fandom filled with people everyone should avoid. They get this attitude that they are above such things so they are thereby separated from what they dislike in fandom. But the answer is not to separate yourself from the community. It is to see the value it what makes anime and manga fandom great and and trying to encourage what is wonderful and productive anime being an otaku.

#0029
. . . it has provided a way for people in high school to stereotype me, which makes it hard for me to break through barriers and befriend new people. Pretty much I am know as the “anime kid,” so it takes some effort to convince other kids that I’m a normal, rather friendly person, and not some sort of bumbling social reject.

#0030
I wouldn’t be friends with nearly as many people and it kind of gives me a sense of belonging.

Despite what people said about hating their fellow fans I think the evidence points to people not being a hostile as they might let on at times. 80% of the participants had tried to learn Japanese at some point. There seemed to be a genuine interest in learning about Japanese culture and the Japanese language. A good deal of the people had contributed to some sort of activity for the anime community to enjoy be it a blog, podcast, fanzine, AMV, fan fiction, or fan art. And most everyone else who did not do one of those at least partook in the efforts of someone else who did.

What I really took away from this part of the survey is a desire that everyone wants to be a better fan. Everyone recognizes bad behavior so it is only another step to seeing it, and correcting it, within ourselves. And more positively is that people want to be apart of their hobby, anime fans maybe more than others. With few means to actually communicate with or becoming involves in the creative process of anime, fans are looking to connect themselves in different ways, some fun and some thoughtful (some a little of both). Anime fandom has a huge, and vocal, community and people want to be apart of it even if there are deterrents to it.

As much as they complained about hating other fans they usually had kind words about the people they had connected to. Anime fans want to make connections to their fellow fans and often do. There was rumbling of displeasure with their fellows in most peoples surveys but they were also able to talk about what they liked and who they felt exemplify what had drawn them and kept them in the fandom. The people who took the time to fill out this massive survey obviously cared enough about anime fandom to make their voices heard and that if nothing else is a good sign of people who still care.

The further we dig into these surveys the more obvious it becomes that our sample group is a diverse bunch that surprises me more and more. As we say in the previous post about attractiveness, you might have gotten the same results by polling random passersby on the street. I think the same could be said for many of the answers in this section as well. Okay, so maybe the majority of respondents being students isn’t surprising. But as you’ll see there seems to be specific areas that really define the otaku group.

What are little otaku made of?
Action and mecha
And cat girl tails,
That’s what little otaku are made of.

What are little fujoshi made of?
Doujinshi and fanfiction
And everything BL,
That’s what little fujoshi are made of.

-The Great Poet, Hisui

That silliness aside what does go into making an otaku? What factors say that someone becomes an otaku rather than a video game player or a sport fanatic? Are these mutually exclusive? Do any any hobbies or interests foster otakudom or hamper it? Our recent review of the second Mechademia reminds of an article in the first by Susan Napier. She states that early anime fandom was made up of mostly of Asian male Computer Science students. If that was ever true this is clearly not the case anymore? But is there a dominant theme in what sets one down the path of hardcore anime fandom? Lets try and find out.

Once again esteem seemed to be a pretty good affair in these questions with many people linking what sets them apart to their intelligence. This has plenty of cross-over from our last look at attractiveness versus smarts. However, most people didn’t consider themselves overachievers in school. In fact, a few even mentioned being lazy but intelligent which allowed them to stay in the average zone without much work. Also, more than a few people mentioned writing as a special ability, in fact it was the only answer that stood out as being often said.

In school a majority of the applicants stated that they were average students. We had a good bell curve if a bit skewed toward being academic. Almost everyone said they had participated in some type of club or school activity. Also almost everyone claimed to have some sort of skill that made them standout. The participant’s school life tended toward normal if a bit nerdy. On the career path we saw that there was no clear dominant answer. A majority of the participants were students but this is unsurprising considering that anime fandom has started to skew younger than it used to. Although computer related jobs were the most common after the overwhelming number of students there were almost as many librarians and graphic designers are there were computer scientists. We had everything from acupuncturists to financial experts. While CS majors are hardly adverse to watching anime and reading manga they are also not pushing out people from all other professions as well.

#0015
. . . in fact people seem to say I don’t stand up for myself very often. . . . I’m always avoiding conflict.

#0079
I’m probably too forgiving actually – it tends to be a long time until I’m able to extricate myself out of a bad situation . . .

#0060
I’m a terrible procrastinator. . . . I really can’t work without the pressure of imminent deadlines.

With so many results in this survey likening the otaku crowd to the average joe, the pieces that pull them away are these ones about their temperaments. I found it especially true in the question about forgiveness. Many participants frequently used the phrase “too forgiving” within their answers. This may have a lot to do with a desire for acceptance among other things. This is also reflected by so few stepping up to be leaders, having doubt that anyone would follow them or believing they have the ability to move people as a whole.

From our results I would would gather that the average otaku tend towards being introverted and passive but not to an extreme. With 3/4 of the participants not having a temper and 78 percent being forgiving it seems that otkau tends words more mild mannered. We also see that 88 percent of the participants were prone to procrastination and only 38 percent considered themselves leaders. This further reinforces a feeling that otaku tend to be on the passive side. While there are always gregarious members of any group I think the result confirm the stereotype of the shy and quiet otaku being the majority. On the other hand 73 percent of the participants did not watch anime to escape reality. Then might be quieter people but they mostly do not run from their life. Or atleast that is how they perceive themselves.

#0063
Next to none intentionally. Although, sometimes, I do change what anime I watch depending on the mood . . .

#0019
People like me all too often gladly turn to moe or harem shows to provide a respite from the grim nature of existence, but I can’t believe the illusion.

#0094
I mostly watch it to have a good time and to talk about it with fellow fans.

One of the great things about the escapism question was the variety and thought so many people seemed to put into it. More often than not people came to the conclusion that they don’t use it in that manner. However, quite a few went on to talk about how all entertainment contains some level of escapism. This I find to be quite true, though the whole debate people have about realism in entertainment sort of throws a wench into such things. How often have the words “that is so unrealistic” been hurled at a show to which one might reply “who wants it to be realistic?” Different people like different levels of true to life in their fiction. And still many more participants expressed an old desire to escape but having since moved past that part of their life.

Unsurprisingly we did not get a huge punch of athletic fitness fanatics answering the survey. Most people talking the survey did not regularly exercise or watch what they ate. We had one or two participants they played sports or did some amount of light exercise but for the most part most participants did not seem overly concerned with fitness. Most people ate what they wanted when they wanted. They might do a little towards eating better by buying slightly healthier food when they could but it was hardly a lifestyle decision. I do wonder how much this has to do with the fact that they are otaku or the overall more sedentary lifestyle of people in modern times.

On the physical side of things, it comes off as a fairly standard affair in my eyes. Though there were more people than I expected who said they exercise regularly but still wasn’t so overwhelming to seem like anything but the average group of people. As for the medical conditions question, I don’t think it reflects much. Plenty of people have at least some small problem such as allergies which which we saw here all the way up to major medical concerns.

Hobbies on the other hand were just as varied as careers but we saw some distinct stand outs. Without a doubt the most common past time of anime fans was playing video games. There were almost twice as many people who played video games as participating as any other type of hobby. The next most common hobby was music. I think these reason for these two hobbies is two fold. The first is they both intersect with anime repeatedly. You can listen to anime music and play anime based video games as well as listen and play non anime related works. Also both hobbies are just extremely mainstream and enjoyed by most everyone now a days. We do see the more academic/geeky hobbies in the survey as well with good numbers of otaku into reading, writing, computers, and art. I also left dozen of hobbies including puzzles, motorcycles, and cooking as well as many others because they only had 1 participant who was active in that hobby. There was no one who participated in the survey who have at least two other hobbies other than anime and manga.

Some people have one hobby they subscribe to, but I’ve always found more often than not many hobbyists get embroiled in many different ones possibly due to the obsessive nature of it all. If we didn’t already know anime and video games had huge crossover audiences, we would now. But we did already know that so this just goes to confirm it. And a look at further results proves geeks are geeks in more ways than one.

The results of this section mostly reinforce the idea that it is nerds tend towards being otaku but that it is not a hard and fast rule. Even the the more introverted of the otaku tended to have outside interest and lives beyond the scope of their devotion to Japanese animation. I do wonder how different the answers would be if we took the same poll at a con. Is the number of introverts to extroverts in anime fandom a good representation or did the Internet nature of the project skew towards the introverted? No matter what I think we can conclude while there are certain types that are drawn to being an otaku but it is a lifestyle that draws people from all walks of life. Anime and manga may be more seductive to the geeky and the shy but they are not the only people who answer the call.

There is no straight road to becoming an otaku but there are certainly some lines that can be drawn to correlate the two. There are exceptions to every rule but it’s hard to deny there are some big similarities between many anime fans seen here and I think it would be further seen with a larger group. But really draw your own conclusions. This is all about realizing how much we fans differ and how much we are clearly joined by other than our fandom.

#0094
People never seem to pay attention to me so I take that as a sign that I am average looking.

This part of the survey is really about how otaku see themselves, not how the outside world sees them. Though of course our own opinions, whether we like it or not, are largely based on what we have experienced in the world around us. Here, more than ever, honesty is about taking away any facade you may have in the presence of others and telling it how you really see it. And in this way the results may not be the “truth” but they are a way to gauge confidence, self-esteem, and to understand how we measure up to our fellow otaku.

Over the years I have learned one simple fact: Everyone views events through their own unique filter. You can have 100 different people experience the same event and get 100 different interpretations. The simplest example is asking someone if a glass is half-empty or half-full. But each person paints their view of the world from their own individual paint set. Some colors come from birth and upbringing and some colors come from experiences in life. But the pictures each person creates have a style that come from our interpenetration of events as well. This goes for internal perception as well as external. The next few Otaku Diary posts will look at the self portraits that a participants drew of themselves. How does the otaku surveyed view themselves? Do otaku see themselves as half empty or half full?

#0069
I know I have the potential to fit my own views, but unfortunately I got dealt a hand that hasn’t made my appearance easy.

I don’t think it would surprise anyone to hear that many otaku don’t have much confidence when it comes to themselves, in this case their outward appearance. This is a long discussed issue for many adolescents but it can come down harder on the geek/nerd/dork variety leading into an adulthood plagued by putting no stock in their appearance. Looks can be a major factor in bullying or isolation as well, two things that in our previous survey showed to be very prevalent in the group. This can have varying results between being able to value others beyond them not being (or being) conventionally good looking or becoming bitter to the point of rejecting anything that has to do with outward looks. However, those resulting characteristics weren’t apparent. But looking at the overall reaction to this question, I have to say I’m rather impressed with the positive results. It seems quite natural and possibly the reaction you would get should you ask 40 random people on the street the same thing.

#0045
I wouldn’t, but I must be with all the girls that I attract. Somedays I see it, others I don’t.

#0036
No, something is always out of place. Either my skin, or I have put on some weight and have a disproportional gut, or my hair looks awful-even if it all was fine, I’ m not really a looker.

Simply put the pretty people of the world as less inclined to get into geeky hobbies. That does not mean that everyone who is a geek is average looking or unattractive. Especially after more women have entered into anime and manga fandom, the overall attractiveness of the average con goer and anime club member has slightly increased. But our results seem to indicate overall otakudom is filled with those people who are not so good-looking that everyone gathers around them. But they also indicate it is not just made up of the dregs. We see a decent bell curve of attractiveness in our participants. This more honest self-evaluation of appearance is what I expected. I think people are better able to judge how attractive they are because it is easy to gauge other people’s reactions to them. Individual prejudices will cause some people to be overly harsh on themselves and others overly generous but overall it is easier to see if people think your are appealing than if they think you are smart.

#0030
In short, yes. I’ve seen such insane amounts of stupidity both in person and via news sources and such that the average person is clearly not very intelligent.

On the other hand, if there is one thing that a majority of otaku seem to agree on, it’s that they have a higher intelligence level than the everyday person. This isn’t surprising, but setting the results of perceived intelligence against perceived attractiveness shows where and what the confidence levels are. Being smart sets them apart, this explains why other people don’t understand them, and this can be how they take pride. For a lot of people, being smart was who they are, it came somewhat naturally to them from an early age. In an extreme case it could be even used as something to hold over people, to exert strength in lieu of say popularity or charisma. It’s almost as if aren’t good-looking you have to be smart, or atleast you have to think you are. Being a fan of anime and manga may not make you automatically smarter, obviously we have all seen conversations that would blow that theory out of the water, however geeky hobbies to tend lead its participants to theorize, debate, and converse on a different level.

#0044
I consider myself worlds beyond the average person.

#0009
Work in any job that interacts with the general public on a daily basis and you’ll soon discover that the average human being is pretty damn dumb.

#0039
Yes, and I have the IQ scores to prove it.

#0034
I’d usually prefer not to come out and say it directly like that, but at least if you’re talking about “book smarts” the answer would probably have to be yes.

Where as the we had a nice bell curve with attractiveness we had no such phenomenon with intelligence. People were much more willing to brag how much smarter they were than the average person. I think that comes from two major factors. The first being that like many geeky hobbies, it draws people who tend to be smarter. Clearly not everyone who is intelligent is drawn to doing geeky things and not everyone doing geeky things will be smart. But I want to believe that anime  attracts a more intelligent crowd than more mass media materials. The other reason for the higher numbers is your evaluation of your intelligence is so much more internal therefore easier to paint yourself as smart. Unless your self-esteem is broken or experience has shown you be to utterly outclassed by your peers, you tend to think of yourself as intelligent because intelligence is all in your head. It is much easier to assume everyone is wrong about you not be so smart than it is to assume that everyone is wrong about you actually being hot.

One word questions are difficult but also telling. What is the word that people would walk away with after meeting you for the first time? Some people cheated and gave more than one word, so for them I had to just pick from the list of options. Only one person flat out refused to answer it. We had a couple of overlaps, but for the most part everyone came up with something all their own. While I think this type of question is very difficult, it is also very telling. Some said things along the lines of “I hope it would be . . .” or others answered with just the word, as if they knew it without any doubt.

Creative, Arrogant, Grumpy, Insane, Otaku, Strange, Eccentric, Intellectual, Enigma, Anxious, Interesting, Unique, Pragmatic, Funny, Energetic, Nice, There, Unpredictable, Villain, Lazy, Hidden, Awesome, Asshole, Sincere, Thoughtful, Roadrunner, Social, Unforgettable, Excited, Shy, Even-keel, Quiet, Opinionated, Verbose, Passionate, Nice, Inward, Eccentric, Weird

I was impressed that we had few overlaps in the words. The question seems to ask what other people think of you. But in all actuality it mostly shows what you think your most prominent feature is. Everything from extremely positive to extremely negative. There was a tendency to go for the more unusual, off kilter, or inwards words but I think that is the tenancy of most nerds. Please note that even words that seem similar have very important distinctions. “Shy,” “quiet,” and “there” might all seem the same but they imply very different things. In my opinion shy implies a positive connotation. Someone who has a lot to offer but is not able to easily show that to others. Quiet is much more neutral. It implies nothing other than the person is not quick to open up to others. The word there on the other hand is quite negative. It implies people have gone out of their way not to connect to the person and perhaps have reason to. It is amazing to me how much of a person you can get from a single word. Also people tend to be slightly more unguarded with such questions.

#0099
I don’t have much of a presence or personality, so I’m not that memorable. The best one could probably say years later was that I was just there.

An interesting question that arises in my mind is whether or not looks has anything to do with people becoming engrossed in their chosen hobbies. Does one influence the other? Obviously not everyone who is attractive avoids geeky hobbies like the plague and likewise not every intelligent person has participated in a game of “Who would win in a fight?” I also find it telling that almost everyone found themselves to be smarter than the average person, I wonder how that would stack up if we changed to the question to “Are you smarter than the average anime fan?” In any case, people seem to take much pride and perhaps just a little bit of devilish joy in saying they are brighter than most bulbs.

If it is a a school, a job, a hobby, or anything else there is a certain type of person that is more likely to be drawn to it. How much attractiveness has to do with this is a good question. Another question that pops into my head due to our results is if otakudom and the world in general is mostly made of average looking people who just think they are much smarter than they actually are? I mean I think we have all had conversations with membesr of anime community that have proven 75% of anime fandom is not made of the world’s greatest think tanks. On the other hand, I have had conversations with people in fandom that have proven to me that some very intelligent people are members of the community who can dissect trends, analyze information, and create works of amazing genius. This leads me to think that while there is some delusion of the overall intelligence of anime fans it is not without a grain of truth.

#0009
I was bullied in school, sometimes worse than others. It’s another thing I don’t like to revisit.

While bullying is never quite how it is in fiction it is all too real for most nerds, geeks, and otaku. Almost everyone in the survey has been bullied at some point. I am sure if we all look back over our lives we will notice that sometime someone has tried to hold dominion over us physically or mentally to the point that it could only be called bullying. Sometimes it’s a family member, sometimes it’s someone at school, sometimes it’s someone at work, sometimes it’s long term, and sometimes it’s a few isolated incidents. For most people, it is a trial you must face in their life at least once. But over all the weaker people perceive you the more people with predatory natures will be attracted to you. People who have geeky hobbies tend to be people who give off an aura of vulnerability and therefore they will get harassed more than other people.

This particular article in the series probably isn’t too surprising to anyone. If there is one thing that has been played to death on television and movies it is that nerds/dorks/geeks/what have you are notorious for being picked on. Though those instances are usually pretty exaggerated, the underlying idea that this happens a lot is still relevant. And while many of us think of bullying to be a thing sectioned off for childhood, there is plenty of it going on in workplaces. Bullying can take many forms from physical to verbal to isolation and it is always a coin toss to say which is more detrimental to a person. In this survey it became clear, for the most part, that almost everyone had suffered (or is still under such strain) under someone’s hand and it is not something easily forgotten.

#0055
I was a standard victim in junior high, but I was sensitive and took it very personally which caused problems later on.

#0030
I was picked on quite a bit from when I first started school on, and am still picked on now.

#0094
I was mostly ignored and excluded in school more than bullied.

People who were willing to share their kinkiest fantasies, their shocking misdeeds, their heartbreaking sorrows, and their darkest fears in great detail but would give one line answers when it came to being bullied. Even the safety of anonymity prevented many people from sharing their experiences which shows how powerfully it effects some. When people did bring up their stories they were usually painful and almost everyone who was bullied had a sense of shame about telling the story. This coupled with the number of people shows there is an extreme stigma not only about being bullied but even talking about it. This victim’s shame keeps things instead bottle up inside them. While bullying leads to anger management problems, low self esteem, depression, isolation, and all other sorts of physiological damage, keeping such feelings bottled up inside surely aggravates them. Also the few people who admitted to bullying others were just as silent on the whole matter. They would off handily mention that they did it and then say no more. But that sort of guilt is much more understandable.

#0019
I was picked on for being a nerd. . . . Frequently, groups of girls I’d never met would walk up to me, say “see that girl? SHE LIKES YOU!” before indicating a friend of theirs whom they were teasing and then bursting into laughter like the notion of a girl liking me was the funniest goddamn thing in the world . . . .

#0016
I was teased pretty much throughout my entire school career. . . . Starting in middle school I was sexually harassed by a group of boys who were spreading rumors that my best friend and I were lesbians . . . and the principals we complained to didn’t do anything about it.

#0045
I was smaller than most and kind of scrawny growing up, so I got bullied a bit until the late years of high school when I started getting bigger. I also was a bit of an outcast when it came to social standing, so that didn’t help any.

While many people listed varying degrees of being bullied ranging from quite severe to only minor isolated instances, the thoroughness of their accounts was given sparingly. For the most part people were reluctant to go into details about their experiences in this instance, sometimes in lieu of the fact they elaborated extensively in other parts of the survey. Many answered with a simple “Yes.” Perhaps the other things we may not tell the whole world about don’t sit on the same level of humiliation, helplessness, or erosion of confidence as bullying does for many people. There are multiple ways people are bullied so it is unclear what kind was most prevalent. Though many of the group mentioned their “looks” to be a factor. And while slowly over the course of reading through our participants survey’s we came to understand their personalities, it doesn’t really give you a direct line in many cases as to why people become victims. Or perhaps it didn’t give us a direct link to who they became later on.

#0099
It did a lot for my confidence I’ll tell you because I have absolutely none.

#0065
I had a bad temper, so kids found me to be a wonderful target, but I always got the feeling that even if it didn’t bother me they’d still do it.

#0011
I was picked on for much of elementary and middle school to the point of being beaten up fairly regularly. I wound up learning some martial arts to defend myself.

I am very surprised that whenever someone mentioned bullying they mentioned being bullied at school. I am sure that people who took the survey also got bullied by siblings, coworkers, customers, and a variety of other people but for one reason or another people, including myself, associate school with bulling more than anywhere else. I suppose that when siblings bully us it is seen as part of life unless they are particularly horrific about it. When you are at work it is seen as more of being lower on the food chain. But cruelty by follow students at school sticks out in our memories more than any other type of bullying. We are at our most emotionally and mentally vulnerable so any and all traumas are more severe because we have not yet developed all the tools to deal with such abuse.

Being bullied can taint your views of school and for some, maybe for many, it doesn’t make you long for childhood days gone by. But that doesn’t mean that everyone handled their situations the same. For some being bullied caused them to get angry, for others it sent them into depression, some in turn bullied others, and still others said they learned to turn the other cheek to such things. With all of these varying reactions it becomes clearer that being bullied doesn’t take its lead from your personality. For some it made them work harder to achieve, to prove themselves, and for others it left them feeling hurt and reduced their confidence to nil. Even the people that bullied, expressed remorse and guilt for their actions. Looking years after, you can see how it shaped each individual.

#0036
I became quite vindictive towards my tormentors and bystanders eventually.

#0073
At the time, I thought of it as friendly gestures, but now I’m very sure I bullied him.

I think this question more than many others showed a limitation to this form of doing the Otaku Diaries. While the email gave the participants both anonymity and good deal of time to answer lots of questions it also meant we were not able to ask follow up questions. Had we been face to face with many of the participants we would have asked for more detail about being bullied. I would have liked to hear a little more from the people who bullied other people, too. One or two people mentioned that since they were bullied they would never bully anyone else but almost anyone who was a bully had been bullied as well. But the information we got was quite illuminating on its own. It show us an ugly and tragic fact of most of our participants lives. But it was a universal hurdle that the majority had to face at one point of another.

Some take bullying very seriously, and some shrug it off as a the way of the world. Everyone in the survey had their own ideas about what it meant to them. What happens to us is just as important as how we move on from it (or if we ever do). This is certainly a fascinating topic that could have a survey all its own. More importantly, in connection with this survey is that the geek being bullied factor is a very real piece of growing up. Even if you weren’t bullied or did any bullying, you probably saw it happen. This is just one more important connection found between so many people sharing common hobbies.

Look for a new Otaku Diaries Post
the first Monday of every month!

 #0044
Otakudom is all that I am.

The story in this portion of the Otaku Diaries starts almost at the very genesis of the project itself. When we sent out an initial call for people to participate in the Otaku Dairies, one of the first places we put up a request was in the forums at MyAnimeList. Several people spoke up saying that while they were interested in the project they felt that is was detrimental to call the project the “Otaku Diaries” because of the negativity surrounding the word “otaku.” This negative reaction threw me off guard. I was aware that there was a growing backlash against the English definition of otaku but I never realized it was that strong on the Internet. This incident along with several other conversations encouraged us to add a few question about how the participants of the survey view the word “otaku.” We asked the participants what their thoughts were on the word, if they considered themselves otaku, would they admit to being otaku to others, and would they be more or less willing to date or be friends with people who called themselves otaku.

#0034
. . . I tend to be sympathetic to the otaku personality traits that are often thought of as negative, and of course while “otaku” covers a wide range of interests, it probably means there are more things the potential friend/date and I could enjoy doing together.

#0016
I think of it as a word that Japanophiles apply to themselves to sound even more “different.”

Even though we called this the Otaku Diaries, it was interesting to see how everyone reacted to the word “otaku.” As you can see, 1/4 of the people who answered our call proclaimed themselves not otaku even with us leading the charge of calling the participants in our survey just that. I, too, was thrown by many complaints early on in the titling of this experiment but some of that can be chalked up to the Internet being a place where people love to argue. Some but not all. From many answers, we can tell that people are becoming more aware of the history of the word “otaku” in Japan. However, be that as it may the majority of people still found the word positive in their current state or were atleast middling. Afterall, “otaku” is used quite frequently in American anime fandom, just look around, we just got back from Otakon, many of us read OtakuUSA, and you can even find a date on OtakuBooty. I think you’d be hard pressed to say that the use of “otaku” in these instances is being bandied about in a negative manner.

#0009
I used to think it was a positive label, now I’m convinced otherwise. I’ve yet to see a convincing argument that would make me change my mind. Otakudom is often synonymous with social ineptitude and derangement.

#0080
It shows how dedicated you are to what you love. Although there are some who have made the term less than desirable, I think the term should be associated with good.

Loanwords are an interesting thing. Usually a language utilizes a foreign word because the word fills a niche in the language adopting the word but on occasion when a word is taken up by another language the meaning changes. Some times this shift in definition is subtle and other times it is a complete reinvention of the word. “Otaku” is is a clear example of a subtle but profound shift in the meaning. To make a very long story short, “otaku” usually means hardcore anime fan in specific and dedicated fan in general. The main difference between its meaning in America and Japan is that the Japanese see it more as a mark of shame with a distinctly negative connotation and Americans generally see it as a badge of honor with a distinctly positive connotation. The majority in this instance still considers “otaku” to be a positive word. Though several people did mention that at one time or another they had had only a rose-colored view of the word but have since stricken the word from their vocabulary when talking about themselves.

#0079
. . . I’ve never felt the Americanized version of the term applied to me . . . but the label itself fits me fairly well.

#0081
When I think of otaku, I think of the definition that seems to be focused here: a strong anime fan. I feel like there’s already a connection made by sharing the same interests, so it would be easier to relate to someone who calls themselves an otaku by that meaning.

#0069
I don’t describe myself as an otaku anymore. Am I a fan, yes. Am I a big fan, yes. Am I obsessed, no.

“Otaku” is a rare word that has become defined by the person saying it in this survey. Some people even mentioned that based on who was using the word “otaku” and the way in which it was said can make it an insult. But at the same time there is a very real chasm dividing people about it. Many said with 100% certainly that it was a badge of honor, proof that you were a proud and knowledgeable fan. And then some participants insisted that they are just a “fan” and the word “otaku” holds no place in themselves. But is fan not short for fanatic, a word synonymous with extreme devotion and obsession? Just as that word has taken on a more broad appeal (though we certainly see news reports of “crazed fans”), maybe the word “otaku” in the anime community will continue to diversify itself.

#0019
Being called an otaku is an insult. It’s not something you want to be. At the same time, I am one. I wish I wasn’t, but I am.

#0067
I don’t ever use the word otaku to describe myself and rarely use it to describe others—to me it is derogatory, as it is in Japan.

#0045
There’s no shame to me in using it as a badge of honor to explain what and who you are. So using it in a description might even make me more inclined to meet or date them because it means at least a shared interest in that sort of thing.

Of note is that several people mentioned they found the word “otaku” negative but would still attribute it to themselves and even mention it in casual conversation. Essentially they are in so deep that they could not hide it. Contributors to the survey listed co-workers as the most common group of people they were reluctant to mention their anime hobby to. There were a wide variety of reasons from shame to not talking about their personal lives at work. Most people either assumed the people they would not tell about their anime fandom either did not care, would not get it, or would look down on them. This is hardly limited to anime and manga, in general people are more likely to hide their hobbies if society in general labels those activities as nerdy. Everyone on the survey would tell someone else they knew who was into anime though. This goes to show why anime conventions and Internet sites about anime are so popular. Once people feel they are safe, they are willing open up. I think people want to share their fandom with others but have been burnt in the past and therefore guard what they see as vulnerabilities.

#0063
I do identify myself as an anime fan . . . online fairly readily . . . and in real life it’s fairly obvious, too. . . . Basically if you’ve met me for more than 30-minutes, I’ve probably made myself clear.

#0094
I don’t really like to share much about myself in general let alone what nerdy hobbies I am into.

It’s also important to mention that the age range of people who kept their fandom private varied greatly. Many people have attributed an overzealous nature to younger fans, but here we saw that even those still in high school or recently graduated had just as many qualms with the word “otaku” and/or sharing that they were indeed anime fans with the rest of their social circle. Equally telling were people saying they would befriend someone calling themselves “otaku” and also many inferring that they would know from the start they would have something in common with the person. This was rather refreshing to me as I’ve mentioned I see a splintering in fandom. In earlier days if you met someone who liked anime you would more than likely have some common ground, but now with so many choices out there many feel liking anime is not enough to build on. Here we found the inclination to be very much alive.

#0015
I haven’t told my friends, I’m worried they either wouldn’t know what it is or just judge me. . . .

#0096
I have used the word “otaku” to describe myself. I usually have to explain what that is to my family and friends. . . . Despite its offenses in Japan, the word “otaku” has come to represent a group that I identify with in America.

I still think that a majority of anime fandom still has a decent self image. Most people who answered the survey saw at least some benefit of being an anime fan. They had some amount of pride in enjoying what they liked. Yes, there were some people who saw their fandom as an albatross around their necks but overall people saw it and something that enriched their lives even if it was just by being something entertaining that passed the time.

There were a lot of people who answered plainly, and proudly, “I am an otaku.” This seems to correlate with a continuing movement in the U.S. of geeks/nerds/dorks/what have you coming together and embracing the words that were once hurled at them. Taking back words is a way to show strength and also show you can accept yourself. As we explore self-image further in subsequent posts you’ll see what we have seen, probably much like the rest of the world, people’s self-worth lies somewhere in the middle ground. But just looking at the results here, that should be apparent.

The question that interests me most coming out of these particular results is how would anime fans answer this same question 5 or 10 years from now? How much is this movement to return otaku back to its original Japanese meaning going to catch on? Or is this movement a passing fad that will mostly be forgotten by all but the most die-hard advocates? Also some Japanese fans and creators have noted they enjoy that English fandom has a mostly positive spin on the word otaku. What effect will the constantly changing definition of the word in Japan have on the English speaking fandom? How strong is the idea for people to take the word back in Japan? Only time will truly tell us the answer.

Look for a new Otaku Diaries Post
the first Monday of every month!

This idea came up quite suddenly and almost as suddenly it became a reality. Maybe we are just a curious duo, and since we paint ourselves as sleuths maybe this is no surprise, but we just plain wanted to know about the growing hordes of otaku out there. People involved heavily in a hobby have something that bonds them to their fellow connoisseurs. However, it becomes increasingly clear the more people you meet that there is no one story that is the same and many don’t seem to deem their peers as equals. But maybe, just maybe, there are more things to relate to than previously thought. In fact, one of the reasons I was curious to do this is the sweeping diversity and sometimes fracturing of anime fandom.

We asked 40 anime fans for a brief self-description along with 125 questions broken into in three categories. Questions asked about the user’s relationships, self-image, and views of otakudom. We tried to pick questions that gave us a detailed look into the lives of each of our participants. Through these answers we hopped to gain a better understanding of how each participant dealt with their friends, families, lovers, fellow anime fans, and themselves.

Any good research should start with some basic statistics of your group! So before diving in to the more telling answers in coming posts we wanted you to have any idea of just who our participants are:

Our goal was never to view fandom as a whole because our sample size is just too small. It would be nice to do so but we just don’t have the man power and time for that sort of experiment. We would need at least 1,000 participants to make any sort solid conclusions. Instead we focused on getting a more intimate look at a smaller sample size. So when we makes observations it is important to remember that we are only basing our observations on the people included in our survey. We are not as foolish as to assume that a sample of 40 people necessarily fully represent of all of anime fandom. If we were to do that, just by our statistics only we would conclude that there are no gays or lesbians in anime and manga fandom. Which is clearly crazy talk. Such a small sample size will also lead to some amount of skewed results due to the roulette of chance. This does not mean that there is nothing to be gained other than entertainment for the experiment. There are truths and revelations in our participants answers. They are just more likely to be personal answers rather than universal ones.

I don’t think we have aspired so high as to make any concrete observations here. Heck, we are missing the entire non-English speaking world of anime fans! But there is something to be learned from any one person, let alone having 40 telling you their stories. I was looking forward to seeing the varying degrees by which all fans live but also to see how their stories relate to my own. Perhaps that sounds incredibly self-serving but I think everyone, us included, will walk away from this venture with a bit of a better understanding of their fellow anime neighbors.

Look for a new Otaku Diaries Post
the first Monday of every month!