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Weaboos and Otakus: Top Eight most Annoying Questions (Clephas version)


Clephas

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Generally speaking, if you are a weaboo and/or otaku and you reveal your hobby, you generally tend to end up on the receiving end of all sorts of unbelievably irritating questions.  This is my list of the most annoying questions I've heard as an otaku/weaboo.

1.  "Is that a cartoon?"  Almost every anime fan gets asked this at some point, though generally speaking, this is an event that was a lot more common when I first started watching anime.  To be blunt, American cartoons tend to be one of two types... the kid-oriented or the adult-oriented comedy (Simpsons, Family Guy, South Park).  However, anime's sheer variance leads a lot of fans - including me - to want to clearly delineate a difference between the two, despite the fact that the actual Japanese anime definition includes Western cartoons.

2.  "Why do you hate your country?" This is perhaps the dumbest question I've ever heard, but I've been on the receiving end of it countless times during my weaboo life.  The fact is, I don't hate my country.  My country does a lot of stupid things, but it raised me, it helped form my personality, and it has kept me fed.  I simply prefer to study Japanese culture and language over American.  Unfortunately, trying to explain that this is essentially a matter of aesthetic tastes is pretty pointless in the case of those who ask this question (since they've already made their own conclusions).

3.  "Why are you dressing up like that?"  When you cosplay, this is perhaps the most unbelievably obvious question you can ever get.  Back when I still cosplayed, it drove me insane to be asked why I was dressing up that way when it was bloody obvious I was doing it for fun because I liked the anime/books/etc it was based off of.

4.  "Why is there a poster of a cartoon character on your wall?"  This gets old, fast.  When I still bothered buying swag, it was as annoying as hell to have the occasional visitor to my room ask this and similar questions about the swag in my room. 

5.  "Why do you like the Japanese when they are the ones who started WWII?" This is mostly a question asked by someone who has only read US history books or high school level world history textbooks... WWII was the results of both sides' arrogance and over a half-century of bitter economic competition, preceded by an even more arrogant series of attempts to turn Japan into a Western satellite country (ie. late nineteenth and early twentieth century China).  That said, the question has absolutely nothing to do with why I like Japan.  I like Japan because its unique cultural development has so many interesting aspects to study, and I am fully aware of the insanity of war-era Japan and the cultural quirks that led to it, unlike the people who ask this question.

6.  "Japanese games are all the same... why do you play them?"  This is a more recent question and one of the few that has a legitimate point, though it is made from ignorance (usually some newbie listening to a long-time vet complain).  The fact is, otaku media, in particular their games, are slow to change... The shifts in the market are slow, and so gluts of certain types of games are endemic to the industry.  The same applies to all otaku media, really.  Japanese business-people hate change and are slow to adapt to it.  The eccentric exceptions are just that... exceptions.  The answer to the question I usually give is that I honestly just enjoy Japanese style more than Western when it comes to telling a story, and more than half of my reason for living is experiencing good stories.

7.  "That Japanese sword look like it would break with a single whack of this hammer... why don't you just buy a broadsword?"  lol... this question I got when I was showing off my 日本刀 (a katana actually made in Japan in the old manner) to another guy who does broadsword fencing.  The simple answer to this question that I gave him is that my sword is prettier, because I didn't want to get into the arguments about the difference in purpose.  The more complex answer is that katanas make more sense in an era without metal armor than a broadsword (katanas are designed to slice, as opposed to the way western blades are designed to smash and crush as much as cut).  Again, there is also the aesthetic, lol.

8.  "Do you support what the Japanese did in China during WWII?" Now this question... I've never got how people can ask this question.  Do people really think that even a weaboo would lack that much common sense and clarity of thought?  Seriously?!  Of course I don't in any way support Japan's actions during WWII.  Only someone who hasn't read history could have.  In regards to America, there were mitigating circumstances and legitimate reasons, but China was another matter entirely.  China, for all intents and purposes, was basically a helpless, defenseless region (I don't call it a country because it wasn't and hadn't been since Britain won the wars in the nineteenth century), and there was absolutely no need for any of the excesses Japan undertook during the invasions and occupation there.  The same goes for Korea.  I almost punched the last person who asked me this question.

 

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Broadswords being made to 'smash or cut' is as incorrect as the myths about the katana. Actually, most broadswords were light compared to katanas (unless they were ceremonial). They were double bladed, compared to katanas which had a wedge (obviously heavy), and so two handed longswords were longer and weighed about the same as a 2 handed katana (speaking in generalities.) 

Broadswords were made to cut and thrust. There's a whole bunch of European one handed swords named 'cut and thrust' swords, for a specific reason. Armour was heavy, and people wouldn't wear it unless it was effective. There were a few ways to bypass full bodied armour 1 - thrust at the joints. This is why a lot of European swords have a nice taper compared to Japanese swords. There's even some swords made only for thrusting, including a massive 2 handed one. 2 - Bash and crush bones underneath the armour. You don't do these with swords. You do these with maces, or halberds, or blunt weapons. Pole arms. 3 - Take them to the ground and finish them off there, polearms sorta combined reason number 2 with reason number 3.

Hollywood likes to have people walking around with 'heavy' 2 handed swords, bludgeoning people. This didn't happen :P I prefer European cut and thrust swords mainly because of the versatility, but katanas are obviously far superior in cutting flesh.

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Close-minded, ignorant, assuming, presuming people, just busy existing.  ご苦労さん. I'm happy I don't have to try justifying what I like to people like that. Just stay apart and both be better happier for it.

You should make a list of the 10 most annoying things from within the fandom.

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TL;DR "You have hobbies I'm not familiar with, are you literally Hitler or something?"

I can not tell you the amount of awkward situations I get put into when I say I like anime, although not for the reasons you listed. (The WWII thing... lol)

You see, when I say this, people are actually generally nice and try to hold a conversation, so they keep going with questions like "what's your favorite?" or something, and this is where my grave starts being dug, because I've watched so many anime, I probably would just name obscure stuff most people didn't watch, and then they just back off when I don't answer with Naruto or DBZ.

If it's about my figures or my wallscrolls or anything, it would take a long time to explain who that character is, but people expect a straightforward answer anyway.

Worst of all is when I'm reading manga and someone comes up to me and asks what I'm reading. I tell them it's manga and then they ask what manga and then of course they don't know it when I answer, so they just walk away. 

Life Pro Tip: when you know a person's hobby, don't start inquiring them on it unless you're prepared to learn things you're totally unfamiliar with. Otherwise, try to discuss more everyday topics, otakus are generally normal people too.

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You see, when I say this, people are actually generally nice and try to hold a conversation, so they keep going with questions like "what's your favorite?" or something, and this is where my grave starts being dug, because I've watched so many anime, I probably would just name obscure stuff most people didn't watch, and then they just back off when I don't answer with Naruto or DBZ.

Ugh, I feel the same pain. I think the problem is this question. "What is your favourite" only works when the probable set of answers falls within the knowledge of both parties. So they either implicitly think that most anime are the ones they know, or that your favorite ought to be one of the ones they know. Gotta start shallow and then test the waters.

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When I'm watching some anime or playing a vn I always get "are you still watching those cartoons?" but they don't use the word cartoons but "dibujitos" which means cartoons for little kids like, dora the explorer. I don't give a crap and i never answer. xD

Also this is something that everyone says here everyone! (school, family, job) "do you like japanese stuff? that's weird "Japanese people are all the same, they all look the same to me" and the worst of all "Japanese people are a bunch of perverts, they like little kids, they are very sick people" Yeah the racism here it is over 8000 xD (it's actually 8000 and not 9000) 
What I have to deal with:vinty:

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58 minutes ago, Zidan209 said:

Katana is actually the best sword, better than longsword or broadsword

No actually, it isn't.

 

 

Also: http://www.thearma.org/essays/longsword-and-katana.html#.VptRu-h96aE

At the end of the day, these are the key facts:

- Katanas can't cut through metal armour, and in fact early incarnations of the katana were defeated by Chinese studded armour. They are inferior at thrusting. They are shorter than 2 handed weapons, and thus have less reach. They have a poor guard. And, in fact, they weren't the first choice of weapon for a lot of samurai. Longswords are more adept at dealing with armour, have more ways to attack, have a better guard, and have superior reach. Katanas are obviously better at slashing, but against someone in chain or plate slashing attacks are at a disadvantage (although obviously for facing the type of armour in Japan, the katana could arguably be the more suited weapon.)

Furthermore, in a one-on-one deal, observe carefully the points made about the rapier in the video above.

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@Zidan: Also, if plate could be penetrated that easily, people wouldn't wear them. Why? Because a bow and arrow would go straight through. But you should be able to tell that just by looking at it, the plate isn't actual plate. Which brings into question other stuff about the video - if the plate isn't actual plate, what else are the fudging?

 The vid is bogus.

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The katana has more of a history of development (as opposed to an actual length of history) than the broadsword, so a lot of the technologies that went into forging it were more advanced than anything that got used in broadswords in the age in which they were used in battle commonly (most swords in Europe were essentially iron bars repeatedly folded to add strength to the grain, until the Renaissance era).  I should say that it was a history of 'clever compromises resulting in a branching off of unique sword-making technology'. Of course, when I say 'technology' in this case, it is metallurgy... the forging methods for katanas made it possible for them to retain a sharper edge without breaking, but in exchange, they were less useful as a defensive weapon, because they were more likely to break when struck a heavy enough blow and their effectiveness against armor was minimal due to their relatively low weight.  Part of this was because very little iron exists naturally in Japan, which meant making a lighter weapon that utilizes a 'softer' core made more sense than making a primarily iron or steel weapon would have.   The curve-edged katanas we know today didn't even come into existence until six hundred or so years ago (mostly the Japanese used swords based off of the design used on the continent). 

This same principle is why most Japanese armor sets weren't made wholly or even mostly of steel or iron.  Hardened leather, ceramics, and even lacquered wood were common in Japanese sets of armor, especially amongst the ranks of the ashigaru and lower-ranking samurai and retainers.  Heck, it was common for them to use bronze buckles rather than the iron-based ones that were normal in sets of armor in the west or on the continent.  This tended to make them softer and more vulnerable to warping from blows, but in exchange, they suffered less from corrosion and their parts were less expensive to replace after damage.  The segmented nature of the samurai armor most of us are familiar with is a result of efforts to disperse the impact of edged weapons and a compromise with the reality that Japan didn't have the internal resources to be able to afford the kind of 'arms race' between the power of ranged weapons and armor that Europe went through in the Middle Ages. 

 

See, I'm a weaboo.  If I let my inner weaboo take control, it automatically creates walls of text without me having to even think about it seriously.  This is the monster any adult weaboo has to reign in constantly... isn't it terrifying?

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Continuing on from my last point, latter era plate armour was thick enough to stop a bullet. This was because they had to actually stop a bullet. So no, chuck away the fanciful idea that a katana could poke straight through, because that's what it is - fantasy.

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Rooke is right about this.  The katana was never meant to face plate armor at all... in fact, mounted katana techniques tend to place emphasis on blows to the head, throat, and the legs (all of which tended to be less heavily armored).  On foot, katanas were as much of a thrusting weapon as a slashing weapon (thrusting up and through the throat, down through the thighs or groin, and through either arm) and the naginata was a much more effective weapon both ways (not as heavy as halberds we know of, but in exchange, it was ideal for both foot troops and mounted ones, though it was primarily utilized as a mounted weapon).

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The current image of the katana was born during the long peace after Tokugawa took over, when the samurai caste basically had nothing better to do than refine weapons-techniques in an age where armor was rarely used at all.  Even when it was used, it was generally chain armor (which is why some katanas tended to come to a somewhat slimmer point in the Edo period), and a blow from a katana to someone in chain armor was likely to break bones and/or rupture organs if it hit wrong, so slashing and evasion became a larger part of the technique than it was in the pre-Tokugawa period.  Before that, slashing attacks were somewhat less effective than most people seem to think...

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The good old swords argument.  I still prefer archery.

 

On topic: I don't get any of this anymore.  Since about 8 years ago, I was always in an environment that had some sort of understanding about entertainment.  Even my parents stopped bothering at some point, and I actually dragged them in to watch some action shows.  Hooray for time passing?

Just goes to show how superior nippon technologies are taking over the world /s :makina:

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This sword discussion definitely deserves it's own thread/blog post. I demand a "Katanas aren't as cool as everyone thinks they are" or something like that from either Rook or Clephas :D

 A little on that topic, swords were always made for the demands of their time and region, so it's rather odd to say one is "better" than the other, or that one sword has an over-all advantage over an other. Clephas already explained why katanas were made the way they were in regards to the armor of their time and place, and European swords were generally heavier in order to deal with the heavy armor the Europeans were a fan of. Rook's earlier video explains the advantage or rapiers in one-on-one combat. If anything, I'd argue Sabers- of Indian and Middle Eastern origin- seem to be the most well rounded, having fine reach and strength, and good use both on foot and mounted. The fact that Europeans later adopted these sabers, and are still worn today by US marine corps, make it all the more plausible I'm totally not being biased here

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Really liked the sword discussion. We definitely need a thread dedicated to swords.

 

And as for the annoying questions, I've seriously lost count of god knows how many times people have told me "Oh My God! You still watch cartoons!!". 

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