I love it when people bring attention to otakukin! (not)
It really is Otakukin week on the intarwebs, thanks to the Sarah saga, and the same old misconceptions and prejudices are making their way through.
Here's a sample of comments from a Gaia online thread on the subject.
"Do they have a "kin" word for the trannies? We supposedly just "think" we're the wrong sex, after all.
As for the otakukin, it's really only a sign of a serious maturity issue. They lack an identity and they have a very low self-esteem. They desperately need therapy. Not because they're "crazy" or anything (even though they are), but because they need to work through these issues. "
"The best otakukin are the ones whose "past lives" happened in the future. Like the ones who think they're the reincarnation of Vash despite the fact that Trigun takes place several hundred years after Earth is abandoned."
"I see no harm in it, as long as you eventually grow up and move on. Its just a way of escaping reality. I like to daydream that kingdom Hearts is real and that one day I will save the universe ^^ but its just a day dream, and I get back to doing home work. Some people have low self esteems[points at self] and need ways to cope, not everyone has the same way of copeing. I think it only becomes a real problem if you try to make the world around you conform to your idea. When you no longer accept logical things and try to live in a fantasy world that no one sees, then you have problems."
"How come anime characters as they exist in this world are usually unhealthy, unappealing looking perpetual underachievers who spend more time watching cartoons and whining on the internet about the validity of the beliefs, than actually doing the sorts of thing their character-sakes would actually do?"
"I never heard of otakukin but that seems like they may have mental problem and can't tell the difference between reality and fantasy/fiction or choosing to reject reality and logic (maybe there is another problem they are having, which is why they do so? To try and permantely escape from their problems because they can't handle it)."
".....scary stuff. some of these guys could benifit from padded walls and lithium pills."
Here's a sample of comments from a Gaia online thread on the subject.
"Do they have a "kin" word for the trannies? We supposedly just "think" we're the wrong sex, after all.
As for the otakukin, it's really only a sign of a serious maturity issue. They lack an identity and they have a very low self-esteem. They desperately need therapy. Not because they're "crazy" or anything (even though they are), but because they need to work through these issues. "
"The best otakukin are the ones whose "past lives" happened in the future. Like the ones who think they're the reincarnation of Vash despite the fact that Trigun takes place several hundred years after Earth is abandoned."
"I see no harm in it, as long as you eventually grow up and move on. Its just a way of escaping reality. I like to daydream that kingdom Hearts is real and that one day I will save the universe ^^ but its just a day dream, and I get back to doing home work. Some people have low self esteems[points at self] and need ways to cope, not everyone has the same way of copeing. I think it only becomes a real problem if you try to make the world around you conform to your idea. When you no longer accept logical things and try to live in a fantasy world that no one sees, then you have problems."
"How come anime characters as they exist in this world are usually unhealthy, unappealing looking perpetual underachievers who spend more time watching cartoons and whining on the internet about the validity of the beliefs, than actually doing the sorts of thing their character-sakes would actually do?"
"I never heard of otakukin but that seems like they may have mental problem and can't tell the difference between reality and fantasy/fiction or choosing to reject reality and logic (maybe there is another problem they are having, which is why they do so? To try and permantely escape from their problems because they can't handle it)."
".....scary stuff. some of these guys could benifit from padded walls and lithium pills."