There’s a cycle that plays out in anime fandom that, on the surface, looks benign, and mostly is benign. Despite that, however, there are subtle issues with it that bother me in that it tends to prevent a real discussion from occurring.

Or: “How To Run An Anime Club Like Char Aznable”

It’s surprising how easy it can be to push a false narrative to the level where it becomes accepted by default by many within a population, despite not representing reality.

Manami and Ayase are different versions of the same paradigm.

The underlying dynamic of both is "I want to reign this person in from their passion because I want to satisfy my ideal of them."

A series of selfishly-made bad decisions. A downward spiral of people treating other people badly to satisfy their own ends. A tragic story of people callously taking advantage of one another.

All three describe School Days.

If you’ve seen Otaku no Video, you know this story.

Kind of.