Anime: The Last Bastion of Western Civilization or Weeaboo Brainrot?

Now that I’ve grabbed your attention with a clickbait title, I suppose I can hide the answer behind walls of textual analysis and rhetorical argument. That would probably amp up engagement. I won’t though. I don’t buy into this frame that the internet loves to draw battle lines over. The debates raging between whether anime is based or degenerate don’t really do it for me. Because the truth is, anime is really neither. Or at least, that’s not the frame we need to consider.

The question of anime has to be implicitly couched in the understanding that it is not our culture. It’s not our characters. It’s not our dialogue. It’s not our conceptualization of the transcendent. Anime is the expression of a people fundamentally outside of the West. It’s the ideas of another land that imposes itself on others the same way Hollywood imposes itself across the globe. The discussion of whether anime is good or bad assumes a commonality and a shared culture that in large part does not exist.

In short, it’s not our art.

The Boomer can whine about anime pfp’s on Twitter all day long, but the Boomer is fundamentally disconnected from the forces that brought about said pfp to begin with. You can complain anime is degenerate, but you are most likely a continent and an ocean away from the culture that produced it. Any dialogue you might have is not with the actual people who created it, but rather a downstream reaction that has already metastasized into something far larger and farther reaching than you can comprehend.

This goes as well for the degenerate aspects of anime as the noble parts of anime. Now some people might interpret my words as criticism of anime, and we can get onto that later, but what I want to get across right now is that anime is foreign. No matter what side of the debate you find yourself on, this should be something everyone agrees on.

And if you are unhappy about anime’s influence, the question is not the best way to criticize anime. Again, it’s not yours. The question is what to do with the absolute death of Western Culture. Anime would not have the influence it does if the West hadn’t torpedoed its artistic production. People naturally turn to other cultures because their own culture is rotting, and no matter how many intellectual arguments we get into, it’s not going to change the fact that people’s desire for good art will be satiated where they can get it. And the transparent fact is, anime is by and large better than Western media.

Western Culture has utterly lost the mandate of heaven. And as time goes on, you are going to see people defaulting to other cultures for their entertainment. The bar has sunk to the bottom of the ocean. And all any artist needs to do is to step over it. Whether you like anime or not, it’s clear that it possesses more vitality than whatever we’re making.

We can argue about whether anime is degenerate, but the real problem is that Western Culture is even more so.

And until that problem is addressed, all discussion on whether anime is good or bad is (forgive my crude language) pissing in the wind. If your country was in a war, it would be unbelievably silly to have a debate about the ethics of your attackers while they are in the middle of occupying you. In a similar manner, it is downright moronic to have a debate on whether anime is degenerate when your own culture is in shambles.

But as I am about to discuss Japanese culture anyway, think of this as less a critique and more a series of observations. To reveal my own preferences, I watch anime on occasion when a show catches my interest. I am by no means a purveyor of the medium, but I have enough experience to notice patterns and trends in the media. And I do have some thoughts on some of the shows that have taken their foothold in the West.

I’ll begin with anime’s strengths, which is that the Japanese have not forgotten earthly virtues. They still have a notion of a familial unit, healthy relations between the sexes, and an understanding of good vs. evil. Now we can have debates about how that translates to in irl practice, but it’s clear their entertainment still allows for a niche where healthy modes of human existence are depicted.

And that has utterly ceased in the West.

I still remember when Spy x Family made controversial waves on the internet with its debut of… a loving family. But let’s back up. The premise of the show is that a spy puts together a fake family in order to infiltrate a top tier school in a foreign country. Little does he know, his daughter is a telepath and his goofy wife is an assassin. The family are all hiding secrets from one another, and they’re all using this fake family for their own ends.

But this is not a Breaking Bad style drama. This is a comedy, and the family genuinely grow to love and appreciate each other as time goes on. The series has not ended, but it’s clear the author is taking it to a happily ever after where the family becomes real.

Can the West even imagine such an ending now? Or rather, can the West imagine a happy ending where it’s not diverse and fake and gay? When was the last time an American family was happy? It seems all the good mainstream stories we have now are tragedies, and that’s because tragedy is the only thing Hollywood permits us to understand.

And we’ve gotten to the point where the Left cannot stand healthy depictions of anything. Their immediate reaction is to try to tear down anything that they can’t classify as their own propaganda.

Where anime shines is when it reminds the West that good exists—and in doing so it shines a light on the absolute corruption of the West. It’s a contrast that condemns the Left more thoroughly than a thousand political rallies. A happy, healthy family is anathema to the Leftist, especially if said family is white. And we can extend this to any depiction of natural virtue.

For this reason, I’m a particular fan of Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. I think it’s one of the few shows out of Japan to approach what could be called Christian storytelling. Now this isn’t because FMA:B is Christian, it’s not in the slightest. But it’s understanding of virtue—notwithstanding it’s spiritual elements—is practically on point

There are so many areas where I could heap praise on Fullmetal Alchemist. And this is not just because of content, but that so much of the story was executed near flawlessly. It is one thing to depict good and evil characters. It is another to make it believable, and it is still another to make it mean something in the end. And it is only when you have all three that you have a genuine piece of art.

I must restrict myself, otherwise this will quickly turn into an essay about FMA:B, but this is my personal example of what “good” anime is. This is my go to whenever I judge the medium. I don’t expect Christianity (largely because Japan is 1% Christian), and it would be foolish of me to expect anything Christian. But what I do want and expect from anime is the virtuous pagan, and the virtuous pagan is far far better than the Left.

What anime excels is in the simple truths that have become utterly alien to the West. And these simple truths often send shockwaves. They break the frame of the Left, and often introduce ideas that the Left desperately want to hide. Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End was controversial because it had the audacity to say that demons are psychopathic and always lie. And then the Left stood up to bat for the demons.

Moving on, let’s talk about anime’s weaknesses. Now I’m not going to be talking about everything. That would quickly turn this article into a book, and I would have to delve into genres and character archetypes and the like. But what I do want to talk about is the gaping holes in storytelling that appear with the lack of Christianity. You see these whenever an anime broaches talking about the transcendent and the nature of the world. And people might raise an eyebrow at my example here, but stick with me, I think it’s a perfect illustration.

First, I said anime has more vitality to it than Western Culture, and I think that’s true. But that does come with a few caveats. Japanese Culture, by and large, is poisoned with a similar strain of nihilism that has infected the West. You can see this directly in their plummeting fertility rates, but it also bleeds through into their entertainment as well.

Anime focuses very heavily on the power of love and friendship, and those are certainly good things, but when you drill the Japanese harder on transcendent beliefs, they tend to squirm. Attack on Titan strikes at the very core of this issue, as you could tell in the beginning seasons it was trying to find a response to nihilism.

The premise of the show is that man-eating giants (called titans) have forced the last remnants of humanity to barricade themselves into one walled country. After a century of peace, two new unique titans have started breaking down the walls and thus begins a story of humanity dealing with an existential threat. Eventually, it is revealed a select few humans can become titans and safely transform back. And after that, it is revealed that humanity was not going extinct, but rather this was all part of a political plot about racism.

If that last part seems odd to you, then yes, you now understand the whiplash I felt when watching the show.

But let’s focus on the early seasons, then I can get you up to speed. The first three seasons are just about fighting titans (mindlessly guided by some strange intelligent titans) and a political coup of overthrowing the monarchy controlling humanity from inside the walls.

You can almost view it as a Nietzschean Man looking into the abyss and the abyss looking back. Every time we’re introduced to a group of likable characters, they are brutally murdered before the plot arc wraps up. There’s a horrific battle scene three or four times a season that acts as a clearing out of all the extras and one or two major characters.

Meanwhile, of those who do survive, they become increasingly more brutal as time goes on. “You must become a monster to defeat monsters” is a character arc most go through. The message is hammered home. The world is harsh, uncaring, and cruel, and you must become nihilistically so if you have a chance of surviving. You must double-down on the nihilism that brought you here in order to make a better world. It supports this view unapologetically, even going so far as to bash organized religion as being nothing more than the corrupt taking advantage of the blind. There are no gods, prayers do nothing, and to delude yourself into thinking that is a form weakness.

And that’s literally in the theme song if you want to go watch.

It’s not just Attack on Titan that takes that particular approach to organized faith. Even landmark shows such as Fullmetal Alchemist (which again, I consider to be one of the best anime Japan has ever produced) take this same stick to bash religion, or more accurately, their stereotype of Christianity.

“Walk on your own two feet.” You’ll see this theme repeated within much of the Japanese media. And while I cannot deny the merits of this message from a purely material view, from a spiritual sense, this is snake oil. Because while the Japanese love to say this critique, they don’t often answer where you’re walking to.

As for Attack on Titan, the show’s answer is ever more horrendous carnage and destruction. There are great moments of human spirit which partially save the show, flickers of genius that earned it its appeal. But often these scenes need to be read in spite of what the text is trying to say. For me, the most egregious one was when a military commander named Erwin leads one final suicidal charge against the titans, inspiring all his men to give their lives so that humanity might have a chance of survival.

From a spiritual perspective, this is a great triumph of courage. But Attack on Titan sees it more cynically. Erwin’s charge was little more than a man deluding a bunch of fools into giving their lives willingly for the sake of humanity. Now there’s some more nuance to that, but the man is literally characterized as a “necessary devil” just minutes following his sacrifice. AoT understands martial virtue requires the horrific, but it doesn’t understand that martial virtue is a good thing.

But as Attack on Titan’s author continued to double-down on this nihilistic tendency, he must’ve quickly realized where this ever growing bloodbath was leading. Either that, or corporate forced him to change the show. Regardless, when it is revealed that humanity exists outside of the remnant found inside the walls, the show irrevocably changes. I would argue that the last true episode of Attack on Titan ended with Erwin’s charge as the moral suddenly shifts from “Do whatever is necessary to win and throw away your humanity” to “War is horrible and we need to rediscover our humanity.”

This shift comes with a gigantic change in the framing of the show. Until now, it’s been humanity versus titans. But as we learn, humanity trapped within the walls are part of a previously cruel race called Eldians who possess the capability to transform into titans. Another country called Marley overthrew the Eldians sending them into exile and took a contingent of the population hostage to forcefully transform into titans. The titans the show’s protagonists have been fighting are all actually Eldians taken and transformed against their will.

After this reveal, the show too transforms from about fighting titans to exploring a centuries long blood libel between the two groups. And to make matters even more deranged, the Eldians in Marley are forced to wear armbands, just in case you didn’t quite catch the bizarre allegory the author was going for.

Anyways, let’s wrap the rest of this plot up. As matters continue to worsen, Eren, the main protagonist, decides to go on a genocidal rampage. He chooses to exterminate the whole of humanity living outside the walls because there doesn’t seem to be any other way for his people’s survival. And in a very cliché fashion, the former enemies of the two countries work to bring the big bad down.

Bear in mind, this happens after we’ve watched nearly seventy episodes of them brutally killing each other with no attempt on either side to compromise or negotiate.

The plot becomes… interesting after this point. The ragtag group defeats Eren who then reveals it was a part of his plan all along where he made the Eldians into heroes for the rest of mankind while also obliterating all of their enemies.

What strikes me about the ending was that after nearly one hundred episodes of brutal war, there’s not really a lesson you can take away from the show except the mundane observation that brutality is a fact of the human condition. Nothing is really resolved in AoT. The show ends on the lukewarm possibility that Eldians and regular people can co-exist.

And while the magic system for creating titans was thought to be destroyed in the final act, it is implied that it wasn’t. Thus nothing was really changed from all the blood, sweat, and tears of the protagonists. They all effectively died for nothing, except maybe a fragile peace between Eldia and what remained of Marley.

Is that realistic? Perhaps, but there’s nothing uplifting to the soul in final product of AoT. It sought out to provide an answer to nihilism, and the best it could do was shrug its shoulders in the final act.

And you see this again and again throughout anime. Their serious spiritual answers always either default to a similar atheism, an appeal to fundamental human goodness, or some quasi Shinto-Buddhist philosophy. It’s never substantive. The atheistic nihilism is what’s currently killing them. The appeal to human goodness is naïve and just gets deconstructed by the former. And while I’m not as well versed in the Shinto-Buddhism as I would like, it seems more a cultural fascination in their entertainment than it does a formalized faith.

Perhaps anime is the wrong place to seek such dialogue, but I think you would then be underestimating anime as an art form. We would not say television is incapable of serious religious themes, and I don’t see how it’s any different for anime. Perhaps I have watched all the wrong shows, and maybe this observation is wrong, but this is what I have seen from my experience.

In any case, I can’t help but sense a spiritual dearth in anime just as I do in Western media, and I think that shouldn’t be ignored.

There are, of course, degenerate aspects to anime. And there are also just plain garbage shows that are mass produced to make a quick buck. I see a lot of people focus on these in their critiques, condemning anime for this spiritual trash. I do not argue against the point that there are vast swaths of Japanese media that are spiritually unhealthy, but that is not the damning claim people seem to think it is.

Because again, there are vast swathes of Western media that are absolutely trash. And even if we lived in a healthy culture, I think most entertainment is bad simply from a pareto principle.

I think these aspects are highlighted not because they are unique, but because they are unique to the West. For example, Japan has a form of porn called hentai. The West has cartoon porn as well. But we don’t call it by a genre. We just call it porn.

So strangely, we consider hentai as a part of anime but we don’t consider our cartoon porn to be a part of cartoons. I think this is partly due to the widespread physical commercialization of hentai that exists in Japan, whereas the West seems to take a more digital approach. But I think this is also due to the fact that the particular manifestations of degeneracy are more apparent to us in other cultures than our own.

People will walk past billboards of scantily clad women in lingerie but freak out when they see the same image but Japanese. And yes, I am aware there is a lot of more hardcore stuff over there. But there is also a lot more hardcore stuff over here. Do I need to bring up the bear scene in Baldur’s Gate 3? It is around us as it is over there. We just blink and walk past it because it has become normal.

So no, I don’t think anime is inherently degenerate. I think its abstract nature makes it easier for it to be degenerate, but the medium itself does not need to be slandered on this basis. The fault of the art lies squarely on the artist and not the paintbrush. The real conversation on this subject is the spiritual differences that come with changing mediums, what strengths and weaknesses they offer. But that is a side tangent for another day.

As for all entertainment, I think the most interesting question is what would it look like if it were Christian? Suppose Japan was a Christian country, what would the landscape of anime become? I suppose it’s unfair for me to make that lament, as I expressly stated earlier it is not my culture. And yet, as an artist, I often daydream about my preferred vision for any story I consume. I want to see all art elevated to its highest possible form, and I think anime would be improved if it embraced the real Christianity behind the aesthetic it loves to ape.

I think the best thing anime has to offer is not its based controversies on social media, even though those are fun to read. The best thing anime has to offer is the inspiration it can give to artists in the West, a door to realities and truths that are now forbidden in our own media. I think a Christian artist needs to be able to parse the good from the poison, but that’s just the same with media in general.

Whatever the case, I am most interested in what anime can potentially inspire over here, and can it contribute to a dissident art scene? I think it can, but only time will answer that question. In the meantime, all we can do is promote the good art in our circles and wherever we happen to find it abroad. And anime isn’t an exception to this.