Do watching anime somtimes gives you unrealistic perspective of the world?

[Daichi]

If I were to give some examples then consider the case of harems, protagonist being overly powerful, teens leading world armies, ninjas being like superheroes, cat girls and so on? Does it happen to you?

 

[K5Rakitan]

Watching Disney movies gave me an unrealistic perspective of the world that was very damaging to my love life. I grew up thinking I had to have "one true love" and got crushed when the first one didn't work out. I gave up on monogamy in 2009, and it was the best decision I ever made.

 

[Yorda]

Well, we live in the age of misinformation.

Information Age ---> Misinformation Age

Alternative narratives, governments, advertisements, cultures, religions, and many more are fighting for peoples' attention constantly. Entertainment is just one more facet of the whole, and anime is just a minuscule subcategory of major portions of my life. The effects of anime on my perception of reality cannot compete with other influences on equal grounds.

With that said, my perspective of the world is already unrealistic because of lack of scope. The reality that I experience in my locale, with my language, with my culture, ethnic groups, religious influences, age, gender, environment, socioeconomic status, etc., is very limited considering all the countries and people on this planet who are experiencing vastly different realities.

 

[Yorda]

Watching Disney movies gave me an unrealistic perspective of the world that was very damaging to my love life. I grew up thinking I had to have "one true love" and got crushed when the first one didn't work out. I gave up on monogamy in 2009, and it was the best decision I ever made.

Reminds me of a philosophy professor I once had.
Half-serious Professor: "Marry once, twice. Marry often. And always marry up."
I think he was up to #3 or #4.
I personally know worse, and it is ugly when they forget the 'marry up' part.
He should have warned the class to be careful with children too!

Meanwhile, I'm at #0 and follow a different life philosophy.
Now that you mention it, I still want idealized love, but I'm smart enough to know that people are not anywhere near as virtuous and amazing as anime characters.

 

[ChronicleCrawler]

If I were to give some examples then consider the case of harems, protagonist being overly powerful, teens leading world armies, ninjas being like superheroes, cat girls and so on? Does it happen to you?

Seeing Trump though Im not from USA, gives me much more unrealistic perspective of the world than watching animes.

 

[AliceShiki]

Not really, like... Fiction is fiction, it's up to the reader to make the separation between reality and fiction.

Yes you can be influenced by what you watch, but that doesn't mean you'll seriously think it's possible for a lone teenager to change the world... That's not anime influence, that's stupidity.

Giving a personal example, CLAMP mangas were one of the main influences I had when I was a teen and they had a considerable relevance in the formation of my morals... But that's because the foundations to those morals were already in me due to the way my parents brought me up, CLAMP just helped shape my views of the world after a solid foundation was already established and said foundation aligned well with what was depicted in CLAMP mangas.

Anime alone can't make you believe in stupid stuff. If you're already stupid and had stupid influences all your life though, then maybe anime will be the final nail on the coffin.

 

[Ral]

Well, seeing that simple gossips and tweets gives people unrealistic perspective of the world . . .

Like, seriously, who has a correct realistic perspective of the world? Pretty much no one.

So, like everyone said, be smart.

 

[gaylolis]

i don't know about anime, but i kinda give less fucks about the world as the time goes.

the only thing that matters is when some funny shit happen.

i don't know what's realistic anymore when real-life stories were so absurd and weird, like when 40-year old monk in thailand dressed one of his monks as shimakaze and went to do lewd stuff with him. or someone who lived his entire life as a man, just told by the doctor one day that he's actually a woman.

 

[ShrimpShady]

The biggest lie anime told me was that highschool would be an exciting romp full of self-discovery and emotional maturation. It was really just 2 years of dicking around and a whole senior year of not knowing what the fuck to do with my life.

 

[Raneday]

when I was a little kid I would answer yes

But if it's now? Nope

 

[Nahrenne]

If anything is giving unrealistic perspectives on the world, then it's films and TV programmes aimed at kids.
At least anime often shows the dark side of humanity, as much as the light side.
With kids' shows and films, though...
...If I ever had children, I think I'd try to not show them such things so they don't live in a bubble of idealistic nonsense and believe that's reality.
I see a lot of stuff aimed at kids is just a load of lies.
What's better: growing up aware of the vicissitudes of life and having common sense, or growing up believing everything is safe and full of rainbows and fluffy talking animals and then being disappointed/terrified of the real world when they grow up?

*sigh*

Nvm, I'm just ranting a bit, sorry.
orz

...x...

 

[K5Rakitan]

Reminds me of a philosophy professor I once had.
Half-serious Professor: "Marry once, twice. Marry often. And always marry up."
I think he was up to #3 or #4.
I personally know worse, and it is ugly when they forget the 'marry up' part.
He should have warned the class to be careful with children too!

Meanwhile, I'm at #0 and follow a different life philosophy.
Now that you mention it, I still want idealized love, but I'm smart enough to know that people are not anywhere near as virtuous and amazing as anime characters.

My philosophy is simply to be honest with all the men in my life.

Dan Savage talks about how there is no "the one" but rather someone you round up to 1. I prefer to add them together and get more than one.

 

[Yorda]

If anything is giving unrealistic perspectives on the world, then it's films and TV programmes aimed at kids.
At least anime often shows the dark side of humanity, as much as the light side.
With kids' shows and films, though...
...If I ever had children, I think I'd try to not show them such things so they don't live in a bubble of idealistic nonsense and believe that's reality.
I see a lot of stuff aimed at kids is just a load of lies.
What's better: growing up aware of the vicissitudes of life and having common sense, or growing up believing everything is safe and full of rainbows and fluffy talking animals and then being disappointed/terrified of the real world when they grow up?

*sigh*

Nvm, I'm just ranting a bit, sorry.
orz

...x...

It's hard to say what to do. I don't really want to be too strict with a child and inhibit their freedom, after all I've lived a life where my entertainment choices were my own to make. However, I do realize there is a certain level of impressionability for younger audiences that shouldn't be ignored.

The real marker of success (or at least something went right with their upbringing) would be if the child is able to put down their Nazi zombie killing FPS game and ponder at the same level that we are right now, of their own volition and out of their own intellectual curiosity. "How have I been influenced? What were the effects on my psyche? Am I happy with these results? Do they align with my ideals?"

 

[weakwithwords]

K5Rakitan, that polyamorous philosophy was something I learned from Undocumented Features in the late 1990s. I think I was already starting to resent Disney for mutilating fairytale endings back then.

Yorda, Glass Age transitioning to Plastic Age.

thepundit, "You're fake news? You're fired!"

AliceShiki, Card Captor Sakura is probably the first manga series I managed to finish reading. I had a friend who was a fan of CLAMP gushing over how they were a circle of four in uni before they became famous. I remember telling her about seeing a complete set of Clow Cards while visiting a bookstore in Japan.

Ral, light and shadow philosophy.

gaylolis, like I welcomed a returning author with: "You can forget sleep and you can forget food, but never ever forget fun."

ShrimpShady, the biggest lie is the cake.

Raneday, kids can be the cruelest of creatures, but they are also gullible. Imagine, they don't realize gullible isn't in the dictionary.

Nahrenne, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory eventually becomes the geezer of orz.

Daichi, are you waiting for someone to tell you that you're overextending yourself?

 

[Silver_Sky]

Seeing Trump though Im not from USA, gives me much more unrealistic perspective of the world than watching animes.

Agreed when trump was elected I was like "maybe I'm the only sane person alive". And about the afore mentioned anime views, I was given antisocial behavior the idea that I was superior and more special. Odd reactions and mood swings were there too because simply 'its normal in anime' before then if a little exaggerated I was still 'normal' and even popular. I wish I read novels before than or during they helped me mature and fix the emotions I didn't know how to deal with by giving another outlet. Now I just have to fix laziness.

 

[DeathLight]

If anything non-animated TV shows about school life did more damage by giving me unrealistic expectations about school, life and mostly Friendships in general.

That because it very easy to take Friendships lightly when you start growing up and not help by kid-friendly shows or shows aimed at teens in which they don't show that sometimes Friendships can end or they don't last forever.

 

[CommonSense]

Well, when i was a kid movies and animes give me a high expectation and excitement of becoming an adult....
And now, well.... you probably figured it out already. It was disappointing.

But personally, i think those expectation as well as disappointment is necessary in life. The expectation as gave me hope to grow, to learn, to reach my dreams. The disappointment that came when i started living as an adult keeps me anchored to reality. However, i also know that dreams can come true, as long as i reach for it.
Malicious misinformation is wayyy more dangerous for a kid. Things like santa is okay, but like having degree = good employment = good life is something that still often ruins a lot of people.

 

[weakwithwords]

I see emphasis on what school people came from during job hunting in korean drama and novels so that's probably a real thing in their culture.

Friends get seduced by POWAH! so they will eventually shun the weakling you. The wavering undecided turn into frenemies. Eventually, you'll realize you're alone.

No, you are not alone. Do not forget your loyal insects. You outmass and outnumber the traitors you laughed and cried with before. With a moderately good strategy, you should be able to bring it back.

Bring it back, bring it back
Don't take it away from me, because you don't know
What it means to me

We're bringing it, we're bringing it back
Fireball!

 

[AliceShiki]

having degree = good employment = good life is something that still often ruins a lot of people.

Tbf, this notion is a relic of old times, where simply having a degree was something extremely rare and already worth-note, to the point you were basically guaranteed a job at that point.

Times changed, nowadays degrees are often times expected and nothing particularly praise-worthy... Our mindset just didn't catch up with the changes in society.

So yeah, a degree by no means guarantees a job nowadays, but I can't really fault this notion... It's just dated. It's by no means easy to updated mindsets, that change will come with time.

 

[D4isuke]

It’s called “Anime”, and it’s Art, like it’s called Hentai and it’s art.

The story within every anime is a fiction.

May be realistic or not, it gives us a bit of philosophy behind it. Through “show, don’t tell” or “tell through show” principles, it gives much consideration to its form of escapism. Our ideals which we really wanted to live in, but in reality, it’s not.

anyway, in terms of realistic perspectives:

I would say that most genre or descriptive in anime that I don’t mostly disagree is:

BATTLE SHONEN WITH “DON’T GIVE UP” OR ”POWER OF FRIENDSHIP”.

Generic characters like “I’m going to be good, for the sake of being good” or “wahahhahaha I’m evil because I’m evil” is so one-sided compact in terms of morals and ethics. As a mature reader or viewers, you really won’t get it at all since y‘all can’t relate to this “generic” character because how good or evil they are, but in reality, we are human being with complex mindset.

I get that, “nobody is alone”, but some or most people won’t help you at all. Your battle is your own battle, and what you get in front of your eyes is the fear which you need to pass through in order to escape from safe zone. If you can’t, you’re completely drained out. Nothing will bypass you.... or I hope someone will understand your pain.