Okay The Yano Research group: says 1 in 4 Japanese say their Otaku- ah this chart! – see chart. I really don’t think surveys are on the whole are honest, rather how you interpret the data would more or less make it honest, that said I believe this survey to be mostly correct. But keep in mind that this survey ropes in: Plastic models and trains not anime related, cars and buses again not anime related; Just obsessed folks. It also includes Wrestling, pro wrestling and costuming, again general groups of people. The Word Otaku has simply become more used and less notorious and can easily be attached to almost anything. Like Coin collectors could be Otaku for example.
The classic term Otaku: Otaku is the honorific word of Taku (home). – Otaku is extremely negative in meaning as it is used to refer to someone who stays at home all the time and doesn’t have a life (no social life, no love life, etc)
I ask you to take time out of your day and walk around Tokyo. While doing that find a suited man among his fellow workers and again ask that business man eye to eye if he’s Otaku and the most common answer is NO, even if he was Otaku he would not admit to it in public, it’s about image. This survey does go around that allowing mostly anonymous, allowing for fax/phone/email responses, so I’d hope folks would be honest no face to face. Is it a good thing? well sure, but really it creates room for more labels and more separation of levels of obsession, for example stepping into Weaboo status. What is a Weaboo well
Weaboo: A negative term directed to anyone overly obsessed with Japanese culture to the point where they become annoying. Used frequently on the image boards of 2ch/4ch.
In the end at the end of the day and to put it simply, this whole study does not matter. Culture changes, it shifts with times and styles. Anime fans and hardcore Otaku are always roped together and their level of obsession will be viewed the same way. The word is used more often and in turn the side effect of this is the of softening of the term Otaku. Being labeled Otaku is something that might make you lose a job in the past, now it just means your into anime or cars or coins, in short you have a hobby that your very passionate about.
Source: ANN
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