Kids are going to be weird and use their imagination. They'll pretend to be an NFL player breaking tackles as they run through a crowded school hallway. They'll pretend to be Optimus Prime and pretend to transform into a truck. Or they'll pretend to be iron man blasting bad guys with their lazer palms.

The issue is when your friends have aged out of that behavior and you think it's still cool to Naruto run up to them all the time.

There were definitely kids naruto running and doing kamehamehas at recess, but by high school, if it was ever known you watch even some mainstream ass anime, kiss that social life goodbye. Other anime nerds went way too weeb with it, so the only option is to hide your enjoyment and never make any references to anime in order to have some kind of normal experience. These days it's super normal to watch anime because it was our parents generation that didn't grow up with it. Now everyone is familiar with it.

You make fun of me now.... Wait till I'm able to turn Super Saiyan. We'll see who is laughing then!

If you've never tried to go super saiyan, you're not a real anime fan.

Also, "everybody"? No, it's just a slightly larger percentage of nerds

Its a little wierd for me as nerdy. geeky, fen. Being part of a subcluture had become part of my identity but now they are just normal ole things.

And look at what's happening now. Entire cosplays at school when it's not even Halloween.

I laugh at the ones that have anime girls pasted all over their cars.

this guy in college would masturbate to sailor moon

I've been into Anime since the 90s, always had friends and wasn't ostracized for it. Some people asked questions about tentacle hentai and Akira, but since was I never found any intereet in either all I could talk about was stuff I'd seen and I'd just tell em that.

I guess the closest thing to a real negative reaction was my mom walking in on the opening scene of Ranma 1/2 Movie 2, where Ranma, having been at the beach as a guy, was now running around topless as a woman. She didn't accept "that's really a guy who just got splashed with water."

I didn't like anime for so long because the fans of it in the 00's had some very eccentric behavior.

Anime kinda polarized itself by the time I stopped watching like 5-7ish years ago. Idk if it's changed now.

But back when I stopped watching your options were:

• Shonen Reboot/Continuation
• Generic Candy-Colored anime girls at high school show.
• Rare 10-60 Episode mini-series that had no right existing in that era.
• Jojo.

Nice subculture you got there, would be a shame if it was commodomified for mass appeal.