I've been lurking for quite some time now & I felt like sharing something because it's something a lot of us here that are of the Millennial Generation can probably relate to.

BACKSTORY: I myself am relatively late to discovering TRP & have only just begun introducing its aspect into my life for about a year now. I grew up with my parents being married but my father was relatively weak in parenting. He tried teaching me life lessons but he was all talk. I was never really actually taught skills or lessons from him, only lectured so I gravitated towards my mother & was therefore cuddled. My childhood & adolescence reflected that. Sedentary lifestyle, fat, played lots of vodka, watched lots of tv BUT that's what my post is about.

BODY: As we all know & circlejerk over, Western society is & has been very feminized over the last few decades. Western boys have adopted sedentary lifestyles that leave them with no outlet for their own masculine aggressions & this tends to manifest itself in various negative ways, e.g. ADHD, Austism, general social retardation, etc. see /r9k/ for more. The Western media these boys consume has also been feminized over the years. Comic book heroes & GI Joes had been replaced by SpongeBob & borderline Acid trip cartoons. I experienced this first hand but it's also evident by viewing the various popular shows & media of the last few decades. Feminization in almost every aspect of culture combined with the collapse of natural male role models, due to increases in divorce & strong independent womenz, has been disastrous obviously but I do think that certain Millennial boys had one outlet in their lives, shonen anime, particularly Dragon Ball Z.

Now I know what you're thinking "Erde, what sort of weeaboo bullshit are you trying to spread on my forum?" Hear me out. For those of you who grew up watching DBZ, like myself, it was an entirely different kind of media. The fighting, the yelling, the explosions! It's everything little boys naturally like to see but it's more than just mindless entertainment & here's why.

  • Goku, the main character, was more or less by himself since he was a child. Hunted for his own food, made his own way after his grandfather died.
  • He sets out on an adventure filled with epic fights & hard training. He has aspirations of fighting the worlds greatest fighters just for the sake of fighting.
  • He marries a nice girl who bares him a child. Even this animal has instincts that need to be met & he fulfills his natural provider role after this.

So Dragon Ball is pretty tame relatively but a lot of good lessons are learned here that, while not overtly apparent to a 7-12 year old, are still something he will retain going forward. Dragon Ball Z however is more about lessons in attitude & masculinity than it is about actual life lessons & here's why.

  • The recurring theme of discipline & training from DB is even more emphasized in DBZ; Gravity training, Hyberbolic Time Chamber training, Afterlife training.
  • Another recurring theme that is expounded on is determination & maintaining willpower even in the face of overwhelming odds. Every fight follows virtually the same formula; bad guy is stronger, good guy preserves to find new strength which makes him victorious.
  • Anger, jealousy, & frustration are NOT bad thing. This is a big one here. For those of you who haven't watched, Goku transforms into the Super Saiyan after the bad guy kills his best friend since childhood. His anger pushes him into that transformation. Vegeta reaches the same transformation out of frustration & jealousy of Goku.
  • The role of positive male role models in the life of young boys.
    • Gohan, the son of Goku, is trained & taught survival from one of the strongest warriors on the planet.
    • He later trains with his father & afterwards reaches the height of strength in the show at that point.
    • After this, his father dies & he returns to live under his mother where his strength is significantly diminished due to hear nagging him into a different path than his father.
    • Gohan does eventually teach his younger brother how to fight like their Dad taught him.

What's all this to say though? Similar lessons could have been learned from observing other superhero shows or reading comics but this is important in a contextual sense insofar as a good portion of Western Millennial boys got to absorb this Eastern media which is more attuned to traditional senses of masculinity & strength, & much less corrupted by modern Feminist philosophy, much like the East in general.

Other lessons have been learned from other main stream, action/adventure focused "shonen" animes such as Naruto & Full Metal Alchemist. In the case of Naruto, you have a boy who is considered to be a burden who has a goal & never wavers from achieving it. In FMA, the primary lesson that can be taken away is sacrifice or equivalent exchange as it is referred to in the show, which as we know is a fundamental part of discipline & self improvement.

DISCLAIMER: Now I will say this, obviously anime isn't all good. In fact, I've debated even posting this because of the connotations that surround the stereotypical anime watcher. Bad acne, shaggy hair, fat, heavy breathing, you know what I mean. Obviously I'm not offering this as a prescriptive media regiment for the Red Pill. Screaming & yelling like Goku won't increase you SMV or give you strength, it'll only give you a stroke, believe me 10 year old me tried. Anime, like anything else, can easily go from a positive influence to a means of escapism. But fuck it, it's been a positive influence in my life & I'd wager that others would agree. I can genuinely say that Goku saving the world on TV every Saturday morning has been inspiration for me to try to improve my own life & hopefully the lives of others.

SUMMARY: Western boys who grew up in the 90s & 00s suffered from a shortage of role models in their real lives & in media. Eastern Media offered a more masculine alternative that provided potentially enduring lessons for them.