I realize I’m breaking a rule of the Round Robin by posting this. Don’t worry though, my blog is so new and sparsely read (partly due to the previous reason) that this shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll link to the other girls’ posts, so no worries. Don’t kill me, itsubun!
(Well actually Hinano went ahead and beat me to it! I feel much safer now.)

The allure of anime
Anime’s appeal is best understood by none other than us, the anime fans. Before I continue, let’s touch on what is just so appealing about cartoons from Japan.

For myself, the one thing that was striking about anime versus American or traditional cartoons was the difference in detail and body proportions. Cartoons like Batman were dying out, ushering in a new wave spearheaded by shows from Nickelodeon like Dexter’s Laboratory and Rugrats. As a child who wanted to grow up as soon as possible, I was immediately disgusted with these new shows: “Ugh, what is this kid stuff!”

Others may have slightly differing reasons, but that’s what it ultimately boils down to. The art. What is anime without art, anyway? (Yes, this is a stupid question. It’s also rhetorical.) Humans are predominantly visual species, and from that angle, it’s easy to explain an interest in anime. Anime can portray fantasies and impossible fiction (such as an entire cast of unimaginably beautiful girls and handsome guys) that no human acting could ever hope to achieve. In a sense, the mere interest in anime is a form of escapism. (But that’s a slippery slope that we’ll avoid for now.)

A shield for reality?
Anime is a stress-reliever. To understand this, it would be easier to breakdown what an anime is. An anime is primarily two things: 1.) the art, and 2.) the story. As they would say, you come for the art and stay for the story. The story is what absorbs us, immerses us into the anime. It’s like reading a book or watching a movie — you want to know what happens. And you forget about everything else in the meanwhile.

Rabbit-hole or not, though? Not for me. Not intentionally, anyway. I don’t return home and tell myself that I should or need to unwind by watching x episodes of y anime. (I don’t mean to play holier than thou here.) Almost all of my anime viewership is conducted when I am bored. Yes, that means when I’m sitting there with nothing to do – no worries, no stresses, nothing. I become immersed, as expected, but I don’t consciously decide to use it as a form of escapism.

Anime is escapism
Typing this, though, I began to wonder, what exactly entails escapism when it comes to anime? Is it like the slippery slope mentioned earlier, the desire for the impossible; or is it that from which I’ve already exonerated myself — watching anime to wipe away stress? To be honest, it seems like a bit of both.

By merely reading a book, or watching a movie/drama, are you not escaping from reality during that period of time? Escapism is defined as the avoidance of reality by indulging in entertainment, imaginative situation, or activity. I feel that unconscious escapism is absolutely possible. In that regard, I am guilty; merely because I have an interest in anime.

It’s all up to you
Am I… are we, cowards? Or rather, is anime a healthy refuge with which to dash your worries? This is not a black-and-white question. I’m going to get into what may seem like a lot of common sense. Whether anime is your cowardly white flag to reality, or a sanctuary with which to rejuvenate yourself is based on the degree of usage.

When is too much, too much, though? Simple. Analyze yourself. Log the amount of time you spend, when you watch anime and why. Go ask somebody. (Not your mom. She hates your anime hobby with a passion.) Someone in the community, who you feel is objective. Tell them your habits. Decide from there. I assume none of you are escaped insane asylumees.

Bottom line: Good or bad?
Anime is a casual activity. Like any casual activity, as long as it retains a level of priority less than work, it’s perfectly normal and fine. (Unless you work in the anime industry. Then it is work. Ha.) Everyone has different means of entertainment, and for us, it’s anime. It’s not bad, not at all. (Excuse the corny ending.)

Other entries by members of the Round-Robin:
blissmo: The Rabbit Hole - Means of Escaping Reality
Hinano: The Rabbit Hole: Anime & Escapism
tachikomaticdays: The Rabbit-Hole: Anime and Escapism

I’m sure most of you already understand the concept of a “rabbit-hole”, which can be linked to Alice in Wonderland. The premise is that a young girl named Alice falls down a rabbit hole into a fantasy realm, where she has incredible adventures.

The premise.
A friend of mine and I were talking yesterday, when she brought something interesting to my attention. Bill Cosby, a man widely famous for his role as the lovable Cliff Huxtable in the Cosby Show, had made a “controversial” speech at the NAACP’s 50th anniversary of the Brown v Board of Education decision. (If you don’t know what either of those are, look them up.)

In his speech, Cosby voiced what nobody was willing to touch for  years — the state of the current black population in America. He pinpoints specific issues within the black lower-class; specifically Ebonics, criminal behavior, and gang activity. Citing these as prime examples, he asserts that the root of the problem is the parenting, or lack thereof. Cosby tells the black population rise up to the occasion; the top 10 percent has already paved the way, it is now time for the rest to follow.

Following his dissertation, Cosby came under fire from various groups for a few key reasons. One, many felt that Cosby was airing the black community’s “dirty laundry” for all to see. They felt that in identifying the problems, he had officially normalized those behaviors, making them even more acceptable than before. Others jumped on Cosby for “relieving” the White Man of responsibility towards impoverished blacks.

My take, and opinions.
I do admit that reading Bill Cosby’s speech yesterday certainly did put in me the motivation to write this, but the idea has been on my mind for quite some time. Bill Cosby may be a comedian, but he’s not joking this time around. I couldn’t do anything besides nod my head as I read through the transcript. The black community really needs to get their act together.

A little history, if we may. I, a Taiwanese-American, grew up in a very sheltered suburban area. If anywhere could have a negative crime rate, it would be the fair city I was raised in. (It’s so safe everyone calls it the “bubble.) Though I attended public schools, they were all located in upscale neighborhoods. I had never really met a black person of the so-styled “working-class” before. The black students in my honors classes were… well, they were amazing. People say that Asians have a high work ethic and concentration on education. Black honors students amazed even us. For the life of me, I could not see where the negative black stereotypes came from. I found whites to be much more crude and crass in comparison.

That is… until I began attending college downtown. It did not even take weeks to reconstruct my entire opinion. I was suddenly hit by all the stereotypes, all at once. Sagging clothes, lavish use of Ebonics, constant pounding of rap music, and the ever-present headline: Robbery/Murder/Gang Violence, Suspect Black Male. Statistics mention that 28% of black males will be sent to jail some time in their life. We all like to toss statistics because the average is not a good representation of the whole, one particularly bad part drags everything else down. I am sorry to say that I find it hard to toss statistics on this occasion.

The problem? From my point of view, it seems to be the evolution of Black American culture. From a similar standpoint that youth in Asia all want to look like the next pop star or fashion model, many black youth see themselves as the next rap artist or basketball star. In Taiwan, everyone wears these silly clothes with nonsensical Engrish on them; in America they wear oversized and sagging clothes. The difference between these two are the general impressions that they give off. (We’ll ignore the 1 in a million chance to become a famous celebrity thread for now. Wearing what a celebrity wears doesn’t make you look like a celebrity [in most cases] anyway.) Tight-fitting clothes with silly Engrish are as synonymous with femininity as baggy, sagging clothes complete with oversized jewelry and a bandanna are synonymous with gangster membership. And to be honest, I’m much more afraid of gangsters than homosexuals (Or people who look extremely girly despite not being actually female). I often can’t tell if some blacks walking around my university are students or gangsters.

Ebonics is yet another issue intricately tied with black culture. For those of you who do not live in America and wonder about the interesting way that lower-class blacks speak, it is not a joke. Linguists have gone far enough to identify it as African-American Vernacular English. I had been under the impression that it was just a horribly butchered form of English. The fact remains, though, that Ebonics can hardly be used in a professional setting. A person using ebonics will commonly be tied with the lower class, along with poverty and delinquency. Definitely not something you’d want to walk into job interview spouting.

Some people don’t think so
Critics of Cosby’s speech have expressed a few interesting things. Like Cosby said himself in an interview, I was inclined to write them off as, “Crazy.” In retrospect I can see the logic behind their dissent, and will try to address them from my perspective.

“Airing the black communities’ dirty laundry for all to see is detrimental to the state of the community, though we concur it is already in a dismal state. By shedding light on these issues publicly, you are essentially legitimizing them and have sealed their continuance.”

Actually, I feel Bill Cosby decided to make the speech because it was obvious that keeping silent and/or working inside the community just wasn’t cutting it. Behaviors can legitimize themselves perfectly fine without a catalyst like the focused attention of the public. Also, if these critics themselves acknowledge that the problem exists, why can’t they acknowledge that whatever they’re doing right now obviously isn’t working?

“Freeing the White Man of his responsibilities towards the lower-class black citizens will result in an even worse situation.”

I don’t know if I can see the logic behind this one. The reasons are definitely there, but whether or not they should be called logic, is debatable. Those of you with knowledge of US History, know that this great nation has a dark history regarding the treatment of blacks in the past. Amidst the Civil Rights movements of the last century, it was proposed that whites should make “reparations” to blacks for the infringements their ancestors made on the blacks’ ancestors. Erm, proposed and materialized, actually. A system is now in place known commonly as “affirmative action“. But should whites really have to take responsibility for blacks’ unwillingness to move forward on their own? Does that even make sense? (I’m going to avoid getting into the whole issue of the affirmative action, which, while touting equality, actually performs the opposite. Affirmative action supposedly works for minorities, but for non-blacks, this is debatable. For example, the bulk of affirmative action articles neglects to even mention Asians.)

Wrapping up
With all that I’ve written, I would be unsurprised if I received negative feedback. I realize I am probably not very qualified to discuss this issue, being unphilosophical at best, not to mention the fact that I am not of the demographic which is the target of this entry. Additionally, it is pretty clear that my opinion of lower-class blacks is not too high. I recognize these biases, and tried to be as objective as possible. As for how blacks could hope to solve these issues, I would not be able to provide a satisfactory answer. I am not part of that community, and can only hear about what may be the causes of the effects which I observe. (I think I have much more to say, but my writing spirit is all burned out for now.)

For the transcript of Bill Cosby’s (now fondly referred to as the ‘Pound Cake’) Speech, go ahead and click here. Just in case you missed it in the first paragraph.
(All this material deals with issues WITHIN the United States. From my knowledge, such problems are practically non-existent in other parts of the world.)

I don’t feel I did this topic justice after all. So have this nice image of more cherry blossoms. Next time I’ll do something less controversial, promise. ^^

Well, here we are. This is the introductory post that nobody will read or comment on, simply because it is the introductory post. As most introductory posts go, this one will do two things. One, it will allow me to test and see how properly the post system works, so that I can get used to it. Two, it will serve to make it look like this blog actually has content. (Do not be deceived, it doesn’t… yet.)

Since I’m here, though, I might as well go ahead and describe the background and purpose of this blog. Note that while I could do this in the About page, I’d rather reserve that space to for a little bit of freelancing. I love some of the creative things that people have done with their About pages, and I intend to do so myself.

Tabitthy Tadochii is a blog started at the behest of the girl’s round-robin, which was founded by itsubun. This blog, while spawned partly because of the anime blogosphere, will probably appear to be very un-anime oriented. The reason for such will be attributed to the fact that I will almost exclusively use this blog to respond to the topics of the round-robin. I may post other topics, but they will generally be unspecific to the world of anime, instead touching on some philosophy from me whenever I have those rare bouts of inspiration.

The name “Tabitthy Tadochii” comes from an ancient Atlantean saying, meaning “Timeless Fortune”. It’s a bit of a nonsensical phrase, since fortune is measured through time and cannot lack it. Ha, ha. Did you fall for the lies?
Anyways. I came up with “Tabitthy Tadochii” while actually trying to brainstorm a real name for this blog. I ended up with “Tabitthy” which is derived from “Tabby“, since I love cats. I haven’t the slightest clue where “Tadochii” came from. $5 might help jog my memory, though. *winks*
Linking (THIS IS IMPORTANT!) : If someone wants to link to me, Tabitthy Tadochii can easily be acronym’d to “TT” – add an underscore, and wah-la: T_T. In fact, I insist that anyone who links to me use T_T on their blogroll.

Before I conclude, I must say that the WordPress platform is rather nice. It’s a bit mind-boggling at how many features there are. The last time I did any blogging was through Xanga, which honestly has this unshakably juvenile feel. Maybe that’s because I last used it when I was 12. Bottom line is that I’m impressed. I look forward to being read by all my future readers.