▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬ Interview #225 - @SadAkko▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬  Some rando on the internet "Let's be honest - anime isn't even all that great." Interview conducted by: @Ultimatedeath Reviewed by: @bmoore07 Ultimate: Good day FlowersInTheRain. :3 I’m Ultimate, and I will be the Interviewer conducting your interview on behalf of the club I’m working at. ^_^ Thanks for giving me the opportunity to interview you, and thank you for your time in advance. :D Could you tell us about yourself? I’m one of those people that can be described as an achiever. All my life, I have always set myself goals and worked towards them. The most frustrating thing for me is when I can’t do something because someone else is in the way. I am a self-reliant person. I really don’t like to depend on, or rely on anyone else. I rarely ask for favours. I really dislike asking anybody for anything. I grew up being constantly disappointed by people, constantly being accused of things, and being constantly suspected of doing something wrong. I also grew up self aware and so, when I see people in a situation that may get me into trouble, I try to avoid it. I used to be pretty extroverted, but my hobbies are mostly introverted because people annoy me more and more, and I want to do things my own way more and more. I have become more and more introverted overall. Nowadays, I am happiest being extroverted online and keeping to myself irl for the most part. There are some rare instances where I enjoy being an extrovert irl, but all of those instances are related to online communities that I have been a part of. For example, if you were to meet me at an anime con, you would see my extroverted side. I pretty much don’t show my extroverted side to people unless they share the same hobbies and interests as me now. I was born and raised in London. My father is Jamaican and my mother is Nigerian. My dad used to preach, and my mother used to be a doctor. I have a sister that is 18 months younger than me, but our relationship has been strained since our teens. I have quite a bit of life experience. I’m not really what a lot of people expect. I don’t fit neatly into boxes. Because of this, I have never really fit in anywhere. I just do my own thing. I’ve made a lot of friends online and irl. I’ve had to cut a lot of friends loose, for various reasons. I just don’t have the time or the energy for everyone, and some people are incompatible with my life right now. For example, my fiance doesn't want me keeping in touch with any of my female friends that are also ex girlfriends, or that I have slept with. This means that some of the people I was closest to are now gone. Online, I have made friends with people that have suddenly disappeared, or I might be the one who suddenly disappears. So nowadays, when I make a friend with someone, I don’t really value the friendship as much as I used to. I don’t put in much effort to maintain the friendship because I know that it is likely to be a fleeting thing only, and in time we will no longer be speaking to one another. I do remember the people that I considered to be good or even great friends, though. But sometimes, I have to let a friend go just because talking to them brings back some painful memories. For example, when I was in the RAF, I made a lot of great friends there, but I also had so many negative experiences that once I got out, I didn’t want to keep in touch with anybody that I met there. I wanted to move on with my life. I’m also the sort of person that never gets bored. I’m a ‘been there done that’ kind of guy. I always keep myself busy with something. I’m always interested in learning new things, and trying new things, and seeing what's out there. Things that people think can’t be done, can be done. If you see someone on your computer screen doing something, that means it can be done, and it is being done, and guess what? Maybe I can do it, or I have done it too. This is why I am not a jealous or envious person. This is also why I don’t look up to celebrities. We all have our abilities and potential. I despise those that look at someone, and assume that what they do right now is all that they have ever done. Or all that they see in front of them right now is all that they are. For example, just because I am posting on an anime forum, doesn’t mean that I am an incel. For some reason, people around here assume that everyone here is an incel or something. I used to get depressed, but I have found ways to avoid getting depressed. Because I believe in God, I believe that my life has meaning, so I don’t get depressed about my existence. I never have suicidal thoughts, or anything like that. I like to hope for the best, but prepare for the worst, and so far things have been working out for me, big picture wise. Ultimate: Wow! That is a long and interesting answer to a question! :D How did you choose your username? I signed up here as DarkChildOfLight, which is the name I went by during my Destiny days. My MFC account and one of my YouTube accounts still go by that name. When I discovered the forum, I decided to make a new name before I started posting. I wanted a name that reflected the real me as much as possible, because I was planning to engage with this community the way that I did when I first started posting on forums back in 2009. I have gone by many names, online and even irl. One of the names that most people both online and offline know me as, is Flowers. My personality has changed over the years, because I used to be quite naive. People used to describe me as a walking bouquet and I became known as Flowers. I guess, I’m more like a bunch of roses now. Nice to look at, but thorny. Beware of my barbs lol. There is also this song. People like to sing this song when they see me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iR2tIyj8_y8 Could you give us a brief history of your time on MAL? My time on MAL has been brief actually, but because I have been really active on the forum since last October, some people think that I don’t do anything else. People have said to me, that I make fewer threads, and make more time for my fiance, which is a really big LOL. I use my laptop and my phone to update my MAL list, and to post on the forums. A lot of the time when I am posting here, I am out and about, or at work. And when I say at work, that can mean I am on lunch at work or I have a quick break, which can sometimes be as short as five minutes. When I first started posting on the forum, I wanted to try to get to know everyone as quickly as possible. I just jumped right in. I didn’t want to take on too many responsibilities because I have done that in the past. It has taken away from the fun of being able to freely come and go, and talk to users on other forums that I have been on. Making a new thread has always been my favourite thing to do on any forum, and it’s no different for me here on MAL. I can get to know everyone a lot faster, and engage with multiple people at once on a thread. My second favorite thing is reading people's profiles. I love the way that everyone can freely express themselves on their profiles, which is one of the things that drew me to want to be a part of this community. Any users you like/dislike? Why? I try to get along with everyone, but in life you just can’t do that. There will always be misunderstandings. I am pretty open minded and tolerant, for the most part. I was raised not to hate anyone or to have hate in my heart, so if I dislike a person, it means that I am really disappointed in that person for something. It might just be that I am disappointed in the way they are treating me or others, or some assumption that they have made about me or others. The first person that I disliked on MAL was @Railey2. I didn’t like him because he has a blog on MAL, where he appears to call out and attempt to ridicule members of the MAL community for doing nothing more than expressing their own opinion. I quickly let him know how I felt about it, and I told him that I didn’t like him, but in time, I came to understand him better. Even though I still didn’t agree with the existence of the blog, and the way that it can create discord on MAL, I have seen that he isn’t all that bad. We are currently on friendly terms. I also dislike people that post nasty comments on my profile or someone else’s profile, or send nasty PMs, but you can’t say anything back to them because they disable profile comments and / or PMs. It’s really unfair, and I am all about fairness and justice lol. It comes from my Christian upbringing, I guess. I’ve been told that I have a very strong sense of right and wrong. I am a black man living in a white man’s world and I’m a Libra, so that's probably why I turned out like this. Once, I was in a debate in an anime discussion, where someone called my fiance a monkey because I said that real people are more attractive than anime characters. Some people lol. I also dislike people that are horrible trolls. Especially the racist ones. I don’t mind trolls that are more or less just role-playing, or are being funny. I like jokes as much as the next person. However, if you have to say ‘it was a joke’, and nobody knows you were joking until you said that, then you are really not doing funny right, imo. Okay, enough of the negativity - let me tell you about what I like in people. I like most MAL users. Even though I don’t trust people fully anymore and I keep everyone at an arm's length, I do like people deep down. There are also some people that I can’t help but like because they just stand out to me. I like people that are funny, friendly, intelligent, understanding, open-minded, creative, helpful etc. Here are some of the people on this forum that I find to be an absolute joy to have around. When I see a notification from these people, or a post on the forum from them, I get a warm fuzzy feeling. These are the people that make life great and make the world a better place, in their own special way. I don’t always agree with some of these people. I don’t need to always agree with a person to like them as a person. @SadMadoka, @_Nette_, @operationvalkyri, @Youmu_Konpaku, @deg @moe_sama, @Katagari, @EmilioX, @-Shinzo, @Soverign, @RealTheAbsurdist, @Missaliensan, @BrightFlashLight, @Noboru, @Injenss, @FacelessVixen, @ElChOrC, @KlTY, @Fauxgrandma, @An0nim, @RadMillennial, @Water-sama, @Gan_water, @IpreferEcchi, @traed, @Scud, @Manaban, @SuperHands, @fancyjasper, @fuckgendo, @Nym_, @NickRedMachine, @Hodenhagen, @Konradikon, @Peaceful_Critic, @Viltas, @RicePounder, @OfDeathandLove, @Height, @HappyPicnic, @Fleeting_Dream, @Seiya, @Skittles and @Ryuk9428. Ultimate: Those were a lot of names… :O How did you get into anime/manga? I grew up watching cartoons. In my house, we only had BBC 1, BBC 2, ITV, Channel 4, and then Channel 5 when that came out. We didn’t have cable tv, or Sky, or anything like that. My mother said it would distract me from my school work. So, before I got a video game console, and before I learned to play the piano, I watched cartoons before and after school. That was my first hobby. I didn’t know this at the time but some of those cartoons were actually anime, like Pokemon, Digimon and Yu-Gi-Oh. These were the first anime shows that I watched. I didn’t watch shows like Dragon Ball Z, because I didn’t have the channel. I also got the internet pretty late as well. I didn’t get online until I was in university (2005-2008). This is probably another reason why I am different to a lot of people online, and why I just see online as an extension of real life, and not separate to it. I was pretty active in the Fighting Game community in 2009. Street Fighter 4 was the big anime fighter at the time, with BlazBlue coming out soon afterwards. Marvel vs Capcom was another franchise that brought Japan and American comic book characters together. I grew up reading British comic books, like The Beano, The Dandy and The Beezer. I also enjoyed Marvel and DC movies, so when my fighting game buddies started talking about and suggesting anime shows, I was all for it. They started me off with some pretty big shows, like Fullmetal Alchemist, Death Note, Claymore and Mushishi. This set the bar pretty high, and I was totally in love with anime because it brings together all of the arts. That didn’t last long, though. I became disenfranchised with anime because of the fan service and lolis. It was also because of shows that were bland, generic, and overrated. I like to use anime and fighting game characters for my forum avatars, and signatures. I also liked to collect anime pics to use as my laptop screensaver, but I stopped watching the shows because they were feeling like a waste of time. Anime became something that I sometimes watched in the background while working out, or doing some other thing. To be honest, I find that even now, my favorite way to enjoy anime is when it’s combined with something else, like smoking weed, or watching hentai, or watching another show, or doing household chores. I find it hard to sit and watch an anime show, and do nothing else at the same time. Only a select few shows can hold my interest like that. It’s a shame because, when it comes to non-anime shows and movies, I can sit and watch those without feeling restless at all. So that means anime is really not living up to its full potential at all. Anime as a medium is really kind of meh. It focuses far too much on its core Otaku audience in Japan. Really, it should try to make things more appealing for the West. How about they make more shows that are not centered in Japan for a start? How about some shows that are not centered around school life? How about some shows, where the main characters are not socially awkward? I don’t know why Japan insists on making so many anime shows the same thing over and over. I’m not saying they should stop doing what they’ve been doing, I just think they can diversify, and add some variety to the types of shows they put out. How do you feel about how the site is run? Especially in regards to the moderators and admins. I like it, for the most part. The only time I didn’t really agree with the way that the site is run, is when Ishuzoku Reviewers was about to become the #1 anime on the site. FMAB is my favorite anime, but I was all for Ishuzoku Reviewers taking the top spot. The admins were acting like it was the end of the world, just because a popular YouTuber asked people to check out the show and rate it 10/10. I don’t see anything wrong with that. People are constantly being told to do this and that by society, and by influential people but nobody forced these people to make an account on MAL and rate the show. I don’t believe that people are mindless robots. I believe that the people who signed up and rated the show did so because they actually watched it, felt that it was deserving of a 10/10 and rated it thusly. The admins made some changes to how their system works after that, and apparently a bunch of FMAB fanboys gave Ishuzoku a 1/10 to stop it from taking the top spot. Apparently FMAB fanboys do things like that from time to time. Well, I don’t know about that. It might be true, but I am not one of those people. I do have a FMAB tattoo on my arm, though -- the one that Scar has. Other than that - I haven’t had any issues with the way this site is moderated. I used to be a moderator myself on other forums. I was even an admin once, but that forum ended up getting DDoSed to death. This was because I banned someone who didn’t like that a black man was the owner. He promised to get the site taken down because according to him, ‘black people shouldn’t own anything’. Ultimate: Wow… That must be an extremely racist person for someone to say that. :| What other hobbies do you have outside of anime/manga and MAL? I’ve tried my hand at a lot of different things and ways of life. Some things worked for me and some didn’t. These, I grew bored or tired of. I won’t go into everything, but here are the staple hobbies that I keep coming back to: video games, playing the piano, music production, watching tv / movies / cinema, holidays / travel / eating out, exercise, reading, forums, photoshop, video editing and YouTube. I like getting into things that broaden my mind, that allow me to challenge myself, or that connect me to new and interesting people. I’m not someone that only likes to be around people who are like me. The truth is, most people are not. We are all unique and different. I am not afraid of people that are different from me. I am curious about them. I want to know their stories. I want to see things from their perspective, and this is what drives me to try out different hobbies. The ones I can do on my own are what makes me happiest. People can be annoying because they often want you to do things the way they want you to. I like to see how other people do things, and I may be inspired by them but I am either going to do it my own way or I am not going to do it at all. What do you like about yourself? Everything. What's not to like? I was never really one to compare myself to others. I am happy with the way that God made me. A lot of people aren’t happy with their natural body and they want to change it. I change my body too, but in realistic ways. If I feel like I am putting on weight, I will make an effort to exercise more and burn off the fat. It’s really that simple. If somebody doesn’t like me, or isn’t attracted to me or whatever, that isn’t really my problem. Someone else will like me just as I am. I like that I am strong physically and mentally. I’m not perfect, though. We all have our flaws, and none of us know everything. There is always room for improvement. There is always more to learn. There is always more to do. Ultimate: I totally agree with the last part! :D What do you like less about yourself, and if possible, is it something you can change / do something about / improve? I don’t trust people. I can’t even trust myself anymore. We are all corrupt in some way. When I think about it, a lot of depression begins to set in. I’ve been told that my standards are too high, and that I am a perfectionist. I didn’t choose to be that way. I just read the Bible, and saw that we all fall short of The Lord’s glory. We are all sinners, but those who believe in Jesus are covered by his blood. He died for our sins. Even Christians still sin, but the big problem for me is that I keep doing the same sins. Once you give your heart to Jesus, you are supposed to try not to keep doing the same sins, but I am not able to control myself as well as I would like to. I eventually fall into the same temptations over and over. It is an internal struggle that I have been living with since my teens. What kind of things bring you to the point of anger? I get angry and frustrated with people that accuse me of something I haven’t done, with people that try to criticise me for something I know I have done well or properly, with people that assume I haven’t looked into something or thought about something when I have, with people that try to point out things that I already know about. I get really angry at places of work where I am treated unfairly. I get angry with people that try to make a pointless argument with me, with people that ask a question and don’t want to listen to the answer, with people that abandon logic in an argument and start flaming instead. A lot of things make me angry. I don’t like stupid people. They upset me the most. Which quote inspires you to try living accordingly? As if I could live by a single quote. I live according to my own standards and beliefs. I sometimes come across quotes that fit exactly how I am already living. What is your motto? Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst. What are some of your greatest personal discoveries? I have discovered that the beaten path isn’t the only path. There is more than one way to skin a cat. If I look at a problem long enough, I can find a way to solve it or get around it. I have figured out how to have my cake and eat it too. What is a trait you like to see in others? I like people that can plan ahead and think for themselves. I like people that have backup plans, if the first plan doesn’t work out. I like people that can depend on themselves. What is your view of the world? The world is a nice place. The people, not so much. Things went wrong with Adam and Eve. People make this world a bad place. Those who are benefitting from how the world is today don’t want it to change. Those who have been downtrodden want it to change. Change is inevitable though, but the cycle repeats itself. Things will never be perfect. There will always be injustices. What is your life goal? We were created to serve God. That is our purpose. In the end, nothing else really matters. Everything else is merely a distraction. I’m not even serving God properly myself, so I guess my life goal is to be a good Christian. How would you like to be remembered? Why should I care about being remembered? Each person who remembers me will remember me in a different way. Nobody knows the complete me - I probably don’t even know the complete me. Someone may remember something about me that isn’t even true or a fact. We remember all these people and events throughout history, but none of us were there. None of us really know exactly what happened, or what these people were like. Someone wrote in a book that such and such happened. Maybe it did. Maybe it didn’t. Maybe it wasn’t quite like that, so why should anybody care about being remembered? The number of people that have existed, and that will exist after I am dead and gone, are like the grains of sand in the desert. I’m not any more important than those other grains of sand. It is a bit silly to me that we care so much about what people have done. Everyone should just live their own life. The only legacy each of us should worry about is passing our genes and knowledge down to the next generation. After that, our work here on Earth is done. What is your favorite and least favorite food? Least favorite would be whatever makes me feel sick. I don’t think I have a favorite. There are foods that taste great, but I’m not really a big foodie. I kind of wish someone would just invent a food pill. To me, eating is a time-wasting chore. What are the top five countries that you want to visit (or revisit)? To start with, I don’t care about Japan. I had a Japanese girlfriend that wanted me to come back with her, but I declined, because I don’t think they would treat me well as a black guy. I get really annoyed when people are looking at me like I’m some alien just because I am black. I did go to Little Tokyo in L.A. though, and I got a gift for that Japanese girlfriend. I have visited France, Spain, Greece, Morocco, Jamaica and the USA. My top 5 to visit? USA, Jamaica, Nigeria, Brazil, and the Philippines. Which languages do you wish to master? I look at the dictionary and thesaurus a lot. I’ve always been like that. I do like English. After all, it’s the only language I know so why not learn it well? I learned a tiny bit of French at school. My mother didn’t teach me her mother tongue, which is Yoruba. Because of this, I don’t really care much for languages. I’m upset that she didn’t teach me my language. In a way, this makes me like the African Americans that have been cut off from the homeland. Now any children I have will not really know where they came from. I’ve asked my mother many times why she did this. She doesn’t care enough about heritage and legacy. She only says, “It doesn’t matter where we are on this Earth. Our place is in heaven.” Still, that doesn’t explain why she couldn’t have just spoken her language to us at home while we were growing up. She knows 5-7 languages herself… I will say that I like the sound of the following languages when people speak: Spanish and Portuguese. What is the first anime you ever watched? (Keep it spoiler free) Technically Pokemon, but I didn’t know it was anime at the time. The first anime I watched that I knew was an anime (because Studio Ghibli doesn’t count either, as I didn’t know it was anime back then), is Fullmetal Alchemist. Yep. You can see why I struggle to find good anime when I am thinking about gems like FMA, while I watch these other shit shows. What is your favorite anime? (Keep it spoiler free) The ones in my favorites. Just look at my profile lol. What are your favorite and least favorite anime genres? (Keep it spoiler free) Romance is my least favorite. And comedy, because the shows labelled as comedy, are not even funny. The only funny comedy anime I ever saw was Ishuzoku Reviewers, which is more borderline hentai. My favorite should have been Mecha. It sounds good on paper, but it really isn’t. How would you describe your anime preferences? (Keep it spoiler free) My preference was to find anime of any genre that’s a great show, but that has proven hard to find. So, lately I have been trying to find shows that I am at least happy to watch without feeling like dropping it, something that I can just watch in the background. Its time to accept anime for what it is: something that could be so much better, but just isn’t. What is your routine when watching anime? Routine? I guess the routine is to sometimes watch it as a hobby when I am not at work lol. I find it helps a lot to watch anime when exercising at home, or when I am high. I sometimes watch the same episode of a show on two screens at once: one on sub with the sound turned off and the other with dub. I may also combine anime with music, or hentai, or whatever else. I could even be on the forum making a post while watching a show. I don’t really like to watch anime subbed. I have to sit there glued to the screen, and it makes me feel so unproductive. At least with video games, I am at least challenging myself. I’m working my brain, and my motor skills. Also, the Japanese language just doesn’t sound good to my ears, and they shout too much in anime. It’s really annoying. If they aren’t shouting, they’re making lewd noises. I used to feel annoyed, even when I was in bed with my ex-Japanese girlfriend because of the noises that she would make. Grrrrr. So annoying! Do you have any favorite reading materials (Book, Manga etc.)? I have never read a manga in my life, unless those Hentai doujinshis count lol. I read comic books growing up and novels. These days, I am mostly reading forum posts, news articles and blogs on whatever I am trying to learn about. What are your favorite movies and songs? There are so many. I don’t want to write a long list. I have a playlist on my iPod with about 2000 of my favorite rap songs that I like to listen to when at the gym. I recently made a Spotify playlist with a bunch of Lo-Fi as well. These days, I like instrumental stuff more than lyrical stuff. People just talk a lot of shit in songs these days, for the most part. I don’t just have favorite songs and artists. I have favorite composers too. I myself have written songs and composed music. What is your favorite game? What sort of game? Video game? My favorite game of all time is the Street Fighter IV series. I’ve been playing video games since I was about 10 years old. I started with the SNES and then I got the Gameboy Yellow. I also had PS1, PS2, PS3, PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch & Gameboy Advance. My close friend who lived next door had a Nintendo 64. Some other friends had Sega Megadrive / Master System. One friend had the NES. Another friend had the Sega Saturn. I’ve played a lot of different games on a lot of different consoles. I was never a PC gamer, though. I’ve never even had a PC. I use Mac because I do music. We used Mac in College and Uni for music programs. My favorite game on my MacBook is Civilisation V. That is a top game! In recent years, I have spent the most time playing Destiny and Overwatch. In the last year, I have played Apex Legends the most. My first game was Killer Instinct on the SNES. I got the Xbox One for Killer Instinct as well. I only played Pokemon games on my Gameboy systems. I only have Super Smash Bros Ultimate on my Switch. I’ve had too many favorites on the other consoles. I won’t bore you with a long list of games. If you can have any power, what would it be? Oh, I don’t know. The power to… *shrugs* I feel like these sort of questions are better for people who are not happy with their life. I just fucking deal with it. Give me any power, I don’t care. Whatever power I get, I’ll make good use of it. Or not. Remember Mario Kart on the Nintendo 64? Remember those power-up cubes that would give you a random power? Give me that. A random power. I don’t care lol. Ultimate: lol! xD If you had three wishes, what would you wish for? I wouldn’t wish for anything. If I’ve got three wishes, why do I need to rush to use them up right away? Give me a few years to really think about it. Maybe, I won’t even use them at all. Maybe I’ll add them to my will, or something. Maybe I’ll sell them, or something. I wish you didn’t ask me this question. What will I do with my remaining two wishes now? lol I believe in God, so I really don’t need to wish for anything. Prayer over wishes, bitches! What is your opinion on the MAL forums? It’s a great forum! I wish it was a bit more active though, and it’s always a little disappointing to see a passionate thread get shut down just because of some rule. The fun threads get locked, or deleted. Ah well. What threads do you like on MAL? What is that supposed to mean? Are you asking me, which threads I return to over and over because I like it, or something? Or are you asking me, which kind of threads I would respond to? I respond to a thread if I am mentioned, or I find it interesting in some way, or someone says something that I feel I want to reply to. There are threads that I may be interested in, but not reply to for various reasons. It could be that I don’t want to get into an argument, or I haven’t got the time, or energy, or I have discussed it before, or some other reason. I don’t think I have any threads that I like any more than others. A forum is for discussion. I am here to discuss and to read people’s replies. I guess I like threads that get people to open up and share a little. It’s no fun when nobody is really sharing themselves. What is the RAF? Google it. Ultimate: *Googles it* https://imgur.com/6WZKBC8 Okay. :| Could you tell us more about how the process went for you when you wrote songs and composed music? As for writing songs, or composing, it’s not very methodical. I don’t always do the same thing. I might just have an idea in my head that I start with. Like I might say to myself, I want to make a song about a girl I like. Or I might start with a drum beat I have in my head. I might have no idea at all and just start hitting keys on the piano until I find a melody. I might be dreaming and compose a song in my sleep. Then, I wake up irl, hum the tune and record that on my phone until I can get to my computer and create it. I might just be browsing the virtual instruments in my music programme, before starting with some sounds and instruments that I like. I might be inspired by another song or an OST, or an experience. I might have an emotion in mind like sad or angry. I don’t really like making happy or dance music. I like sad sound stuff in minor keys best. I don’t really like making fast-tempo music either. I like slow and dark. I like fusing classical sounding music with other genres. Speaking of genres, I don’t try too hard to make my music fit into existing genres. I like to go with the flow of whatever wants to come out of me. Once I get the basic tune down, I then start to arrange it and refine it. Then I just mix the sound levels, until it is something I am happy with. Once I am happy with it, the song or instrumental is finished. Sometimes, I just remix something existing as well. Like most creative people, I don’t finish every project that I start. These days, I don’t make as much music as I used to. There are a lot more distractions nowadays. I used to get far more pleasure from it before. Now I just create in bursts, but it used to be something I did almost daily in my school days. Joining the military and working jobs with a slot of hours and shifts changed my focus from music production and socialising in my spare time, to playing video games and exercising more instead. I know you are into trans women, but what are your opinions on traps? By @_Nette_ My opinion is that there is no such thing as a trap. I have never hooked up with someone that identified as a trap. I have never even so much as seen a profile for a person that identifies as a trap. I’m guessing people who do that are probably only saying that for their fans. People who are actually looking to meet up for real don’t call themselves traps lol. As far as I know, a trap is just a 2D drawn character that is basically a very feminine young guy that is crossdressing. I used to collect pictures of traps and futanari, and that was part of some of my old porn stashes. But I don’t do that anymore. If I feel like looking at traps, I just go to a site called “that pervert” and look at a few pics, but tbh I can rarely ever pleasure myself and finish (trying to keep this somewhat safe for work) just from looking at a pic or even a slideshow. I need the image to be moving, or it least needs to be a very good doujinshi (I’m not really into donjons either tbh). How did you discover MAL? By @RealTheAbsurdist I didn’t discover MAL. I was referred here in 2018 by r/Anime and the r/Anime Discord. I decided to return to anime because I was getting bored of video games and I was hoping that some great shows may have come out since 2011. MAL was going through some sort of apocalypse, and I couldn’t make an account for months. Before MAL, I was keeping track of some of the shows I watched on kissanime, and on Notes on my laptop and phone. I didn’t have everything listed though, just a few shows. Once I was able to make an account on MAL, I only updated the list. I wasn’t aware of the forum until I decided to look for seasonal shows, and this led me to start looking at everything that this site has to offer. I spent a whole day here reading threads and profiles. That's when I decided that I wanted to take part in the community. There are few forums around that are like MAL. The MAL forums reminds me very much of the Street Fighter forum, the Fable II forum, and the Endwar forum that I loved so much back in 2009. I have been looking for a community like this one, for quite some time. Other communities always have something missing, like no signatures, or no custom avatars, or no profiles, etc. Have you ever thought of quitting MAL? If so, why? By @RealTheAbsurdist I have thought about leaving MAL. Over the foscor reddit drama, and my fiance being called a monkey, as I mentioned earlier in this interview. In the end, I decided to stay after @Luchse encouraged me not to give in to a defeatist attitude. I can be pessimistic at times, but really I am a realist. I was an optimist until my teens. I was considering leaving, because I felt that there was no point in staying if there are people like the racist guy that didn’t want me here. Also, because most of the anime shows I have watched are not that great anyway. If the hobby itself isn’t great, and the people on the forum are toxic, then why should I continue to pursue it? On the other hand, though, not everyone on the forum is a racist asshole and there are some great shows around. I just need to find them. I also started looking again at my approach to watching anime, and I have been experimenting a lot more with different ways of watching anime. For example, I have tried watching an anime on one screen and a hentai on another at the same time. I have tried watching genres of anime I didn’t really care for before, such as Ecchi. I have accepted that not every anime needs to be story-driven. Some can be fun just for the vibrant colours, and to have on in the background. I’ve started watching hentai for the plot and picking one to watch at random. I’ve found that hentai actually has a lot to offer. It does everything that anime does and more, and it does it in just 2-6 episodes. What's not to love? I now keep multiple shows in my watching list and I quickly drop shows that are losing my interest, or put them on hold for other shows. This is keeping me from getting bored, or burned out with anime. Also, the way that the MAL list works is really good and that alone is reason enough to stay. So even if I depart from these forums, I will still keep my account for the list, at a minimum. I also sometimes write a review as well on a show that I’ve seen, or I might comment on an episode of a show if I can be bothered. I usually don’t, but I might. Mixing it up keeps things fresh and interesting, so I’m sure I will find new ways to enjoy anime. I have never been as active in an anime community as this one, but I was aware that anime communities existed. There was an anime forum I was a member of and had less than 100 posts on that shut down. Some of you may have been on there. It was a really famous forum, but since I wasn’t really all that into anime, I can’t even remember the name of it. I also remember back in the day there were hentai sites that had chatrooms on them. I don’t think I made more than 50 posts, but every now and then, I would look at the chat feed and I could see that people were really making friends there. They were talking to each other about anything and everything. And of course they were all horny as hell. What are your suggestions to improve MAL? What features do you think could be added that would improve the experience here? By @Injenss I haven’t thought much about improvements that MAL may need. I guess, that means for the most part MAL is running fine for me, or I just don’t use enough of the site to see its flaws. I think that there should be tags for hentai and that we should be able to discuss things of a sexual or sensitive nature more without the topics being locked or deleted. That said, I’m sure they have these rules for a reason. Members have hinted that in the past, it was a bit of a Wild West on here, with random dick pics in threads and spam. I also think that we should be able to see all of our posts / threads. For some reason, we can’t right now. The forum also needs to be more visible. If you got to the Introductions forum, or you ask active members of the forum, if they started posting on here when they made their account. You will find that most people were not aware the forums even existed. I was one of them. Perhaps you are too. They need to make the forum much more visible. This site has millions of users. The number of forum regulars would be way higher if people could see it at the top of the site on the front page when they visit. I have no idea why they choose to keep the forums buried. How long do you think the West has before its chickens fully come home to roost for the evil it’s done in the world? By @Injenss I have no idea. As a Christian, I believe that none know the day, or the hour when mankind will be judged. People who are not Christian may believe in Karma. Who knows when karma those who do even will get their karma. And I am no saint. I have done evil as well. We all have a little evil in us. It just manifests in different ways. Some people do evil for all to see and others do evil in secret. What one person sees as evil, another will see as a completely acceptable thing. They may even see it as good. What was it that made you an anime fan? What was that moment when you realized: "This is something that's going to be a part of my life, maybe forever?". By @Injenss What made me an anime fan was the fantasy, I suppose. I appreciate that some talented artists drew this stuff, and some talented voice actors voiced this stuff, and some talented writers wrote this stuff, and some talented musicians did the music etc. I just like creative things. So, I’m not one of those people that just likes anime. I like anime because it expresses art. I like art and creativity, in general. There was no moment when I realised that anime would be a part of me forever. I grew up with cartoons, just like I grew up speaking English. In a way, it was inevitable. Anime is like a part of me that was always there but I just wasn’t really thinking about it, like my ear lobe, or something. If you could cheat on your fiance with a monster girl, would you? If so, which one would it be? By @Soverign Lol! You are one of my favourite people on here man, haha! Damn, I should have finished Ishuzoku Reviewers before doing this interview. I’ve had enough time lol. I don’t really pay that much attention to monster girl characters. I know I have fapped to some hentai with monster girls, but I don’t really remember. And what even counts as a monster girl? Does a succubus count? Does an elf count? Let me just assume we are talking about proper monsters like slime girls, lolis and mermaids. I think I'll just go with one from Ishuzoku Reviewers. I want to do that sex robot. It seems like something that has the potential to one day happen in real life. I mean, if I fuck a robot or a sex doll, that isn’t really cheating. At least not to me. It would probably be seen as cheating to her though, because you know jealousy and all that. She doesn’t even like my dakimakura lol! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3v3qC0tWfM Favorite experience on MAL? By @-Shinzo My favorite experience on MAL was probably the New Year 2020 thread. https://myanimelist.net/forum/?topicid=1818377 Your closest person on MAL? By @-Shinzo The person I feel closest to is probably @_Nette_ even though I only speak with her sporadically. I don’t really talk to people a lot on MAL one to one. When I do, I don’t really talk much about personal stuff. I tend to put the personal stuff out in the open on the forum board. Someone on MAL you would want to meet in real life? By @-Shinzo Who would I want to meet from MAL irl? This is a tricky one. It would depend on a lot of things. Can they be trusted not to reveal my secrets to people I know irl? Where would I be meeting them and what would we be doing? Are they male or female? Will other people be with us, or would it only be the two of us? Will I see what they look like before I meet them? Do they want to meet just as friends, or to hook up? Because of all of this, I would probably not meet anyone from MAL unless it was by chance. Like we just so happen to be going to the same con at the same time, or something. I’m not going to say who I would want to meet just from their personality on MAL and our interactions. If they are staying anonymous, then I don’t want to meet them. I would rather meet someone that’s more open and straightforward. I’m too busy and too careful to waste my time meeting the wrong person. Boobs or ass (boobs ftw) (you can only choose 1)? By @-Shinzo Boobs or ass? 100% ass. A lot of anime girls have boobs, but a few have ass. I don’t like top heavy girls. A proper woman is in proportion. This means that she has ass. So you've told us you have a passion for piano and that you studied classical piano and worked in production for a bit but didn't enjoy the experience. Would you go back now if you could change a thing or two about the music scene then? By @HappyPicnic Well, the issue was that the music studio I was working in was owned by a guy and his son was a producer as well. His son wanted his works to be used and not mine. He saw me as a threat, or something. Also, I wasn’t into the genre of music that they did there at all, and the pay was terrible. Lowest paid job I have ever done! So, when an opportunity came to do something else, I left and I never tried to look for another job in the music industry again. I just kept it as a hobby. If you weren't so active in random forum boards, what do you think you would have been doing instead? xD By @HappyPicnic If I wasn’t so active on the forums, I wouldn’t be doing anything different, except being active in a different place. I’m never just on the forums. Anytime I am on the forums, I am actually doing something else at the same time. How big is your dick? By @FacelessVixen Lol, my dick is 8” uncut and thicc. I’ve had a lot of compliments. People can't get enough of the bbc. “What inspires you to collect so many anime figures?", "How far will you go before you conclude your collection?", and "If or when you have kids, how are you going to explain it to your son(s) and/or daughter(s)?" By @FacelessVixen I think I'll keep looking for new figurines and adding them to my wish list, in case I one day get a chance to buy some of them. Its not that I can't afford them, but I have to consider space and my fiance thinks I have too many already. I don't think I would need to explain it to any kids I may have. To me, they are no different to the paintings on the wall. They are just pieces of art on display. I remember from our last conversation you're half-Jamaican and half-Nigerian yet born and raised in London. Being a child of immigrants, what are some of the struggles you've to overcome along the way growing up? By @Konradikon Well at first, I didn’t think I was any different to anybody else. It wasn’t until I went to Jamaica for a family reunion when I was 18 that I began to see how different life is outside of London and the UK. I couldn’t understand anybody. Even now, I can’t understand most Jamaican people. And don’t even get me started about my Nigerian side. My parents hardly taught me anything about Nigeria and Jamaica. Dad at least told me a few stories and experiences, but that's it. So among my own black people, I am like a stranger. I don’t understand them. They think I am being rude and pretending that I don’t understand them. Of course, being in London, then leaving London to join the RAF, and being around only white people in the countryside, I began to really see what it is like to be treated differently. I am black. I am not one of those people that suck up to white people. I tried their way. I looked at their things. Sitting down at the pub and drinking beer is not my way of life at all, and I won’t even talk about the plethora of negative experiences I had. Let’s just say that the reason I am always explaining myself stems from how I was always being suspected of being in the wrong, or always being treated like the bad guy. There was a time when a racist movie was put on and I asked if we could watch something else. Next thing I knew, I was told off for making the others feel uncomfortable in their crew room. Holy shit, I was the one who was made to feel uncomfortable, and it was my crew room as much as it was theirs ffs. There was also a time when some racist guy in the local town was calling me the N word and wanted to fight me for simply existing. I had to call the police, and when the police dropped me off to base, I was in trouble for apparently getting arrested. They just assumed that I had done something wrong when I was the victim and called the police to avoid trouble. There was yet another incident when one of my female superiors wrote in a report that she felt I might come at her in the gym with a dumbbell. She also said in the report that she’s aware that I have no history of violence. There were also other bullshit reports where they downplayed all of my achievements, and they made up shit just to prevent me from being able to get promoted. All this and more. Soooo much more. For one, I couldn’t even trust the guys on nights out because they would all go off with random people and to random places, leaving me completely on my own in some place I didn’t know, drunk. That would never happen with the boys in London. In the end, I just stopped going out and doing things with anyone. Here’s the icing on the cake. When I was leaving, I put in my request on our intranet (which was something that only my direct superiors could see and would be privy to) but by the following day the whole base knew that I was leaving. What the fuck happened to confidentiality? And do you know what they said when I questioned it? They said I must have told someone and they spread it around. Well, guess what? I only told my mother and my girlfriend at the time that I was leaving. And those two women were not in touch with anybody from the RAF. Anyway, enough about that. Wherever I go, it’s dangerous for me. Even my own fellow black folk can either be a threat or see me as a threat, so I avoid all those stupid clubs and parties etc. I mostly stay to myself. There are too many idiots around and I don’t need them getting me into any trouble. I wouldn’t have achieved all that I have if I surrounded myself with clowns. Also, no matter what job I am in, there is always someone trying to block my progress or trying to get me fired. Sad thing is, my fiance has been experiencing the same thing. A lot of people think that everyone is where they should be in life and if you are not there, it is your own fault somehow. For some black people, this is true. They never tried, but my fiance and I did try. We jumped through all of the hoops and we still get shit on. What was the happiest moment in your MAL life? I don’t know. There have been many happy times, I guess. How do I choose the happiest? I don’t really think about things like that, or take note of it. Sometimes people say really nice things about me. Sometimes I prove people wrong. I guess those things are the best. Also, when someone remembers something I said, or something that I am interested in and they bring it up. I like that. What do you like and dislike about the MAL community? I like that most people are quite tolerant about things. We can talk about LGBT stuff, until it gets shut down by the mods lol. What I don’t like is how some people act as though you have declared war on them if you don’t like anime in the same way that they do. Some of these guys need to get a life lol. How do you think the MAL community sees you? All I know is that they really don’t understand me at all. I keep trying to explain myself, along with my stance and thoughts. I tell my story, my history etc. No matter what, they still don’t get me. They still make the wrong assessment, judgment and assumptions of me. I don’t know why I even bother. Some people think I am a fat, attention-seeking neckbeard virgin/ incel woman-hater that’s obsessed with hentai and little girls, that likes to flex, that sits on MAL all day and neglects his made up fiancee. I’m rolling a few bad assumptions that people have made about me into one here. I usually don’t care what people think. However, when I make efforts to correct their bad assumptions and they still don’t understand, then I get frustrated. I shouldn’t really. I shouldn’t care and I shouldn’t bother. The only reason I do is because I actually like this place, and I like this place because it reminds me so much of those old forums that I mentioned earlier. *shrugs* What's something you want to tell MAL? Stop taking anime so damn seriously. Stop kissing Japan’s ass. Live your own life. Be the MC of your own life. Live a little, you lazy fucks. Stop bitching and moaning about how you can’t get a boyfriend / girlfriend and do something about it. Open your mouth and speak. You want something, go get it. Work towards it. Think outside of the box. Nothing more annoying than someone saying, that something can’t be done (such as talking to someone and starting a relationship with them) when it clearly it can because if it couldn’t be done, there wouldn’t be billions of us on the fucking planet. If you are white or asian, I don’t know what you even have to be sad about. Life is cake for you. You get to do whatever the fuck you want and society is on your side lol. For people like me, life is on hard mode. I just roll with the punches and get on with it. Do you see yourself leaving MAL in the near future? In the near future? Are you lot trying to push me out? Hoping I’ll go in the near future? If I go, it will be because I got banned, or I got bored. The internet is big and wide, just like the real world. There are many communities and I have many interests. When I’m on here posting, I’m not somewhere else where I could be posting. There are only so many hours in a day, so if this place fails to entertain me or gets on my nerves, then I’ll take my talents elsewhere. I mean, what do you guys think I was doing before I started posting on here? You think I was crying in a corner somewhere? I wasn’t lol. If I’m here, I am sacrificing something else. The time I spend here could be spent somewhere else. Any feedback on the interview format? Nah. An interview is an interview, isn’t it? Just do it however you like. Ask questions, get answers. That's all it is, really. Anything else is just extra bells and whistles attached. Can you recommend us three members who we can choose from to interview next and briefly explain why you would love to read their interviews? Can I recommend far more than three? Because I know some people don’t care about interviews, or don’t want to be interviewed. All of these people are really interesting to me. If you really just want three, then please ask the first three people first. @Soverign @IpreferEcchi @Konradikon @HappyPicnic @KlTY @Fauxgrandma @Peaceful_Critic @fuckgendo @-Shinzo @Injenss @operationvalkyri @RealTheAbsurdist @Youmu_Konpaku @deg @Katagari Is there something unasked you would like to talk about? Not right now. If there is, I can just make a thread like I usually do. Ultimate: Thank you very much for taking the time to do this interview with me, and letting me ask all the questions I wanted while conducting! ^_^ |
"No matter what painful things happens, even when it looks like you'll lose... when no one else in the world believes in you... when you don't even believe in yourself... I will believe in you!" |
| Hmpf. Would it ever kill you if you decided to slow down with writing this much... 😠 In any case, your Interview is up. :3 @SadAkko  |
| "No matter what painful things happens, even when it looks like you'll lose... when no one else in the world believes in you... when you don't even believe in yourself... I will believe in you!" |
UltimateDeath said: Hmpf. Would it ever kill you if you decided to slow down with writing this much... 😠 In any case, your Interview is up. :3 @SadAkko Lmao! Well you didn’t want short one line replies so I tried to expand. Not gonna lie I couldn’t or didn’t always want to expand. It could have been mich more lengthy. Careful what you ask for next time in interview requirements. Let people do one liners if they want and it won’t be so lengthy. In any case you have my thanks. Good job. 😇 |
| @UltimateDeath Writing a lot is good and especially so if it's about oneself. Oh my, a fellow ass man. We are quite underrepresented on this godforsaken site. I cannot agree more with the fact that forums are indeed barely visible. RAF story pains me. If there's a person on these forums who values merit then that's me. It's really nice getting to read someone's sayings without it including "i hate myself", "my life is a mess" and or "i'm gonna kill myself". This makes it two of us who are not self loathing mongrels on these pages. |
  “The most shameless thing in the world is political power that can be inherited regardless of ability or talent!” |
| Very interesting interview ! Might drop into your DMs later. I's funny how you mentionned my name in the recommendation and our interviews got published at the same time x) |
 |
| Hey thanks for mentioning me ^^ Interesting Interview! |
 |
| Oh wow I didn't know you thought so highly of me, thank you so much! Was an interesting and wordy interview. A good read for sure. |
  ♡ Harder Daddy ♡ |
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