There was this one comment I came across on a discussion about if Isekai is ever going to run out of steam:
The most popular trope coming from a single place is usually indicative of the biggest problem there. Japan with isekais (deaths & escaping reality), Korea with returns (social pressure & regrets), and China with Cultivation (breaking free from/overthrowing the upper control). Those common tropes are what the people wished they had in real life.
I've been reading quite a few manwha's recently as well as manga and this are REALLY common trends. Enjoyable too as on each side we can easily relate to that desire.
So why not apply it to western fiction, what was the main trend there?
In the past, when the leftists weren't involved, I'd say it was more inspirational, from the obvious Superman to the relatable trying to do his best despite personal issues Spiderman, even in a nihilistic world of mega cities, Judge Dredd could be inspirational just because he still stood up for the values of law and justice in this husk of a world.
After the leftists, I think the worst thing is not just the tranny, race and gay pushing, it's that it's no longer inspirational. Rather than inspire to do better, they want everyone dragged down to their level, have everything given to them and not have to struggle because 'they're on the right side'.
Even though it's majority leftist propaganda, if we apply the same rule here 'Most popular trope indicative of biggest problem' then the West's biggest issue is stagnation, no inspiration to push forward or lead the way for others to follow your example. It might be another reason for the great switch to manga and Anime as people would rather adopt another trope than be stuck in essentially the West's limbo trope. At least the Asian tropes offer a way out of the current problem in a fictional setting.
You can see how much people are deprived of inspirational media with the success of films like Top Gun Maverick or John Wick but what do you guys think, this ring true to you?
Interesting theory but somewhat at odds with the decline of western media into full-throttle degeneracy coinciding with the west’s actual decline into degeneracy.
This might be explained by two factors, both racial/ethnic.
Firstly, Asian cultures are, broadly speaking, more repressed and collectivist, so it would make sense that Asian escapist media reflects a desire for greater freedom and autonomy. Traditional western cultures were already more individualist and “free”, yet our media did not reflect a desire for greater collectivism.
I used to judge the west superior for this, but I no longer make such claims. Asian cultures seem to be fairing much better than the west, of late, no?
Secondly, thanks to unchecked mass immigration, western cultures are no longer “one place”, so our media tends to fall into two categories: schizophrenic or centralized. Put another way: at best, our media is all over the place, representing many different views and aspirations, and at worst, our media is dictated top-down by whichever demographic cohort controls the levers of power (guess who).
Increasingly, it is clear that we are suffering under the latter case, which is why breakout counter-culture successes don’t seem to move any needles right now. The control mechanisms are too fixed and effective. Under OP’s theory, we would be enjoying a renaissance of anti-authoritarian media expressing our deep-seated desire to break free from leftist thought control. Instead, most people seem content to mindlessly support corporations up to and including objectively evil big pharma.
We probably need to collapse.
Another one? Jees I think we're up to our tenth by now if we count all the European empires throughout history...
Holy crap, the West constantly dying and resurrecting into a new power structure, the west has the same story line as Re Zero! /s
How exactly does the west resurrect itself when half the population aren’t even western anymore? Ideological purges and bloody civil wars are not even a fraction so destructive as mass immigration.