It’s because anime currently offers a higher quality (as an average and as a ceiling, obviously there’s still schlock and stuff too) than Western culture does for modern entertainment. Lots of people that are disgusted with woke politics in all media will naturally be attracted to anime and/or manga because it doesn’t have that issue. Also, acknowledging that there is the cultural barrier and the weird shit you can find, a lot of the most popular, broadly successful anime and manga still undeniably celebrates things like masculinity, femininity, loyalty, family, duty, and working to improve oneself and excel. Again, values largely absent from or even villainized in modern Western media, but values that naturally appeal to those who are opposed to certain current issues in Western society.