Anti-Anti-Hetalia

Hetalia isn’t a bad series. It is actually very unique and clever and educational if you look at it from the perspective of adding a human aspect to history. A lot of the time kids don’t enjoy history because they cannot relate to it. They don’t care so much about wars and dates and political leaders. And yet Hetalia brings an element of human emotion to things like the death of a leader or the conflict of war. 

As I said to my friend a couple of days ago Hetalia relies on the viewer’s ability to read what isn’t shown and to analyze what is and isn’t being said.

Yesterday we saw a post over Germany seeing a child Italy in his dream and we talked about how dreams work, and how nothing in a dream can be conjured from nothing. This adds a new perspective on what was previously a cutesy scene in the anime. 

The thing that people who look at the Hetalia fandom don’t realize is that honestly, Hetalia doesn’t place emphasis on the things that you are taught in school, like the body counts and horrors of wars. They don’t talk about German concentration camps other than a couple of references and they certainly don’t talk about British Imperialism. 

Why? Because it is assumed that the viewer was already taught at least a loose understanding of those events and concepts. 

This anime was actually made from a webcomic made for adult males, it would be assumed that they would catch the references to the darker parts of history, while instead adding on new and much gentler and even fun information, like Busby’s Chair, the Cafe Du Pain and the silly references to Germany’s porn collection. 

Hetalia is not meant to be educational in the traditional sense of the word. It is meant to give a human element to a study that has been stripped down and treated with clinical gazes. History relies on people, on cultural change and stability, it relies on the different perspectives and understandings that people will display or see. Hetalia brings that element back to history. It gives us a personification that feels very human emotions and yet has the responsibility of representing an entire country with all their quirks and human nuances. 

I do admit that I myself, even being a part of the Hetalia fandom, am not a fan of the fandom. There are a few fics I enjoy and of course we have some amazinging artists, but in general I tend to stay out of the fandom, or at least attempt to be impartial to the shenanigans going on in it. But that doesn’t mean that everyone does that too, or even will consider it. There is no problem with fangirls, there is no problem with people being enthusiastic and excited. If you focused only on the people who “ruin” a good work then people wouldn’t be so enthusiastic about Sherlock, Doctor Who, Supernatural, Homestuck.

You can rag on the fans all you want, there will always be shitty fans in every fandom, but don’t for a second think that the series doesn’t have depth and knowledge that can be learned if you look past the conventional idea of history.