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"Mai waifu" - Kimura-sensei, Azumanga Daioh (2002) This is a very old question, yet which only came to my mind recently. Why do we like "waifus" so much, and find them so interesting? For a very long time, I was not interested in such a thing and was pretty much un-phased. However, in the leading year to finding Touhou, something had changed. I started become increasingly more find of one fictional character or another, without having a clear understanding why. Few months later, I got into Touhou. Not even now do I know if I did so for the cool music, story/worldbuilding, or just because the girls are pretty (greatly emphasized in the fanart). And the whole "waifu" thing went full-throttle recently, as I discovered new series to supplement Touhou and avoid a burnout. I have talked in some measure about that in my recent thread about anime and its artstyle, so I will spare repeating the same points. Which at some point made me start to question if I started getting into series just because I like how a character looks and acts (basically "I came her just for/because of..." argument). Be it Kaoru for Amagami, Yelan for Genshin Impact, Byleth for Fire Emblem, Female Commander (Gentiane in the manga) from Girls' Frontline, Yamashiro and Bismarck for Kancolle or Prinz Eugen for Azur Lane (luckily, I am still in the phase of deciding whether to get into any of the games mentioned, right now just staying aside and enjoying fanart). And just recently, as I discovered Azumanga Daioh (credit goes to @sodaodaoda and @SoundOfRayne), I also stumbled upon the original use in media of the word "waifu". From there, going down a rabbit whole, I ended up discovering what can basically be described as The 4chan Manifest of Waifu-ism. Since it is an old document, things are actually quite interesting to read: With this in mind, we are coming back to the original question: what is a waifu, and why do we like them so much? It's been more than 20 years now, and yet there still are people who are confused and wonder where does their appeal come from (or better said, how and why we end up liking them so much)... And even more so, do you have any character from any series that you are very fond of?

Usually I only use those two workspaces out of four. I change my wallpapers every two weeks or so.

What is a waifu? A miserable little pile of pixels.

so basically I found this really nice girl these days and she looks like this: what do you mean she's "not real"

I think that to most people where having a waifu actually means a lot, they are filling for something currently missing in their lives. Well that's the impression I got from listening to this podcast by HealthyGamerGG: To be quite frank, I never had an experience like how the person describes in the video (I guess that's a good thing?) Instead, it seems that my "waifu", in this case Patchouli would end up serving more of what I chose (and didn't choose) as part of my online "branding" so to speak, and having her represent me in the internet leads to more familiriaty, in turn making me like the character more simply because I've gotten so used to them. So yeah, I can't really explain why patchouli is my "waifu". Are they my waifu? I don't really imagine a married life iwth "patchouli knowledge" either. XD But upon further introspection, it is true that there's some characteristics about her that I admire. So in a way, those aspects of serving as " comfort character" or even just as a form of motivating myself to reach my goals plays a role here. Patchouli is wise, cool and thoughtful, she also seems to know a lot of things, and those are all qualities I want to have for myself. The complexities of human relationship with others don't seem to be lost even when talking about fictional characters, it seems. :P As for your comments about what seem to be (mostly) gacha characters, I believe they are fundamentally different from touhou, in the sense that these are made from concept to be marketable (to men, for the most part), even if, ultimately, they are both examples of idealized concepts of people (and as we know, fantasy trumps reality in the eyes of the one that becomes enamoured by it), the point is that these character shoot for combinations that make them attractive to the fans upon tried and true industry tradition, similar to how the idol industry works. I believe it's good to be critical of waht makes these characters "waifus" for you, as they are often superficial traits that just appeal to your specific yearnings of one nature or another. (Not to be a killjoy however, it's good to find things you enjoy regardless). Also, on unrelated note: Your tastes seem very similar to another friend of mine judging by the examples you provided alone :p To conclude: At first glance, I guess it would be easy to equate a waifu to a non-existant wife, but the point of all my ramblings is that these relantioships are more complex and of a different nature, In my opinion. For you to genuinely attempt to replace a real human with a 2d companion, you'd have to be unique circumstance not common even among us weebs. In this, I find the comments made in question 3 of the FAQ you sent to be exceptionally pertinent here. Also, I've been wanting to watch azumangah daioh. It seems to be similar to the likes of nichijou (both "My Ordinary Life" and "Danshi Koukousei", which I enjoyed a great lot) maybe I'll finally take the time to give it a watch and join the discussion. Thanks for reading my ramblings, I hope it made sense. Cana out. :P

The Waifu FAQ is written in a waaaay too much affirmative way, like, the guy conveys a feeling that he knows what he is talking about however it’s kinda bs First of all, the word "waifu" comes from the katakana transcription of the English word "wife" so basically, it has to be a girl, just, I precise that if it’s a guy it is called a "husbando" (= husband) Then, it refers to video game or anime (3D or 2D) characters however I would like to make a larger definition of it by saying that it refers to fictional characters from Japanese related content, so, for example, if the character comes from an American manga, then you can consider it as a waifu/hosbando because manga are from Japan. Otherwise if it’s from a cartoon (like Steven Universe or idk) it is traditionally just called a love interest, maybe now people would include it in the waifu/husbando category :/ Don’t take what I’m gonna say in consideration it’s just my personal point of view, you don’t need to have the Discord Mod starter pack to have a waifu, it’s in the mind so no need to have posters or anything, and it would’ve been better if instead of saying this « you’re not working towards a goal or anything, enjoy her and yourself », he have said something like « make sure to improve yourself so that you give a reason for your waifu to chose you over another guy ». A lot of persons are unhappy in real life even with 1000 waifu/hosbando (I’ll write it w/h to make it short) they are depressed and feel empty : fictional love will, sadly, never replace irl love, you don’t learn how to improve yourself with a w/h because they can’t give you advices and there’s more reason about it but I’m gonna keep it short ^-^ Tbh I don’t really understand what is really confusing you with the waifu concept : you simply feel better with those characters because they convey to you a feeling that makes you feel better or a feeling that you are missing, for example if you tenderness is really missing in your life then you’ll be more interested in sweet and softhearted waifu

CountVonNumenor back with another fire post ✍ On a serious note, I think it's because of 3 main reasons. First, anime and manga display stuff in a perfect and unrealistic manner. So it's only natural to be attached to a character in that way. Heh, it doesn't even have to be a character. I have lost count of the times where I saw a food being cooked in an anime and thought to myself that I wanted to eat that right now (but that's completely different from liking a character so let's get back to the main topic). Since they are "such perfect beings", you might end up longing for them. The 2nd reason is that there are thousands of waifus, each suited for a different person. If you think about it, there have been thousands of anime/manga/visual novels released, some of them having very bug casts so after watching many of them, one waifu will catch your attention. And the 3rd reason is that, we're lonely. Waifus can give us that affection that we otherwise wouldn't get.

Do tell me how it is