Can confirm this. The fanbase nowadays is trying so had to be PC it's unnerving. I've posted examples in the sjw art thread but they racebend characters that are supposed to represent european countries (while conveniently ignoring the 'poc' ones that definitely exist in canon but that the creator doesn't take care of because, surprise surprise, both the japanese and the international fanbase demande more of their european white boys), they slap weird sexualities onto everybody, insist that the Hungary character is genderfluid/transmale because she fits the badass warrior woman trope and had a phase where she had penis envy, the France character gets every gender and sexuality slapped onto him because he's a narcissistic man who fucks everything...
The fandom itself is divided between weebs who want their pure uwu shit and a smaller portion who have drifted really far apart and literally just... Wanna look at historically inclined fanworks. It's stupid at best but if I have to choose between gritty angst fanfiction about guys making harsh decisions in the trenches, and saccharine coffeeshop AUs where everybody us pure uwu, my choice is made.
The primary focus of Hetalia is 'anime boys from different countries poke fun at different national stereotypes and make light of minor events'. There's no political commentary, no Nazi apologism (since there's no references to nazism at all within canon), nothing of any sort of substance. The canon material itself is very saccharine and humour-based (weird japanese humour, but humour nonetheless) and it's only fanworks that even remotely touch anything harsher than fun historical facts you'd tell children like 'Did you know that the japanese and the dutch exchanged clocks? That's so funny!'
:powerlevel: it was baby infidel's first anime fandom, man. just hoping it gives any sort of insight eyyy :autism:
![:\](/styles/custom/emotes/svg/chris-confused.svg "Confused :\")
