Doujinshi perception

John Oppliger of AnimeNation stated that creating doujinshi is largely popular with Japanese fans however not with Western fans. Oppliger claimed that because Japanese natives grow up with animation and manga “as a constant companion”, Japanese fans “are more intuitively inclined” to create or expand on existing manga and anime in the form of doujinshi . Because Western fans experience a “more purely” visual experience as most Western fans cannot understand the Japanese language, the original language of most anime, and are “encouraged by social pressure to grow out of cartoons and comics during the onset of adolescence”, most Western fans participate in utilizing and rearranging existing work into anime music videos.

In Western cultures, doujinshi is often perceived to be derivative of existing work, analogous to fan fiction and almost completely pornographic. This is partly true: doujinshi are often, though not always, parodies or alternative storylines involving the worlds of popular manga, game or anime series, and can often feature overtly sexual material. However, there are also many non sexually explicit doujinshi being created as well. The Touhou series for example, is notable for the large amount of dōjinshi being produced for it that are not pornographic in nature. Groups releasing adults only themed materials during the annual Touhou only event Reitaisai in 2008 were estimated at roughly 10%.