Hey, Answerman!

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I have never replied to your column before and usually just lurk in the forums. Your question hit home. I have been president of my university's anime club for over three years now and I probably should graduate at some point. Anyway, In my years I have seen my fair share of 'that guy'. We usually have one every other year, sometimes less, that joins the club. My first real experience with a 'that guy' was my first year as an officer. We will call him JimBob.

JimBob was always a bit akward. He was obnoxious, loud, and no one could stand him. In his first semester he pulled fire alarms, stalked one of our members, and did every little thing that he could to try to 'fit in' and make people laugh. We did not find it funny. At all. On our cosplay contest meeting he did something very stupid. For no reason that we could fathom he took his lighter and decided it would be 'funny' and 'cool' to light someone's hair on fire. Which he succeeded in. Needless to say, we banned him from the club. A year later he tried to come back thinking somehow we would 'forget' the incident. I ended up having to escort him out of the building after having a small argument with him since he clearly didn't understand WHY he was banned.

A year or so later we had our next 'that guy'. Luckily this story ends in a happy ending. After the previous 'that guy' my club made it a mission to do our best to help the 'that guys'. We realized that a lot of those 'that guys' were basically raised on the internet and didn't understand HOW to socialize. So my next story is about a guy who I shall call Jeff Jeffington. When we first met Jeff he introduced himself as 'Hi I'm Jeff, and I'm bisexual!" Well, most of us were just confused as that wasn't the best way to make an introduction. As weeks went on we noticed Jeff causing issues. At meetings he was the guy yelling internet memes and random stupid phrases at the viewing screen. When he actually had a face to face conversation he often would ask really awkward questions that would make everyone uncomfortable. So one day we took Jeff aside and explained to him what he was doing wasn't quite right. We told him the best thing to do is to simply watch the people around you and make mental notes on how people behave and react. Jeff took this to heart and the next semester we hardly heard a peep from him. After our summer break Jeff comes back as if he was a new person. He stopped being the 'that guy' and actually was himself. It turns out Jeff was a pretty intellegent and funny guy and most people enjoy his company now.

So all I can say is, give your 'that guys' a chance. You might just be surprised. But if they stalk a member or catch them on fire...ban them for life or at least help them find medical help.

Gay Axel. Oh how I loathe Gay Axel. I was at A-Kon last year and my girlfriend had gone into some "How To Draw" panel and I miraculously found a spot waiting for me on the couch next to this big guy dressed as Axel from Kingdom Hearts 2. I'd saw him earlier at the Snafu booth and seeing as how Snafu-comics was one of my fave webcomic sites at the time I thought he was a cool guy. Oh how wrong I was. He had a lisp, not too severe and an effiminate way about him. Didn't bother me. But then he asked me what I had bought. Well, I had just gotten the first few Getbackers. Number 4-7 or something since I already had the very first ones. He then breaks into a long speil about how "Western translators don't translate it right" and how Get Backers was originally Yaoi. Then he goes on another rant about how Dragonball Z is Yaoi. Then Prince of Tennis. Then Naruto. I didn't care about it at first, but it kinda annoyed me. Then we see a Haruko from FLCL with an actual good Conti. He then starts on about this lecture of "How he was one of the first people to start liking FLCL and he was into it before everyone else". I tried to say "Does it matter? As long as people genuinely like the material, isn't that what counts and not who liked it first?" He did not agree. So much so he decided to show me his collection of Pirates of the Carribean Yaoi that he'd bought. I don't particularly like Pirates because it seemed to me that the characters weren't very well characterized. Sparrow was always forgiven way too quick and the fight scenes were way too over the top for me, in the sense that I didn't see how Will, Sparrow and unimportant guy from first movie brougth back for second one would all feel the neeed to fight in the wheel for any reason. Were he a priest he would have doused me in holy water and tried to exorcise my soul for saying these things. But the other hot topic at the time was Spiderman 3. Which of course led us into X-men. Which led us into how and why Wolverine was gay. As was Nightcrawler and Gambit. I don't hate gay people, but if I did it would be because of this guy. Oh yeah, and let's not forget that he hated lesbians because "They're not really gay. They're just pandering to boys who wanna see 'em kiss 'n stuff". It was like I had Ultra Banky from Chasing Amy sitting next to me.

 

From Jason Hendricks:

Not only have I run into "that guy," I usually see him twice a week. However, I don't see him at an anime club, but at my work place. I work at a Library and every Tuesday and Thursday this man in his 30's who lives with his parents and has about 5 cats comes in and will follow me around telling me about either his latest Gundam model or the latest volume of Gundam Seed Destiny. Imagine Michael Moore with Michael Jackson's voice and you'll pretty much be able to picture what he looks and sounds like, its really creepy. The reason he follows me around was that I was sitting at the reference desk once and he wouldn't shut up about giant robots. So I made an off-hand comment about being a mecha fan because I was trying to be nice and I was hoping it would satisfy him enough to leave me alone. Bad move, now he actually follows me around the Library when i'm trying to put books away. What's worse is one time he brought in some posters of Rei Ayanami in a bikini. I like Eva, but I reallu have no desire to see that. Now whenever he comes in I usually try to hide so that I can avoid hearing about his latest Gundam Model, because I really don't care, and it interferes with getting my work done.

From Rin:

For me, 'that guy' was the annoying person who attended one of our anime club screenings near the end of the semester. He hadnt attended any screenings before this.
We were watching Shigofumi, and Wolf and Spice, and had been since the start of the semester. Obviously, we had nearly reached the end of the series.
Now, you would -think- someone with half a brain could realize that if you jump into an anime series near the -end- of it, you're not going to understand all that much. In fact, I'm not quite sure why you'd bother, and if you did, you could at least have the sense to maybe read up a little on the series before going to see episodes near the stories conclusion. After all, its pretty much the effect of walking into a movie theatre when the movie only has half an hour to go, and expecting it to make perfect sense to you.
So what does That Guy do? Complain, with the foulest mouth you ever heard, and as loudly as possible. "What the sh*t? What's going on? This doesnt make sense!" Also, referring to Horo in Wolf and Spice when she bared her fangs, "What the f*ck, is that chick a vampire or something?" (If you couldnt figure out what she was from the title, you must be kinda thick) In a part where Horo started laughing for a while, he yells out "SLAP HER! HURHURHUR". He obviously thought he was hilarious.
Then when Shigofumi came on, the usual little text appeared at the bottom of the screen, in japanese, that reads 'when watching anime, brighten your room and sit away from the screen.' That guy yells out, "WHAT THE F*CK, I CANT READ THAT SH*T", as if it really mattered.
Does one honestly need to be so obnoxious? It was all I could do to stop myself leaning over and whacking him with my bag. Our screenings were normally PEACEFUL...

From Kimberly Naff:


Finally, from "Eos":

I've heard the “that guy” label used to describe many notorious club members, but when I first read the question, one individual came right the front of my mind. My senior year I acted as president of the geeky interests club on my college's campus, the same year that this “guy” transferred in. At the all-school club fair, he introduces himself then decides to become the official spokesperson, scaring passersby with “we're all crazy otaku!” This kid unfortunately has a knack for getting on people's nerves, referring to me as “Pres.” For some reason, he's of the mind that all females are inherit yaoi-lovers, and would often start conversations with me by asking in an embarrassingly loud voice “why do you girls like to watch to men do it?” Or more puzzlingly, “why do guys like to watch two girls doing it?”  Obsession with homosexuality aside, he had problems with personal boundaries, going to far as to grab my face with both hands to “punish” me for not wearing green on St. Patrick's Day….while I was at work in the campus library's front desk. What made this guy especially annoying was that as president, I tried to be civil and not to outright ignore him, which became increasingly harder. He still attends the school, opening up his usual canned rants about his ex-girlfriend during his presidential candidate speech. Some things never change.