From the Bullshit Department...

... we have this story, Japan's 'Lost Decade' Produced it's Biggest Cultural Phenomenon, in which the author, Son-U Jong, ("the Chosun Ilbo's correspondent in Tokyo")

1) observes that the Japanese are

... getting up to some very queer things, such as "maids" addressing "masters" in cafes and toys that exaggerate the female anatomy like children's perversions...

and believes this is all a part of moe (mo-eh).

2) asserts that Japan's "biggest cultural phenomenon" is the moe variant of otaku.

3) informs us that "otakus, once treated as psychos, have skyrocketed in numbers to nearly three million." (No citation given.)

4) blames it all on Takashi Murakami (and, for some reason, thinks it's relevant to mention that Murakami "failed to enter university twice").

5) implies that the Japanese government is involved in the spread of the moe "craze", and that the "seed" money was from "the petty cash that otakus earned from part-time jobs":

This money, combined with the huge market of Akihabara, it can be said, has produced marvelous "buds" of Japanese culture," called "moe."

6) claims that "otakus in the upper culture" are ultimately responsible for the "worldwide impact" of Japanese popular culture.

I'm no expert on Japanese popular culture, let's get that out of the way now. Nor am I even particularly interested in anime and manga and their associated genres and cultures. Had the writer of this article simply had a thesis along the lines of ""geeks" ("otaku") are often a source of innovation in popular culture," I wouldn't have bothered writing this post (I don't relish writing seriously about topics I'm not fluent in). What bugged me about this article was its not-so-subtle conflation of terms, coupled with some not-so-subtle innuendo, to create a generally negative impression about Japanese popular culture (and, by extension, the Japanese themselves).

The author sets things up with his examples of "perversions" (1, above), which we are to equate with "moe". Later he explains,

The character [萌え] used to write "moe" means "sprouting" or "budding." The term is said to refer to animated characters, mainly girls, who look sweet and lovable.

This is really only a partial definition (check the link above for a fuller explanation), but the author has connected moe with perversion and "budding", and thus slyly conflated it with lolicon (in the eyes of what one can safely assume is the non-otaku English-speaking reader).

There's really little else that needs to be said about this, but the author wants us to know that this is Japan's "biggest cultural phenomenon", spearheaded (we are led to imagine) by a "three million"-strong force of "psycho" otaku with the implicit involvement of the Japanese government, and that it's spreading throughout the world. (One wonders why the writer failed to bring up the additional threats of rising Japanese nationalism, Godzilla, and natto.)

What a load of bullshit.