My Dumb Role Model
I didn’t expect my role model to be a four-year-old cartoon character. Especially not one who was basically a walking advertisement for being inappropriate.
But Shin-chan showed up and ruined that particular lie. He had no manners, no impulse control, no embarrassment reflex. He’d dance around with his butt out, he’d make his teachers regret their life choices, he’d say whatever perverted thought crossed his mind that second. And somehow that was the point. The show was just this relentless refusal to be civilized, and every episode—every single one—had you laughing at something stupid you weren’t supposed to find funny.
His creator Yoshito Usui died in 2009. Hiking accident, mountains, just like that. I remember feeling it more than I expected. Not because I knew him, but because you realize how much of a person’s voice gets into their work, how much of Usui was in every dumb thing Shin-chan did.
The thing that stuck with me though is that it didn’t matter. Shin-chan was already out there, already living separate from his creator. He just kept being himself—crude, fearless, completely unbothered by what anyone was supposed to think. And I think that’s what I actually took from him. Not a role model in any conventional sense. Just permission to find humor in the wrong places and not apologize for it.