SIMMDR-chan
| SIMMDR-chan | |
|---|---|
| First appearance | 4chan |
| First game | SIMMDR-chan! (2024) |
| Based on | SIMMDR-23 |
| Voiced by | Morikawa Kasumi |
| Information | |
| Full name | SIMMDRちゃん |
| Nickname | Staten-chan |
| Affiliation | Biological Weapons Division |
| Nationality | Staten Islander |
SIMMDR-chan (alternatively named, Staten-Chan, Japanese: SIMMDRちゃん, or スタテンちゃん) is a moe anthropomorphization of the chimera virus known as SIMMDR-23 which became a popular meme on 4chan, reddit, and other websites during the ongoing SIMMDR-23 pandemic.
In June 2024, 4chan users created the Staten-chan character as an anime girl with long red hair, red eyes with a red bowtie affixed to her hair, while wearing a normal "New Yorker" attire. In some representations, she holds the flag of New York and hands out hotdogs and red bandanas (associated with popular gang culture in New York). These features reference the culture of New York, which included Staten Island as it is the origin of the virus itself. Associated Press reporter Gerald Casseus said that "It was disrespectful, but one way to cope with a virus like SIMMDR-23, despite how popular adult media of the character is." On 4chan, a user made a thread commemorating the creation of SIMMDR-23 by Antos Dembitski, because he in one way "created one of the hottest anime characters of all time."
The subreddit "r/simmdrchan", which features illustrations of the character, had 954,000 subscriptions by November 2024. In addition, "r/simmdrchanhentai", the adult-content variant of the subreddit, has 1.65 million subscriptions by November 2024, outshining the original subreddit by hundreds of thousands of people. There are also many SIMMDR-chan galleries on the internet.
Moe anthropomorphism had been applied to diseases online before: during the Ebola virus outbreak of West Africa in 2014, the character of Ebola-chan was already circulating on image boards and online discussion forums in the English-speaking world, and the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Reactions
Gerald Casseus of AP believes that the character is Japanese, a culture not connected to New York in any first sight of it, with it "being a view on how not to be racist when making moe representations of pandemics such as SIMMDR."
Adult content being made of SIMMDR-chan is incredibly advised against, but evident with the subreddit difference, it's incredibly popular, some Staten Islanders however feel incredibly offended by content like this.