I never realized it when I was young. Watched this with my kids this year and was quite taken aback by what a massive dickhead Santa is in this story.

Spooge

The ratio of comments that get the joke vs comments that don’t is troubling

Facts

Yes, anything is an improvement over what I’m working with.

You might have something there

The response being “How so?” Doesn’t really make sense. The natural response would be something like “What is it?” But you could probably get away with “What do you mean ‘finally’?” and that would get you to the punchline that the joke is long overdue, like a book you checked out and never returned.

Eventually, first two seasons of DBZ aired on syndicated TV. Cartoon Network picked it up in 98

There’s a scene in the netflix show, Daybreak, where RZA as a narrator explains how eastern warrior culture became popular in the black community. I couldn’t find a clip but here’s an article about it, and the relevant quote:

“It’s not your fault you want to be a samurai,” says RZA. “See, that’s the economical pressure being expressed as warrior code. It started when young black men couldn’t afford to go to the movies, so we watched kung fu reruns. We found beauty in things that had been neglected.” He explains the socioeconomic forces that raised a whole generation of “blerds,” spinning out into everything from Jim Kelly to The Last Dragon to Kendrick Lamar’s “Kung Fu Kenny” to The Boondocks to Wu-Tang Clan itself.

For a serious answer, as someone who grew up in a family that couldn’t afford cable television. DBZ, Sailor Moon, and Pokémon all aired on network, antenna, televison in the morning before school or after school throughout the 90’s.

So it’s probably a function of income more than race. All the poor white kids I grew up with worshiped those three shows too.