Well for the government it does matter. Cause if you think about it, why do men work? Usually because they can get a woman, that's how it worked for a long while. Men would work keep the infrastructure and society running when there's enough incentive to keep playing into the system. But if you remove that, and a majority of men can't find a woman, most men aren't going to do overtime, or work hard to progress the company, and that way the economy slows down. If most men start to be unable to have a 'normal' woman, and drop out of the system eventually prices will inflate to an unsustainable level. Sure women do work, but more often they do office jobs, and jobs that don't really produce physical products. It's why monogamy was effective, since it gave an incentive for every man to produce into the society to have a woman and raise a family. Chadharems are going to run into a problem where everything becomes inflated because woman consume, they don't produce much.
Probably not, anime and things like comics has gone mainstream. But on the flip side, while it is mainstream now its very watered down versions of the previous niche nerd stuff. Most people don't dive into those hobbies that much.
It's strange that you mention getting bullied back then if I remember correctly halo was popular back then, and no one bullied people for liking stuff like that, neither star wars, at least in my school lol. Maybe I am off the timeline, but I am pretty sure starwars was mainstream accepted around 2005.