Subs vs. Dubs
From Fandom wank wiki
The "subs vs. dubs" flamewar is one of the longest-standing in anime fandom.
For those of us who don't speak Japanese, we must have our anime translated for us somehow. The most common way of having this translation done is to use subtitles, aka subs, which usually provide a more accurate translation of the original Japanese due to the fact that there is no need to try to sync the old animation with the new audio content.
Subtitles are also essential tools for learning fangirl Japanese.
Dubs are done to make it possible for people who don't speak Japanese to watch anime without having to read subtitles. As the sound and video tracks have to sync properly, the quality of a dubbed translation can be somewhat dubious, to the point of completely changing the story of an episode or series. This is rape, according to the hardcore elitist folks in anime fandom. Because the story loses all its meaning if Riza is changed to Lisa, or "I love you dearly" becomes "You're very special to me."
If not for the dubbing industry, GrantM would have nothing to live for.
Licensing usually kills the distribution of fan-subbed anime on the Internet, and the new subtitles generally follow the script from the English-dubbed translation. These complaints get wanky very quickly.
