Born and raised in Northern China (2hrs drive from Beijing), my parents bought me crickets & taught me how to catch grasshoppers when I was in early school age. They have short lifespans, so they are quite affordable and low-maintenance pets for families who aren't yet sure about (or can't yet afford to) keep pets that lives for years (cats, dogs, ...). Plus, they teach young children lessons on caring, feeding, life and death, just as well as the latter. I like it.
I had a chinese friend who was apparently really into fighting them, which seems a bit of a fringe sport…
The Japanese are also into fighting insects, although mostly with beetles. Pokemon is more understandable with this in mind as the idea of people collecting creatures to fight with other people's creatures is an extension of this.
Beetles? Hmm I never heard about that. Spiders, yes.. And they are huge :)
Beetles fighting things are all over youtube
Let's have a talk about the tweetle beetles!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5wvurTU5DI&t=276s
I grew up in the South Eastern US, and bug and lizard cages were common educational toys.
I used to catch grasshoppers, lizards, fireflies, and "June bugs" (Popillia japonica).
One summer, there was a particularly bad outbreak of June bugs and if you shook a Japanese maple tree, the entire tree would empty of thousands of them in a dense cloud.
Childhood summers were fun.
I'm pretty convinced that June bugs are the dumbest insects on the planet.
They are so clumsy! They slowly fly and collide into everything.
There are so many "smart" insects with highly evolved predator avoidance. These are not those insects.