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Personally, I think a big part of the problem is that we're applying western genre classifications to Japanese shows. The two don't fit. Anime has distinctive genres. In fact, for most shows it would be possible to describe a show as being overwhelmingly one genre. But because we're stuck with using western terms, everything ends up with multiple genres.
As an example, I would use the following genres to classify Japanese shows:
1. Super Robot
2. Real Robot (Mecha shows are a distinct genre, they have conventions that go beyond the presence of giant humanoid robots. There are two varieties, Real and Super)
3. Shonen Action
4. Shonen Sports
5. Shonen Romance
6. Harems
7. Visual Novel
8. Seinen Action
9. Ruthless Game (think Kaiji, Battle Royale, Death Note)
10. Seinen Romance
11. Salaryman
12. Shojo Romance
13. Yuri/Shojo ai
14. Yaoi/shonen ai
15. Magical Girl
16. Mystery
17. Epic Sci-Fi/Space Opera (think LoGH, Banner of the Stars, Yamato)
18. Healing Anime
19. Slice of Life Anime.
I could go on, but I don't want this post getting larger. Some genres could realistically be considered subgenres of others. For instance Harem and Visual novel are subgenres of Shonen/seinen romance (which could also be possibly merged for similarity).
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