It certainly seems like every stylus is not perfectly parallel with the cantilever and always seems to lean ever so slightly to one side or another. Seems like new ones can be like this too. So I assume a bit of a lean is normal / not an issue.
Sorry OP, really wish people would read and think first. He didn’t and so doesn’t realize he just told you to throw away all your cartridges. He didn’t mean it. Forest for the trees. You were right in the first place, as I so clearly explained. No worries. Carry on.
Anti-skating by the way, playing a record generates a force that pulls the stylus towards the center. Anti-skate counters this force with an equal force pushing the arm out away from the center. So if your bent cantilever was due to anti-skate it would be bent the opposite of what you see. So sorry, but he got that one exactly backwards. Almost certainly a slip. He knows a lot more than you would think from this example.
Analog is not that hard. Just a lot of simple stuff, levers and straight bits for the most part. Not that hard, just have to know what’s going on and think it through. But you do have to think it through.