Oh man, I just realized. Italy. Lulz.

My liveliest memory of Italy(Rome) was how polite and friendly it was at night, with a nice little concert near Piata Navona and people drinking all over the streets. It was 1:59. At 2:00 everything closed down, the locals started throwing eggs at the concert goers, the concert goers started throwing bottles at the locals, all in one hate-fest because the band was Dutch and didn't know the "everything closes down at 2:00 SHARP" rule.

And Italy is known for burning down gipsy camps, which is not exactly much better than how the Japanese treat their foreigners...

And speaking of how businesswomen rob you whils housewives give back your wallet

Fraud is a major contributor to Italy's crime rate, with some level of fraud appearing in all sectors of the economy since the country's founding in 1861. Notable cases of financial fraud include the collapse of Parmalat in the early years of the twentyfirst century, and the Lockheed bribery scandal in the 1970s.

Insurance fraud also takes a high toll on the cost of insurance in Italy, with 115.646 incidents of fraudulent claims in 2001 alone, with 3.28 percent of all claims in 2002 accertained to involve fraud. The percentage rose above ten percent in some of the southern provinces.[6]

State employees have been perceived to have such a high rate of absenteeism, often feigning illness, that in 2008 the government introduced a law to harshly prosecute civil servants who are found to be making fraudulent claims about their health.[7] Fraudulent claims of ill health are not confined to state employees, with some physicians often willing to receive bribes to certify non-existent conditions so that citizens may receive incapacity benefit. A case was revealed in 2010 where in one quartiere of Naples alone, 400 people were found to be claiming mental illness while being healthy.[8]
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(wiki)

Last edited by Zgarbas (2012 February 09, 6:03 am)

qwertyytrewq wrote:

I wonder how Japan as a whole, views alcoholism? I know that in countries like USA and UK, alcoholism can be considered a national pastime. Unfortunately, someone has to clean up the social and physical damage afterwards...

Depends how you are using the term "alcoholism." If you mean it in the since of the psychological illness of being an alcoholic, I can't really say too much on that. I have heard/read(?) some time ago that its sort of hush-hush thing in communities where you have a father or someone that is always drunk. They sort of expect them to eventually get over the issue or something. Its hard to say how serious of an issue it is in Japan because of the way of the culture. Which brings me to the other thing.

If you mean "alcoholism" in the sense of, "How do people view alcohol and people that get drunk?" Then Japan is probably one of the laxest countries. Speaking as an American, I can definitively say that many Americans would be shocked/offended at how Japanese handle alcohol. In the US if you drink on the side of the road? Arrested. Fall asleep on the side of the road? Arrested. Vomit on the side of the road? Arrested. I'm pretty sure you could get arrested for even walking down the side of the road if you are super drunk.

In Japan if you go to any of the large University campuses. There is always one or two streets lined with bars or izakayas and if you go there on a Friday/Sat (sometimes not even that!) around 9-12am. You can see people sprawled out all over the place asleep. You can see friends with some poor young dude vomiting into a bag. You can spot vomit on the streets. I've sat there and watched police step around passed out people on the street and just shrug. Its perfectly fine and viewed ok in the culture, but most Americans would probably be aploplexic over it. I still remember one time I went and bought a few beers at a small mom and pop shop. The shop keeper asked me something and my Japanese and I had to stop and think what he said (今飲みたい？）. It took me a second to realize it because it didn't fit nicely into my usual view on things (You drink alcohol in private), but standing on the side of the street and drinking beer is perfectly fine. Oh and alcohol vending machines, 'nuff said.
I hear Korea has quite the drinking culture too in this kind of respect. The only thing that I can think of is that its never become such a huge problem because a) Not puritan and b) A lot of Asians have the enzyme deficiency for breaking down alcohol so they can't ever get super hammered like Westerners.

EDIT: One other thing I want to add just to show sort of the culture difference in drinking. Most izakayas in Japan have "all you drink" (飲み放題) deals where you can drink all you want in X amount of time. Many states in the US and in the UK are cracking down on "Happy hours" at bars, I can only imagine how "all you can drink" would go over.

Last edited by vix86 (2012 February 09, 6:49 am)

qwertyytrewq wrote:

While we're on the subject of drug addictions, I read Japan has a reputation for smoking as well, though I don't know if it was a realistic reputation or an overstated/exaggerated one. As a preowned goods importer, it does annoy me when a few items smell of smoke or has been turned yellow by smoke.

Japan as a whole does have one good thing on its side and it is its treatment of second hand electronic goods. A common joke is that a "mint condition" item being sold on eBay (America) would be considered "not very good condition at all" in Japan. It depends on the individual of course but generally speaking, it is true.

Japan has been slow to adopt Western stances (lol imagine that!) on smoking bans and anti-smoking campaigns. They now have programs in schools to encourage teens not to smoke, which is good. Till recent though Cigs were still really cheap. I believe recently though they either passed or were talking about instigating a hike on the tax on tobacco. Smoking has been slowly decreasing in Japan I think, but its still there. Its still ok to smoke in bars, restaurants, pachinko parlors, manga cafes, etc. Lots of malls now have "smoking rooms" though for smokers, but lots of populated areas with pedestrian traffic now have "anti-smoking zones" where you supposedly can't smoke but I don't know how enforced that is by the police.

I've come to believe that "second hand" in Japan tends to refer to some sort of system where retailers sell extra inventory to clear out space. Some stuff is just way too new in my opinion to have ever been used by people. The only thing I can think of to account for this, assuming it really was owned by someone, is that there are a lot of Japanese that want to always have the latest, greatest thing so they constantly recycle/resell something that's only a few months old.

At least they pick up your trash in Japan. In Italy...

http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2011/0 … sh-crisis/

"The Italian Army arrived in Naples today to help the city deal with some 2,000 tons of uncollected garbage"

Hyperborea wrote:

Surreal wrote:

WHAT. Are you trying to say that what hyperborea posted doesn't mean anything, because they're isolated cases? Don't you think that the fact that these kinds of cases, and the reactions (like the none too unusual firing of innocents that are somehow related to the incident) are allowed to happen means something?

No, I wasn't saying that they don't mean "anything" - they are sad cases of human tragedy. However, you can't draw conclusions from isolated anecdotes. If you add more anecdotes they don't add up and become data without a very large statistical sample.

If you ask just about anything about a large enough group you can find examples of anything. Does it prove anything? Nothing at all except the gullibility of the listener.

Surreal wrote:

What the hell, dude?

Indeed, what the hell, dude?

Are Swedes cannibals?

Why yes, they are. I've found an anecdote about some so that means that they all are or at least that it's rampant. If I find more then it just become true, right?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article … -unit.html

Sweden's most evil couple - a cannibal and a Satan-worshipping vampire - have applied to get married behind the bars of their secure psychiatric hospital.

Isakin Jonsson, 33, has asked human vampire Michelle Gustafsson, 23, to join him in unholy matrimony in a move that has shocked the country.

He killed mother-of-five Helle Christensen - his girlfriend at the time - by cutting her head off, eating parts of her body and then boasting about it on the Internet.

Does it prove anything? Why no it doesn't but it sure is sensational. It also sells a lot of tabloid newspapers.

But he wasn't even trying to provide a set of data to draw conclusions from, he was responding to someone who explicitly said they wanted to hear about cases in which racism was involved. And of course murder happens in any country; however, like I said earlier, the way that authorities dealt with the cases can tell you something about what is allowed by(or at least can slip by without being handled properly by) Japanese society. Moreover, ronnihonjin (whoops I just noticed I accidentally wrote your name instead of his in my last post) never tried to imply that Japanese as a group would be cannibals, that's just you shouting at a strawman.

Last edited by Surreal (2012 February 09, 3:28 pm)

If you're going by "better now than it was 30 years ago" on racism and feminism I think you can say the same about Japan. They were far behind then, so they're still behind now. Proportionally it should be the same, no?

I know I don't really have anything to contribute to the discussion, not having ever been to Japan, but I can't help but feeling that as I read through this thread there should be a sad, sad song playing in the background XD

Like some other people said, you need to take a balanced view. However, I think "You'd probably have the same experience in ANY foreign country" is a much different argument than "You're doing it wrong, so your opinion is invalid" which is how most of these types of comments are coming off as. This may be unintentional, but if you're going to make this type of comment I advise you to check yourself, and make sure you aren't being unnecessarily negative or judgmental.

However, I do appreciate the youtube video posted by mosunshine. Japan seems to be a stunningly beautiful place, and despite all its flaws, I still want to go there someday.

mosunshine wrote:

Here is a video for you to get a bit of an insight of what you might have to face in the country .
http://youtu.be/atrUv7qb4P8

Irixmark wrote:

So I always carry my passport with me. I'm not worried about losing it, because it would surely turn up at the next 交番. Point in favour of Japan in my book.

You don't need to carry your passport after you have your ARC. Even tourists sticking around in Japan for more than 30 days are technically required to get an ARC (my friend had to get one while on tourist visa in order to change from tourist->working while in Japan).

Your passport should be at home locked away somewhere safe.

Actually Brits and Canadians aren't sincerely polite either, but it's better if someone says "Have a nice day" and isn't sincere, than if a random guy who thinks you're in the way says "get the f*k out" and means it.

Pretty much it. For all the people complaining about the "insincerity" of Japanese, do they really want people walking around saying whats exactly on their mind? "Piss off." "F* off!" "Hell you looking at?!" "Oh hell. Another stupid customer! Don't you go anything better to do!?!"

This is the side of Japan that troubles me the most. And no, there is absolutely no point in denying that underage prostitution is rampant in Japan, and that teenagers selling their bodies to middle-aged men is tolerated, and if anyone is blamed, it's the girls themselves.

Whose fault is this though? Is it the fault of the middle-age man paying the girl? Is it the fault of the parents for not raising the girl with higher standards? Is it the fault of consumer society that makes people want more money to buy 3man handbags? Or clothes?

A lot of these girls doing this prostitution though are simply looking for a bit of extra money to spend each month. Its not like many are being pushed to prostitute by a pimp or anything; though it does happen on occasion. Prostitution with the absence of a coercive pimp, is a victimless crime. Both parties are consenting to the act. We could sit here and argue that minors can't legally consent to anything, but I still think 14-16 year old is smart enough to think through stuff and make a decision on having sex, in the same way that an 18+ yr old can.

turvy wrote:

Underage prostitution, pornography, as long as it is not coerced, why is it thought to be immoral or for some people 'sickening'?.

Is this really a direction we want to go with this thread....?

don't be so ridiculous.

Young teenagers are in no way capable of making decisions like that. You can even argue that older teens aren't.

It's one thing to have consentual sex with someone that they have feelings for, who is also around their own age, and something totally different to have sex for money with older strangers. Pimp or not, there are close to always going to be very difficult emotional consequences.

i suggest reading about teenage brain development for starters:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor … =124119468
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/ … dobbs-text

And yes, people used to marry at that age centuries ago. They still do in some countries. Fortunately, we've now grown some understanding of why that's not a brilliant idea, both psychologically and physically. Perhaps you should read up on the facts before you start spouting your ever-so-intelligent opinions.

Okinawa has nice beaches, blue water and a tropical climate, but it's a trip of its own. Unless it's a high budget trip, it's quite hard to fit both a visit to Japan and Okinawa.

There are plenty of nice beaches elsewhere around Japan, but no clear water.

turvy wrote:

At 15 you are most usually mature enough to know what sex is about and many people at that age are already having sex, so if these girls are 'selling their bodies' is not like they don't know what's happening or what they are doing, they know well. And what if they are just having fun while making some money from it?.

At the risk of pointing out the obvious..

From the girl's perspective - who says it's "fun"? once money is involved there will be pressure to do things she is not comfortable with, with a man she's not in love with and possibly not even attracted to. It has the potential to screw her up emotionally for the rest of her life (not to mention she'll be stigmatised if she's caught). Yes I'm sure some girls enjoy it, just like some adult escorts enjoy their jobs, but there's huge potential for emotional harm so why risk it?

From the man's perspective - why on earth would a salaryman aged 30-50 want to date a girl in her early teens? What do they have in common? What will they talk about? Do you think this is going to be a healthy relationship with loving respectful sex? Even if they do fall in love, will the relationship last long term. Again, too much risk of damage to the girl.

As you and Icecream pointed out, young marriage/sex died out centuries ago in all civilised countries; It is hugely embarrassing for Japan to allow this to go on in this day and age.

Last edited by aphasiac (2012 February 09, 8:47 pm)