7777777 comments

I doubt companies will be sending people home early and based on the weather right now, I dont think it is necessary, but I dont know what the winds will be like later tonight.

What do they expect? It seems logical to me that anyone that would dump a baby would do it for a variety of reasons. Personally, Im against dumping babies, but Im also equally against putting a hatch out to annonymously dump a baby thinking you can do it safely and then grilling the people and releasing the results to the public. If they are going to have an annonymous hatch, they need to keep their word on that. If they dont want people dumping babies, then they need to show a history of what catholics to to babies and children in their care. It is a LONG grim history of horrific abuse. That would make most people think twice. It wouldnt stop the cold hearted, but it would make those with a conscience reconsider.

"Simply unbelievable that the police in this country are incapable of filtering out mental problems among their own recruits. "

Who is to say the cop is a mental case? Probably he is just a pervert. You don`t have to be mentally ill to be a jerk or pervert. I had a student once who was applying to be a cop and the screening tests he had to go through were pretty impressive. It was obvious that not just anyone off the street could qualify to be a cop in Japan. So I think some screening or background check for mental illness must take place.

I wonder if he killed himself because of personal problems or police related problems. For him to do it at the police station seems like it could have been a statement about the police force/work. Was he being asked to do unethical things as a police and he couldn`t handle it morally? Was he being asked to rough up people? Was he being bullied as a new recruit? Or did it have nothing in the world to do with policing? I guess we will never know because if he left a note condemning the police, they would hide that. But if he talked to friends or family outside the police force then a better understanding of his reasoning might come to light, but at this point one can only speculate.

Lovenot, of course Im NOT saying "all women are the same as animals". Please read my post again. What Im saying is animals cant be used as an illustration for good mothering because animals are guilty of abuse and murder too. In fact, when a person kills another we often call the murderer an "animal" because they are acting in an animalistic way. But I am saying not all women automatically know how to show love for their babies. If all women knew how, then why are so many grown children seeking out psychologists because of how their moms treated them as a child? Years ago I saw a statistic that more women abuse their children than men. Mothers may feel love but they dont always know how to convey that love as love, and the same can be said of men.

illsayit, yes I think textbook parenting causes a lot of problems because textbooks and professionals tend to paint a picture of if you do XYZ, then your child will be a good child. But when parents do XYZ and their kids dont turn out as the book or professionals promised then the parents might conclude the problem is the child since the parents followed the professionals formula so it cant the be parents. Parenting isn`t as simple as the professionals paint it to be because every parent comes with different circumstances and each child is an individual.

NIcky, although the woman in this case may have had PPD/PNI, I dont see her condition as any different than a man who is at the breaking point of stress. Of course, at this point we can only speculate about her condition. The report does not say she had PPD so to automatically assume a mom that kills her baby has PPD is the same as making the assumption that a homeless man that kills someone must be schizophrenic. He may be or he may not be, but perhaps schizophrenics would take offence to such an assumption just like perhaps PPD sufferers may take offense at the assumption that all female baby murderers must have PPD. Probably the majority of women with PPD dont murder their babies. A woman can kill her baby for many reasons.

Lovenot, I dont see any difference in Japan than other countries. All countries have similiar problems I think. As for animals, have you owned pets? Ive owned many kinds of pets and believe me animals can abuse and kill their babies too, and when I say kill I mean murder, not accidentally smoother them or something. I mean deliberately kill. As for motherly love, I personally feel there are maternal instincts in women but maternal instincts don`t equal love. Maternal instincts mean to feed and care for the baby/child. But love is much deeper and has to be nutured, cultivated and for some women it has to be learned and encouraged. Unfortunately not all women know how to give or show love to a child and in my opinion that is where other women, family members, and spouses really need to come in and support and encourage a woman who is struggling rather than tell her what a bad parent she is. She needs help but to know how to give love, she has to be given loving guidance, I think. Women need to support women. Just my opinion.

It kind of amazes me when a mom kills her baby, women have sympathy and blame it on PPD, but if a man is suffering depression and stress from unemployment, work, etc. & he kills his child, hes a worthless good for nothing who needs a dose of his own medicine. I think we should have the same standard. Either both get sympathy or both are good for nothings because stress and depression have no gender lines. All can experience it. Unfortunately some people dont have the self control to keep themselves from taking it out on others.

As for TigersTokyoDomes comment, I also dont like criminal names being listed whether they are accused or convicted because it puts a black mark on their family in the neighborhood. It can cause children to be ostracized. It can causes spouses and parents to be blamed or looked down upon. If there is no reason to list the name, then it is best to keep it quiet to protect the innocent family members. However, there are times listing a name may be beneficial for example if it were a child molestor, rapist, or any sort of sexual preditor, it could encourage other victims to come forward. Or if it is a suspected criminal on the run, this too would be essential for society to know the name and face. But in a domestic case like this where a living child is involved, I prefer to not know the name because it benefits no one to know.

Farmboy, another form of fake marriage is when normally the woman is already married with children to someone in her home country but pretends to be single to get a visa and money to send back to her real husband and kids. It is ruthless. There was one case where a Japanese man had been married for years to one of these women and gave her money every month thinking he was helping her mother NOT her husband. He even paid for her to make regular visit to her "mother"/husband. It was a terrible shock for him to find out she was maintaining her marriage overseas and just using her Japanese husband for her convenience and profit. The man later found out from police this is not a rare event. It happens fairly regularly.

Crazy. We are hearing stories of people being found dead from starvation, we have no idea what the medical costs are going to be in the near future due to radiation, we are being told there isn`t enough money for basic domestic needs so there has to be a tax increase, we have a LOT of people in need from the tsunami and nuclear disaster who have been denied an extention of unemployment but no jobs to turn to, and we have a lot of kids coming out of the foster care/orphan homes that are just sent away with basically nothing with no home to turn to and no way to get a degree yet the government has no money to support their education. Yet the government has hundereds of millions of dollars to spend on causes that have been supported for decades. Tax money should be used on tax payers needs and any extra can be used to help other causes. And I think starvation is a need not a luxury or want, and a kid that has had the disadvantage of being dumped in an orphange with no loving parents deserves a little break too.

Heda, I once heard a very good presentation about the "triangle of life" theory. The speaker said the triangle of life studies were done in collaspeable structures. So this theory is good for countries where construction is poor and structures are likely to collapse, but Japan has good earthquake resistent construction so structures arent as likely to collapse so the best thing to do in Japan is to get under a table, desk, etc. and protect your head. In the triangle of life, getting under something would mean you get smashed by it as the structure collapses, but in Japan it is more likely something will fall and injure you if you are not under something to protect yourself because the structures in Japan tend to sway and throw things rather than just completely collapse on your head. The speaker said Mexico, China, Iran, etc. these countries make collapsable construction so the triangle of life is your best bet in these countries if you cant get out into an open space. Anyway, it is hard to know, but I personally am going to follow the "get under cover" theory because it made sense to me for Japan.

So to make it more appealing and an easier sell they call radioactive debris, tsunami debris.

j4p4nFTW, please do a little research on your own and you will find information on the nuclear plant and yakuza ties. You will not have to look hard to find the info. It is out there.

Gurukun, the yakuza dont play nice. They have a way of making ppl do what they want them to do. They can threaten bodily harm or mutilation. They can kill with no remorse. And if that doesnt work, they can threaten to harm innocent members of your family, and they dont make empty threats. So those who fall into the hands of the yakuza may weigh their options and feel they have a better chance workiing in the plant getting 8000 yen than the other options. And although I think everyone should be grateful they are doing this work, to label them as heros distracts from the abuse because a hero does things voluntarily. I would bet the majority of these men dont want to be there & would take a lower paying job if they had one. However, there were some old retired men that volunteered to do the job after the big quake, and Tepco refused them. Those were heros. Those were men who said "we are old so our lives are limited and we want to save the younger ppl". They also said by going in voluntarily they could demand better safety and work conditions than those going in as contract workers. So they were willing to put their lives on the line to save the contract workers too. This was true so Tepco refused them. To be called a hero one has to qualify. These men are victims and need to be recognized and helped as victims not applauded as heros to continue as usual.

Gurukun, to be a hero you have to do something with courage from your heart and convictions. Some of these men are in those plants by force of the yakuza or force of economics where an empty stomach motivates them. All are victims of a company that is using them at almost slave labor. And some are victims of a yakuza that says "go in or else". In my opinion, a hero shines & is helping and doesn`t need help. But in this case, these men are helpless victims who desparately need help. They need someone to force Tepco to pay them right, train them right, & work them right. Others need help to escape the arm of the yakuza. All these men are being taken advantage of and mistreated.

What bothers me most about this is a bit rude to say, but I think the mayor is just trying to hold on to his job and power at the expense of ppls lives, both the ppl he is representing and ppl all over Japan. He recognizes this waste will make the land unliveable, but to ship the waste to liveable parts of Japan and make more places unliveable is okay to him as long as he can keep his job. I also wonder if he is part of the problem of why ppl will not leave. He may be sending out information to the residents that returning to their homes will be fine as soon as clean up is done. This is a lie. The land is too contaminated and the ppl need to be told the truth and helped to relocate. I know having to start all over again is tough and no one wants to lose their good job in this economy, but dont put a job over countless lives.

BurakuminDes, do you not think that Nihonmatsu does not take a dim view on animal abuse either? I think he demonstrated that he cares very much for the well being of both animals and humans, and he made an effort to close a gap of misunderstanding between the two. If he had treated these youth with contempt as though they are worthless, thugs who will never amount to anything, it is very possible that he could have helped pave a way for this exact outcome, but instead he took the higher ground and looked at them as redeemable people who could make contributions to society and learn the value of life in animals. Because he demonstrated to them kindness and mercy, we hope it will inspire them to be better people and someday they can return the favor to someone else who needs forgiveness.

Another Y2K story. These "total collape" stories come with each generation creating all sorts of unnecessary scare tactics.

Im glad that Nihonmatsu has a heart. He took into consideration the age & maturity of the kids as well as the fact that probably they did not have any vandalism record. Im glad he was forgiving & just wanted the kids to realize what they did to another living being & to learn a lesson from it so they could move on and have productive lives. In many Western countries, ppl would be saying "throw them in jail" or "put them in a cage & throw fireworks in their faces" which would do nothing to encourage them to be better ppl, but a humbling yet compassionate punishment like this may be just what they need to better themselves as humans. However, I must say apologizing to a monkey must be more for the kids than for the monkeys. I don`t think monkeys understand "gomenasai".

"It is barbaric to feel empathly for the killer, instead of sympathy for the victim(s)"

I think a person can feel both, but priority must always go to the victim and justice. We can look at a bad childhood of a murderer and feel badly for the person and learn from it. Remind parents that are struggling that they have a duty to overcome because how they parent has lasting and rippling effects. But when it comes to justice, we have to put empathy aside and stand up for the victim. However, after judgement is made, then empathy can return by ministering to the killer to prepare them for the afterlife and help them come to a place of remorse and repentence in this life.

" But maybe it is better for him to sit in jail the rest of his life tortured by his own mind and demons."

Maitake, the problem with this is 1) justice is not executed 2) he may not be tortured by his actions. Before he took pride in what he did. If he took pride and still feels it (we cant trust his lawyer saying he now feels remorse because that is what a lawyer has to say), then there is no point in keeping him alive to torture him. 3) Mental torture is probably worse than physical torture and legally most civilized countries are against torture so torture as punishment should not be an option. 4) If he still feels pride in what he did and is housed with the general population because he is not on death row, then he can be a bad influence and stumbling block for potentially rehabilitatable people. That is not good. 5) Keeping him alive punishes society. Tax payers have to pay a lot of money to keep him alive, watched, and cared for. Tax payers may not mind investing in rehabilitating people that will eventually return to society, but for those who are condemned to spending the rest of their lives in prison because they murdered, it is a waste of money. The prisoners are just living to gobble up money but not returning anything to society. 6) Most of all, keeping him alive torments the victims family. The father will never feel justice is served until justice is executed. He already had to lose his daughter and granddaughter in a horrendous way. Why must he be tortured more? It is punishing the victim, and that is wrong.

I genuinely feel sorry for the boy who killed because his whole life was miserable. A life where he was regularly abused as a child and a life of seeing his mother beaten & eventually kill herself which left him abandoned and helpless at the mercy of his abuser, BUT justice is and should be justice. He had a miserable life and upbringing but that does not mean he had to take it out on others and murder. Murder was his choice. Therefore, death should be his penalty and of course the victim`s father should have a major say in the penalty. To disregard justice in the face of the victim only breeds vigilanties b/c ppl can no longer trust the courts to execute justice. The court made the right decision, but I hope the boy now man will find peace and be able to face death without fear so he can go on to the next life in a good way and have no more pain and sorrow.

The line Yang used is cheesy & probably what he uses on all girls, but lets face it, girls like to be told they are pretty so girls often fall for lines like this. Maybe her Japanese boyfriend was not telling her she was pretty nor whispering sweet nothings in her ear. And maybe Yang was the first male to ever tell her how "beautiful" she was. So I don`t think she was necessarily loose by going to Yang. Maybe his words made her start to think she could stay with her present boyfriend and feel plain or be with Yang and feel pretty and special. The sad part of it is Yang probably was like many guys just throwing out a line to see if he could catch a bite, reel her in and have a good time and then move on to the next girl because he never had serious intentions or feelings towards her to begin with. The Japanese guy may have had more committment and loyalty in his intentions towards the girl, but did not know how to romance her and make her feel special so he lost her.

I dont see why its such a problem. The gov. could simply remove the forced retirement age to retain a lot of its skilled work force. Many people really dont want to retire or are not in an economic position to retire so being able to continue working would be good news for them and the economy combined. It would also be good for society because it may lower divorces of the housewives that cant stand having their husband`s sitting around the house all day after retirement so they divorce them. And it could lower health problems related to depression or feelings of uselessness based on not having something constructive work to do. Work is a good thing. Of course, those who become too weak or tired to work, they should be allowed to retire with full benefits, but no one should be forced to retire.

"But what about someone not prone to violence but who is mentally ill and incapable of following a rational thought process?"

If someone cant follow a rational thought process which makes their behavior unpredictable, then they are potentially capable of violence which means drugs may dull their senses, but if they have the potential of violence in them, the potential is there whether they are medicated or not. I have known some severely mentally ill people and they seem to go through cycles where the medication mellows them out, then the severe side effects kick in which highly aggitate them so they become more unstable, and what often happens is because the side effects are driving them up the wall they stop the meds so a whole slew of other problems come out. But the point is whether on or off meds, those who are potentially violent will remain potentially violent unless some cure is found. Meds alone dont cure the violent potential. I would agree though that the severely mentally ill people need some sort of meds if they are going to live in society.

I dont think meds would necessarily have stopped her. I cant speak for other countries but American prisons are filled with "mentally ill" people. America really pumps the meds in people, yet the meds dont stop crimes. In fact, research has shown some of these psychiatric drugs CAUSE violence. Personally I think if someone is prone to violence, they will commit violence with or without drugs. If drugs were the solution, then society should say she is innocent because she wasnt on medication therefore she cant be held accountable for what she did, give her some drugs, and let her go free with the understanding that she has to take the meds. But not taking medication isnt the root of the problem. The root of the problem is she willingly premeditated and chose to attack a child rather than suppress her violent nature. This was her choice. Therefore, she needs to pay the penalty for her choice.

"Feeling suicidal? Go abroad, open up your mind! See the beautiful world out there! A company situation or a　失恋(unrequited love) doesn't worth your life. I wish I could send these people with suicidal toughts to some poor countries I know to see the very reality, I guess one or two would get ashamed to even have thought about taking their own lives, while there's ppl out there struggling to survive every single day. What would a bed ridden person or paralytic feel when they read those news about healthy, lifeful youths taking their own lives.."

With all due respect Thunderbird, dont you think that is a little short sighted? Perhaps if someone were in the financial situation to travel the world they wouldnt be considering suicide. Perhaps they are on the brink of homelessness which would put them in no better of a position than someone in a poor country. And perhaps if the suicidal teen who is bullied every day at school with no support from teachers had the same loving care and support that the paralytic or bedridden person had, he wouldnt be considering suicide either. Suicide is more complex than just spoiled brats who cant have all their materialistic dreams to come true. Of course sometimes it can be the result of an impulsive teen feeling crushed from unrequited "love", but I think most cases of suicide are deeper and more complex than that.

"Seriously, is anything ever done to help these poor, desperate people here? I mean I get the impression that mental illness is just a taboo subject here that nobody wants to discuss."

I dont think mental illness is the primary cause of suicides although it is a cause in some cases. I think the primary cause in adults is financial/job loss and for kids bullying. You dont have to be crazy to be bullied or finanically strapped to the point of seeing no more hope in life.

Issa, I agree that finances are a primary cause of suicide but I dont think pachinko is the reason most fall into financial troubles. For some it is job loss. For others it is debt or signing for someone elses debt and that debt falls on the co-signer. For others it is illness. For others it is divorce that leads to financial ruin. So I think it is unfair to say the majority of people that commit suicide due to finances do it because they foolishly squandered all their money at the pachinko parlor.

I agree with Christian that there is a mentality among bicyclists that cars "should" stop for them therefore bicyclists tend to ignore all rules. Everyday in my town I see bikes on the wrong side of the road so you have a one lane road with cars going in one direction yet bikes going in all directions and bikes swerving out in front of a car to hurry up and get around the pedestrian or the bike on the right side of the street. Somehow bicyclists even with children in tow don`t feel the weight of responsiblity like a driver does. That is not to say drivers should not take extra precaution, they should since an accident with a car is more likely to cause death, but if a bike causes a driver to kill someone, it is cruel to make the driver take monetary and/or criminal responsibilty. Bicyclists especially mothers with children on their bikes have to take extra precautions and responsibilty too. All responsibility on the driver is wrong.

"The Japanese press said the car had green light, according to witnesses. It was a big three lanes road. Regardless, the guy is toasted, both by the system and by the heavy burden of involuntarily killing two children"

This is a real shame. Its sad that the woman and her children were hit, but the driver should not have to sit in a jail cell if he was obeying the traffic laws and the woman was not. Its a tragedy, but it`s not his fault and he should not have to pay damages or be criminally punished just because her bicycle ran in front of him when she should have stopped for the red light especially with 2 children on her bicycle. I always stop when the light is yellow when my child is on my bicycle because I never want to take a risk. A child weighs a lot so it is harder to get across quickly. Also if they wiggle you can lose balance easily. So just riding with 2 children is a risk in itself, but dashing across a big 3 lane road with 2 children on a red light is flat out dangerous and is heading for trouble. Anyway, I feel sorry for both the woman and the man.

Gyouza, I have no intentions of going to Sapporo just to buy this magazine. I dont have the time or money to do that. Nor do I intend on buying a magazine that exploits and takes advantage of its employees. Basically what I want to say is a company should pay the homeless the SAME as any other person. To look at the homeless as an opportunity to get free/dirt cheap labor is wrong. If this magazine is so great then it can pay the homeless an honest wage. And if they are going to use the homeless as a means of advertising and marketing their product, then they should pay the homeless that price too just like they would pay a person to be in a commercial or a famous person to appear in their product line. Why is it that they would pay someone else to use their name or appear in their advertising but the homeless dont count? Why is it they would pay someone to deliver their magazines & sale them but the homeless dont count? The homeless just get the crumbs. It is WRONG! Thats the "big issue", people taking advantage of the economically vulnerable!