AgentX comments

Just goes to show that brainwashing has a detrimental effect on the development of intelligence. The strangle-hold of nationalistic ideology driving identity politics (Aso et al.) and the straight jacket of an authoritarian education system reproducing sterile conformity is bound to create such robotic individuals with thought processes akin to AI. "Deprogramming" is urgently needed if Japan is to prosper into the 22nd century.

Very well said!

A deep bow and some lame excuses should fix it. No need to be detained and cut off from lawyers and family for months on end...

Corruption is alive and genki in Japan.

his client was questioned an average of seven hours a day without a lawyer present.

In...hu...mane!

Japanese authorities still have a very weak grasp on humanity, in general. Truth.

Because he (and his government) is so renowned for 'easing tensions'...

Utterly reckless, more war for oil hoorah (or is it hooyah).

I think it's 'booyah' or some-such incoherence...

Yep, America, the World Police, brought terrorism to the world outside the Middle East and is still at it. The people of middle eastern countries and others across the globe pay for America's constant belligerence.

The American military industrial complex is simply outta control. It is intent on keeping the ME in a permanent state of war.

These drone attacks in sovereign countries are disgusting, abhorrent and cowardly acts.

It doesn't matter who's in government in the Whitehouse, the people of America have lost all control. It doesn't help that so many of them are raised on glorified violence and war-mongering and are so deeply brainwashed that they actually support the machine.

Wat a sad, dark world the US is creating...

It could be an easy bit of propaganda too...

"The suggestion that any way shape or form that Australia -- accounting for 1.3 percent of the world's emissions... are impacting directly on specific fire events, whether it is here or anywhere else in the world, that doesn't bear up to credible scientific evidence," he told ABC radio.

How much coal, gas and uranium does Australia export to the world again..?

Japan signed the document the world put in front of it to sign, and they did it to get sovereignty back after their defeat in WWII. The wording was not Japan's but that of the occupying forces as punishment for Japan's wartime actions and aggression.

Well said! And nor should the wording be Japan's after the atrocities the IJA committed before and during the war. And the suffering it brought to Japanese people, too. The constitution was written to denounce war for good reason. Sensible Japanese citizens have agreed with it ever since. Yet, here we are, the descendants of the war-mongers themselves, that brought such mass suffering to Japan and it's neighbours, steadily steering the ship back toward mass-suffering yet again...

let’s hope the book also includes educational references as to why the bombings took place and Japan’s complete lunacy of trying to take over Asia. However, I fear it’s just a soppy and pitiful read about a victim. Yes, Japan was a victim. It was a victim of its own lunacy.

Exactly. Always glossed over or white-washed. How about holding Hirohito and his generals responsible to some degree for the misinformation and refusal to end the mass-suffering that they guided Japan into.

Again, Japan in general has learned very little since the war and are destined to make similar mistakes again in the future. Start with the truth, then give the people freedom to hold their leaders accountable (aka democracy).

Around 99 percent of trials in Japan result in a conviction

Except the weekly assault-against-women case that is dropped...

Japan's ancient culture of fudging numbers and outright lying should be on Unesco's list.

"I will investigate the issue and explain, but in the meantime public trust in the justice administration will be lost."

Like anyone with half a brain in Japan has a modicum of trust for Japan's justice administration... especially foreigners.

I avoid Kyoto..it , to me, is no fun at all.

Me too! Waste of time and money.

So.. just ignore the first-hand information from the millions of people that vouch for its medicinal qualities? Ignore the reports of other studies that vouch for the legalization of cannabis?

Also, getting the drugs via the illicit market "carries risk of prosecution as well as unknown product content, quality and safety,"

[snip] and there [is] evidence that people who use cannabis regularly may be at increased risk of developing depression and psychotic symptoms."

Being stigmatized and/or criminalized for choosing to smoke some weed is enough to stress people out over time, too. So are the stresses of one's job, morgtage and the state of our societies that meddle in every aspect of our lives! Millions of people have been made into criminals because of these ridiculous views toward cannabis. What a tremendous waste!

Of course, overuse of anything will have undesired effects (painkillers, for example) but painting cannabis as something that will lead to psychosis in mentally healthy people is absurd! (source: observing hundreds of long-term cannabis enjoyers over a lifetime!) Mentally unhealthy people, on the other hand, will end up in psychosis even without having smoked cannabis. How can these academics possibly believe they have taken all the intangibles into account!?

Now turn that 'high-powered academic perception' toward purely man-made drugs (without funding from big-pharma or other corporations) such as; alcohol, painkillers, deppression and anxiety meds etc etc and tell me how they don't have any side-effects and that they are more worthy to have a place in our societies than something that grows naturally! FFS!

Fact: Japan still has a sick sense of justice and fairness... the people of Japan have suffered for centuries because of it. Like I've said from day one, whether or not Ghosn is guilty is beside the point - he deserves a fair trial. The actions of Nissan, the prosecutors and the Japanese justice system have been illegal, appalling and are not welcome for a, supposedly, developed nation. Far worse than anything Ghosn has been accused of.

I believe the oyaji running Japan will have much mud on their faces on the international stage once Ghosn sinks his teeth in, and look forward to the day. They messed with an extremely capable man.

In the meantime, as a foreign-born resident of Japan, I would sooner avoid capture if I were accused of a crime than go through the impossible process of 'justice' here. I've lost all faith in the 'system' and 'due process' here. It's an abhorrent, disgusting mind-set that the Japanese in power choose to foster. And in time it will lower Japan's ranking in the world even further.

This way of currying favour with citizens is morally low, and lacks backbone. Pretty much everything about the monarchy is. So much mental illness in one place (the monarchy, those who adore it, those who use it as a weapon to control the public, and the public that is subsequently controlled by it).

What a joke! But nothing unusual in a nation where the people so easily give over and welcome a future of suffering.

A 'gift-giving' culture?

...

Japan is just one small overpopulated island in the world. It is not the center of the world.

Exactly. It's common knowledge within scientific communities that Japan is notorious for overfishing. Japan will arrogantly fish the any oceans they can access to extinction within 3 more decades.

Not to mention the great insult of hunting these amazing, intelligent animals.

Ludicrous Japan.

So much self praise by Japan.. wow.

The empty can rattles the most...

Mental illness = huuuuge in Japan...

So much for all the anti-Japan posters on here who claimed South Korea do not need Japan. Japans intelligence on the missiles was 100 times better than SKs, which is a why they are now begging for information.

A rather petty comment...

The friends I have made there over the last decade are some of the best people I know and there is no hidden rudeness, racism or anything else.

When you say 'there', does that mean you don't actually live in Japan?

It's a dreadful place, that zoo, I hated going there, and stopped some years ago. The conditions for the animals are pitiful.

I agree. Disgusting place.

Maybe it's time that Japan tried true diplomacy to smooth things over with Japan's neighbors...

For those that speak of 'here and now', surely you can agree that now is the time to focus on the individuals that will imminently send death threats once again.

That and corrupt government officials' actions that aim to censor this artwork are the only crimes here.

Funny... when I went to Kyoto with a Japanese family, the family took plenty of photos of geisha and sumo. There wasn't a problem then.

Conversely, I have had a camera shoved in my face by people I barely know hundreds of time while working in Japanese schools (glad I got out of those toxic places). However, I was not permitted to take photos of my own at those schools.

Japan still has no grasp of what constitutes 'hypocrisy'...

Ensuring absolute safety at nuclear plants was not a government requirement then, it said.

Then I suggest that the Japanese government and Tepco have never been competent start down the nuclear path.

And what has changed now?

Ticking time bomb.

There is something which nobody here seem to notice but I hear from Japanese around me who still haven't lost their sense for what's right and wrong.

The apparently national broadcaster NHK haven't aired anything about the issue so a vast majority of the population doesn't have any idea about the censorship put by the government.

Its no secret that the Japanese public are horribly uninformed. Hence they roll with a the revisionism.

Holding the family accountable for financial problems of deceased individuals is commonplace here. I would prefer to see his family stand trial then just walk away with the extra 300 Million yen.

To all the people here saying 'it's not art' etc as if what constitutes art is your sole decision. Luckily for you, we have freedom of speech and expression in Japan (apparently). So, why don't you just go and make your own art pieces that convey your own passionate message/s and put them on public display? Nothing else much to say really, is there...

People just don't want to work for poverty line wages in a job where half the customers don't even say thanks. It's simple.