Alex comments

The only thing I find mind-boggling is this: if you're going to shoplift because you don't have enough money to live or care for your child, why wouldn't you shoplift essentials like food or baby items? If you're going around shoplifting toys to re-sell them at a recycle shop, that seems a little suspicious.

We’re losing all the greats recently…So sad. May he Rest In Peace.

(As for Gambon as Dumbledore, a lot of children learned of who he was from the Potter films, and became fans of his. So hardly “wasted” in the role. He brought his own wonderful and unique charm to the character.)

When I first came to Tokyo over a decade ago, I was wholly impressed by scenes of nature and Japanese architecture (ancient and futuristic) intermingled. Now I honestly find myself horrified by how quickly and easily they destroy the nature that made this city beautiful.

By the way, I heard that they want to build office building towers over where these trees stand, but at the present moment, the number of vacancies in current office buildings has already increased significantly since the pandemic. Why tear down the few pockets of nature we have left to build something you already have abundantly available to you??

dagonToday  07:38 am JST

Japanese educators want to allow students to use robot substitutes to attend school

Sounds like the set-up for the next hit anime series.

"V-Tube! Tokimeki Heartbeat Classroom"

There is, in fact, a Japanese movie from 2005 about this very thing. "Hinokio", a story about a boy who uses a robot to go to school! Now in his case, he uses it because he is physically disabled. But the story does warn us that using the robot (understandably!) turns him into something of a recluse.

To the people who think 30 years is too much:

The crime committed against the victim affects that person for the rest of their lives. They can't live fully normal lives or have complete peace, ever again. If you don't want to spend 30 years in jail for committing a crime and taking away the potential for your victim to ever have a healthy quality of life ever again, then maybe don't commit the crime in the first place. The fact that people would defend this is sickening.

P.S. I intimately know a rape survivor, and what was done to her genuinely messed her up for life. She can never feel genuine happiness, and she consequently has hurt (emotionally) many loved ones in her life because of it. Rape is no small crime. It destroys lives and has a ripple effect.

It's pretty much already been said, but a (poor) stipend for parents of three or more children misses out on the fact that many people cannot even afford to have the first child, let alone make it to three and finally get some financial help in raising them! That policy sounds like it's purely for show, because it's very clearly not going to do anything to help this situation.

The government has unveiled measures such as removing the income limit for parents to receive child allowances and increasing the benefits for families with multiple children.

What is honestly the point when parents can't even afford to have their first child??

This half-baked scheme for helping with the aging population would be hilarious if it wasn't so painful for those of us living it.

mountainpearToday  01:42 pm JST

Of course, they're crowded. With the low yen nobody can afford to go abroad! You keep trying to put a good spin on it!

This right here. I think the only reason why crowds have surpassed pre-pandemic levels in some places is because 1.) you've got the foreign tourists coming here and taking advantage of the incredibly weak yen, and 2.) you've got the domestic tourists (Japanese) who simply can't afford to leave the country due to said incredibly weak yen. It honestly sucks. I'd like to be able to afford to go home and see my family again some day.

To the multiple people commenting, "Who is this guy?" and assuming he isn't famous...As I commented above, I am a fan of Shinjiro Atae, and I am also a Westerner. He (and the idol group he was a part of, AAA) are actually quite famous, especially in Japan. Maybe the world of J-Pop is just not your scene?

(Also, you'll have surely seen his face around. A lot of drugstores in Japan used to have his face plastered up for skin care products there.)

I'm a long-time fan of Shinjiro Atae, so the news is pretty surprising. Nonetheless, I can fully understand why he's bringing up his sexual orientation, given there has been a lot of talk recently about LGBT+ rights and discrimination in Japan. Maybe he is throwing his own hat in the ring to let people know that even a beloved idol out here is gay, in hopes that it might help with better acceptance for LGBT+ people. I fully support him on this and don't see the harm in him speaking up. You do you, Shinjiro!

What a shame. She had such a beautiful voice. May the poor woman rest in peace and her family find solace.

The 70-year old man is tremendously brave. Good on him for scaring away the cowardly, would-be thief, and may he recover swiftly! Hope they catch the thief soon, as well.

Lol all the dudes in the comments defending the criminal pervert in favor of blaming the victim! The clear hatred of women in these comment sections never ceases to disappoint me.

By the way, to the victim-blamers claiming the victim is “a grown woman” and thus it’s her fault what happened to her, pretty sure the article states she is a “teenage woman”, which means she is either 18 or 19 years old, and effectively the same age as her attacker. The only difference I suppose is that unlike him she is no longer still in high school.

Hope he gets charged to the fullest extent of the law - and that he gets to find out how it feels to be on the other side of this story when he ends up in jail.

Regardless of the fact that care staff are paid far too little for the kind of hard work they do, that surely does not excuse this scum's behavior. There are plenty of other minimum wage jobs that he could have taken on if he found the care industry too difficult. Never an excuse for beating up someone who you are literally being paid to care for, and who usually cannot care for or protect themselves. Work at a convenience store, and stop beating on the elderly!

Every week these stories of people murdering their family here. Every week.

Though this one is extra scummy since he chose to murder his mother on Mother’s Day.

May she Rest In Peace. Life sentence is too good for the murderer.

Wow. Can’t go a day in this country anymore without hearing news about someone attempting (and usually succeeding with) the murder of a family member. And usually the victim is a family member who is weaker than and/or dependent on their assailant. Despicable. I hope the father rests in peace.

Takahashi was fantastic at the 2010 Olympics! And not only did he display incredible talent, but he also looked just so happy to be there. Made him a really endearing performer. Sad to hear he will be retiring, but it's a retirement well-earned after all his accomplishments for his country. Bravo, Takahashi!

This news is actually laughable after the other news that just came out today: "Inflation pain to continue for Japan consumers in new fiscal year"

Wages are for the most part stagnant, while prices of basic necessities are soaring. Tell me, Children's Policies Minister, Masanobu Ogura, how do you expect people to find love, marry, and have children, when they are already struggling just to take care of themselves? When they can't afford the ridiculous increase in the cost of transportation to get to their job, where wages haven't changed in years? How do you expect these people to take on additional mouths to feed, when their current salary isn't even enough to feed their own?

Laughable, is what this measure is. Simply laughable. (And a horror for those who actually do want to be able to have a family some day.)

In its appeal, Tanaka’s defense team argued that he was stressed out, as a single father, from looking after his three children, and worried about raising them.

This is enraging, that this loser thinks this is a valid excuse for murdering children - his own children! How many single parents are out there taking care of their kids without any help? (Especially single mothers, who often get beat up on by society for not having a partner?) All these parents still make-do and try to give their children the best lives they can. This guy didn't even have the decency to do that for his kids. Instead, he just took their lives away, completely. Here's someone who deserves the death sentence. Despicable.

I've lived most of my adult life here now - came here at 19 and never looked back. With that said, the want to leave has, in recent years, crept into the back of my mind. I left my original hometown (which I sorely miss) because of a lack of opportunities. I think that is the very same reason why a part of me thinks, even after living here for a decade and a half, that it might be time to move on from Japan, too. There's a severe lack of opportunities, and not just in the career sphere. It markedly impacts one's quality of life.

As for retirement, assuming I ever have enough saved to do so (unlikely), I've had a dream retirement spot in mind since I was a teenager, and unfortunately it is not here in Japan.

I think it says everything that (reportedly) the version of TikTok approved for children in China is vastly different from the one approved for children in countries like the United States. Chinese TikTok only has educational content for children. American TikTok has...everything else (and not in a good way).

May this man (and any like him) have nothing but pure healing and goodness for the rest of his life. After all he lost, that kind of peace is what he deserves most from now on.

A shocking number indeed, but the fact that elementary school children are included in the total is even more horrifying. May these poor children rest in peace. They didn't even get a chance at life...

About half of those behind the acts were romantic partners, but friends and acquaintances that victims only knew online represented some 20 percent of cases.

Who can you trust with your children anymore?

CaptDingleheimerToday  09:34 am JST

In other news, half the board of directors and 142 section chiefs enjoyed their first days back on the job as janitors. Panasonic building now spotless.

This is the second comment from you that I've read today on here, CaptDingleheimer, and the second time I've been left in stitches because of it. Great wit, hahaha!

girl_in_tokyoToday  07:43 am JST

Betrayed her trust, betrayed her friendship, after knowing her since she was a little girl. Beyond disgusting, beyond shameful. Can you imagine how she must feel, knowing that this man she saw as a grandfather figure all these years, would do this to her? After this kind of experience, trusting any man will be very difficult.

Yes, this is 100% true. Some of us have grandfathers who did this to their own daughters and granddaughters. It's an experience that can never be forgotten. To have that trust taken from you by one of the few people you should be able to trust the absolute most.

I hope this young woman gets justice. And as for the old man, prison is too good for him. To have reached such an age, when you should be living out your last years in peace and wisdom, only to destroy the life of a young person who you knew as a child? Saying what I hope happens to him would probably get me banned, but I will repeat, prison is too good for people like this.

Oh wow, now we have commenters actually defending the idea that because a child has gone through puberty, they are capable of consenting to sex. Are you actually hearing yourselves right now? It doesn't matter how much more "fertile" you think a 13 year old is compared to a 30 year old - that's still a child. The fact that people are actually out here defending this, that we are actually discussing the fertility of children in the context of whether or not adults should be able to have sex with them...

Some people have lost their minds.

It's a shame about the stadium, but the bigger shame is the number of trees that they plan to cut down. Tokyo already has so few green spaces! I wonder if someone has a copy of that heat map that showed how hot it is in Tokyo compared to other cities in Japan that have more trees? Despicable of the government to go ahead with this despite the citizens being against it. (And honestly, which would cost more for taxpayers? Renovating an already-built stadium, or paying to have it all torn down and then have something new and bigger built over it? I expect we'll be paying far more for the latter. An absolute shame.)

Disturbing, the number of people showing displeasure at the possibility of the age being raised to something closer to adulthood. Very disturbing indeed. (Looking specifically at the downvotes to perfectly reasonable comments stating 13 is too young.)

LindsayToday  08:04 am JST

It’s about time Japan! Once again we see Japan being half a century behind the rest of the world. However, this change is only on the table. It still has to be passed by all the old men that grew up with this ridiculous rule.

I completely agree, but half a century? I don't know when the age of consent was changed for other countries, but the one in Japan is from 1907 - unchanged for nearly 120 years already!