ChaosWyvern comments

@DiscoJ_2

Well, I was only speaking for myself, not everyone. But indeed, it isn't limited to early in the morning or late at night. My point was that, for me, it's a chance to sleep because I don't sleep much at home. I sleep about 3-4 hours at home, get up to get ready for work, then sleep another hour on the way to work. If people have different work schedules they might sleep at other times. I can sleep easily on trains or buses because I'm just used to it, not because it's some kind of national characteristic or something.

I'm Japanese, and sleep on the train regularly. It isn't some sort of skill. It's because I only have a little sleep at night because I need to work late, so falling asleep is easy.

I'm not ashamed of sleeping on the train. It is better to let myself nap there and then I can make myself stay awake at work. I actually enjoy my little naps and feel better afterwards.

I personally find it stupid and pointless, but if people think it's fun then ok, fine. I would never take pride in it just because it's Japanese. That's ridiculous. Rather, the opposite. I feel ashamed if this is the image people have of Japan, just as I feel ashamed of idol culture. I would probably be less grouchy and sensitive if people didn't constantly generalize about all Japanese based on every stupid song or fad that comes along.

Those of you who think silly pop culture seriously reflects how we all think are wrong. I point this out every time, but on every story it's the same "all Japanese are stupid and every one of them thinks like this" sort of rubbish. I would never make such stupid generalizations about other countries based on their silly pop culture either, so do us a favor and at least try to be fair in return.

@Cleo

You're totally right. These aren't people who want to sacrifice themselves for the country. Instead, they're people who get off over making other people sacrifice themselves.

Choosing to die for our beliefs can be heroic. Making other people die for our beliefs is just sick and cowardly.

Rather disturbing. The "Japan" and "Japanese tradition" that these people talk about isn't real. It's just a phantasm created by the 19th-century government to justify imperialism. I'm not surprised that nationalists believe such rubbish about our country, but I am more upset when people who should know better just play along and say "yes, I guess that's our tradition."

@katsu78

Very good comment!

@Mr.Noidall

What you describe isn't a product of Japanese culture "per se," but the myths created by the modern government that told us we were totally unique and had a divine mission in the world AND that we were a modern country that should have exchange and cultural dialog just like all other modern countries. It was a bizarre contradictory message and some kind of "echo" of that is still left today, I feel.

Silly misguided government attempt to use soft power to draw tourism. I agree with the sentiment a lot of comments above express, except for the idea that the whole country thinks this way. Everyone I know, even the people into pop culture, thinks it's just a silly marketing ploy, which is exactly what it is.

@Aly

Totally agree. Seeing people dedicated to something they like and working hard at it is great!

@turbotsat

A lot of cons here have gender division rules that state only men can play male characters and women play female characters. I don't know why since I was never into this hobby....dressing room problems maybe? I know those rules caused problems for some fandoms like Touhou (because 99% of the characters are female, so if you're a male fan you have to crossdress).

The pension system was supposed to be progressive when it was created, decades and decades ago. But it was based on the assumption that the tax-paying population would keep growing at the same rate. It has not been seriously overhauled in years and is now in critical condition. In its current form it is, as Moonraker said, unsustainable. My husband and I (age 32 and 28 years) are not counting on it at all and expect to keep working fully somehow until we die.

One of the worst acts ever. Anything else I have to say at this point will just be more bashing. I think pop music sucks everywhere, being manufactured rubbish, but we're really at the bottom of the barrel here. I can't help but feel ashamed of Jpop as a Japanese person.

ewww supporting "cool Japan" is the ultimate sell-out. That silly government initiative will strangle our culture before it helps it.....

I never wanted to be a housewife. I always wanted to follow my own career, and I have. Fortunately my husband is supportive and we work in the same industry. However, there are not many other women in my office or my field as a whole. I do not really experience discrimination, but I do sometimes get asked why I did not decide to have children and stay home. I think the people asking those questions do not have bad intentions, but no one has ever asked my husband such a thing. I feel like there is still a strong expectation in our society that we are supposed to stay home, have children, and that our careers are not as serious as men's careers.

I agree we need to work harder to be more accepting of foreigners, but I don't think that's the main issue here. Being accepting of foreigners and tolerating illegal immigration are two separate issues.

Like other commentators said, these are illegal immigrants. I know our refugee system is not great but we cannot just allow anyone to circumvent it. It exists for a reason.

That being said, I think we should develop some kind of mechanism to allow people in this situation to correct their status and become legal migrants.

It looks so horribly tacky!

@Kazuaki Shimazaki

The fact that you consider concern over harassment and molestation to be "overblown values" just proves my point about not taking this seriously.

Actually, many types of harassment are already criminalized, just poorly enforced. Your argument that this creates paperwork is not convincing. So does dealing with any crime, so you could use that argument to decriminalize a lot of things. Our priority should be stopping this behavior, not decreasing paperwork.

Secondly, to the victims this is not "overblown," even if you think it is. A lot of people think drug convictions are overblown, for example. Don't assume everyone will think something is overblown just because you don't take it seriously.

Worst of all is your third point, that victims will not want to see the assailant punished. Excuse me? As someone who has been assaulted multiple times, I totally want to see the assailants punished. I know others who feel the same.

Let me make a controversial argument. Butt-patting, which causes no physical damage, is not worth a prison-sentence. And before you say "Oh, think of the woman's feelings", think whether those feelings can remotely be argued to have an objective base. She wasn't penetrated. She wasn't injured. Something just contacted her skin and she placed a ridiculously high value on it.

So you don't think bullying or harassment are a problem either, as long as there's no physical damage, right? Lovely. I can think of all kinds of nasty, truly horrible things to do that don't cause "physical damage."

Honestly, I think we do a bad job in Japan dealing with harassment and molestation. We need to think about these issues more seriously, not downplay them because they don't cause physical harm.

At my workplace there are over 50 people in my department of highly qualified people but most have not spent time living abroad extensively. I would think that they represent the Japanese very well.

Just because they haven't lived abroad they know nothing and have no opinions? And if they know nothing how are they "highly-qualified"? My own highly-qualified workplace is full of opinionated people, and most of them haven't lived abroad.

While I admire your ideal view of Japan and your desire to see the best in people, the Japanese kokoro does not need enlightenment, we are quite content with what the masukomi feeds us. You have been in Japan for a long time and forgive me for jumping to conclusions but my ishindenshin tells me that perhaps deep down you agree with at least part of what I say.

What rubbish. And why do you keep writing decent English while throwing in random Japanese words that have perfectly logical translations?

In any case, you are wrong. There is a lot of discontent with the mass media and politics. The problem is there is also a lot of apathy and people think the system is too rotten to be fixed. How can you claim to speak for us when you obviously don't even check out japanese forums?

Thanks, Stranger :)

We never watched in in my family when I was young, maybe because we had developed our own new year traditions living overseas. I honestly don't know if my parents like it or not. My husband's parents used to watch it but not any more. They don't like the current pop acts. If it is just me and my husband at new year we don't watch it either (he doesn't care either way, and he knows I hate pop music).

It certainly isn't as popular as it was a long time ago, but there are still a lot of people in my office who say they will watch it with their parents. The family bonding part is more important than the content of the show, I think.

@nedinjapan

It doesn't sound like sleeping together or separately was the problem. More like your ex-wife had some serious mental issues!

I get that she might have been in shock, but for 30 minutes? 30 MINUTES? And she had the ability to record it but not the ability to just kick him in the face?

I'm really suspicious. Sounds like this was arranged and the naughty boy didn't want to pay his bill for the service....

I must admit, I have not seen an Abe mask.

I will confess, I don't go to these kind of parties where people wear masks, so I do not know if Abe masks are popular there. I do often see protesters near my work wearing Abe masks, though.

I am a bit uncomfortable with the idea that some people are able to be targeted with masks and others are not though. If there is a disrespectful element to making a mask of anyone then perhaps it should be so for all. Conversely, any public figure should be fair game. I tend to favour the latter. And I'd buy an Emperor mask.

hmm, you made an interesting point. I suppose a lot of us think laughing at a politician and laughing at the emperor are very different, so this might be something hypocritical about our society.

@Aly

Thank you for your kind and thoughtful response. I appreciate that.

Cleo has it totally right. That's how my husband and I do things (though we do discuss work a bit, but we're in the same industry and support each other).

We do know some couples that sleep separately but it's not the standard people seem to think. I've always slept with my husband. My parents sleep together. So do my husband's.

My husband and I both work late. We enjoy our late evenings together, catching up on things and solving any problems so we can sleep comfortably. I feel empty and can't sleep well by myself, and he says he feels the same. So what works best clearly depends on the couple!

I'm not too upset over this. At first I thought TPP was a good idea, but the more I learned about it the more worried I became. I think it could be a disaster for small businesses in Japan and discourage innovation except for massive multinationals. So if it ends up dying it might be better in the long-term.

Do they do masks of Japanese politicians?

Yep, there's always Abe masks around. I don't understand the appeal of masks, really. I can make a huge idiot out of myself without needing a mask...

Or how about the royal family? Or would that be too disrespectful?

That would be considered disrespectful. Also, it's kind of pointless since the only thing most of us know about the royals is that they exist. Not a lot to work with for comedy, unlike politicians with their outbursts and so on.

I was responding to your aggressive responce to my first comment. What happened to you is unforgivable, but that does not excuse the lax attitude Japan has toward bullying. I was bullied terribly at school. It was the reason that got me interested into martial arts which in turn got me to move to japan. But even though I was bullied, and others were as well, our teachers even back then took it VERY seriously. Of course some slip through the cracks, but by and large, bullying was taken seriously. Its the attitude of the system that is wrong.

I'm sorry if I came across as aggressive and not just a bit sarcastic. I like reading what people here have to say but so many posts here are always "Japan is the worst, Japanese are no good" and it just drives me crazy. I thought your implication that Japanese never take responsibility for anything was insulting. I take responsibility very seriously.

I'm sorry to hear you were bullied too. I'm glad your teachers took it seriously though mine did not. Are you sure your school was not just a fortunate case? I was mainly bullied due to racism although at my schools white British kids got bullied as well for other reasons so it wasn't always a race issue.

Did your parents report your bullying to the school? and if so, was nothing done about it?

Yes, I missed school due to injuries. The headmaster talked to (some) of the students responsible. Not effective, naturally. This was the school that totally ignored bullying issues. The first school I was at was a little different because teachers would yell at people for causing disruption (no matter if they were bullies or bullied) so there was less open or physical bullying around the school.

seriously more needs to be done to keep elderly drivers off the street , should be compulsory driving , eye test after a certain age, dont pass cant drive

I like this idea. Just banning elderly drivers seems unfair when some of them have no problems driving well. Some kind of extensive regular test could be used.

I understand that they're angry, but what are they trying to accomplish by doing this? What is the point of just breaking things and screaming? There are more productive ways to express themselves.

I don't know what schools YOU went to but when I was there we certainly took things seriously.

Right, so because it was fine for you it had to be fine for everyone, right? I was in the regular school system during the 1990s. Only asian kid in my class. The teachers either ignored it or laughed it off.

I'm not downplaying that bullying is a problem in Japan. I was bullied back here too, because of where I was born and my English. It was upsetting but much less physical/violent than what happened to me in the UK. More like people wearing me down by reminding me 1000 times a day that I didn't "belong" here.

Can the Japanese understand the phoniness of a presidential Trump?

Yes. We're used to politicians who make big empty promises.