purple_depressed_bacon comments

Such a diverse group...and in outdated penguin suits too. It's not flattering, the lack of diversity or the outdated penguin suits.

Isn't Japan popular for its seasonal and limited edition products ? It's kind of their thing.

The utter irony of this considering how it's part of Japan's company culture to drink yourself into stupor after work with your colleagues whether you want to or not.

Different face; same policies and mentality. Nothing'll change.

... picked Junko Mihara to take charge of children's policies and Toshiko Abe to oversee education.

Tell the people to conform to gender norms without telling to conform to gender norms. If my eyes rolled any harder, they'd fall out of their sockets.

Alright, this isn't funny anymore. Dame Maggie Smith and now Kris Kristofferson? The universe is having a right laugh. Another legend lost. His music was a staple in my house as a child. RIP and condolences to his family.

I'm utterly devastated by the news. We lost an absolute legend. Been watching her on telly for as long as I can remember. Condolences to the family and RIP to Dame Maggie Smith. Thank you for all the decades of brilliant entertainment.

Not a film but Taskmaster goes down a real treat when I've got the blues. What do you get when you put a group of comedians together and assign them increasingly mad and absurd tasks to complete? Hilarity. Pure, chaotic hilarity.

Perhaps if they, oh I don't know, installed some of these nifty things called rubbish bins around the area...

I recently jumped back onto Disney+ mainly to watch Only Murders in the Building but there's actually some great stuff on Star including a nice selection of 90s flicks. I also have Netflix for the vast array of TV shows they keep churning out. I guess it depends on what people like to watch..

...but conservatives have argued that separate surnames may affect family unity.

This excuse is actually laughable. You know what affects family unity? Having to work late hours and at weekends so that you have no time to go home or stay home with your family. Having kids' lives be utterly consumed by school and club activities and cram school Mondays to Sundays so that they have no time to spend with family. Try again, conservatives.

What's with the cop's ridiculous stance?

Very Gandalf meets bouncer on a power trip. YOU SHALL NOT PASS!

Peoples heads are going to roll for this drug mixup.

If the multiverse exists, not any one of the alternate Japans would implement this successfully. You'd sooner see pigs fly and unicorns prance down the streets.

"Spray"? Did he carry around a spray bottle of his bodily fluids? Or is this a translation error and they meant to say "ejaculate"? Either way, what an a sick and abhorrent individual. His defence of "I don't recall anything" when he sexually assaulted the victim for 7 minutes surely won't pass muster. Lock this PoS up.

All I want to know is if he's been given the sack. Apologies are useless. Actually do something about it, like removing this piece of scum from the police force.

1 month old baby at home,

while the mother works, and the father is home?

Babies need their mothers at that age, for feeding, bonding,

and to establish a schedule.

I’m thinking this guy knew nothing about caring for a baby, and when it cried, as babies do, he had nothing to give it but anger and abuse.

I suppose the idea of a stay-at-home dad is a foreign concept for you. Fathers also need to bond with their babies and should be perfectly capable of doing all the things you mentioned for a newborn if the mother decides to head back to work - feeding, bonding, establishing a schedule, along with changing, bathing, and soothing them. Until we as a society stop perpetuating the notion that women are and should be the sole caregivers for children, incidents like this will continue to occur.

My folks believed in the "spare the rod; spoil the child" philosophy. Back then, corporal punishment was still doled out at some of the schools I went to, so being physically punished seemed normal to me. I was also grounded and sent to bed without supper. I know now that there are better, more efficient, and less traumatising ways of instilling discipline but times were different back then. I would also argue that the way many kids are disciplined now is inefficient and ineffective; so many parents are just letting their kids run amok without a consequence in sight. It's highly worrying.

According to the Kawaguchi City child welfare center, Kono's household was registered as one requiring monitoring, as there had been reported fighting between Kono and his wife.  

Another case where the system failed a child. Instead of proactively removing the child from a harmful environment, they chose to wait until it was too late. Now a child is dead while scum like this man still pull air into his lungs. At the very least, lock him up and throw away the key.

Considering the haphazard way people cycle in Japan, I'm unsure if allowing the local populace access to e-scooters is in anybody's interest...

Phone numbers in those capsule balls. I was unsure if they were legit phone numbers but it was very peculiar.

Looks like a scene straight out of a horror movie. The Taliban are so petrified of their womenfolk that they've resorted to masking mannequins.

Girl wears glasses = she's ugly, invisible, gets bullied. Girl takes off glasses and suddenly OMG she's the most beautiful dame I ever did see! Ridiculous.

When a character happens to overhear a conversation at a highly specific point that leads them to misinterpret what they've heard, which then results in miscommunication, misunderstandings, and unnecessary drama. Really gets my goat, this one.

Slim pickings. They all look like clones of each other. Is this really the best they can do?

Security is going to be mad tight at the concerts and people attending have already been warned about the heightened restrictions on bags and its contents. I understand why they set these restrictions but it's going to cause delays as people to queue to get into the stadium because inevitably, someone's bag / contents isn't going to pass muster.

What sad news to wake up to. Gena Rowlands was such a versatile, brilliant actor. 94 though - she lived a good, long life that was hopefully fulfilling and full of joy and adventures. RIP and condolences to the family.

They should have stopped at Toy Story 3. Toy Story 4 was a mess.

Another Incredibles is somewhat intriguing. I'd like to see how and if Jack-Jack's powers further develop.

The incident came to light after Ishikawa was suspected of being involved in a voyeurism case in June. 

And he wasn't immediately suspended pending a full investigation because...???

Japan's continued lax attitude towards sexual predators and sex crimes is both disturbing and confounding. When are they going to admit that a good chunk of their society have a serious issue in this area and do something about it?

So each foreign student takes up valuable teacher time and school resources meaning Japanese kids lose out.

Such programs and services should be part and parcel of schools. Do they expect all non-local students to go to international schools? What about returnees who've spent time abroad and need to brush up on their Japanese? These programs should always be available and those who need it should have access to it.

Yet, Japan has the best education system in the world.

Surely you josh. Japan's education system is far from the best; it's not horrendous, but it's not the best. That superlative goes to Scandinavia.

This could have been an honest mistake on the guests' part because to my knowledge, I scarcely know of any hotel or accommodation that isn't pre-paid upon booking, automatically debited on or near your check-in date, or paid upon check-in. I myself can't remember the last time I paid upon check-in or check-out; everything is usually prepaid.

The inn should also admit to their own fault in the matter because they failed to follow proper procedure when checking in guests - getting a form of ID, checking the card used to book / pay for the booking, and informing the guests about check out procedures etc. The "woe is me" attitude isn't doing them any favours, and I feel as though they're hamming it up somewhat because the guests were non-locals.