This is not a perfect truth. Friend reports that her family have seen (directly or indirectly, I don't know) both theft and rape. Nonetheless, the extent is probably much less than any other place of crisis.
Why no looting in Japan?
51–60 of 191 posts
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
This actually happened. When we were living in Tokyo my wife lost her wallet. A day later she found that it was sitting in the basket of her bicycle outside our building. This was a busy street in a business district (Nihonbashi) with hundreds of people going past it and it was a large new coach wallet with at least a few hundred in cash. Not that someone wouldn't have eventually stolen it though.
>Not that someone wouldn't have eventually stolen it though. Japan is only nearly Utopian. Let's be careful with the orientalism. The suicide rate[1][2] is one thing that personally bothers me. Japan is fundamentally different from the West, and this has its advantages and disadvantages. [1]: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/List_of_count... [2]: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/List_of_OE…
I deleted that line, so we don't have to have the world's most boring discussion on HN.
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
So have the people of England, what's your point?
No, they have not. Roman Briton was a different society than pre-Roman Briton. The Anglo-Saxons came about 1500 years ago and nearly completely replaced the Britons, genetically and culturally. The Norman invasion was about 950 years ago and greatly changed Anglo-Saxon culture, although not as much as the AS changed post-Roman Briton. There were several other invaders (Danes, etc.) as well. By contrast, the Japanese…
The Anglo-Saxons came about 1500 years ago and nearly completely replaced the Britons, genetically and culturally
Replaced in that region, but the Celtic peoples were driven West and North (Wales, Cornwall, and Northumbria).
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#54I can't find the link right now but I'm prety sure I saw a news report yesterday about some looting happening. In any case, I see absolutely nothing wrong with looting in an emergency situation where there is no access to food and water.
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#55Aside from the strong cultural values and homogeneity of that culture, I would think socioeconomic factors must have a major impact. I don't know how the statistics stack up in Japan, but looting is generally an activity of the poor and disenfranchised. Anyone have data pertinent to this?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/22/world/asia/22poverty.html
The poverty rate in Japan isn't that much lower than the US (15.7% vs. 17.1% according to the article). However, people below that line in Japan are somewhat unwilling to admit being in poverty.
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#56http://partialobjects.com/2011/03/is-looting-our-default-rea...
when you feel like you’re on your own, when you feel abandoned and the only one who you can depend on is you, then yes, you’re going to do what you have to do to survive. This has been seen around the world in many countries and cultures. The big difference in postwar modern Japan is that people are confident that help is on the way.
...
Here’s where you see a glaring cultural difference: virtually nobody in contemporary Japan has this kind of contempt for their fellow countrymen. Yet prewar Japan was deeply divided along class lines, and when disaster happened and the poor starved and burned, neither the government nor the upper classes could be bothered to give a shit. Currently in Japan there are calls for the government to scrap proposed tax cuts and use the money for relief efforts. Can you imagine the same happening in the US?
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#57Many other people on this thread have compiled lists of "western" tragedies that did not come to looting, so I think calling it a cultural thing is out.
I think the difference is that when people believe the world is watching and that help is coming (ie September 11th, this earthquake) they maintain their composure. People destroy and loot when they feel that the world has forgotten them and that help is not coming. During Hurricane Katrina the government was quite slow to respond. In Haiti it took nearly two days to reach twitter/the public and trigger international relief. Almost nobody was there to hold them over until then, and chaos happened. I think this is quite rational: if you felt the world had ended and that it was not going to be made better, you'd probably act like an animal and only think of yourself too.
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#58This was the first thing I thought about when it all kicked off. I watched a video on one of the news reports and when the earthquake hit, staff in the stores instead of hiding tried steadying shelves to stop things falling off. We honestly have a long way to go.
Japan also gets more earthquakes than most places that you're probably used to. Even though this one was larger, it seems that to the Japanese, dealing with earthquakes is rote.
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#59I am surprised nobody mentioned this yet: Japan has a much MUCH lower level of income (and wealth) inequality than the US, Haiti, etc. [1]
There are just a lot fewer poor people in Japan. So if your house got leveled by the tsunami, you can go to your friends, relatives, family, etc for a little help because they aren't half impoverished already.
I don't mean to demean the theory regarding social differences. I'm sure it's very true that society's standards and everyone's individual respect for shared property play crucial roles in the lack of looting. But I'm willing to bet that economic factors made a difference too.
[1] https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/...
Re: Why no looting in Japan?
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, they have not. Roman Briton was a different society than pre-Roman Briton. The Anglo-Saxons came about 1500 years ago and nearly completely replaced the Britons, genetically and culturally. The Norman invasion was about 950 years ago and greatly changed Anglo-Saxon culture, although not as much as the AS changed post-Roman Briton. There were several other invaders (Danes, etc.) as well. By contrast, the Japanese…
The Anglo-Saxons came about 1500 years ago and nearly completely replaced the Britons, genetically and culturally Replaced in that region, but the Celtic peoples were driven West and North (Wales, Cornwall, and Northumbria).
Yes, that is true, and I should have mentioned Northumbria especially because that was a wonderful culture, but their numbers were still greatly reduced. Cornish culture is now completely wiped out.
Edit: Cornishness wiped out as far as continuity. I respect the "revival movement" but the re-rooting process will take awhile even if most of the people there support it.