Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

tofugu.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 133 posts

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#31

Post by bluepizza »

userbinator wrote: post #20
rowanG077 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They get a notification if they have chosen to receive notifications. It's not like the sender forces themselves upon someone else.

I think this and the other comments here show an important cultural difference: Western culture places more emphasis on personal responsibility: if you don't want to be disturbed, the expectation is that you turn off notifications. Japanese culture seems to be the opposite, in that you expect others to know you do not want to be disturbed, and thus you don't bother with turning off notifications.

Western culture is not an unified blob, as it encompasses wildly different languages, customs, and peoples, ranging from Sweden to Mexico.

And just the same, Japanese people are not one unified blob and each have their own preferences regarding texting, just like the rest of us.

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#32

Post by spywaregorilla »

FooBarWidget wrote: post #13

> In Western culture, if someone suddenly and unexpectedly confessed this to you so quickly you would start running, I think. As a Chinese I can't wrap my head around the concept of running away because someone loves you. So to enter a relationship with someone you have to not love them while still loving them...?! Do western people all have fear of commitment? I'm just glad I'm married now (to a Chinese girl) and no…

If you actually have a relationship it wouldn't be surprising. Although it would be surprising to develop such a relationship without formally starting it earlier.

The implication is that someone telling you they love you out of the blue implies they very likely do not know you well enough to justify such a sentiment.

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#33

Post by eredengrin »

jtriangle wrote: post #8
SoftTalker wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I think it's inconsiderate to text people when they are likely sleeping. If you have kids/family you typically don't silence your phone at night in case there's an emergency. So if I get a text at 03:00 I'm likely to wake up and look at it. You're the one sending the message, so you're the one who should wait to do it when it it will be convenient for the recipient. If you're texting me in the middle of sleeping…

'Do not disturb' settings have been granular enough for awhile now, such that this is no longer a problem unless you want it to be.

I think you're probably overestimating how much most people know or care to worry about setting custom do not disturb settings, although that's just my anecdotal guess based on interactions with friends outside the tech space. Also, I'd consider myself pretty on top of tech (enough to run cyanogenmod/lineageos/grapheneos) and have a custom DnD schedule, but I had no idea setting it per contact was an option until you hinted that it might be. I've been wanting that for a while so thanks for letting me know, but also I'd imagine most people are very unaware of that option still.

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#34

Post by 331c8c71 »

PartiallyTyped wrote: post #24
linguae wrote: post #3

As an American who spends a lot of time traveling to Japan and who had experience living there (and who has dreams of moving back there once I pay off my student loans), I’ve done this type of confession twice; it’s quite different from the ambiguity that often occurs with forming relationships in America where people don’t know exactly where they stand. While it doesn’t remove all ambiguity (does she like me? Why is…

The same perspective exists in multiple places in Europe as far as I can tell. It certainly does where I come from.

Surprising for me. Can you maybe share some links?

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#35

Post by aidenn0 »

userbinator wrote: post #20
rowanG077 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They get a notification if they have chosen to receive notifications. It's not like the sender forces themselves upon someone else.

I think this and the other comments here show an important cultural difference: Western culture places more emphasis on personal responsibility: if you don't want to be disturbed, the expectation is that you turn off notifications. Japanese culture seems to be the opposite, in that you expect others to know you do not want to be disturbed, and thus you don't bother with turning off notifications.

My wife is incredibly western and low-context. She still gets pissed off when friends and/or family in different timezones wake her up in the middle of the night with text messages.

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#37

Post by aidenn0 »

rowanG077 wrote: post #12
coldtea wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not the point of the article, but this is a personal bugbear of mine - no it wasn't. Text-based communication is asynchronous. That's irrelevant. They still get a notification to disturb them, they still can see it when looking at their phone, they can still be concerned about the content and how to respond later even if they don't answer, they can still be concerned about the content even if they don't read it, th…

They get a notification if they have chosen to receive notifications. It's not like the sender forces themselves upon someone else.

They get a notification if they haven't actively opted out of notifications. I think there is an important distinction between "not opting out" and "choosing to"

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#38

Post by nextworddev »

geraldwhen wrote: post #17
FooBarWidget wrote: post #13

> In Western culture, if someone suddenly and unexpectedly confessed this to you so quickly you would start running, I think. As a Chinese I can't wrap my head around the concept of running away because someone loves you. So to enter a relationship with someone you have to not love them while still loving them...?! Do western people all have fear of commitment? I'm just glad I'm married now (to a Chinese girl) and no…

Yes, many westerners, at least in America, fear commitment. There is a doomed generation that believes they will find their soulmate in their mid 30s and start a family in their mid 40s, despite this being a biological delusion.

Try explaining much lower birth rates in China then

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#39

Post by 331c8c71 »

FooBarWidget wrote: post #13

> In Western culture, if someone suddenly and unexpectedly confessed this to you so quickly you would start running, I think. As a Chinese I can't wrap my head around the concept of running away because someone loves you. So to enter a relationship with someone you have to not love them while still loving them...?! Do western people all have fear of commitment? I'm just glad I'm married now (to a Chinese girl) and no…

> So to enter a relationship with someone you have to not love them while still loving them...?

It's weird and even offending to hear "I love you" (said seriously) from a person who doesn't know you well.

My take is that you can say you are _in_ love and this may sound fine if delivered right. Still, better be sure that there is at least some mutual sympathy. Also highly language-specific I guess.

EDIT: I personally find the non-verbal communication preceding the relationships much more fascinating.

I am also curious if there are cultures with a polite probing mechanism which are not humiliating for both parties regardless of the outcome (reciprocity or the lack of such).

Re: Kokuhaku: Japan’s Love Confessing Culture (2013)

#40

Post by bee_rider »

kbenson wrote: post #29
cj wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whenever I use delayed send at work, it’s for optics. If I’m working outside of business hours (a few instances per week) I don’t like to slack my direct reports because I personally don’t want to create an “always on” culture at our company. If your manager messages you at all hours of the day and on weekends, it can become unclear whether the same is expected of you. So, I like to delay messages to 8am the next mor…

Yes, where there's a large power imbalance, you have to take that into consideration. I manage people, and if I message one in their off time and it's not an emergency or something I really need them to answer if they see, I'll be careful to state clearly that no reply is needed or we can follow up on Monday or whenever they are next on. Its the same reason I don't make jokes deprecating them to them within a group (…

I think it doesn’t even need to be a large power imbalance. It is probably best for the longest-serving worker (aka, someone with only social seniority) to set a good example by making sure routine communications only show up during the work week.
Post reply on HN