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I only skimmed the article but are there hikikomoris who are happy with their life? I'm an introvert who is happily anti-social and wouldn't mind staying home all the time if I could afford it.
So first, economy in Japan sucks, there is not that many jobs and houses to go around. Also problem is not just depression, but shame and lack of alternatives. And hikomori also affects women at large scale. Japan (and any Confucian culture) shames people who do not accept their traditional roles. Men are expected to work until they fall dead. Women are expected to take care of children (while optionally following ca…
Japan (and any Confucian culture) shames people who do not accept their traditional roles. Men are expected to work until they fall dead. Women are expected to take care of children (while optionally following career at the same time). This sort of works in closed system, where people do not really know about any alternatives. You could look at it this way, I suppose, but it falls apart a bit when you consider that J…
Not adoption of new cultural norms, but corruption of existing cultural norms. I would offer parallel in how soviet block was disturbed by western culture. People were not so keen to build communism anymore,since they saw alternatives.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm married into a South Korean family, and from my observation Korean society has less intense version of Japan's social collective mood (IIR it's written as '情' in both countries) It's really difficult to read about this kind of thing and maintain an appropriate feeling of cultural relativism without wanting go "oh Japan" or in my case "oh Korea". There's been many times with my family and friends a seemingly intra…
YMMV, but having seen both the Japanese and Korean sides of the coin, I'd generalize Korea as being more "intense" on all counts: studying even harder, working even longer, endurance being prized even more as a virtue. Although I think both societies are slowly evolving out of this, Japan is just a bit further down the path. But yes, the let's-all-be-individuals-together cliques are still going strong. Japanese Hallo…
They definitely work long hours as well and have ridiculously high suicide rates - higher than Japan's and third highest in the world.
I only skimmed the article but are there hikikomoris who are happy with their life? I'm an introvert who is happily anti-social and wouldn't mind staying home all the time if I could afford it.
For some people, it might be true, though. Regardless of this fact, this is a very unhealthy and unsustainable lifestyle which should be corrected and these people should be helped. I don't see it much different from somebody being addicted to drugs. Sure, they might be happy taking drugs, but that's not going to work well forever. (Obviously this is an exaggerated example)
One reason for this is the primacy of the workplace/school, to the total exclusion of any third place. If you don't have a job or are harassed out of your school, what does one do when not working? Japan does not have great ready-made answers to this question, for many people. (It seems like a silly question, but after six years here, I honestly struggled with it after leaving the day job. Where should one be at 3 PM…
When I graduated from college, I worked my entire time there and was kind of over stressed/exhausted, so I took a sabatic year. I spent I guess 6 months browsing the web, reading about compilers, and watching video lectures, I just spent time with my mom. My dad started questioning me, but both were very supportive.
After about 6 months, I started to gain weight, so I decided to join a Gym. A pal offered me classes on a local university and things started to move on.
I was very depressed, sad, I didn't want to do anything, literally, I just wanted to sleep. At the end, I took about 16 months in rehabilitation, I grew frustrated of literally doing nothing, and started to work again, first at the family company as a hobby, then as general manager, it really helped me that I've been an entrepeneour since my 16's, and well. things just keeps going.
I really where on a different position than all of this persons, but I acknowledge it's very hard to stand on your feet after a break down. Is like you loss the will to live and you start giving a fuck about everything, friends, family, money, everything.
Returning to the sabatic year. the second part of that sabatic year, was one of the happiest moments on my life, I got a Girlfriend (Denisse), I traveled not a lot, but enough, wasted all the money I've saved from the company I had on college (I developed webpages), but I got some great friends, they were awesome people and I laughed and enjoyed life like never before.
Straightforward to the present time. last year suddenly I felt like the loneliest person on earth, I've been working so hard the last 6 years, that again I didn't had friends at all, I wake up, work, gym, bed. In that order, now I'm in my 30's, still single, I buyed a flat, buyed fourniture, but at the end, I still live with my parents, I just can't handle being alone there. and throught I can say I'm quite succesful, being succesful is not actually a requisite to make friends, a requisite to being friends is being happy, and was again stressed but now I was kind of angry with life too.
I changed gym (I used to go to a sports club rather exclusive, where I couldn't meet new people), joined graduate school, actually I'm studying two master degrees right now, one in applied statistics, and another one in business planification. I also joined new groups in order to meet new people. Things are changing now. Now I've friends againg to hang out on weekends. But damn, I have to make assessments every now and then about my life, and take corrective actions because if I just keep going, it seems that the path always takes me to a depressive life, maybe is my personality, maybe I isolate when I take a challenge (as a programmer, I like to program in isolation, so when I become general manager of the family company, I isolated myself until I took the company to profit again). Nevertheless, the only thing I take for sure is: Damn, life is difficult.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm extremely introvert and – as a student, not a neet! – I've lived the past months in a manner similar to that described by the article. I think no shut-in nor introvert gets satisfaction from such behaviour.
I apologize for the--know it all--you are responding to. The one thing that really irritates me about Americans(including myself at one time) is we think we know, or have the the answers to Everything! I can kind of stomach it when it comes to our culture, but it become nauseous when we comment on other, usually better cultures.
You shouldn't generalize people (doing it by race is called racism; doing it by country has no fancy name that I know of but it's wrong all the same), or refer to some cultures as "better" than others.
So first, economy in Japan sucks, there is not that many jobs and houses to go around. Also problem is not just depression, but shame and lack of alternatives. And hikomori also affects women at large scale. Japan (and any Confucian culture) shames people who do not accept their traditional roles. Men are expected to work until they fall dead. Women are expected to take care of children (while optionally following ca…
There are plenty of jobs. In fact, there's a labor shortage. It's just that they're all shitty low-wage part time jobs with no security.
Housing only seems to be a problem in Tokyo. My wife and I have been looking at apartments and there are tons of all sizes that have been open for months. Nothing at all like back home in Sweden where there's a 3 year waiting list even outside of Stockholm.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I apologize for the--know it all--you are responding to. The one thing that really irritates me about Americans(including myself at one time) is we think we know, or have the the answers to Everything! I can kind of stomach it when it comes to our culture, but it become nauseous when we comment on other, usually better cultures.
I downvoted you. You shouldn't generalize people (doing it by race is called racism; doing it by country has no fancy name that I know of but it's wrong all the same), or refer to some cultures as "better" than others.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hikikomori are also well "networked" online and play the game of who is authentic and who is fake. Perhaps it is as popular as it is because it has become an identity.
I have read a fan translation + to-fiction conversion of a japanese manga about a hikki who died saving other people, ended up in a fantasy world and became successful. The sub-culture is definitely going strong and international.
So first, economy in Japan sucks, there is not that many jobs and houses to go around. Also problem is not just depression, but shame and lack of alternatives. And hikomori also affects women at large scale. Japan (and any Confucian culture) shames people who do not accept their traditional roles. Men are expected to work until they fall dead. Women are expected to take care of children (while optionally following ca…
> So first, economy in Japan sucks, there is not that many jobs and houses to go around There are plenty of jobs. In fact, there's a labor shortage. It's just that they're all shitty low-wage part time jobs with no security. Housing only seems to be a problem in Tokyo. My wife and I have been looking at apartments and there are tons of all sizes that have been open for months. Nothing at all like back home in Sweden…
This is their version of the American corporate reported STEM shortage. There's such a high demand and so few qualified employees that IBM has to lay off thousands a year, every year, for decades.
If there's only "real jobs" for maybe 75% of the population, and 5% of the population decides to opt out leaving only 20% wanting real jobs and unable to get them, then its not really a problem other than freaking out westerners.
It sounds brutal because it is, but if you have too many people for your economy, then people opting out and negative birth rates is both a symptom and the only possible (very long term) cure, not the problem itself.