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Why I left Japan after 10 years

blog.uchujin.co.uk

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Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#251

Post by CalRobert »

kire456 wrote: post #200
fleitz wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the number of times I've been yelled at by cyclists for getting into accidents caused by breaking the law is rediculous. Hey fuck heads I could give a shit if I kill you when you run a red. If you don't want to be killed don't run red lights, I don't do it and I have a 4x4. Also if I'm in the right lane with my turn signal on it means I'm turning right, don't try to pass me in the slow lane fuck wit.

Just curious - where I live, traffic going straight has priority over traffic turning or leaving the road in some way. So if the bike lane is to the right of the car lanes, the cars have to yield to bikes if turning right (in fact, they have to yield to pedestrians that cross the side road as well). Is this different in the US? (Am I assuming a bike lane that isn't actually there?)

That's generally true, but as noted by GP you'll get run over anyway.

Also, bike lanes are rare in most of the US, and at least in California (which is where I got my license), if you're driving a car and turning right, you can enter the bike lane for the last couple hundred feet. In theory, that prevents right hooks, but it doesn't seem to help much in practice. The other issue is that you can turn right on a red light, so the driver is often looking only to the left for approaching traffic, turns right as soon as they see a gap, and runs over the cyclist or pedestrian who happened to be to their right.

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#252

Post by muninn_ »

Mithaldu wrote: post #246
muninn_ wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently you misunderstood. I didn't write tattoos are "literally the same thing as being gay". I showed the same faulty reasoning used in that's line of argument about tattoos. Or unless you did understand and you're just being intellectually dishonest. I'm not sure which one it is. I assume just a misunderstanding of what was written.

Next time try to use an analogy that doesn't need explanations to clarify why it isn't entirely broken. For example cut off fingers would've been a useful one, particularly in this context.

It doesn't need an explanation since it's a pretty simple swap.

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#253

Post by fenomas »

muninn_ wrote: post #224
bojo wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Japan has a country wide stigma against people who wear tattoos due to it being a primary feature of Yakuza (Japanese Mafia), typically due to a history of them bringing their bad reputation into respectable establishments. Public bath houses and hot springs actively ask people with tattoos to leave because of this. While the younger generation have been getting themselves tattooed more these days, it's still pretty…

> Japan has a country wide stigma against people who wear tattoos due to Reasons I don't care about. Doesn't matter. Deal with different cultures. > This is exactly the mentality being discussed in this thread that is so abhorrent. You don't see Japanese people strolling into an American house and telling everyone they should take their shoes off before entering. Why should their society turn a blind eye to foreigner…

It might help to understand that, broadly speaking, businesses in Japan that forbid tattoos are usually fine if the person covers up the tattoo with clothing or a sticker, etc. In fact stickers for this purpose are in shops - a friend told me a public bath once even provided her with one when she forgot.

So, while I don't agree with it, it's not exactly the human rights crisis you're envisioning. Also, it sounds like you're holding very strong opinions about something you don't know any details of, which is generally a bad idea.

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#254

Post by yorwba »

markburns wrote: post #236
yorwba wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, I only copied the text from my parent comment, without checking that it actually matches the original. My point about the grammar stands, though. I think they simply wrote Chinese text using Japanese kanji. Simplified Chinese would be "(谢绝)(中国人)" = "(politely refuse)(Chinese person)" = "(verb)(object)", which is correct Chinese grammar. However, 謝絶 seems to be a noun/suru verb in Japanese ( http://jisho.org/se…

I am not doubting you. I was saying something simpler: One Chinese-only character is enough to show it is not Japanese.

The original text didn't use the Chinese-only character, it used Japanese kanji instead.

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#255

Post by muninn_ »

fenomas wrote: post #253
muninn_ wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Japan has a country wide stigma against people who wear tattoos due to Reasons I don't care about. Doesn't matter. Deal with different cultures. > This is exactly the mentality being discussed in this thread that is so abhorrent. You don't see Japanese people strolling into an American house and telling everyone they should take their shoes off before entering. Why should their society turn a blind eye to foreigner…

It might help to understand that, broadly speaking, businesses in Japan that forbid tattoos are usually fine if the person covers up the tattoo with clothing or a sticker, etc. In fact stickers for this purpose are in shops - a friend told me a public bath once even provided her with one when she forgot. So, while I don't agree with it, it's not exactly the human rights crisis you're envisioning. Also, it sounds like…

> It might help to understand that, broadly speaking, businesses in Japan that forbid tattoos are usually fine if the person covers up the tattoo with clothing or a sticker, etc. In fact stickers for this purpose are in shops - a friend told me a public bath once even provided her with one when she forgot.

But this isn't ok. That's the point.

> So, while I don't agree with it, it's not exactly the human rights crisis you're envisioning.

??? I think that Japanese should be accepting of other people and cultures. It happens to be that we're talking about tattoos, but it could easily be something else.

> Also, it sounds like you're holding very strong opinions about something you don't know any details of, which is generally a bad idea.

False.

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#256

Post by fenomas »

muninn_ wrote: post #255
fenomas wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might help to understand that, broadly speaking, businesses in Japan that forbid tattoos are usually fine if the person covers up the tattoo with clothing or a sticker, etc. In fact stickers for this purpose are in shops - a friend told me a public bath once even provided her with one when she forgot. So, while I don't agree with it, it's not exactly the human rights crisis you're envisioning. Also, it sounds like…

> It might help to understand that, broadly speaking, businesses in Japan that forbid tattoos are usually fine if the person covers up the tattoo with clothing or a sticker, etc. In fact stickers for this purpose are in shops - a friend told me a public bath once even provided her with one when she forgot. But this isn't ok. That's the point. > So, while I don't agree with it, it's not exactly the human rights crisis…

> I think that Japanese should be accepting of other people and cultures.

Asking A to respect B's culture of not covering up tattoos in the onsen is not materially different from asking B to respect A's culture of covering up tattoos in the onsen.

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#257

Post by markburns »

yorwba wrote: post #254
markburns wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not doubting you. I was saying something simpler: One Chinese-only character is enough to show it is not Japanese.

The original text didn't use the Chinese-only character, it used Japanese kanji instead.

Ah, sorry, I didn't notice. That makes sense then.

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#258

Post by Veratyr »

muninn_ wrote: post #233
bojo wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If a Japanese person owns a house in the U.S. and asks me to take off my shoes, maybe I should ignore that since my culture in my country doesn't do that? No, I'm not an asshole and I respect their culture, even if they want to practice it in my country. But you won't respect their culture in their own country? Double standards indeed. Wearing your tattoo proudly in Japan is perfectly fine. Just be prepared to be a…

> But you won't respect their culture in their own country? Double standards indeed. Double standards not indeed. I respect both cultures, unless of course they are bigoted or racist. The difference here is in America you can wear tattoos, a headscarf, or even not take your shoes off when you enter a home, or take them off, we are cool with both - which was my point. > Wearing your tattoo proudly in Japan is perfectl…

> The difference here is in America you can wear tattoos, a headscarf, or even not take your shoes off when you enter a home, or take them off, we are cool with both - which was my point.

This depends heavily on the house you're entering. Some people, even born and bred Americans, prefer you take your shoes off.

And it's important to note the reason you take your shoes off in Japan: Because they've been outside and are dirty and they don't want dirt on the floors.

You'd take your shoes off before entering someone's house if they were covered in mud right? Same thing, different threshold.

> It's the exact same nonsense.

Being gay is an inherent part of who somebody is and being gay doesn't passively affect the people around you.

Tattoos are the result of choices someone has made in the past and in Japan, as mentioned above, that generally means Yakuza.

Would you think it unreasonable if a family restaurant asked the Hells Angels to leave?

> Japan (and anybody else for that matter) needs to respect people and other cultures like we do in the West.

Would you accept it if someone from a Middle Eastern country came to the US with their multiple wives and you could hear the beatings at night? Of course not. Western countries have a threshold for what they'll tolerate from other cultures and so does Japan. We in the West also expect other people to at least try to fit in to our culture and I don't think it's unreasonable that Japan does the same.

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#259

Post by muninn_ »

fenomas wrote: post #256
muninn_ wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It might help to understand that, broadly speaking, businesses in Japan that forbid tattoos are usually fine if the person covers up the tattoo with clothing or a sticker, etc. In fact stickers for this purpose are in shops - a friend told me a public bath once even provided her with one when she forgot. But this isn't ok. That's the point. > So, while I don't agree with it, it's not exactly the human rights crisis…

> I think that Japanese should be accepting of other people and cultures. Asking A to respect B's culture of not covering up tattoos in the onsen is not materially different from asking B to respect A's culture of covering up tattoos in the onsen.

Sure so why do we have a double standard in the West?

Re: Why I left Japan after 10 years

#260

Post by Veratyr »

Grue3 wrote: post #168
d1ffuz0r wrote: post #3

Come to Russia instead, it's the best to be for a foreigner

Lol. Literally every single one of his complaints is even worse in Russia. Hating foreigners? They teach us that from kindergarten. Police doesn't like you? You're screwed completely. And god help you if your skin is even slightly darker than white (or if you happen to be gay).

It might be because I married a Russian but when I visited, Russians were nothing but welcoming, even strangers unknown both to my wife and me.
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