Yes, and the irony is, that is what destroyed Japanese culture.
The only part they got right was getting rid of the items that don't serve you.
The part they got wrong was enforcing the behaviors that don't serve you. No true man (yes yes, no true scotsman argument, I'm aware of the fallacy, just stick with me on this) is served by being a "herbivore" or whatever term Japan uses for their men.
If you look at productivity and creativity rates among men, men that spend significant time on self improvement (eating right, including meat; exercising, including cardio and weight training; meditation and focusing on the now (instead of the irrelevant bullshit the Universe throws at us on a constant basis)) tend to perform much better at any given task.
Japanese men are typically critically devoid of ego, in the sense that they have no personal value, and often commit suicide once they realize they have no value and no one would miss them.
Too many Japanese men go to work every day, and celebrate working themselves to death, as if this is a worthy goal. If you go to work every day, you are living your life wrong. Every day, you should be focused on things that work for you, not against you.
If you have to drag yourself to work every day, you are working at the wrong job. Japan has made doing this a core principal of their culture, and its killing them, and may actually be one of the driving components behind the lost decade.
The reason fertility rates are collapsing, and lots of Japanese women aren't even having sex at all, let alone dating or marrying, is because herbivore men are not sexy. They just aren't. They want big strong men to lead in the bedroom (I'm not even being sexist, there has been studies in Japan about this), and Herbivore men are the exact opposite of that.
Genetically, women are predisposed to want to mate with what we, of the western world, have generally called "manly men": beards, muscles, a certain musky scent, a certain way of unapologetically taking what they want, all signs of health and sexual maturity in ancient man. Japanese men show none of these traits, and are androgenous as fuck.
I'm not saying half the shit the Silicon Valley culture is doing is any better, but it isn't nearly as toxic as what Japan does sometimes.
Don't want the US to turn out like Japan? Go put yourself first, take care of yourself, and enjoy every minute of your life. Do what you find important in life, don't work at a job just because bills need to be paid.
