General Japanese Culture Thread

More like "want to have".

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I mean, it's not like the viewer of the average shoujo romance thinks they "ought" to have that rich, charming guy who has only eyes for her. At least I wouldn't call it that way.

edited 23rd Jul '14 2:19:02 PM by Uchuujinsan

I read an article not long about about interracial dating in Japan. Basically, the article stated that while Japanese women flock to Western guys (especially White men), Japanese men tend to be rather hesitant to date Western women. The reasons for this seem to be related to both patriarchal values as well as Japanese Politeness.

In short, Japanese men find Western women daunting. Japanese women have cultural conditioning to maintain the Moe, cutsey-pie, passive-aggressive aesthetic. Western women tend not to have that same conditioning unless they were raised Japanese. This tends to be very much a turn-off, even if foreign women are considered a niche fetish (kind of like how many Americans are Asia-phile Race Fetishists but still greatly dislike Japanese porn because the women always seem to be in pain or being raped).

Japanese women, on the other hand, like foreign men largely because movies have convinced them that we're shining romantic knights. Public Displays of Affection are a severe taboo in Japan, to the point that couples tend not to hold even hold hands in public. It's also taboo in Japan to say "I love you" or to materialize terms of affection (something about it "cheapening" those feelings with words or something). Westerners, however, are encouraged to get all lovey-dovey and touch and caress and kiss their woman in public. Western men tend to either not know about the taboo or not give a crap, and some Japanese women find that to be extremely romantic.

edited 23rd Jul '14 2:29:24 PM by KingZeal

Ur-Example of Tsun Dere?

edited 23rd Jul '14 3:13:05 PM by TheHandle

Incidentally, I have witnessed quite a few Japanese couples being visibly couple-y (hands holding, arms around each other, etc) but now that I think about it, they always look like younger couples.

As i said elsewhere, a lot of the "traditionally Japanese" stuff falls by the wayside as we see the millenials rise.

I disagree that Herbivores are akin to "Men Going Their Own Way," at least in the sense that that movement has quite a few misogynist overtones. Herbivores honestly don't give a fuck, as opposed to being passive women-haters like the MGTOW

At the very least, the Wikipedia article seems to disagree. Although, it's Wikipedia... So eh.

Wikipedia's very reliable on the long term. Errors are usually corrected, citations are requested, and neutrality means they stick to the provable facts. It's haphazard, but asymptotically it tends towards perfect.

Japan's Better Hafu.

And here I thought that the But Not Too Foreign transfer student was a cliché that only stuck to (somewhat lousy) manga and anime.

edited 23rd Jul '14 9:32:28 PM by Kayeka

I'm honestly not seeing anything that suggests the "herbivore men" are misogynistic. I'd certainly agree that the situation is caused by sexism — men are expected to act a specific way, and women are expected to act a specific way, and deviating from that is very frowned upon by society. But the herbivore men seem to be saying "the game is stupid, so I won't play" and just opting out of the situation entirely, rather than blaming it on women refusing to stay in the kitchen, as it were.

To quote the Wikipedia article: "Many women refuse men that do not have steady jobs (such as freeters and NEET). Other women feel that self-proclaimed soushoku-kei danshi (herbivore men) are weak and not masculine." So basically, many women aren't interested in men who refuse to conform to the Japanese cultural expectations of men (the aggressive, workaholic salaryman breadwinner) — so men who reject those expectations also give up on dating, as the two are quite thoroughly linked. Of course, it does go on to say that "Additionally, some men have considered themselves intimidated by more independent women" so it's not like attitude regarding gender-appropriate behavior are one way. But I think characterizing it as "These broads are hard to deal with, so I'm gonna stay in my cave with my anime waifus" is an unjustifiably harsh judgement of the phenomenon.

I think some of it is also related to the work culture. When you get home after a 12-hour workday, sex is probably not the first thing on your mind. While this is nothing new (and indeed I think it has actually gotten slightly better, but it is still a big problem) the societal changes with the slow improvement of professional opportunities for women (so that they don't actually have to get married) has disrupted the way it used to work. So while some men may blame the improved lot of women, most probably just genuinely don't have a strong desire for sex or romance due to being tired and due to the still remaining social expectations that you have to work even more if you get married. In the same way many women are not interested in getting married due to the still remaining social expectations that they should then quit their job (or at least it'll be harder for them to advance their career afterwards). Of course these expectations are slowly changing, but right now the country is in a transition period, which may be somewhat painful. There is nothing about the herbivore concept which suggests that these men don't want to associate with women at all, they are just not interested in romantic/sexual relationships.

edited 24th Jul '14 2:42:15 AM by mathias

Handle Plus, Wikipedia has a Quality Scale. Which they show in bright, black letters in any article's Talk Page. So it can often be remarkably easy to discern the good articles from the bad ones.

"Many celebrities and fashion models are of mixed race,"

Miss Utada Hikaru-san, for example.

"Hafu are also assumed to have foreign language abilities and to be well traveled."

Out of curiosity... how does that translate to people who have both of their parents as foreign, but happened to be raised in Japan?

My only input in regards to this is that I've known at least two women who were half-Japanese. Both could pass perfectly for Americans, down to speaking fluent American English and not really looking Japanese (at least, not to this Texan).

There are a few celebrities who are halfs and some are bilinguals.

Though I may need to fish out names later since I arrived in Manila a while ago.

Actually, you seem to be right. It seems the comparisons to MGTOW was premature, and caused by actual MRA groups proclaiming Herbivores to be "One of us! One of us!" by assuming that they were men tired of dealing with women and feminists.

It's actually more complicated than that, which means I need to do some more investigation...

So do you think Japan has too many double standards? Cause I know that a few aren't find of its culture due to them, or at least what they perceive as them.

Well, yeah. Of course it does. Japan has double standards depending on whether you're old or young, male or female, foreign or native, Asian or Western, White-western or Minority-western, etc, etc.

Most of it stems from being a homogeneous culture focused on preserving its homogeneity at all costs; most foreign insight gets rejected as "not understanding the Japanese", and that which doesn't get rejected is altered just enough to "become Japanese".

So does that make you not a fan of their culture?

Well, it bothers me a little. I mean, I love their manga and video games, but I can't help but feel like smacking them up the head whenever those myriad double standards show up.

I mean, double standards are pretty much universal, but at least most nations have the decency to feel bad about it.

There are things about Japan I admire. In particular, I've found Japanese Spirit to be an immensely helpful trope when not used for elitism and/or what I refer to as "reductionism".^note What I call "reductionism" is the introduction of hardships or difficulties into a task that should be easy just to make it so that a person has to stretch their willpower to do it, instead of using their willpower for that which is truly productive. For example, a proper use of Japanese Spirit is putting all of your heart and soul into working on a project or invention that no one has ever done before and breaks tremendous new ground. An "improper" use of it would be putting all your heart and soul into finding enough food not to starve, or learing a basic skill or technique, or scrounging barely enough money to pay the bills. Shounen fiction, unfortunately, likes to do the latter a lot.

I also like that Japan emphasizes harmony and the good of all. I dislike that the individual is too often disregarded for it.

I also like other things, like Japan's focus on moral relativity instead of moral absolutism, their understanding of transience and impermanence, and their willingness to explore and refine things until all factors that contribute to, lead to, or emphasize it are as close to perfect as possible.

I like their video games, because they can do crazy stuff in them (Platinum Games, Cyber Connect 2, to name a couple of examples).

If you are interested in Japan, I can recommend https://www.youtube.com/user/MyHusbandisJapanese and https://www.youtube.com/user/Gimmeabreakman for foreigners.

We have enough threads talking about sexism, so maybe continue there.

My favorite tourist attraction in Japan is certainly Himeji castle Such a beautiful place, I can only imagine how it looks during hanami. Currently undergoing restauration, though.

Japanese Spirit applied to Quest for Sex with Failure Is the Only Option is very trite, but, somehow, it can still remain very funny if done with enough panache. Great Teacher Onizuka is the greatest example of Loveable Sex Maniac.

My favorite tourist site in Japan had to be Kinkakuji. A big gold-plated temple in Kyoto, downright gorgeous.

I do miss Tokyo sometimes. It's hard to reconcile my love of Japan with my professional ambitions (i'm into International Development, a realm where Japan is an American competitor, rather than benefactor), though an ideal world would find a bridge between them.

I do want to try to go back for the Olympics in 2020. Four years after i get out of grad school i should have the money :-(

I'm too typical: Kamakura for me. Soba to die for, amongst other things. And, less sneezy than Tokyo. More hills, though. <_< And, with CFS, that can be a bit of a problem.

Say what you like about Tokyo, but it's as flat as a pancake. Even in "hilly" Meguro-ku.

edited 24th Jul '14 4:57:49 PM by Euodiachloris