Japanese culture - more altruistic?

[rogero]

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/ed...ting-in-japan/

Hey Y'all, Please read the article at the above link and comment on why Japanese (Oriental?) culture is so much more kind and altruistic than Western?

Roger

[Hamster]

Most noticeably of all, there has been no looting,

Probably because they can still experience shame. I'm not sure they're kinder in general though

[NeilUnreal]

I asked a Japanese friend about this once, on observing that -- in the part of Tokyo we were in -- people often left their bicycles outside shops without locking them. He found it difficult to articulate an exact answer, but indicated that such behaviour was inculcated by careful childhood training.

-Neil

[Darth Executor]

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/ed...ting-in-japan/

Hey Y'all, Please read the article at the above link and comment on why Japanese (Oriental?) culture is so much more kind and altruistic than Western?

Roger

When did "not looting" become kind and altruistic? Hey, I'm not gonna jack your car or steal your 40" LCD TV while you're at work. I'm such a nice guy, please praise me.

[rogero]

When did "not looting" become kind and altruistic? Hey, I'm not gonna jack your car or steal your 40" LCD TV while you're at work. I'm such a nice guy, please praise me.

From the article: "And solidarity seems especially strong in Japan itself. Perhaps even more impressive than Japan’s technological power is its social strength, with supermarkets cutting prices and vending machine owners giving out free drinks as people work together to survive. Most noticeably of all, there has been no looting, and I’m not the only one curious about this"

Sounds kind to me. Especially compared to what happened during the Katrina fiasco, e.g. Or 9/11/2011 when service station owners jacked up prices from $2 to over $5 per gallon in a matter of hours. (I was out of state at the time taking my wife to a clinic, so I have first-hand experience of this behavior.)

[Soyeong]

Sounds kind to me. Especially compared to what happened during the Katrina fiasco, e.g. Or 9/11/2011 when service station owners jacked up prices from $2 to over $5 per gallon in a matter of hours. (I was out of state at the time taking my wife to a clinic, so I have first-hand experience of this behavior.)

Charging $5 per gallon is not the same as looting. I think there can be a fuzzy line between demand based off of a wants or needs, but for wants, there is nothing kind or unkind about charging as the rules of supply and demand dictate. Rather, it would have been kind of them if they had continued to charge $2 per gallon because that would have been below what it was worth. On the other hand, while not looting is kinder than looting, it is not the same as being kind. Just the same as creating less debt is better than more debt, but it is not the same as reducing debt.

[Darth Executor]

From the article: "And solidarity seems especially strong in Japan itself. Perhaps even more impressive than Japan’s technological power is its social strength, with supermarkets cutting prices and vending machine owners giving out free drinks as people work together to survive. Most noticeably of all, there has been no looting, and I’m not the only one curious about this"

Sounds kind to me. Especially compared to what happened during the Katrina fiasco, e.g. Or 9/11/2011 when service station owners jacked up prices from $2 to over $5 per gallon in a matter of hours. (I was out of state at the time taking my wife to a clinic, so I have first-hand experience of this behavior.)

Katrina also had a lot of people from all over the country rushing in to help.
At the same time, Japan is also a hotbed for fraud:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/to...cle6261356.ece

I don't think the difference is altruism as much as it is the honor/shame society. Public acts of jackassery will be pretty rare as a result, but private acts of it are still going strong.

And what happened on 9/11/2011?

[rogero]

Katrina also had a lot of people from all over the country rushing in to help.
At the same time, Japan is also a hotbed for fraud:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/to...cle6261356.ece

I don't think the difference is altruism as much as it is the honor/shame society. Public acts of jackassery will be pretty rare as a result, but private acts of it are still going strong.

And what happened on 9/11/2011?

The point is how the victims treat each other and their ambient culture in times of disaster. The Katrina victims failed miserably and were very very lucky (even though many of them don't or didn't realize) for the help of their fellow Americans and most of the victims (at least from popular news reports) thought their help was an "entitlement".

And during the few hours after the 9/11 attacks, fuel station owners jacked up prices over 100%. What can't you understand about that? Was there a supply-demand problem? How much do you know about economics? Not much I guess.

Japanese culture is at least internally more altruistic than American or Canadian or British. Maybe we all need more of the honor/shame culture?

[Darth Executor]

The point is how the victims treat each other and their ambient culture in times of disaster. The Katrina victims failed miserably and were very very lucky (even though many of them don't or didn't realize) for the help of their fellow Americans and most of the victims (at least from popular news reports) thought their help was an "entitlement".

Maybe that's why so many people didn't want to help them?

And during the few hours after the 9/11 attacks, fuel station owners jacked up prices over 100%. What can't you understand about that? Was there a supply-demand problem? How much do you know about economics? Not much I guess.

The 9/11 attacks did not occur in 2011 like you said, hence my confusion.

Japanese culture is at least internally more altruistic than American or Canadian or British.

You mean externally.

Maybe we all need more of the honor/shame culture?

Or we could do with better education. And I don't mean academics, I mean basic decency.

[Epoetker]

Japan more altruistic much less racially diverse. Diversity + Proximity = war.

Around 97% of the people in Japan are...Japanese.

Japan does not allow immigration of non-Japanese.

So social shaming/honor actually works on a nationwide level, because foreigners are not around to flout the norms of the host country and behavioral norms/laws are much more finely adapted to the genetic impulses of the population.

The whole 'shared history' thing probably also helps.

It explains both its internal cohesion and mistrust of foreigners.

And it's totally bad. We should crush their unions, import millions of low-wage third world workers, and institute affirmative action quotas for them. That'll lead to even more social cohesion, I'm sure.

[rogero]

Maybe that's why so many people didn't want to help them?



The 9/11 attacks did not occur in 2011 like you said, hence my confusion.



You mean externally.



Or we could do with better education. And I don't mean academics, I mean basic decency.

Of course I meant 2001. I figured you'd be smart enough to recognize a typo.

And I do mean internally not externally. They're altruistic to people within their culture. The Japanese have an history of brutality to enemies. They take care of themselves like many (good, stable, loving) families. I wish we could have that in the "West."

We English-speaking folks need to learn something from this. "common decency" is an excellent goal! How do we attain this given the class warfare and entitlement mentality? I'm especially interested in my fellow Christians who are politically liberal views on this.

Roger

[Epoetker]

And I do mean internally not externally. They're altruistic to people within their culture. The Japanese have an history of brutality to enemies. They take care of themselves like many (good, stable, loving) families. I wish we could have that in the "West."

Nope, we can't have that in the West, because according to Challenger Grim protecting one's own first is against Christianity or something. Take care of your own people and your own borders and you will be condemned to hell.

In Grim's defense, he has supporters among the churchy...up to the Pope of the Now, actually. But it just goes to show that America's reflexive anti-Papism was probably a good thing for the independence of the country.

We English-speaking folks need to learn something from this. "common decency" is an excellent goal! How do we attain this given the class warfare and entitlement mentality? I'm especially interested in my fellow Christians who are politically liberal views on this.

Roger

Your fellow-Christians in leadership positions are in the pay of the Treason Lobby to lie, dissimulate, and exaggerate about the effects of immigration. They will never restrict immigration, encourage deportation, encourage assimilation, or even encourage the equal protection of our laws among differing races if they're not getting paid to do so. As such, you will never see a return to the general prosperity of the 50s in America's lifetime. Prosperity will be unequally spread amongst those American communities who do pull together and absent from those that fragment along racial lines. (Biggest winners? The Mormons. For a while.)

[Soyeong]

Of course I meant 2001. I figured you'd be smart enough to recognize a typo.

This is lacking in common decency. You made a typo and he asked you to clarify, then you slam him for not know what happened on the date of the typo and for not reading your mind. Really?

And I do mean internally not externally. They're altruistic to people within their culture. The Japanese have an history of brutality to enemies. They take care of themselves like many (good, stable, loving) families. I wish we could have that in the "West."

We English-speaking folks need to learn something from this. "common decency" is an excellent goal! How do we attain this given the class warfare and entitlement mentality? I'm especially interested in my fellow Christians who are politically liberal views on this.

Both individualist and collectivist cultures have their own sets of advantages and disadvantages. A culture that emphasizes group goals above person achievement is naturally going loot less than cultures that emphasize personal achievement instead. However, less looting is a result of their culture, not something they adopted their culture, so it's not something you can individually select without adopting the whole culture.

[Dee Dee Warren]

I think Soy's post is spot on. You can't pick and choose. You want the altruism, but don't want the implied--and socially enforced restrictions of freedom--for fear of shaming your family. Sorry they come bundled. Like Microsoft Works.

[Dee Dee Warren]

BTW, I am not so sure that I wouldn't take the whole bundle as a better deal than our society, but I doubt hardly anyone else feels that way that would also be coveting the "altruism" of the Japanese. You are comparing apples to oranges..... individulistic altruism is radically different than collectivist "altruism." You are doing Amthropomorphism.