Saturday, January 17, 2009

Japanese Culture and the Myth of Safety

There is something broken in Japanese culture. Now this dark spot has always been there, but it has recently seeped out in a wave of violent, heinous crimes that is turning the dogma of Japanese safety into a myth.

Just recently a Chuo University professor was stabbed over 60 times on the Tokyo campus. The killer is unknown, and once more Japan has another gruesome "unexplainable" murder on its hands.

This tragic incident can be grouped into a long line of murders over the last 10 years. And these crimes, while few in number compared to America, exhibit a strange and peculiar touch of evil. The tales of students killing their teachers and children killing their parents are an indication that either the Japanese family or Japanese culture is failing young people.

It's time that Japanese parents, teachers, religious leaders and government officials admit that their is a rage and hopelessness in many Japanese youth that smacks of nihilism or at least garden-variety hopelessness.

For years now Japanese people have proudly touted how "safe" their country is compared to cities in the West, yet if one is no longer safe in the family home or at school, there is nothing safe about Japan any more.

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