What's funny is that "Japan" is also accused of making it impossible for people to access anime by constantly shutting down all anime hosting sites and enforcing absurdly strict piracy laws. Truly a Schrödinger's country.
A Brighter Sunrise: more reforms in post-war Japan | WWII apologies, work culture, civil rights, no stagnant economy, digital tech
Part of this is the backlash against "weeaboos" who mistakenly see Japan as a utopia, but some of the anti-weeb counterarguments go too far into implying Japan is a unique hellhole with no redeeming features whatsoever, claiming "all Japanese are suicidal xenophobic war crime denialists." Like this image for example.
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Sorry. I forgot that I had been having this conversation with Pipcard and others over the course of several similar Pipcard threads, so some of these points were elaborated on in more detail. Pipcard may remember or understand what I said, but now that you've pointed it out, I recognize that it may seem very confusing to someone who has only read one of the threads (this one, for example).
It's an interesting way to describe it, "Japan as a social enemy", but I think it describes it very well.
Personally, my theory is that this situation is the product of the cognitive dissonance suffered by the population and the Government of the United States in trying to reconcile "Japan is our friend and ally against China at a strategic level" and "We hate Japan as a society because they are not a country that has embraced our cultural worldview as their own and they have a poor relationship with our trading partner China."
So, as a result of this, the United States, and by extension the West that embraces America's views as its own, finds itself loving, hating, and needing Japan at the same time. So they have to criticize them for something at the same time, but that something cannot be an issue that justifies a military response.
Which brings us to the current situation in which the United States repeatedly describes Japan in the same way that they usually use with fascist regimes: being at the same time a severe existential threat that can put America (and by extension the West) in grave danger. )... and too stupid and weak to be able to take advantage of this hypothetical advantage, that is if it is not falling apart in itself as a result of the aforementioned stupidity.
This is how we get absurd descriptions like at the same time the Japanese technology of the 1980s threatened to completely destroy the US economy and colonize the country to make it an economic vassal of Japan... at the same time the Japanese are depicted as too stupid and narrow-minded to give up faxing in favor of new technologies.
Now, since it doesn't make much sense to keep shouting that there is a risk that Japan will destroy the US economy (because it is China that is doing that)... the cultural issue is resorted to. An issue that is particularly strong in the United States due to the excessive weight of religiosity and moral guardians in their society. Let us remember that they are the only country where the reaction to denunciations of cases of Satanism ... was to open an official FBI investigation into it, as well as to proceed with arrests and convictions, instead of dismissing the entire matter as a case of mass religious hysteria .
That's where we get things like the whole "All anime is a far-right conspiracy to attack our culture and promote the values of Japanese imperialism" stuff.
The funny thing is that at the same time we see people defending that there are entire anime dedicated to extolling the Japanese Empire and presenting their acts as good and justified. Which doesn't make much sense if you're supposed to be trying to whitewash the country's image as a good, pure and honest nation.
I've also come to hear that many Japanese artists are actually left-wing activists who would use the medium as a way to get around government censorship.
Actually, it's funny because, based on what I've been reading and understanding on various sites, this "anime conspiracy theory" can be summed up like this:
-The post-war anime and until some indeterminate moment of the 60-70s (let's put specifically between 1968 and 1974 to name dates) was a strongly left-wing anime. The artists were all leftist activists committed to putting leftist political ideas into anime to escape government censorship.
-Somehow, for unspecified reasons, and making this escape the public eye, between 1968 (reference to May 68 and the activism of the time) and 1974, what could be called a Great Purge would take place. Supposedly, all the left-wing anime and manga artists suddenly disappear and are replaced by rabid right-wingers nostalgic for the Empire of Japan.
-I cited 1974 as the specific date of the transformation because in 1974 Uchuu Senkan Yamato was released, which is the oldest Japanese series that I know of that has been accused of being propaganda of the Empire of Japan. Supposedly, one of the reasons the series was SEVERELY edited into Star Blazers was precisely to edit out all of that propaganda. (I personally think this is a case of "backward projection" in which a noble justification - to eliminate fascist propaganda - was invented after the fact for an exercise in cultural suppression with far less noble motivations - ahem, racism, ahem).
-So we have that, between 1974 and at least until 2022 and beyond, this hypothetical clique of producers (let's call them LOGOS) would have been controlling and manipulating anime and manga production in Japan from the shadows.
-The objectives of LOGOS would be the ones I described above: to promote the idea that Japanese imperialism was good and justified, to denigrate the West in general and the United States of America in particular, and to paint Japan as a good, virtuous nation. and innocent.
-Somehow, despite the fact that LOGOS has been active since at least 1974, nobody, ever, leaks anything. Nobody, ever, tries to denounce the conspiracy. No one ever decides "Fuck this, I'm out of here." Apparently everyone is silent, obeys, and participates.
-Let's remember that we are talking about a conspiracy that has been active for at least 50 years, which would involve tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of people, including artists, producers, managers, publicists, etc, etc. Nobody talks? Does anyone doubt? Nobody regrets? Nobody decides "I'm sick of this, I'd like to quit and do something else"?
-Well, I'm lying. Someone notices. Young Americans who use the Internet from the 2000s. Only them. In the event that someone from another country "finds out", by trawling, it will usually be found that their primary source...was a random American on the Internet.
-Let's also add that, apparently, as of the 2010s, LOGOS has split into two factions: the traditional one that believes in using subtle propaganda, and the one that is more open and vocal about how Axis imperialism is okay. . To put it in anime terms, LOGOS 1 is Gundam and LOGOS 2 is Shingeki no Kyojin.
-Even though LOGOS has fragmented into two groups, maybe more (The Shield Hero and Redo of Healer have been cited as "evidence" that incel ideology is strong in Japan, which would make them representatives of LOGOS 3), we never see LOGOS 1, LOGOS 2 or LOGOS 3 fighting each other to establish themselves as the dominant faction. This is ridiculous and would require that the three factions were in fact controlled by the same people and were just three different approaches to achieving the same goal.
Or the option that is simpler and more probable: None of this that I have just described is real, and it is only the compendium of the contradictory and unsubstantiated speculations of a bunch of "Americans" who see non-existent phantom threats.
Personally, I'm more inclined to believe the latter: "the conspiracy isn't real." Even if the explanation above could give to write an extremely dark TL. I think using the name of the final villain group from Gundam SEED Destiny as the name for the cabal should serve as warning enough of how ridiculous I find the whole concept, but just in case I add that the whole "theory of conspiracy of the anime" seems idiotic to me.
This has an easy explanation: the people who say one thing are not the same as those who say the other. It's like the magic of getting people to stand up for you at the same time that anime is pure Goebbels distilled, or actually a lot of anime artists were leftists who were slipping leftist political agenda into the subtext in an attempt to escape political censorship. of the Japanese Government.
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Assuming this is true, it still means that people can only conceive Japan in extreme, outrageous terms. Either the country is extremely fucked up or it is truly utopic, there is no middle ground. Why are people incapable of conceiving Japan as a normal, nuanced developed country, the way other developed countries are conceived? That is the crux of my argument.
And looking deeper into this, this whole "weeb" thing is quite peculiar. The way the word is used, someone is a weeb if they are interested and consume Japanese culture. But if someone consumes American culture, or British Culture, or French culture, they are just normal people. They aren't stigmatized for it. IMO it speaks to the status and position of Japanese culture, which is regarded as inferior and unwelcome compared to the other (Western) cultures mentioned.
That said the hostility toward Japanese society predates the rise of modern weebism by decades (look at the books and news articles written about Japan in the 80s and 90s. The idea that Japan is a hellish dystopia with few redeeming qualities is not a new one.
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Definitely this, as evidenced by the "anime is why two bombs weren't enough" meme started by former New Hampshire state representative Nick Levasseur. Either that, or someone who watches anime "self-deprecatingly" referring to themselves as a weeb.
There is a spectrum of anti-weeb sentiment ranging from well-intentioned to blatantly racist towards Japanese people.
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I didn't know where the meme had come from. I wish I could say that I am surprised that he is of American origin.
What surprises me is the part about it coming from none other than a state representative. I mean, people voted to represent their state for a guy who advocates the use of nuclear weapons against civilians.
I would have rather expected the meme to come from somewhere on the Internet.
But I think it reflects very well what I mean when I say that American public discourse is fine with the idea of hating Japan.
For comparison, when MacArthur suggested dropping nuclear bombs on China as part of the Korean War, he wasn't just ousted from office. But, outside of some right-wing loon who hates the People's Republic of China, the consensus is that this would have been completely insane and a terrible idea. And IS a terrible idea.
It's very hard to find someone who will tell you "Well, yes, MacArthur was right, we should have dropped nuclear bombs on China"... but it's amazingly easy to find people who tell you, about Japan, with a straight face "yeah, two bombs weren't enough".
He apologized after the incident, but the phrase got taken up by those kinds of anti-weebs who I feel would support internment camps for Japanese-Americans in the modern day.
The thing is that a German on Reddit said this (bolded for emphasis):
LightsiderTT said:
LightsiderTT said:
which is the exact same thesis of this project: that Japan's OTL "miracle" made its government and businesses complacent when it came to "disruptive" digital technologies.
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My main complaint about these types of arguments is that they never develop WHY making these changes is supposed to be as critical as they claim. And why changes MUST be in that direction, and ONLY in that direction.
It is as if the commentator is so convinced that the whole world will embrace his point of view that he does not even need to develop it.
Which is basically the problem I see with these kinds of critical arguments. As I understand them, they can be summed up in this sentence:
"Country X is making this catastrophic mistake that is destroying its economy. This mistake is so obvious to me that I will never explain what it is, but only I spit vague vagueness about it. I will also discard all evidence from official sources, that I would trust in any other circumstance, just because they don't fit my argument here. Sources: my ass."
Although an unrelated example, what I call "Toozle's problem" fits nicely here: Toozle is cited as seemingly omniscient and unquestionable evidence that "Toozle said this" is considered more than enough of an argument. And so axiomatic that it does not require further development. Even if it is ridiculously unlikely that Toozle is the only author, or the most expert, who has written on the economy of the Third Reich, he is treated as such.
In my view, "We hate Japan as a society because they are not a country that has embraced our [Western] cultural worldview" cannot be the underlying reason for "hating" Japan, as it is yet another iteration of the Japan discourse that depicts Japan as something it is not. It is the symptom not the cause. After all, looking at the data which I cited in an earlier post, Japan has highly similar social and political values to the West (moreso than Eastern European countries). The mystery is why Western discourse feels the need to frame Japan as utterly alien, utterly different, and utterly extreme, in the first place. Why is Japan the only developed country to receive this discursive treatment, which then leads to these framings of Japan that can be used as further justification of "hating" it?
(unless by cultural worldview you mean something else, in which case I misunderstood)
To answer this, I think we need to borrow the concepts of "in-groups" and "out-groups" from social psychology. Western countries are considered the in-group, while Japan is considered the out-group, the Other. Hence, complimenting Japan is implicitly seen as devaluing the in-group, which is unacceptable. While complimenting other Western countries like Canada and Western Europe is encouraged, as it affirms the superiority of the in-group, the West. It is for this reason why you see so many people unabashedly praising Canada and Western European countries all the time without receiving any backlash, while praising Japan is essentially taboo, as it makes you a "traitor" (to the in-group). This also applies to cultural consumption. Consuming French or Italian culture is a non-issue, but the culture of the Other?
Japan being an out-group means one is also encouraged to bash it, as doing so reinforces Western superiority, or the superiority of the in-group. It doesn't even matter if what Japan is or does is any different, for instance Japan is harshly criticized for commercial whaling, while if the larger Norwegian whaling activity were ever to be mentioned, it would have to be defended, since one feels an instinctive need to defend the in-group.
Japan being an out-group is also why people regard Japan as a monolith, as one single homogeneous actor. The phenomenon is called the "outgroup homogeneity effect". And I think it also helps explain why Japan can only be conceived in the extreme, not allowing any nuances, as out-groups are usually conceived in such terms. Their qualities and traits are "essentialized", according to which they are defined.
One puzzle remains though. If Japan is actually very similar to the West in terms of social and political values, and in sociopolitical governance, as the data would suggest, then why are they considered an out-group in the first place?
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The argument for digitalization in Japan and other countries is that it would "improve productivity." Faxes and paperwork are said to be bad because they are "inefficient."
Michael Fitzpatrick said:
If you need data:
(edit: I just noticed that Germany is also near the United States in that link)
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The thing is that Germany has had one of the best economic performances of any Western European country. Their export performance in the last 30 years is one of the best in the OECD. 30-40 years ago, they used to export not much more than Japan or France, today their exports are more than twice that, and comparable to the US. In economic performance, they are the opposite of Japan. IMO this only proves that lack of digitalization is not a major constraint to growth. The causes of Japan's slump lie elsewhere.
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Is it the 1980s trade war and Plaza Accord? The low fertility rates and aging population? (but Germany also has those)
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When I spoke of "cultural worldview" I was thinking in terms of "embracing our cultural, political and social views" (those of the United States, due to the excessive and totally disproportionate weight that this country has on Western culture).
This argument is based on the premise that, in reality, economic similarity does not matter so much "cultural harmonization" with the United States (read, the degree of enthusiasm with which the country embraces the cultural, political and social points of view of the United States). United States, however inapplicable they may be in, say, Norway).
That's where we get things like people wondering why Japan isn't a republic yet, lying that anime is a local copy of the comic (because anime being independent would attack the idea that the US is the only generator of culture and others just imitate them) or insist on how horrible Japan is supposed to be compared to America (it's funny how it always or almost always compares itself to America).
From what I understood of whaling, it fits into what I described in the previous post of "selfishness, stupidity and wickedness of decision makers". This is because one of the arguments I have heard the most is that, in reality, whaling is a profoundly loss-making business that is sustained only by obscure political deals that involve handing out subsidies to the industry. (the complete triad of selfishness, stupidity and evil: running a ruinous business and killing defenseless animals in the name of a higher profit margin).
As for why they are considered an outside group, I think the answer is simple: the racism of many Americans that has rubbed off on the rest of the world. (Remember that it is the United States that sets the pace and the rest just follow).
I mean, while I wasn't quite sure if I should bring this up, I also noted that, faced with the dichotomy of acknowledging the Japanese (and Asians) as victims of American institutional racism, or appeasing the great mass of the public who might be willing to support racial equality but not for Asians... American anti-racists apparently chose the latter and made up that Asians were "privileged collective" even though this doesn't make any sense.
Let us also not forget that many of these people who advocate digitization as a cause of crisis and inefficiency are mostly determined enthusiasts of digitization.
Add to that the ever-increasing tendency of people to present anything from a point of view that is as favorable as possible to their own beliefs, and you get this situation where continuing to work with paper seems to be putting Japan on the verge of economic collapse even if the data disproves it.
I'm not sure if this phenomenon has a name, but I've noticed that too many qualified people tend to see everything in terms that fit the subject matter they're an expert on or is currently in the public consciousness. I am thinking, for example, of the recent tendency to reinterpret archaeological sites in terms of the fact that the great historical movements were the consequence of various climatic changes. Or the mania of too many people to assume that every decision has as its ultimate cause the search for maximum efficiency and economic benefit.
I think TV Tropes calls this "Crippling Overspec". In this case it would be "reducing everything to a single cause" even if the evidence points to that "single cause" being only one of many factors at play.
As I've learned over 8 years ago, apparently the main issue with the Japanese economy is demographics, which also affects digitalization (older people are less experienced with computers).
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Yeah, that's a pretty serious problem they have.
The problem is that the issue of demography is so politicized that you hear tremendous nonsense about it. And tremendous hypocrisy.
I am thinking, for example, of all those Americans who defend at the same time that Japan "needs" to open its borders and let in millions of immigrants... while advocating placing machine guns on the United States-Mexico border to "solve" the "problem" of "illegal immigration". (Mods recently banned a guy here for proposing the latter.)
That is, we have people demanding from another country something that their own government is actively fighting to prevent in their own country, with the determined and enthusiastic support of those same people.
Of course, the birth rate could be encouraged, but that is generally criticized as a "fascist" and "selfish" policy with no more arguments than those. It doesn't help that efforts to try that haven't been very successful.
Like you said before (also, that might be Chat material so be careful),
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Ahem. Forgetting demographics and going back to economics, there is the question of competitors. Asian tigers, known as Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and there is at least one other that I have forgotten (I think Indonesia). They produce many of the things that Japan used to produce, and they do it cheaper. Usually because they have cheaper labor.
This is especially evident in the case of China, with the aggravating circumstance that it was also supported by huge and enthusiastic American investments. The idea behind this was the twofold assumption that 1) It was a good idea to strengthen China to "counterbalance" the USSR, and 2) The arrival of economic prosperity would translate into democratic reforms.
In practice, of course, this did not happen. Instead, China uses its enormous demographic and industrial weight to eat up the market. We might think that American planners would realize that it is a horrible idea to base your strategy on a country playing the way you want when they have no reason to. But that is another topic.
Which was also helped by a change in "corporate culture" where manufacturing and putting on sale huge quantities of product, even if it is of poor quality, prevailed more than creating a quality product.
Possibly less determined support for China would have given Japan more time to develop its economic model to a less vulnerable version than the current one.
This is especially evident in the case of China, with the aggravating circumstance that it was also supported by huge and enthusiastic American investments. The idea behind this was the twofold assumption that 1) It was a good idea to strengthen China to "counterbalance" the USSR, and 2) The arrival of economic prosperity would translate into democratic reforms.
In practice, of course, this did not happen. Instead, China uses its enormous demographic and industrial weight to eat up the market. We might think that American planners would realize that it is a horrible idea to base your strategy on a country playing the way you want when they have no reason to. But that is another topic.
Which was also helped by a change in "corporate culture" where manufacturing and putting on sale huge quantities of product, even if it is of poor quality, prevailed more than creating a quality product.
Possibly less determined support for China would have given Japan more time to develop its economic model to a less vulnerable version than the current one.