Quote:
Originally Posted by Vexx
Not to derail... but any study of Japan that doesn't include the unpleasant aspects is just drowning by roses. All societies have their "backdoors" and "alleyways"  Abe is the nicely painted cover for a nasty clique of ultra-nationalists and a few corporate/clan interests. Much like Bush was painted up to distract that he only actually pays homage to a select inner circle of modern robber barons and you're deceived if you think there's any actual conservative or religious philosophy to it.
The courtesy does put nice icing over corruption (the eyewinks tween yakuza and police, for example), price fixing, clan domination (often concealed by name differences: e.g. the average consumer has no idea that KFC and Taco Bell are the same company -- no real competition).
<shrug> one can understand all those flaws and still love the country and the people. Japan is just historically fascinating for a lot of reasons.
After all, everyone likes the Canadians and they're full of problems under the radar (damned ninja assault moose ). |
Don't forget that the courtroom is set up to deal Texas Justice. Basically the odds of you winning a lawsuit or criminal case are about the same as the roll of a dice during a game of craps. Sometimes you get Snake Eyes and some judge with an agenda or hidden bias (Konami Entertainment Japan v. Ichiro Komami) comes in and deals a verdict with judicial reasoning that will make your head spin (Shiori Fujisaki the Tokimeki Memorial character won a punitive damage lawsuit because her[this is a fictional character mind you] "Pure Image" was damaged by her being featured in an H-Doujin that Komami made).
Oh and we don't have a Ninja Assault Moose that I know of, but apparently we have some uber strike force team that was once actually spotted in Montreal by accident with a helicopter landing on a rooftop in the dead of the night and a dead body being lifted into it only a minute later. And then they were gone. Apparently they are something akin to MI6 and answer only to the Prime Minister. Rumours only though.