The nail that sticks up….

I’ve heard a lot about the dark side of the Japanese culture, but now I’ve got it resting on my doorstep.  It’s been very educational, in a certain sense, about the strong necessity of compliance to social norms. In America, we tend to hold famous people to a higher standard than others, Tiger Woods is a good example. When information leaked out of his affairs, the public went wild, practically demanding as much information as possible, for no real goal other than gossip.

Not that Americans have a corner on the market… The British practically have an entire segment of their media economy based on gossip and innuendo, as well as many other first world nations. Now think about this…What if a bunch of random strangers, from points all over the world, suddenly took that much of an interest into your life? And by interest, I mean, scouring the internet trying to find out EVERYTHING they can about you, your family, or anyone close to you? Spreading lies, innuendo, threats, and general harassment, simply because, in their eyes, you stepped out of line of the social norms that they decide.

Why? For the simple reason that they didn’t agree with you, and they decided to post on 2chan about it…

Now, if you’ve been on the internet for some time, you’ve probably heard of 2chan, or it’s American counterpart, 4chan, an anonymous bulletin board frequented by hackers, otaku, and others generally described as social misfits, but within that realm, have a lot of power within the internet. Since it’s inception, it’s become one of the most popular sites on the internet in the Japanese language, and is home to many internet trolls. The site has been accused of driving people to suicide, and was recently attacked en masse by South Korean hackers because of their criticism of a female skater during the Olympics.

But I digress… Let’s go back in time a bit….

My girlfriend’s oldest daughter was out walking the dog about a month ago. The dog is rather large and strong, and had wrapped  the leash partway around her legs. He saw a bird and took off after it,  causing her to fall face-first onto the pavement, knocking out one of her teeth and damaging several others. Since it was about 6 o’clock in the evening, we had some difficulty finding a dental surgeon who could fix it. It was recommended to us by the critical care unit that we find a dental surgeon, as that would be the best chance of saving the tooth, rather than going to the emergency room, where there wouldn’t be any experts in dentistry.

The dentist wanted over $2000 up front to fix it, and since we were not prepared for such an expense, we borrowed money from a friend to cover the cost of the surgery.

Later, my girlfriend, who has been blogging in Japanese, on a Japanese site for around 2 years, mentioned the accident and everything that happened. Some readers who had been following her blog for a long time offered to donate some money to help offset the expense, which was very kind of them, and it was suggested that she set up a donate button on her website so they could do so.

Who would have imagined the tempest this unleashed…

Apparently some of her readers (or possibly only one for all we know) took offense to this and posted about it on 2chan, claiming that it was fraudulent and a hoax, and it snowballed from there. It spread to other forums and websites quite quickly, and within a few days a simple unknown blogger who writes about recipes and daily life in America suddenly became an item of interest amongst the Japanese internet community.

It started with derogatory comments and calling on her to remove the donate button and to reimburse everyone that had donated. She removed the button and offered to refund to anyone who requested it, but this was not enough, they still claimed she was a fraud and demanded evidence of the accident. Then she posted the x-rays of the damage and receipts of payment and the billing from the dentist of what was done and how much the charges were, but this was still not enough, and the posts continued.

There is now a blog dedicated to ridiculing her, alongside the 2chan board and at least one other site talking about her, calling her a “shit mother” and accusing her of other “Crimes” by people that claim to know her personally and know her situation. They are also claiming to contact various government agencies to report her “Crimes” even though they know nothing about her or her life.

What’s especially funny (in a not so funny way) is that there are at least 3 people on the 2chan board claiming to be her and goading other users by saying inflammatory things to keep people worked up on the subject, and yet no one seems to question this.

Bottom line is, it’s all a witch hunt. They don’t care about anything that proves she’s innocent, they only want to hang her in a public forum, truth be dammed. They don’t care about truth, they only care about keeping it going for as long as possible, using her notoriety to make themselves seem popular and interesting. Kinda sad in it’s own way…

This hasn’t been exclusive to her either. In their attempts to dig up any dirt or information, I became included in the attacks as well.

A few days ago, the traffic to my site jumped considerably, because it became linked to the hate blog. A number of people were scouring the site, looking for something to report back on, but no one actually posted any comments, until now.  Here is the text of the message I received, from someone claiming to be a woman named Mimi in Washington State:

recently came across your blog, and I decided to leave my first comment.

I am a Japanese woman, and I have been living in the United States in the past 20 years.  I came to this country as an international student.  I found your blog very interesting; you provided many unique perspectives in Japanese culture.  It is funny, and I have been enjoying reading it.

However, I am very concerned for one thing.  I understand that you have been in a relationship with a Japanese woman.   It sounds like to me that she has become a symbol of Japan to you for some reasons.
It is actually one of the most common mistakes American men can make when they started going out with somebody from different countries because you guys do not know enough about them.  You may not know too many people to get many different perspectives either.

To tell the truth, I am little disappointed how your significant other (GF) have represented about our country and cultures.  Her perspectives are definitely unique but not the most common one in Japan.  I do not want you to misrepresent our country and make jokes out of it.

Lastly, I would like to know if you have known about a little media attention that your girlfriend’ blog.
Are you absolutely sure the whole details?  It may be difficult for you to communicate with her by having language problems, and love makes you blind.  If you can provide us some insights, I (and many readers of your blogs) would appreciate.

First of all, Mimi, Thank you for being the first person brave enough to contact me directly out of all the people that have been lurking on my blog.

Allow me to address your comments in order…

Yes, you recently came across by blog, through a website that for some unknown reason has decided to take a random person and try to destroy their life. Were you were curious and decided to take a look, or were you are hoping that I would respond, in the hopes that I will give you something juicy to report back on? Are you so desperate for attention or impatient that you needed to post your comments twice because I didn’t respond fast enough?  Gossip cannot exist in a vaccum, it needs to be fed to survive, so here you go, you’re welcome.

I’m glad you enjoy my blog, and would have wished you would have discovered it under better circumstances. I assume that since you have been in the US for 20 years, you should have a good understanding of American culture. If so, you should know that, at least in the US, putting a donation button on a website is not unusual, in fact it’s quite common, and there is nothing wrong with it, even if someone who is native to Japan and living in the US does it.

In light of your concerns, let me assure you that my girlfriend is not a symbol, but rather a perspective of Japanese culture. She knows a lot more than I do about Japan, but I know a lot more than she does about America. There are as many different perspectives about America by Americans as there are different perspectives about Japan by Japanese.  You are very mistaken if you think I take her perspective as how all Japanese are. She even says herself that all Japanese are different with different perspectives, despite the fact that Japan is commonly equated as being a conformist culture.

If you feel that she has misrepresented your culture, then please give me specific examples. I consider my blog an open forum and if you (or any of the others reading this) would like to discuss what Japanese culture is “really like” then I would appreciate your input. Vague disagreement doesn’t help anyone.

As far as poking fun at the Japanese culture, that’s part of humor, and all cultures do it. For example, consider the popular Fuccons which is directed at American stereotypes.  And, yes, I’ll be the first to admit that to a Japanese person, I appear to laugh inappropriately a lot. I get laughed at quite often for my behavior as well because it seems strange to native Japanese. In fact, I tend to make more jokes about myself then I do about Japanese culture. Most of my humor has to do with my own problems in adapting to it, so I’m not sure what you find so offensive.

Lastly, yes, I am aware of what is going on, and what is written on her blog, but I honestly don’t care. Being an American, one of our supreme truths is that everyone is entitled to their own opinion. As Thomas Jefferson said, regarding religion, but it applies here,  ”But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.” I know she sometimes writes less than flattering things about me, some are true and some are exaggerations, and she uses it to vent when we have a disagreement.

What I am truly curious about, is what was your motivation in writing me? As I mentioned in the previous quote, her actions do not affect you in any way, so why tell me about it? A public service? I don’t think so.

You suggest That I’m “Blinded by love” because, in your mind, if I really understood the “Truth” that I would turn my back on her.  In your mind there are only two options, either I should agree with you or I am a lovesick idiot. Did it occur to you that you could be incorrect? Could it be that you are placing your faith in a bunch of hateful strangers on the internet and believing whatever they write? Why do you even care? Why do you think that anything she does is any of your business? For someone who has lived in the US for 20 years, why haven’t you learned that?

Are you hoping that you can report back to your virtual “Friends” that you made us break up? Would that make you happy or proud?  It makes you seem like a sadist (サディスト) . Your motivations for writing me seem like they are only to try to cause pain to our lives and your final statement makes that perfectly clear.

So you understand, the reason I posted  this on my blog is twofold:

1. To create a public record, and to insure that my comments would not be taken out of context. I’m sure that my words will be ridiculed no matter what I write, because this is all about harassment, so there isn’t a correct response, just food for the trolls.  Due to the amount of attention this is receiving, I do feel obligated to respond.
2. To highlight the darker side of Japanese culture.

The post title, “The nail that sticks up…”, is part of a well known Japanese saying. The rest of the quote is, “get’s hammered down.”

Japan is often referred to as a conformist culture. People feel obligated to point things out when they think you are doing something wrong,  or simply not associate with you if you have broken a rule. These strong expectations of its citizens creates both positive and negative effects.

On the positive side, it makes the trains run on time, produces great customer service,  and keeps the crime rate down. On the negative side it creates this kind of gossip, an amazingly high suicide rate, and a populace afraid to step out of line. In comparison, the US could be considered a non-conformist culture.  It has it’s positives and drawbacks as well. Customer service sucks, the crime rate is higher but fewer people kill themselves, and we tend to ignore busybodies with nothing better to do than attack people for no reason, and if someone does attack us, our first call is to a lawyer, not to conform or cry in our pillow.

I don’t know if I got around to discussing the concepts of Honne and Tatemae in an earlier post, but in brief:

• Honne is what you want to do
• Tatemae is what society expects of you and how you should behave.

Both are important concepts in Japanese society, not so different to Freud’s  ”Id” and “Superego”, respectively.  The ability to have anonymity on the internet allows the “Id” to do whatever he wants, without the interference of the “Superego”. What’s interesting, psychologically, is that in this case, the “Superego” still judges other people’s actions, even though it’s exhibited through the “Id”. This creates a situation where other’s actions are judged to a much higher standard than their own, and are judged much more harshly because there is no filter for the “Id’s” actions.

The main lesson you can take from this:

Just because the Japanese are polite doesn’t mean that they are nice.  As Shakespeare said,  ”One can smile and smile and be a villain.”