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Japan's Empire of Cool
The Wicked Priest writes "The Washington Post is reporting that culture is among Japan's leading exports." Talks about Anime, Manga, Music, Video Games and so forth. Interesting reading.
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...every year? I think it's the result of reporters on vacation at the end of the year, doing a cut-and-paste on the date, and hoping the editor doesn't catch the dupe.
I haven't been paying attention to the Billboard top 100 recently, but are there some Japanese rock bands that i don't know about ?
-- You see, there would be these conclusions that you could jump to
I think basically what the West is beginning to realise is that Japan is an entire culture which, while being easily as technologically advanced as America (and in many ways more so), is totally different from America. It's new, it's unusual, it's different, and a lot of it is stuff that Westerners have never even contemplated before, let alone seen.
Kids are insane over Dragonball Z because super-kung-fu-firing-fireballs-from-fingertips-fly ing-about-kicking-people-through-mountains genre just doesn't exist in America. Sure, it's an appalling series on many levels, but it brings something new to the table and for them, that (combined with its testosterone content) makes it worth watching.
qntm.org
How many hot girls do you know that love manga, anime and videogames ?
And please, no anecdotes about "my wife does!"...I'm talking in the general case. Walk into a bar on the Upper West Side talking about Castle in the Sky to the 6'0 Brazilian supermodel and she'll stare at you blankly while planning her escape.
Japan has a niche with a certain segment (nerdy people) but their culture doesn't have broad appeal to the masses. Sure, videogames pull in a lot of money but they're typically bought by young men.
The readers of this site will love the article because it will affirm something they want to believe in, but it doesn't really make it true.
-- You see, there would be these conclusions that you could jump to
Do not forget that Japan "opened itself up" to the west under the gaze of American cannons intent on obtaining Japanese culture.
Thus resulting in the overthrow of the stable "military" Shogunate that had maintained Japan as a land of peace, domestically and internationally, for 250 years or so, to be replaced by militarists who armed Japan and went on an empire by conquest rampage.
A rampage rather overtly based on the western model of such, no less.
You are correct about Japanese racism though. This is a nation that can claim to have no racial issues due to their single race when millions of Japanese born people of Korean descent can't obtain citizen ship and the aboriginal populace is treated as if it doesn't exist, except maybe as a tourist exhibit.
However, through most of their history they have overtly acknowledged that real culture came from the mainland, much as once the English may have held themselves superiour and yet looked to France, Italy and even the German provinces for real culture.
It's a peculiar schizophrenia, but not entirely beyond the realm of understanding.
On the other hand while we have hungered for Japanese goods for the past 200 years or so we too use them as Americans, without becoming Japanese in the process, even while we study Karate and go to Zendos to test our Koan understanding.
We have our own peculiar ways of being schizophrenic, it's just harder for us to see because for us it's normal.
So for the Japanese, or any other culture for that matter.
KFG
This brings up an interesting question: Why are the Japanese so keen to take, modify and integrate other cultures to suit their needs, yet they're still incredibly racist of other cultures?
It's pretty simple, same reason you find racism in certain parts of the States and in ethnic neighborhoods in cities. In monocultures, there's nobody around to point out that you're being a racist when everyone thinks the same.
I'm Japanese, growing up in the burbs of NYC, I was stereotyped and the subject of racist remarks my entire childhood. It wasn't until I moved away to more metro areas that I found more acceptance. So racism still runs strong in the States, make no mistake about it.
"National Pride" is ok, we see a lot of pride parades here in NYC. But just start to say something bad about another race, everyone jumps all over you for being a racist. You can't say anything about another culture without being condemned as a racist. We're forced to be politcally correct or face a civil lawsuit. That's a long ways away from being an integrated "melting pot" society as we'd like to believe.
Japan isn't much different in terms of racism; the only difference is that there aren't people forcing them to watch everything they say, so they don't think about it. Yeah, many will openly discriminate and don't think twice about it, I hear about it from my caucasian friends who live in Japan. It's really that they haven't been forced to accept other cultures, socially or legally.
What Japan really needs is Al Sharpton to stir things up, make them more aware of how racist the society is. Not sure if even he can do it, but it'd be a good start.
-- If god wanted me to have a sig, he'd have given me a sense of humor.
I like Japan. It rocks. The food's good, people are respectful of each other, and you can buy beer in vending machines. However, I feel compelled to tell you all that I hate anime. Lots of Japanese people hate it as well. (Similarly, many Americans hate Hollywood films, network television, etc.)
I feel that American anime fanboys like anime mostly because it is different. To be a fan of anime makes them feel special (because ordinary American people are not very familiar with anime apart from Pokemon et al.)
Lastly, what I hate even more than anime are anime-themed RPGs. Thank you for letting me vent. No offense intended.
" If you look at Border's or Barnes, you'll see five or six shelves of Manga,"
Just a shame that 5 out of those 6 shelves are all Dragon Ball...