Quote:
Originally Posted by Stitchawl
Not in your 'opinion,' but in your 'culture.' That's what shapes our opinion. If we look at other cultures and try to evaluate them based on our own cultural norms, they ALL look nuts! Everything from eating, dressing, working, and family life. In America we look at men who wear skirts as crazy, but in Scotland, a kilt doesn't get a second glance. It's all normal when kept within its own cultural boundaries.
Absolutely right. There are plenty of them. They just are not the norm. Even if you see a few hundred people in your advertisements, or a few thousand, there are almost 130,000,000 in Japan. Every society has people who are discontented with their own culture. Hell, every expat living abroad fits that picture, including me! It doesn't mean that most Americans want to live abroad.
In fact, Japan is going through a radical and rapid change in its cultural norms right now. Perhaps too rapid to survive in a positive outcome. A rising crime rate, a declining birth rate, a radical change in the distribution chain in merchandising, an increase in kiretsu holdings, etc., etc., etc. What doesn't seem to be changing though are the attitudes about employment, family, and religion.
Japan is, and has always been, a culture based on Confucian values rather than Christian ones. And THAT is a very big difference. 'Family' comes first in Christian values, but only fourth in Confucian values. This is why Japanese men are more devoted to their employer than their families, and are willing to work themselves to death to see that it prospers. We in the West have no such allegiance except to our families, or in some cases, to our military organizations.
It's a very different culture. We simply can not view it, not understand it, and not really appreciate it if we continue to evaluate it based on a different criteria. It's a case of apples vs oranges.
Besides... who are we to judge?
Stitchawl
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I have nothing against your preference for Japanese women, although my first reaction was EEEK! But that was knee jerk.
If you are both happy then whatever way you became happy can't be all bad.
I am pretty confused by the quoted post though. Do you think it is a better thing for a man to put his job before family? Might be a necessity in Japanese culture as with few people changing jobs it is possibly hard to find a new/better/different one. And Japanese employers have traditionally looked after their employees as if they were family, but I have heard that is changing.
Some of my favorite reading material is about Asian cultures, perhaps because I have had several good Asian friends and have been in two personal relationships with Asian men, one in the early 70's when it was considered a bit of a no-no in Canada. And I have worked with 100's in my 11.7 jobs
and I like them and they like me AFAIK. But I don't pretend to understand them in many ways.
Still people are all individuals and I find it hard to believe the Japanese are as stereotypical as you seem to imply.
Helen