
How Japan Copied American Culture and Made it Better - eplanit
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/how-japan-copied-american-culture-and-made-it-better-180950189/?no-ist
======
11thEarlOfMar
There are plenty of other examples from America, including vintage Ford
Mustangs, Winnebagos, Converse tennis shoes and Baseball. I spent a couple of
years expatriated to Japan and learned that for a Japanese person to admit
they had a hobby or interest actually meant they were expert with it. You
wouldn't admit you 'enjoyed playing violin' in your spare time unless you were
a maestro. If you were not an expert, you would not talk about your interests.
If a Japanese colleague mentioned they had 1966 Mustang, you could be certain
it was perfect. For many Japanese colleagues, if I spent enough time drinking
with them, I'd find a surprisingly intense sense of pride and mastery in an
obscure area of interest. You'd never know about it unless you spent time
enough to get past their modesty so they'd talk about it. I'd venture that
this is the source of the author's observation about not just copying, but
improving.

There were also some pretty twisted counter-examples of not getting Americana
quite right. I ran across an outer wear store named 'Violence Jack Off',
display windows crowded with black leather jackets.[Edit]

~~~
ANTSANTS
Possibly a play on "Violence Jack"?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violence_Jack](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violence_Jack)

------
spikels
Almost everything is better in Japan!

\- Taxi doors open themselves (and the drivers wear white gloves)

\- Subway maps light up to indicate where you are

\- You can hold your table at a cafe by leaving your phone or keys or wallet &
nobody will steal it

\- Take out coffee often has a piece of tape so it won't spill

\- People are friendly & cheerful when you met them (although they are much
the same when you get to know them)

\- Goods are packaged beautifully (if perhaps excessively)

\- Sexuality is much more specialized (if sometimes bizarre)

\- French pastries are better than in France

\- Even ice cubes are better

\- I could go on and on...

While Japan has many flaws almost any "thing" you can point to, if not always
better, is usually better. What is perhaps more interesting is the things that
are worse.

~~~
ranebo
"What is perhaps more interesting is the things that are worse."

First and foremost I believe is resistance to change. The reasoning of
"because that's the way it has always been" and general bureaucracy means
change is very slow to come. When change is actually put into motion it occurs
with amazing efficiency but initial resistance seems much stronger than many
other cultures.

Anyway, my personal counter list might go like this:

\- Blatant sexism

\- The work emphasis placed on quantity (time) over quality

\- Despite a reputation of High Tech, requiring paper (printed) documents for
nearly everything.

\- Meeting people outside of work/school is so unusual that often you can make
someones night by striking up a conversation in a bar. Great for the visiting
tourist but seems suffocating for many Japanese.

\- Fantastic food often ruined by the people chain smoking right next to you.

Still really enjoy living here, but I fortunately don't have to deal with the
Japanese work environment like many of my friends do.

~~~
Jack000
Don't forget trash cans. I regularly spend 10+ minutes walking around looking
for a trash can. I know they got rid of them due to terrorism but c'mon that
was 15 years ago.

~~~
jmadsen
That's not true. They generally consider it people's own responsibility to
take care of the trash themselves by taking it home & disposing of it there.

Most people don't stop to think: it costs money to dispose of trash. Here they
just don't believe the city should have to foot the bill for your garbage.
Different way of thinking about it, is all.

~~~
michaelbuddy
No, it's a lack of consideration. That's the paradox of Japan. They consider a
lot, say spending zillions on the care of vegetation by the municipality. But
then you find that there's not enough waste cans to dispose of the trash from
the street food you just bought. They could tax the vendors a bit more, have
them pay for the waste removal they are ultimately generating, then everyone's
happy.

Then there's the lack of soap dispensers in restrooms. you know where you
might have just had an accident, you get to clean up your hands with just
water. Then jet dry all the particles into the air on that overbuilt $1900
unnecessary hand dryer. You know for the sake of cleanliness. I guess dry
hands are clean hands right?

It's a different way of thinking about it. So the guy who had shit on his
hands, cleaned it up, but it's still on the faucet. Now I've touched the
faucet (with my had because no towel dispenser of course) and I've got his
shit on my hands. Real cool. But they good thing the hedges outside the
restroom look so nice.

~~~
narism
To the untrained eyes, it may appear that there is no where to throw trash
away in Tokyo. This is because the Japanese have cleverly disguised the trash
cans as vending machines (PET bottles/aluminum cans) and convenience stores
(other garbage).

------
bowlofpetunias
A remarkably American centric article, in which the author appears to see
America as the origin of things instead of just a dot on a long line that has
always been weaving back an forth between different cultures and countries.

A casual remark betrays this blind American-centrism: _" the new American
hipster ideal of Brooklyn is clumsily copied everywhere from Paris to
Bangkok"_.

Seriously? Coming from Amsterdam I have a hard time seeing the American
hipster culture as anything other than heavily copying Northern-European
lifestyles in a way that strongly reminds me of how Japan so often imitates
Western cultures. (Also the same pattern, stuff that is added or reshaped in
America appears here again, which may confuse the author. But "clumsily
copyied", are you f-ing kidding me?)

Interesting article, but the lack of perspective bothers me.

~~~
richliss
I agree...

I visited Stockholm in the 90's and there were many many young people there
that were defacto hipsters in they way they dressed, bought vinyl, used old
film cameras like lomo's etc. etc. way before I saw the same in London or New
York.

I have this view that the individualist fashionistas all around the world are
in realtime creating a movement like hipsterism without realising it, and for
the most part people think they look like idiots, but every now and again the
right person hits the right look at the right time and there's suddenly lots
of people copying it, and validating the look creating a movement.

------
WhoIsSatoshi
I feel the Japanese struggle within their overcrowded society and that
"specialization" is a way that one can have his own corner of freedom. If you
go over there, you will notice that people work extraneously long hours, get
paid little, and are constantly playing an intricate interaction model where
seniority, class, sex, origins all play major roles. This is why so many went
into video games, anime or manga. They need an escape. And just as you find
that drive within their work, which is at the most strict expectation level,
you can find traces of it in their hobbies.

~~~
tluyben2
Is Japan overcrowded? Because I don't think it is. Yes their cities are (I
fail to understand the drive to live in a city, I see mostly disadvantages)
but they have a large amount of unpopulated areas which, if people spread out,
would not be considered overcrowded? Unlike the Netherlands where I'm from for
instance, which is basically a big city.

~~~
skrebbel
And Drenthe.

~~~
tluyben2
And Drenthe.

Edit: I love HN, people care to downvote this joke on a sunday. Must be
Drenthenaren who feel discriminated on. Sorry, it wasn't meant that way.

------
l0stb0y
One thing that it's difficult for foreigners to acknowledge is that Japan is
so completely different to the western world that it's almost impossible to
comprehend. Articles like this, and the musings of western visitors/workers,
read more to me as people misinterpreting their surroundings and
misunderstanding Japanese culture. I'm convinced that a lot of Japanese have
difficulty understanding the current state of their own culture too. The best
way I can describe it is that western culture
(capitalism/consumerism/democracy) does not mix well with traditional Japanese
culture and has resulted in a bizarre chaos. My first-hand experience has
shown me that a lot of Japanese prefer the traditional culture to what they
currently have and I do not blame them one bit.

~~~
greggman
What makes you say that it's impossible to comprehend?

I've been here on and off ~8 of the last 16 years. Several non Japanese
friends that have been here 10, 15, 20, 25 years. I don't get the impression
any of them have a hard time comprehending any of it.

As for some Japanese (not all by a long shot) preferring traditional, first
off, those are not all or even most. Many of those that do are similar to
people in the west that prefer "organic" or "natural" or "traditional" for
arguably no rational reason.

I don't personally know any Japanese that want to go back to any kind of
"traditional culture". Heck, I'm writing this from "The Terminal", a shared
workspace in Harajuku surrounded by Japanese on notebooks. Hardly
"traditional" in any sense.

~~~
celebril
I see you're still perceiving Japanese culture through your native Western
lenses.

Well done on wasting those 16 years understanding nothing but the superficial.

------
joshuak
From my years with my Japanese wife, and the time I've spend in Japan. I've
learned that the key difference of Japanese culture from American culture is
is that americans consider quantity as the measure of value, and Japanese
consider quality to be that measure.

Japanese people will pay more for the higher quality of equivalent goods, and
are interested to learn the difference. While americans feel cheated if they
pay more for a great meal served in small portions, and consider stores like
costco and k-mart to be some of the best shopping choices.

I can assure you if you think Japanese people are missing the point by copying
others you are very much mistaken.

They are not making a copy, they are embracing the point.

~~~
adventured
I think this is far too blanket of a statement given the radical diversity of
America in most every respect.

Many Americans certainly will go for the 50% cheaper, 85% as good product. And
yet America is the largest market for the iPhone, and it does particularly
well here. In the not so distant past, superior Sony products - amongst people
I know - used to be heavily desired for their quality.

I don't think very many people consider K-Mart to be among the best shopping
choices, quite the opposite in fact; ditto Wal-Mart. Being economical doesn't
mean they consider it ideal shopping.

~~~
joshuak
It's very difficult to grok without seeing it at many levels for many years.
And your counter point is a good example of why. It's easy to point to
Americans who have plenty of money and so shop at finer stores. Nevertheless,
at every level the difference between cultures is quality vs quantity.

Regardless if you and I shop at K-Mart you can not deny the market share those
types of stores hold in the US. Most people who don't go to them associate
them with being poor, or unfashionable products. Not because we truly
evaluate, or even know how to evaluate the quality of the products they sell.
This is why rich Americans are just as likely to buy poor quality expensive
products. The measure is exclusivity, or status symbol, which is an aspect of
quantity. Successful Americans rarely show off their good taste and fine
quality, they show off the amount of money they have.

Whereas a Japanese person will go into a K-Mart or a Forever-21(low price
current fashion 'knock-offs') for that matter and look at the stitching and
actually judge the quality. There are poor people in Japan, who wold never buy
some types of american products because they know that while it's cheep it
won't last very long so the net value is lower. I rarely, if ever, see an
American make that trade off (especially in business). In a quality oriented
society, people actually build skills to judge quality over a life time.

Not every single person mind you, but as a culture we each lean in a
direction.

------
emanuer
My wife is Japanese and through her I cam to a realization about this very
topic.

My hypothesis is: Japanese do not accept anything less than perfection. The
accompanying motto seems: "If you cannot archive perfection, don’t even bother
starting.“

To illustrate my point; My wife might ask me to purchase something for her.
Whenever I could not get the specific product she asked for, I just bought
something comparable. At home she would be disappointed to her core, to the
point where she considered the possibility that my intentions where nefarious.
Every time this happened I was shocked. Why would I try to bring her harm by
not buying the exact same thing, but something comparable? Now I was convinced
that her thought-process is rather unique. Yet, to my surprise, almost every
Japanese person who I befriended on a deeper level behaved the same way.

To me it seems for Japanese people there is an crucial "line of competency".
An average Gaijin (non-Japanese) is seen as incompetent to act according to
Japanese customs (rightfully so). Almost everything a Gaijin does, even if it
is rather obnoxious, is not judged by Japanese, but accepted as: „Well...,
different culture, different habits."

When they allow you in their circle, befriend you, you are seen as to cross
the „line of competency“ and your actions will be judged by higher standards.

Now imagine you grew up in a society where everything you do is expected to be
done perfectly. And a consequence of not doing something perfect is bringing
shame to you and those around you (Japan is a shame based culture, so that is
extremely bad). You will not consider starting a task unless you have a very
high chance of archiving mastery. If you do a task, you are not perfect in,
you better hide it.

Another example: A friend of mine visited me in Japan and quite frequently
asked people for directions. To his awe every single one of them went out of
their way to help him. People walked for very long distances with him, making
100% certain that he will get to an ATM. In their mind, drawing on a map just
did not suffice. They would walk with him all across Shinjuku station (the
busiest station on the planet) making sure he will find the right train. To
him these were just examples of nice people in Japan. I believe he,
unknowingly, tasked these poor people with unreasonably big requests. When
asking for the nearest ATM these Japanese did not consider the possibility of
pointing in a direction, as this would have left too much room for error.
Anything less than walking with him would have brought shame to them. Actually
when you ask directions and they „just“ point (it happens) look at their
faces. Often thy turn away from you in shame. Or their faces will freeze as if
they just did something appalling.

Imagine having a country of 129 million perfectionists. How would the society
be run? Trains would always be perfectly on time. Food would always look as
delicious as in the ads and taste like you hope it would. People would be very
stressed committing to anything they have not done 100 times before. People
would feel the constant pressure to live up to insane expectations and if they
could not hold up to them, they would be anxious to leave their houses
(otaku). — If you are not familiar with the Japanese culture, this is exactly
like it is in Japan.

A last point to support the article, I was in Rome and an Italien friend
brought me to „the best pizzeria in Italy“. I must say, it was a truly
delicious pizza. 3 Days later I was in Osaka and went with a Japanese friend
to a „very good “ pizza place. Every single slice of pizza I ate there was
pure perfection. It blew the „best pizzeria in Italy“ out of the water. The
pizzeria in the Namba Parks is run by Japanese who studied in Italy.

~~~
adrianm
Friendly advice: you should think twice before posting long comments where you
systematically examine racial generalizations (and dare I say it:
stereotypes!) you find to be anecdotally valid.

It's this sort of "reasoning by anecdote" that, while convincing to the
individuals relating them, can easily mislead others into believing your
conclusions are rational.

~~~
emanuer
Thank you for your advice, I fully agree. I cannot edit my comment anymore, so
I actually think about just deleting it.

Edit: I am surprised to find; I mistakenly assumed I have the ability to
delete my comments. That seems new...

~~~
pasbesoin
I enjoyed your comment, as I have enjoyed many comments here on HN that quite
thoughtfully and often eloquently take the time to provide a personal context
and, yes, anecdote, to a more generally reported circumstance.

Don't worry about it. I -- for one ;-) -- think your comment was appropriate
and useful, in this context.

(For example, it provides me with some additional insight to my own occasional
interactions with Japanese culture. Most useful, to me.)

Nor do I mean to be overly critical of the critiquing response. Yes, we do
need to be aware of anecdote versus corroborated fact. But, as one other
respondent has commented, we make some assumption that those on HN can judge
this for themselves.

\--

This comment meant in good spirit, all around. And yes, it's just my opinion.

------
Ryanmf
W. David Marx has been doing wonderful analysis of Japan and this phenomenon
of trend adoption/synthesis/evolution—specifically with regard to fashion but
he's covered many other topics as well—at
[http://neojaponisme.com](http://neojaponisme.com) for years now.

Don't lose your weekend to the archive. Or, you know, do.

~~~
probel
But be aware he's considered something of a blowhard and not taken very
seriously by the expat community in Tokyo.

~~~
wdavidmarx
But also be aware probel always says the opposite of the truth and is a little
too overly beloved by the expat community in Tokyo.

------
null_ptr
> _Dylan is, in fact, the bar’s reason for being: Japanese fans come here to
> watch his concert videos, listen to his tapes and relive the ’60s in
> America, a time and place almost none of them witnessed firsthand._

Are there any places in America where one may do this today?

~~~
adventured
I've found that a lot of (all?) major cities in America have throw-back diners
and similarly themed restaurants (I don't know any specific to Dylan mind
you).

~~~
aswanson
There should be. Dylan is awesome.

------
Tiktaalik
The fashion industry owes an enormous debt to Japan for preserving American
heritage after America threw it away.

~~~
adventured
This is hardly accurate. Cultures regularly "throw away" and then later
rediscover (re-popularize) pieces of their own historical culture / identity.
It has nothing to do with it being preserved by another culture (such that if
it weren't, it could have never existed again).

~~~
gregholmberg
Yes. Western civilization became estranged from scientific inquiry itself for
many long centuries.

If not for the patient and curious scribes of medieval Islam, many significant
works from Ancient Greece and Rome would have been lost forever.

------
tzury
single page version: [http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/how-japan-copied-
americ...](http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/how-japan-copied-american-
culture-and-made-it-better-180950189/?all)

------
phr4ts
Understand the way of the Samurai and you're half way to understanding the
Japanese.

Shame, dishonour, pride.... these are words that stem from the Samurai way.

"Measure twice and cut once."

Advice to those who care, watch a few Samurai films and you'll get it.

------
sdvn
I'm really interested in this phenomenon. Can anyone recommend/does anyone
know of other articles, essays, or books on the subject?

------
frozenport
The focus on material things highlights the problem. They have copied
everything, but failed to capture the spirit by not acting like their idols. I
would like to see the Japanese people act, rebel, and change the world.

All I see is escapism, ironically similar to the escapism Westerner's find in
Japanese culture.

------
davidgerard
WARNING: AUTOPLAY VIDEO. Flagged.

------
mailshanx
I hope patio11 can comment on this. I've always enjoyed reading his take on
Japan. He is extremely well qualified to compare American and Japanese
culture: he was born and raised in the US, moved to Japan after graduating and
got married there.

~~~
romanovcode
No offense but your patio11 sounds like a textbook LBH case.

------
seanhandley
American culture? There's more culture in yoghurt.

~~~
smprk
The only other country I have been to outside of my own country, is America.
And I must say I loved the people and the culture there.

If you look at all the small differences between way of life in America and
different parts of the world, you will start appreciating all cultures for
what niceties they offer.

Do try it :-)

------
Second_son
The Japanese culture and way of life were systematically gutted during and
after WWII, after which they slowly came to adopt American norms. Defeated
people have imitated the victors time and again throughout history. This has
little to do with how amazing the other culture is.

I find little to celebrate in the Americanization of yet another unique & rich
culture.

~~~
astrange
Japanese culture, though very "western", is not very American. Many essential
American cultural elements such as religion, guns, cars, libertarians,
feminism, and no sex on TV are missing, and it is certainly not as
individualist.

It's not a great place to be a programmer, though - people I know working at
pixiv (a modern foreigner-friendly web startup) aren't paid even entry-level
US salaries.

But with pixiv you can see one of the good sides of Japan. It's basically
DeviantArt, but amateur artists on pixiv have often practiced for years and
their art is technically good, whereas DeviantArt posters are all more than
satisfied with their weird fetish art they drew in MS Paint.

You could try Korea, which is a lot more like America. Specifically, Texas.

~~~
nemasu
I'm a programmer in Japan. And there are so many dev jobs here it's
ridiculous... _IF_ you can speak Japanese.

