How to preserve Japanese culture?

Just not let it be corrupted by the West

Summary: An American man offers advice to Japanese people to preserve the great culture and values that have served them well for centuries.

Photo of a Japanese girl playing koto

I just read your article "Save Japanese culture - It is slowly being destroyed by Hollywood".

Let me first say that I was born in America and I have not yet visited Japan although I hope to some day.

I read this article and just wanted to say that I agree with this completely! The Japanese people, culture, history and traditions are amazing and I think it would be very sad to allow it to continue to be influenced by the West.

I have lived in America for 40 years now and can say from experience we have very little sense of family here, no sense of community or even basics like taking the time to help someone out unless it somehow benefits them. Sure we talk about these things and tell the rest of the world about how great our freedom is but in reality, this country seems to be more about greed, power and egotism. To me, Japan seems to be the ideal country and it is the rest of the world that would benefit by adopting some of Japan's culture.

I recently read an article about how some American women from Harvard University were offended when they went to work in Japan and had to serve green tea. Being from America they were complaining about how wrong and demeaning it was to them and how the Japanese way of life should be more like America. The reality is that people like that should not be allowed in Japan if they cannot accept the culture because they are just more of a bad influence. When you really get past the 'flash and neon' of America and really look at it's people, it's not so good. Most people don't even see this because when first encountering America they are too distracted by name-brand shopping and Hollywood style settings.

A teacher of mine once told me, the easiest way to learn about any country or culture is to simply look at the children, ages 4 to early 20's. It is because children emulate everything they see and have not yet learned to hide the bad things from public view. If you look at American children you will see very spoiled children that yell and scream when they don't get what they want.

They make friends and their friends instantly become more important to them than family. They steal from each other, do drugs, break laws.... it is the same in all aspects of life here, it is just hidden better by the adults. There is very little honor here.

The schools teach less and less every year and then lower the requirements to graduate in order to keep the graduation numbers up. The government always comes up with new ways to tax your income and control your lives, the true cost of living is not good, most people are taught to live through our credit system and a series of loans that end up lasting for most of their lives, the drug companies take advantage of everyone , especially the elderly, older people are sent to nursing homes instead of being taken care of by their families and even then the nursing homes treat them badly and steal from them. I may have been born in America but I can see right and wrong, good and bad. To be honest, you will never realize how sad it is for me every day to have been born here.... To me, this is NOT the way humanity should live. :(

I truly hope Japan realizes this and begins working on removing western influence from their culture and returning to all the true Japanese values and cultures that make your country great. The entire world would truly suffer a loss if Japan continues to let it's people be influenced by the west. I hope some day soon I will have a chance to visit Japan before it changes any more than it already has. Please don't ever stop trying to keep the true Japanese culture alive.

Transition of Japanese society and business Changes in Japanese companies

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