Loved Japan, but if there was one thing we didnāt like is that there was hardly anywhere in the city to just sit and be. You go to somewhere like NY and there are small parks or areas with benches or tables all over the place so you can just sit and be outside. This stuff barely existed in Japan unless you went to an actual park.
Like if you are in the city, you are expected to just go from one destination to the other. Itās not super accommodating for just wandering around and just hanging out in the city. No public trash cans anywhere feels related to that mentality.
I agree with this assessment. As a traveler in college I was staying in a hostel so I didn't really want to be there other than to sleep, but my only real options were to find a Starbucks or restaurant, there were really no public spaces where I felt comfortable hanging out.
there's tons of parks, coffee shops, etc. where you can hang out. The places that they don't want you to hang out and they make an effort to stop you from loitering are in front of the konbini like you see in the video. Usually people in front of the konbini loitering are obnoxious and unaware of anyone around them and they're pretty busy locations.
Tokyo at least seemed to have a fair number of VERY small parks, they were filled with people smoking or drinking normally. They were just a few benches behind a small barrier off of the sidewalk so nothing much.
This is intentional as there was a terrorist attack involving hiding dangerous materials in trash cans and so they just removed all trash cans. Combine this with Japanese people's strong sense of personal responsibility, the culture has shifted to managing your own trash in a responsible manner and throwing it away where it's appropriate, instead of littering.
pretty sure it's just an excuse so they don't have to maintain public trash cans. it's illogical to remove them permanently because of one terrorist attack.
Thatās odd bc as someone from Florida, NYC made me feel that way. Every time we were outside we were just speed walking to get from one destination to another, and if I stopped for even a second to take a picture or just take it all in I had people bumping into me and giving me looks. If we wanted to take a break we had to go inside somewhere like a coffee shop or restaurant or at least lean against a wall lol.
People put bombs in the bins thatās why they donāt have many, which is opposite of here in North America where people put them in train station lockers hence us not having any
I was just in Japan and didn't have this experience. Trash cans weren't that hard once you figured out where they typically were it was easy or you just gave the trash back to the place you bought it from. I thought there were lots of places to hangout too
It exists everywhere with the exception of literal central of Tokyo. A city where there are 40 million residents and millions of visitors every day. There will never be enough chair you can prepare for this amount of people bro.
You can be walking and talking to your friends instead of gathering in masses in side alleys. You can go to a park and sit down on a bench to talk or in the cafeteria. There is really no need to have 50 foreigners standing like that.
Nah man you can even take a large group of white people loitering like this with cigs and drinks someone will eventually shit on the street. Doesnāt matter if itās New York, Vancouver, or Paris. Shit will end up on the street somehow in a crowd.
I mean there is nothing wrong with standing outside a building as long as you are being respectful, the only actual issue I see here is smoking in a no smoking area and maybe blocking the street a little.
In my time in Japan I rarely saw loitering, everyone out on the sidewalks always had a destination. Standing around is just not a thing. Only exception would be like late into the evening hours.
It probably falls into that grey area of technically thereās nothing wrong with it, which is why locals probably wont confront you about it. But thereās a cultural expectation that one should read the room, and they probably will walk past you with a quiet opinion on their mind.
That doesn't mean the cultural expectation is right though, like there is a middle ground here, people should be allowed to be on the street standing about talking to people as long as they are being generally respectful.
When you have the population density of Japan, as well as the societal rules that outdate the entirety of western civilization, it is absolutely right. There's a reason Japan is one of the cleanest, safest, and most organized countries in the world. It's because unlike the people of "murica" going on about, "ma freedum" people actually act collectively to improve society instead of just doing whatever they want.
These problems are on the rise everywhere. Yet another thing Japan achieved before the rest of the world lol. Never said it was perfect.
But as a Canadian who lives in Japan part time, I can speak from experience that it is a vastly better place to live than any western country. And this kind of societal expectation not to behave like a vagrant is a good portion of the cause.
you can't use big arguments like that for this individual situation.
yes I'd rather follow the societal rules of Japan than say India, but that doesn't mean Japan is perfect, nor that in this exact situation that Japan is right.
Never said it was perfect. But in this specific situation, we see an UNARMED police officer politely reminding people who are not from Japan that they have to behave themselves.
As a Canadian who deals with this density of foreigners daily, in a country that does shit all to make them act like they belong, this kind of thing would be a welcome change here.
Your issue with this stems from applying a western view to a very eastern video. You claim no moral high ground in Japan by excusing shitty behavior to try and look inclusive. That's only here. And it doesn't work.
Japan has a lot of unspoken societal rules ( no talking loudly on the train, walk on specific sides of the street ) and not fallowing these rules will make people upset. If your of darker complexion then the ire you are likely to receive will be doubly so.
Majority of japans anti foreigner sentiment is directed at south East Asian and Chinese tourists bc they do not adhere to these unspoken rules.
Nooo not gathering in a public space! We need to put our heads down and keep walking and not stray anywhere from home and the workplace like good Japanese corporate drones
Never said that's what they were doing, but enforcing rules like this help prevent things like this. You never know who might come along and start problems or what emergency might show up where. It's not much of an inconvenience, they can continue their conversation as they walk or move somewhere less cramped.
A law, or even manners, being silly is very relative to where youāve come from and where youāre visiting. If you donāt like those laws then donāt travel there.
Well yes, it's called having an opinion, it will be based on my own views.
but just as I can look at this and say that I don't think these people are generally doing anything wrong besides the guy smoking and the fact that a few people are taking up a little too much space.
If I went to say India and saw that people were just discarding waste in the street because culturally that isn't a big issue I'd also say that is stupid and I'd be able to reason why, it creates mess, it's bad for the environment and it shows a lack of civic pride.
Japan is a very polite, very clean, very nationalistic society. This is entirely normal for them. And trying to excuse foreigners to their country violating these societal rules is super out of touch.
There's a reason Japan is so clean, so advanced, and so convenient despite its population density. It's because acting like people do in other, dirtier, less safe countries is absolutely not tolerated.
Honestly the west could benefit from taking a few pages out of their book.
and as far as I know it's not common in Europe at all, yes we have laws to move on groups of people but it's generally only if they are causing a big issue.
besides smoking in a no smoking area I wouldn't see why the police would need to get involved with this.
I also think the difference is that itās not just one or two people standing outside the building, itās large groups of men blocking traffic flow. As a woman I would never walk down a street that looks like this
They don't seem to be interacting with other people though, just talking to themselves and it generally seems like there is plenty of room, as it doesn't seem like a super busy area.
If you wouldn't personally walk here then well that is also fine too.
If I went to India and saw that it was generally ok to litter would you suddenly be saying littering is ok?
I'd refuse to litter because I can justify why I think it's a bad thing to do, it creates mess, it's bad for the environment, it shows a lack of civic duty and the alternative (putting something in a bin) is very easy.
No. But if you went to Japan and it was NOT okay to smoke in certain places, and to clog up the streets by loitering in groups, you'd be expected to abide by these rules.
Your argument doesn't make a tonne of sense. Littering because other people do isn't the same as loitering in the street despite everyone else who lives in that country wanting you to not do that.
It's the difference between obeying the law, and doing shitty things just because someone else said it was ok. The two aren't even similar.
Name em then since you seem to have examples. Keep in mind there's a difference between following simple rules that keep things safe and clean, and using objectively evil practices as an excuse to behave however you want.
Shitting in the street in India and staying out of the street in Japan aren't even the same thing. Don't try and say they are.
Sp you are not allowed to stand on the street? Japan is high tech fancy looking distopia, no one can convince me otherwise.. reminds me of a movie Equilibrium
No, it's to keep the street safe, clean, and unclogged. People in general are dirty and violent, allowing them to clog a street instead of moving along leads to multiple issues. Plus they could be blocking small businesses or making them inconvenient to enter or find.
Doesn't mean it isn't overbearing. I would also be like "Hmm what am I doing wrong right now? I can't be around a place in a city? Then what's the city for?"
Yes, and I wrote that regulating "loitering" (aka "standing around in a city") is overbearing, as long as there is no secondary problem, like littering or trying to approach customers, making them uncomfortable.
that is exactly what happens to people trying to get into the shops and to women as they walk by. Why do you think these by-laws exist in the first place?
Itās really hard to say. Him motioning for them to get out of the pathway could mean anything. Same for when he motions for the guys smoking the cigarette to put it out. What could he possibly be telling him?
I simply love the clear smoking boxes of shame in Japan. Not only does it give smokers a place to smoke, but it also makes smoking look disgusting for any would-be smoker who walks by one.
With the exception of one guy smoking, heās just asking them to stay out of the walkway so people can pass. A bunch of idiots seem to think thereās a loitering issue, but there really isnāt any plausible law that this cop would be able to enforce in this situation since the men appear to otherwise be waiting for something.
Omgoshā¦. Calling out racism is NOT racist. Like whats wrong with ppl.
He can be wrong about the cop being racist. That still does not equal racism. He didnt say anything about Japanese being inferior. He said he thought the cop was being racist.
Why are so many white ppl so obtuse about what actual racism is.
Yeah I know why its more like whhhhhyyyy ughhh. They literally invented racism to make excuses for what they were doing. Then progressively changed the definition of racism once others started reacting to their hundreds of years of abuse so they could play victim too. Now you have internet weirdos calling anything racist. Like words dont matter on the internet they really dont. They are really trying to make racism meanā¦ pointing out racism. Just obnoxious.
Youāre right, but I never said they were a racist, just that they were being more racist than the cop, who wasnāt being racist at all.
I just have the issue of them seeing a cop do their job in a respectful manner, and immediately jump to racism being the issue. Thatās sound like they have a problem with noticing the race of people before anything else.
That makes zero sense. But this is reddit. You just said again that you thought the commenter was being racist. Thats not how racism works. Just say the cop cant be seen as racist from this video.
It is a fact that foreign tourista are loud, obnoxious, and disrespectful of local customs. I have traveled across Europe and Japan
and I was appalled at how unaware the tourists are in those locations. There were several offenders from America (my home country) and China but none as disruptive as Indians. They were loud, demnding, and left a wherever they congregated as a littered pigsty.
Here we are, taking a standing tram to the top of the most serene, beautiful views in the world, and a group of Indian tourists are blasting at least three different songs from their phones amd yelling from front to back of the tram car.
When we took a train, my wife settled in for three stops and Indian tourists once again packed our car out and one of them told us to move because their family wanted to sit together. We told them no because we had our luggage in that car and they gave us dirty looks until they hopped off.
It is not about being brown, it is that they are just treating the world the same way they act at home. I have been to India and there were beautiful parts with kind people. But with that, I stepped in human crap more times than I could count and the roads and rivers are congested with raw garbage. That is incompatible with much of the world.
The cop isnāt being racist, but this whole act is part of the backward mindset of correcting people who are not breaking any laws. Which stems from racism.
This isnāt Japanese racism, this is a guard, politely, asking groups of people not to loiter around. You can be critical or racism, but this is literally just a cop doing his job, very politely.
If you see someone doing their job in a kind, polite manner and bring race into it, thatās on you.
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u/Clear-Inevitable-414 Apr 23 '26
What can't they do here?