Posted on 10/22/2009 11:01:37 AM PDT by chinaboy
Few days ago, I have seen a section of article” Eiffel Tower, New York's Empire State Building, Tokyo TV Tower are western three famous buildings” it amazes me, here the Tokyo TV Tower isn’t in Japan. Traditionally in geography and culture Japan belongs to east, but why the international presses reported japan as a western country? Does Japan really belong to “western countries”?
Given its economy, political system and defense alliances, I think Japan, at least for a large part, considers itself ‘western’.
Japan is a capitalist democracy. It’s people are free. It is a prosperous nation based on Western principles that happens to be located in the Far East. What don’t you understand?
By some measures, yes. It’s form of government, political/diplomatic alliances and secular humanist culture all identify it within the ‘western civilization’ sphere. But one could argue these are superficially, even artificially imposed (such as the model of government by the U.S. after WWII). At a deeper cultural level there are still non-western elements, though I’m surprised how thoroughly they’ve disappeared from prominence in Japanese culture (to the small degree I know of such matters.)
Please do remember that reporters, journalists, news persons, etc and so on, are, for the most part, complete, utter and useless fools.
You have to look real hard to find a group of people more naturally prone to be stupid to the point of retarded.
Reporters will always get it wrong if given half a chance. They’ll be wrong in substance, wrong in detail, wrong in assumption, wrong in identification, wrong in namings, you name it, if it can be done wrong, they’ll do it.
Journalism, in our culture, is where people go to find work when they don’t want to just sit on their asses and suck up welfare, but can’t qualify for anything useful due to lack of skills, lack of brains, lack of understanding and lack of basic ability to comprehend or discern fact from fancy.
Not sure how you define westernize. Western countries are the most modern countries, so Japan have adopted alot of the lifestyle. Is it being western or just being modern?
South Korea, Japan, Hongkong, Singapore are advanced modern/western countries, compariable to the best in the west
Oh, i see, from the economic point of view, Japan belongs to the Western capitalist countries,it was a American protectorate.
what do you want to say, is rich belongs to eastern and poor belongs to Eastern?
what do you want to say, is rich belongs to Western and poor belongs to Eastern?
It was an American protectorate in that we defeated Japan in World War II, occupied it, established a democratic form of government (which Japan has done an excellent job of maintaining), established a free-market economy, set Japan on its feet and left. Japan is a Western capitalist country because IT’S PEOPLE ARE FREE. They are not enslaved by their government, economically, politically, or in any other way.
Are you trolling for a fight?
Let me answer that: Yes, he is.
nope!
I don’t think you’re being honest. People who post vanities like that and snap prepared answers at people who think they’re entering a polite discussion are trolls. Why are you doing this?
YEAH, IT’S PEOPLE ARE FREE, LIKE A BIRD. LOL, Just kidding, now I see.
i know it is a political issue! I just have some confusion.
I can only assume, from your profile, that you are unfamiliar with the concept of freedom, in the Western sense. Perhaps your government allows you access to google. Try googling “self-determination.”
I think its greatest links were world war two, Nagasaki, Hiroshima, and the subsequent American Marshall Plan to rebuild their nation (and keep Japan from communism). The gifts of money and technology made their “great leap “ possible. After this were one on one communications with stronger links established, with America supporting the nation through buying their products....
I am learning japanese in my leisure time, and find it intersting, a really different culture from china, there is no need to angry.
Who’s angry? Perhaps you need to google “projection,” in the freudian sense.
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