Followup to “Surviving in Japan. Lesson 2″
Remember the post about how Japan easternized western culture? Well, a little while after that, I was reading Thomas Friedmans’ “The World if Flat”. In one part of his book he mentions exactly that. I know this post is a little off topic, but it’s my blog.
In a nutshell, what he says is that what we generally think of westernization, or “Americanization”, isn’t completely true. Our view of westernization (we really need to think of a better word, as you will see, since this word isn’t that close to the truth) is the zoomed-out google earth view; it’s like looking at two people from 1km up and then saying they’re the same. Westernizing a country gives it tools to better it’s populace. Does its populace then emulate America or Europe? Not really. Since I’m in Japan, it’s going to be my example.
Does Japan drink the same things as the west? The main two beverages of choice in Japan are tea and beer. Coca-Cola is in Japan and they cater to the market. The only thing similar is that you can buy some (Coke, Sprite, Mountain Dew) western beverages. Furthermore, there are many more domestic Japanese beverage companies, not just Coke and Pepsi: Dydo, Itoen, Asahi, Kirin, etc. If you go to a bar you can get import beers, but, by far, the most ingested beers are not Budweiser or Coors, but (probably) Kirin and Asahi.
Does having clean water, money for leisure, a tv, a computer, an internet connection, nice clothes, a car, etc. mean that a person is Americanized? I find this line of thinking to be quite odd. The importance is not that they have a tv, but what are they watching; not that they have nice clothes, but who makes the clothes and what they say; not that they have a car, but who makes it. That Japan has these things does not make it western.
The fact that a technology is invented in one location does not necessarily mean that the technology should be considered their own. The idea of the car was fostered in Europe. What makes an American car an American car is American qualities. All cars share certain qualities (an internal combustion engine, four wheels, a metal frame, etc.), but an American car is distinctly different from a German car, which is distinctly different from a Japanese car.
One can take pride in the fact that their country helped foster such great minds to make such interesting and useful technology, but it is not yours to keep hidden.
Chase, Chase, Chase … clearly you don’t understand how things are westernized (in other words, Americanized). You see, we, as Americans, don’t care about who invented what or what other people are doing with our ideas.
Let me explain. America may have taken some ideas, from other countries, but we changed them to better suit our needs and wants here in this country. We, Americanized those things, if you will.
Also, there are other countries that have taken some of our ideas and adapted them to suit their needs and wants. See, we have Americanized them as well by injecting our ideas and such and letting them be changed in a socially acceptable way.
So, if you follow this logic through, whether we are taking ideas from others and making them our own or our [American] ideas are being adopted to new ways of life … well, it’s still Americanizing. It doesn’t matter what direction the pipeline flows, it’s all Americanizing cause we are just that awesome. So Japan is as American as apple pie, pizza, beer, and chinese food. Make sense?
Keep up the good work. I’m liking the blog thus far. Good insight into the culture and fun stuff happening in Japan. Always love “Monkey Tuesday”. Have you started the documentary, yet?
the original Mike: What ideas are you talking about? Democracy, freedom, liberty, yadda, yadda, yadda? Those aren’t American ideas. They’re “self-evident”.
Are you talking about ideas like Boyle’s Law and Darwin’s Theory of Evolution?
“Make sense?” No.