DailyDirt: Does It Take A Village Or A Japanese Metropolis?

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Thu, Nov 19th 2015 5:00pm — Michael Ho

Raising kids is an adventure filled with all sorts of imperfect decisions. A butterfly flapping its wings on your kid's iPad could initiate a cascade of events, leading to his/her eventual life of crime or triumph. Or maybe that butterfly has no effect whatsoever -- how did that unusual insect get into the house, anyway? Common core standards might be crushing young spirits with "new math" -- or just frustrating parents who don't remember how to do long division. Is there an optimal way to parent that leads to a society where every child is above average and no one graduates in the bottom half of the class? Maybe the best path is just to let kids figure it all out themselves. (But probably not.)

Parents in Japan regularly let 9yo (and younger) kids ride the subway alone, but wouldn't necessarily do so if they moved to London or New York. Is there something special about the Japanese culture that allows unsupervised children to be (or at least feel) safe in a large city? Does Tokyo really have some kind of unspoken community ethics, or is something else going on? [url]
Unschooling is a form of homeschooling -- but "un-schooled" kids have complete autonomy over their own education. This sounds like a pretty extreme lifestyle choice, but perhaps some elements of it (such as the skepticism of the increasing number of tests and hours spent on homework) may be appealing. [url]
Who doesn't want to raise kids to be caring, respectful and responsible adults? Apparently, there are 5 simple steps to do so... but step 4 "being a good role model" is a bit much to ask , isn't it? [url]

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Filed Under: common core, education, free range kids, parenting, standards, testing, unschooling

31 Comments

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Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 19 Nov 2015 @ 5:50pm

The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
When they first found out about guns, they decided they were barbaric, cowardly weapons, and they would have nothing to do with them.

Until Commodore Perry turned up in his one gunboat...

“Being a man” in Japan has more to do with honour than macho.
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- Acksiom, 19 Nov 2015 @ 6:21pm
  
  Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
  If suicide wasn't the largest cause of violent death in both the usa and japan, your nonsense might be worth further consideration.
  
  But it is, so that isn't.
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  - Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 19 Nov 2015 @ 8:14pm
    
    Re: If suicide wasn't the largest cause of violent death in both the usa and japan...
    ...neglecting to mention the actual frequencies of violent death in the USA versus Japan.
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    - Acksiom, 19 Nov 2015 @ 10:15pm
      
      Re: Re: If suicide wasn't the largest cause of violent death in both the usa and japan...
      . . .because it isn't *relevant*.
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      - crade (profile), 20 Nov 2015 @ 7:39am
        
        Re: Re: Re: If suicide wasn't the largest cause of violent death in both the usa and japan...
        relevant to what.. what are you getting at? Are you saying suicide is dishonorable so the Japanese can't be honerable, or violent crime rates don't matter because of this stat, or what?
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        Acksiom, 20 Nov 2015 @ 6:18pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: If suicide wasn't the largest cause of violent death in both the usa and japan...
        Read the rest of the comments. If that doesn't answer your question, try again, with a better question.
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- JoeCool (profile), 19 Nov 2015 @ 10:21pm
  
  Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
  Actually, the Japanese have a HUGE gun culture, but since real guns are banned, it's all air guns and the like. You can get an air gun that looks like the actual thing in Japan and walk around in public with it. The US has long since completely banned "toy" guns that look like the real thing... probably because the police are so trigger happy that they'll shoot you over a TV remote, forget about a realistic toy gun. :)
  
  Japanese media also glorifies the hell out of guns. Movies and TV in Japan is a hell of lot more violent that in the US. You'd never get "Ichi the Killer" in the movie theater in the US. The difference is that Japanese people know that outside their version of SWAT and the SDF, they're almost never going to run into a real gun in real life, so they're safe in glorifying guns and pretending their water pistol is the real thing.
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- Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 2:35am
  
  Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
  Completely false. When guns were first brought to Japan by the Portuguese in the mid-1500's, the Japanese took to them immediately. Within a few years they were everywhere. The wars of unification at the end of the 16th century were fought with huge number of tanegashima (matchlocks).
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- Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 6:10am
  
  Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
  I'd rather shoot a gun a few times as opposed to flying a plane once.
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- Mason Wheeler (profile), 20 Nov 2015 @ 7:11am
  
  Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
  Bows, guns, spears and halberds are all tools of the warriors and each should be a way to master strategy.
  
  ...
  
  From inside fortifications, the gun has no equal among weapons. It is the supreme weapon on the field before the ranks clash, but once swords are crossed the gun becomes inadequate.
  -- The Book of Five Rings, Miyamoto Musashi (one of the greatest samurai of all time)
  
  ...you were saying?
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  - Padpaw (profile), 20 Nov 2015 @ 7:52am
    
    Re: Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
    could you guys just pick a time period to agree on instead of cherry picking certain centuries that agree with your side of the argument?
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    - Mason Wheeler (profile), 20 Nov 2015 @ 8:42am
      
      Re: Re: Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
      I'm not trying to cherry-pick anything. His assertion was that prior to Perry's arrival with his gunboats, (in 1854,) the Japanese (implied: universally, throughout their history) despised guns and thought they were dishonorable. This is clearly not true, as Musashi lived approximately 200 years before Perry.
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      - Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 21 Nov 2015 @ 8:00am
        
        Re: This is clearly not true, as Musashi lived approximately 200 years before Perry.
        And yet Perry never saw a single one of Musashi’s “guns”.
        
        How do you explain that?
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- alternatives(), 21 Nov 2015 @ 3:00pm
  
  Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
  When they first found out about guns, they decided they were barbaric, cowardly weapons, and they would have nothing to do with them.
  
  And you know this based on?
  
  The version I am aware of is the guns were used to overthrow the old leaders and were THEN banned.
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- aerilus, 21 Nov 2015 @ 5:33pm
  
  Re: The Japanese Don’t Have A Gun Culture
  I believe they are also obligated to have a very small defensive military due to restrictions placed on them after world war two. swords are heavily restricted as well requiring registration and notification when they move or change hands. this may be seen as more of a tradition of feudal repression where only the elite could be armed and armoured well as opposed to some evidence of a progressive society. they did after all invade china and preemptively attack the usa not to long ago.
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Padpaw (profile), 19 Nov 2015 @ 5:53pm

Common Core is a blight upon society. It is propaganda disguised as teaching. When it relies on neither facts or reality in it's lessons.
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- Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 1:29pm
  
  Re:
  Common cores goal is to have a set of teaching standards that are the same through out different schools. If you take Algebra 1 in a Kansas school, you will learn the same standards if you move to a school in California. There isn't any propaganda about it. On the other hand, the state testing, I think it where the propaganda is. Common core is being skewed towards how to take tests instead of critical thinking.
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Anonymous Coward, 19 Nov 2015 @ 8:54pm

"Safety"
Is there something special about the Japanese culture that allows unsupervised children to be safe in a large city?
Violent crime is near all-time lows in most large cities of "Western" nations (which may be due to the phase-out of leaded fuel). They'd be fine in NYC too, statistically. Much safer than in the 80's when people seemed more willing to let kids run around cities unsupervised. So I reject the implication of this question; if children are unsafe in non-Japanese cultures, I'd like to see the evidence.
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Glenn, 19 Nov 2015 @ 9:09pm

Stop treating "kids" like they're stupid just because they're still young[er than "grown-ups"]. Don't spend most of their young lives trying to keep them from learning about life and then expect them to magically understand everything they need to once they turn 18 (or 21... or 30). Grown-ups are the stupid ones. Wisdom comes with experience, not age.

Schooling? Since most of what we learn in school is never used again, why place so much emphasis on it. Education should simply be about how to learn, not so much what to learn (after readin', writin', and 'rithmetic). Most adults still don't know how to use the brains that "God" gave them (if they did, then they'd never fall prey to religions to begin with).

Humanity is getting dumber by the generation. Phones are already smarter than their owners.
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- Anonymous Coward, 19 Nov 2015 @ 9:26pm
  
  Re:
  Everything would be better if adults started spending more time exposing their children to the wonders of nature.
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Anonymous Coward, 19 Nov 2015 @ 9:14pm

Michael just loves to leave the good jokes to the normal people and instead distributes a couple of groaners to us.

OK, sorry, that wasn't very good. Anybody know any Gauss puns?
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 2:36am

Japan isn't the outlier, the US is
The idea of 9 year olds using public transportation or going on errands is completely normal in 99% of the world. It's only the Home of the Brave that is in a perpetual state of mass hysteria about kids being snatched by a pedophile satanic nazi terrorist -- or somehow turning into one themselves if left without constant supervision and disciplining.

The only place where America does not infantilize minors is in criminal law, which has the magic power to retroactively transform the very same children into adults fully capable of weighting their decisions.
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- Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 5:38am
  
  Re: Japan isn't the outlier, the US is
  Because in America... hypocrisy is the MO of everything!
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- Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 8:13am
  
  Re: Japan isn't the outlier, the US is
  ...The idea of 9 year olds using public transportation or going on errands is completely normal in 99% of the world...
  
  Because the public transportation is far superior in the rest of the world than the US.
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crade (profile), 20 Nov 2015 @ 7:34am

I have visited Tokyo, I would probably let my 9 year old ride the subway alone there as well.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 8:21am

Common core math is by far the stupidest and most idiotic system I have ever seen. It is busywork which introduces flawed thinking. Math at the lower level always has a correct answer. There are many common core questions which are considered correct by grading but are not. The main focus being on the process not the answer. At some point in math the answer being wrong matters, usually around Geometry/TRIG and most students fail at that point because there has been no preparation and don't realize why their failing. The vast majority at that point give up, thinking they aren't math people. The situation is completely preventable, and the fact that a broken unthought out system is being foisted on people who don't know better is asinine.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 1:23pm

Parents in Japan regularly let 9yo (and younger) kids ride the subway alone, but wouldn't necessarily do so if they moved to London or New York. Is there something special about the Japanese culture that allows unsupervised children to be (or at least fee
No, they are just following the unwritten social rules of the place they live, as one does. Most people in America would not send their kids alone on the subway, so they don't do it either. Its not that complicated.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 2:01pm

normal dodd report
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 2:03pm

The Prussian Connection to American Schooling - John Taylor Gatto
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Nov 2015 @ 2:03pm

the secret history of western education - charlotte iserbyt
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Nov 2015 @ 1:15pm

I only hope there are enough parents who decide to send their kids to trade school and learn a useful skill, instead of having them take out six figures in loans and be exposed to this propagandist brainwashing that's produced 1960s-style riots over such nonsense as Halloween costumes, yoga classes, ethnic food, "trigger warnings," and the all-important gospel of diversity hiring quotas.

Otherwise, democracy and civil liberties will be sacrificed on the altar of "hurt feelings."
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