| Before we get into this debate, let me explain what "best country in the world" does NOT mean... - The best country in the world does not mean everyone is automatically guaranteed happiness there. - The best country in the world does not mean it is a perfect society with no flaws. - The best country in the world does not mean that it has always, historically, been so. - The best country in the world does not mean that it fits best with your personality specifically. - The best country in the world does not mean that it is tailored to fit with most people's personalities. - The best country in the world does not mean people should move there, it also does not mean that if you moved there, that you will find happiness. - The best country in the world does not mean that every single thing that other countries do, Japan does better. What the best country in the world does mean, is that by all objective measurements, it functions the best, provides the highest quality of safety without infringing on the safety of neighboring nations or of certain members of society at the expense of others, and provides the highest quality and opportunity for its citizens to meet their personal life goals. I think we can all agree that if there is a best country in the world, that the following characteristics must apply. A. It cannot be an authoritarian regime that infringes on the rights of its citizens. B. It cannot have been directly involved in an armed conflict within the past 30-40 years. C. It must be a first world nation where citizens have widespread access to the internet, electricity, running water, heating, and air conditioning. You'd probably be surprised to learn that that knocks out approximately 90% of countries including countries you hadn't thought of. The UK (armed conflict), The US (armed conflict), Qatar (authoritarian regime), and South Korea (armed conflict). Yet all these characteristics apply to Japan. So here are the reasons, from safety, and quality of life, why Japan is objectively the best country in the world. - Lowest violent crime rate in the world with a homicide rate of 0.20 per 100,000 or 306 murders in a country of 125 million people. The only countries that can compete are extremely small countries that technically have no homicides per year but a single murder would cause the rate to skyrocket. Japan also has extremely small numbers of other crimes with only 2,352 felonies being committed. - Highest life expectancy in the world at 83.7 years which reflects an extremely high standard of health in the nation as well as safety from violence. - Despite being a 1st world country with widespread access to food whenever people want it. Japan's obesity rate is as low as countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. - Per capita, Japan produces the highest volume of media and entertainment in the world with approximately 300-350 animated television series currently running or newly produced, 160-200 live action drama series, and 613 feature length films. Japan also has the second largest overall music industry in the world. The total amount of entertainment produced is slightly edged out by the US entertainment industry, but the US has almost 3 times the population. Which means if you are an aspiring creative writer trying to get their work made in Japan, there is a large industry of art being produced and you have a much higher chance of successfully entering that industry and having your stories created. - While one cannot have anything broadcast on live TV, Japan engages in almost no censorship of OVA/ONA material and you can create just about any story you want with no restrictions from the government or from the industry as to what you're allowed to create. Thus, why Japan has a reputation for incredibly weird and offensive works of art. - If one desires a fast paced, glamorous lifestyle, Tokyo is just about the most glamorous city on Earth. If one desires a quiet life in the countryside, Japan's countryside is one of the most peaceful and quaint I can imagine. Common criticisms of Japan, and arguments for why it is not the best country in the world tend to be... 1. Its high suicide rate. 2. Its reputation for long working hours and having a stressful office environment. 3. The rigidity of its social life and inability to change its ways in order to improve. All three of those considered to be intrinsically linked to one another. However, although suicide is an awful thing, the high life expectancy of Japan shows that suicide is, without a doubt, Japan's biggest problem. If the root of the suicide problem is solved, there will essentially be no major risks left to living a good life in their society. And covering all three factors, Japan is actually doing a lot to address them. While in the late 80s, the average Japanese worker worked 2050 hours per year, a recent study from OCED has shown that they've slashed their working hours to 1680 per year. On a weekly basis, this means the Japanese work nearly six hours less than they used to, almost an entire work day's worth of reduction. The number of hours worked now is lower than Canada's at 1,708, and the worldwide average of 1734 hours per year. Some Japanese companies are even transitioning to a four day work week instead of the traditional five day week while promising to retain the same basic pay. This is reflected in a tremendous decrease in their suicide rate in recent years. In 2003 the suicide rate peaked with close to 34,427 suicides. A horrifying number. In 2018, however, Japan had managed to reduce it down to 20,598 suicides. Nearly cutting their rate of suicide in half. By comparison, the United States had 47,173. While its true that the US has 2.5 times the population of Japan, it shows that our suicide rate per capita is actually very similar now. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/02/12/reference/japanese-companies-warming-slowly-four-day-workweek/#.Xcg8sUZKjIU https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm https://www.nippon.com/en/japan-data/h00381/japan-records-lowest-suicide-rate-since-statistics-were-first-kept-in-1978.html Keeping all these factors in mind? How is Japan not, objectively, the best country in the world? |
Ryuk9428Nov 10, 2019 9:05 AM
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| I had a list of things it does better but I don't have it now. It's the best country, though. And the rest of the world should mimic it. |
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| It is objectively the best country because it's my favourite. Everything else is irrelevant. Suicide isn't even a problem. |
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| If that's all it takes to be "objectively" the best than being objectively the best is not nearly enough, let me tell you. |
| You are not your body, you are your brain, the "self" that emerges from within it. |
| In my book if a country suffers from suicidal citizenry as much as Japan does then that country is not worthy of being called the "best". |
  “The most shameless thing in the world is political power that can be inherited regardless of ability or talent!” |
Scud said: It is objectively the best country because it's my favourite. Everything else is irrelevant. Suicide isn't even a problem. How about the fact that you have to be rich in order to afford to buy fruit in Japan? |
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Luchse said: In my book if a country suffers from suicidal citizenry as much as Japan does then that country is not worthy of being called the "best". You can't simply measure it on suicide rate. A lot of countries with really low suicide rates are surprisingly shitty countries. Syria for example has one of the lowest suicide rates in the world at 2.4 per 100,000. Guatemala, a nation with a notoriously high level of poverty and violent crime, has an extremely low suicide rate of 2.9 per 100,000. Pakistan, another country with a high level of homicide, major problems with poverty, disease, terrorism, and famine, has a suicide rate of 3.1 per 100,000. While Japan used to have a horrifying suicide rate compared to the rest of the world, at this point I think we can simply place them in countries with relatively high suicide risk such as the United States and Finland. Given the overall life expectancy in Japan though, I think we can conclude that despite their suicide rate being a major problem, it isn't enough to detract from all the other things that their country has accomplished which other countries struggle with. |
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Ryuk9428 said: Yes I can and I will! If people are committing suicide in such high numbers then that country is seriously doing something wrong... Japan is a fine and dandy place but it fails to help its citizens there where it counts.Luchse said: In my book if a country suffers from suicidal citizenry as much as Japan does then that country is not worthy of being called the "best". You can't simply measure it on suicide rate. A lot of countries with really low suicide rates are surprisingly shitty countries. Syria for example has one of the lowest suicide rates in the world at 2.4 per 100,000. Guatemala, a nation with a notoriously high level of poverty and violent crime, has an extremely low suicide rate of 2.9 per 100,000. Pakistan, another country with a high level of homicide, major problems with poverty, disease, terrorism, and famine, has a suicide rate of 3.1 per 100,000. While Japan used to have a horrifying suicide rate compared to the rest of the world, at this point I think we can simply place them in countries with relatively high suicide risk such as the United States and Finland. Given the overall life expectancy in Japan though, I think we can conclude that despite their suicide rate being a major problem, it isn't enough to detract from all the other things that their country has accomplished which other countries struggle with. |
“The most shameless thing in the world is political power that can be inherited regardless of ability or talent!” |
Luchse said: Ryuk9428 said: Yes I can and I will! If people are committing suicide in such high numbers then that country is seriously doing something wrong... Japan is a fine and dandy place but it fails to help its citizens there where it counts.You can't simply measure it on suicide rate. A lot of countries with really low suicide rates are surprisingly shitty countries. Syria for example has one of the lowest suicide rates in the world at 2.4 per 100,000. Guatemala, a nation with a notoriously high level of poverty and violent crime, has an extremely low suicide rate of 2.9 per 100,000. Pakistan, another country with a high level of homicide, major problems with poverty, disease, terrorism, and famine, has a suicide rate of 3.1 per 100,000. While Japan used to have a horrifying suicide rate compared to the rest of the world, at this point I think we can simply place them in countries with relatively high suicide risk such as the United States and Finland. Given the overall life expectancy in Japan though, I think we can conclude that despite their suicide rate being a major problem, it isn't enough to detract from all the other things that their country has accomplished which other countries struggle with. Suicide is a factor to consider for obvious reasons. However, the fact that they've made such a dramatic improvement in suicides, shows to me that they are trying to get people the help they need. What the reduction in working hours and suicide rates also tells me is that Japan is a society that wants to stay with its values, but is not entirely stubborn and is willing to change in order to create the best country they can make. Given that hard work has traditionally been such a key Japanese value, the fact that they were willing to change that value in order to solve a suicide crisis is incredibly commendable. And they are close to solving it. I wouldn't say its entirely solved yet, but they don't have much further to go. In ten years, I wonder if they'll even have a high suicide rate anymore. It shows that one of their values which trumped the value of hard work was efficiency. What actually works? They realized something was not working, and they are trying to change in order to make it work better. |
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| Japan has pretty bad xenophobia/racism issues (so do many other Asian countries near japan). if you argue that japans xenophobia/racism is okay because its a "different culture", you could then also argue that sexism in some middle eastern countries is okay because its a "different culture". so that argument is stupid. also I believe that japan hasn't legalized gay marriage yet, which is really fucked, especially since it is a developed country and gay rights (or just equal rights in general) are a must in my opinion. Also what is japan doing to help with climate change, how is japan becoming more eco-friendly? If Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg (some of the most developed countries in the world) have such a low CO2 emission/low-levels of pollution, how does Japan compete? Also you cannot simply brush off Japans alarming high rates of suicide, linked to how long working hours are plus how stressful Japanese work culture is/how stressful Japanese school life is. That is a big downfall for Japan. I love Japan and it is probably one of the most developed country on Earth, but with any country it wont ever be complete perfect. Meaning I dont think you can actually claim any country to be the "best in the world" because its just so much more complex than that. It isnt black and white "this country is the best. The country is the worst" because there no correct way the measure this its a pretty one sided view of the world. |
SeijatachiiiiNov 10, 2019 10:32 AM
Ryuk9428 said: We can talk all day long about them doing certain things in a way to fix it but its all fruitless because we've no way of knowing what the future brings...Luchse said: Yes I can and I will! If people are committing suicide in such high numbers then that country is seriously doing something wrong... Japan is a fine and dandy place but it fails to help its citizens there where it counts. Suicide is a factor to consider for obvious reasons. However, the fact that they've made such a dramatic improvement in suicides, shows to me that they are trying to get people the help they need. What the reduction in working hours and suicide rates also tells me is that Japan is a society that wants to stay with its values, but is not entirely stubborn and is willing to change in order to create the best country they can make. Given that hard work has traditionally been such a key Japanese value, the fact that they were willing to change that value in order to solve a suicide crisis is incredibly commendable. And they are close to solving it. I wouldn't say its entirely solved yet, but they don't have much further to go. In ten years, I wonder if they'll even have a high suicide rate anymore. It shows that one of their values which trumped the value of hard work was efficiency. What actually works? They realized something was not working, and they are trying to change in order to make it work better. |
“The most shameless thing in the world is political power that can be inherited regardless of ability or talent!” |
Seijatachiiii said: Japan has pretty bad xenophobia/racism issues (so do many other Asian countries near japan). if you argue that japans xenophobia/racism is okay because its a "different culture", you could then also argue that sexism in some middle eastern countries is okay because its a "different culture". so that argument is stupid. Also what is japan doing to help with climate change, how is japan becoming more eco-friendly? If Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg (some of the most developed countries in the world) have such a low CO2 emission/low-levels of pollution, how does Japan compete? Also you cannot simply brush off Japans alarming high rates of suicide, linked to how long working hours are plus how stressful Japanese work culture is/how stressful Japanese school life is. That is a big downfall for Japan. I love Japan and it is probably one of the most developed country on Earth, but with any country it wont ever be complete perfect. Meaning I dont think you can actually claim any country to be the "best in the world" because its just so much more complex than that. It isnt black and white "this country is the best. The country is the worst" because there no correct way the measure this its a pretty one sided view of the world. I'm not gonna say that the racism/xenophobia is okay because different culture different values. What I will say, is that I think its not severe enough to make much of a difference in the quality of their nation. Japan does not legally discriminate against people, there are no ethnic tensions in the country causing conflict, and the xenophobia of private citizens is relatively isolated. So basically you might come across someone who is xenophobic every now and then but given that the majority of Japanese citizens are not xenophobic, I'd say its a pretty minor issue. Japan is actually the second largest producer of solar energy in the world with Germany being #1. Previously, before the Fukushima disaster, Japan used nuclear energy for 30% of its energy needs but the public has become largely suspicious of its use following the disaster. Still the government wants to work towards using nuclear power again in a way that is safe given Japan's vulnerability to earthquakes and tsunamis. Could Japan improve on climate change issues certainly, but they don't seem like a major violator to me. Its worth noting that many of the countries you mentioned are pretty small countries so obviously they are going to produce a lot less CO2. I didn't brush off the suicide rate, I said that their suicide rate has improved dramatically. Japan's suicide rate is still relatively high but they're not exceptionally high anymore. The overall suicide rate of the European continent is higher than Japan's and now they are only 3.7 per 100,000 away from being at the global average. I'm not saying they don't still need to make significant improvements before I will consider it entirely irrelevant to the conversation, but given the overall life expectancy, I'd say that the suicide rate isn't enough to knock it off the top spot in the world. Its impossible for there to not be a best country in the world. Otherwise, all countries are equal and that is impossible. You don't need to be perfect to be the best, you just have to be better than everyone else. |
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| Well bear in mind that Japan was actually colonized by the Chinese many hundreds of years ago, and do take a lot of their culture from China. So, it's not like Japan is it's own planet or anything, it's very much a product of the rest of the world. You could say the same about the influence of American culture. That being said, Japan is the shit. I have no trouble saying it's the best nation. |
| I CELEBRATE myself, And what I assume you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you. |
| Lmao at trying to make your opinion "objective." Look, what you're doing is deciding criteria that you can measure then saying whatever fulfills that criteria is the best. Of course, what makes this still your opinion is that whatever criteria you choose isn't god given. I can say that the objectively best country is the one with the most guns per capita. Wow, I just "objectively" proved that the U.S. is the greatest country on earth. Also lmao at discounting happiness as a very important variable. But I'm sure you left that out because it was inconvenient to your narrative. It sounds like you want Japan to be the best country and are fitting your criteria to match your bias. Most sane people would say that one of the most important variables is the likelihood they'd be very happy if they were in a particular country. Japan is not only low ranked in the happiness report among OECD nations, but it's dropping!  But maybe they're just too humble to say they're happy. And are just getting humbler. ;) |
| Let's compare to some other countries that may be contenders for objectively best countries. Germany is developed, democratic, and has not been involved in an armed conflict. However, their homicide rate is still 4-5 times higher than Japan's, their production of art and entertainment is nowhere near the level of Japan's despite having populations that aren't that far apart, and their life expectancy is approximately 3 years lower than Japan's. Switzerland may be the best contender. Again, higher homicide rate, nowhere near as much art and entertainment produced even if you adjust for population. Life expectancy is amazingly similar, but it doesn't quite reach Japan's. I do consider the amount of art and entertainment produced to be important by the way. Because avoiding pain isn't enough to achieve greatness. You need to contribute substantially to things which make our lives positive as well. If you want to create TV shows and movies in Switzerland, you would have to move to the United States or the UK if you want to seriously pursue a career in it. Japan, on the other hand, has a flourishing industry of music, storytelling, and various other forms of entertainment. |
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| We all know Finland is always gonna be No.1 because Santa Claus Village is in Finland and Santa makes everyone happy! #MerryChristmas2019 |
lrohaNov 10, 2019 11:50 AM
| @Freshell It is objective, I used data to prove these things. I thought Japan was probably the best country in the world even before I became an anime fan. Happiness is important, but I'm not sure if its the sole measurement. After-all, there are countries on your list which are ranked as happier than Japan like El Salvador, Guatemala, Jamaica, Mexico, and Saudi Arabia that have serious glaring problems like extremely high levels of violent crime, poverty, and government corruption in their societies which obviously make them not as good as Japan. Nobody when looking at societies that are doing well says "hey guys, we should be like Mexico," their happiness is ranked 23rd in the world. Their happiness is probably coming from having lower expectations than Japanese citizens have of their lives. But nobody thinks its a good idea to have a country full of drug cartels who literally hold the country hostage on a daily basis. Also, some of their methods literally don't make sense. One of the biggest categories if you read it is "dystopia." What? Japan happens to be low in whatever the hell this dystopia category means and it seems like a major contributor to all of the countries in the top spots. But the "happiness" ranking is based on GDP, life expectancy, social supports, freedom to make life choices, and whatever the hell dystopia means. Most of which is what I'm talking about in this thread. |
Ryuk9428Nov 10, 2019 11:22 AM
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Are you daft? I just explained to you why this "objectivity" you speak of is still just opinion. Maybe I really think that an armed citizenry is the most important thing in curtailing a tyrannical govermment, so the U.S. is the best country on Earth. This of course wouldn't be an objective judgement, because me valuing amount of guns in a country is completely subjective. I mean, you literally just appended "the amount of art created" as a criteria. That's a totally out of left field thing to value and is totally based on your preferences, not something objective. Happiness is important, but I'm not sure if its the sole measurement. After-all, there are countries on your list which are ranked as happier than Japan like El Salvador, Guatemala, Jamaica, Mexico, and Saudi Arabia that have serious glaring problems like extremely high levels of violent crime, poverty, and government corruption in their societies which obviously make them not as good as Japan. Good. Now flip the script. What does it say about Japan that El Salvador, Guatemala, etc. are all above Japan? You would think a normal person might conclude that Japan isn't so great but this is clearly cognitive dissonance at work. Also, some of their methods literally don't make sense. One of the biggest categories if you read it is "dystopia." What? Japan happens to be low in whatever the hell this dystopia category means. But the "happiness" ranking is based on GDP, life expectancy, social supports, freedom to make life choices, and whatever the hell dystopia means. Those are just variables that explains the happiness they measured. GDP per capita for example is highly correlated with life satisfaction as is perception of freedom. |
Freshell said: Are you daft? I just explained to you why this "objectivity" you speak of is still just opinion. Maybe I really think that an armed citizenry is the most important thing in curtailing a tyrannical govermment, so the U.S. is the best country on Earth. This of course wouldn't be an objective judgement, because me valuing amount of guns in a country is completely subjective. I mean, you literally just appended "the amount of art created" as a criteria. That's a totally out of left field thing to value and is totally based on your preferences, not something objective. Happiness is important, but I'm not sure if its the sole measurement. After-all, there are countries on your list which are ranked as happier than Japan like El Salvador, Guatemala, Jamaica, Mexico, and Saudi Arabia that have serious glaring problems like extremely high levels of violent crime, poverty, and government corruption in their societies which obviously make them not as good as Japan. Good. Now flip the script. What does it say about Japan that El Salvador, Guatemala, etc. are all above Japan? You would think a normal person might conclude that Japan isn't so great but this is clearly cognitive dissonance at work. Also, some of their methods literally don't make sense. One of the biggest categories if you read it is "dystopia." What? Japan happens to be low in whatever the hell this dystopia category means. But the "happiness" ranking is based on GDP, life expectancy, social supports, freedom to make life choices, and whatever the hell dystopia means. Those are just variables that explains the happiness they measured. GDP per capita for example is highly correlated with life satisfaction as is perception of freedom. Except that your example of an objective measurement makes no sense on any level. Mine is based on crime rates, life expectancy, democracy, involvement in armed conflicts, and production of media and entertainment, all of which pretty much anyone can agree are going to make life better or worse in your country. Or more likely there's something wrong with the way they are gathering data. Especially given that "dystopia" is a large part of why they are ranking so high. Furthermore though they rank Saudi Arabia higher on the "freedom to make choices" measurement than Japan. The country known for putting gay people to death, gender segregation, forcing its women to wear niqabs whenever they are out in public, and having just made it legal for them to drive a year or two ago is scoring high on freedom to make choices? That doesn't make any sense whatsoever. I agree with the GDP per capita and perception of freedom. But here's apparently their explanation of dystopia... "Dystopia is an imaginary country that has the world’s least-happy people. The purpose in establishing Dystopia is to have a benchmark against which all countries can be favorably compared (no country performs more poorly than Dystopia) in terms of each of the six key variables, thus allowing each sub-bar to be of positive (or zero, in six instances) width. The lowest scores observed for the six key variables, therefore, characterize Dystopia. Since life would be very unpleasant in a country with the world’s lowest incomes, lowest life expectancy, lowest generosity, most corruption, least freedom, and least social support, it is referred to as “Dystopia,” in contrast to Utopia." So basically this dystopia ranking is just how does it compare against the worst country imaginable. This seems like a nonsense category to me that artificially inflates countries happiness rankings. Once you control for dystopia, Japan's ranking in that list jumps up significantly. |
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| Oh yes, I can't wait to praise a country that's enjoying an absurdly high suicide rate, a rapidly dying population, a quite localized phenomenon of people refusing to leave their rooms due to social and family pressure, an absence of LGBTQ civil union rights, extreme xenophobia, a heavy social etiquette that makes people not feel like they have an identity and strips away any individuality, with all those eating disorders being hidden away to keep people as you described, a countryside dying and being abandoned behind for Tokyo in an attempt at better wages despite you using this as a selling point... But did I mention that people are thin? Or... Now, this is just a theory, don't quote me on this... Is this bias against the usually considered the best countries to live in (Iceland, Finland, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands) because they are 'soyboys feminist-ridden SJW dominated hellscapes' in place for great, amazing, gender-role-abiding, conservative, unaffected by the western sensitivities Japan? Hm, now that makes me have the big thonk. But I'll let my SO, @Freshell debate you, because he seems much more open to it than I am. |
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| Are you american maybe? Europe has plenty of countries that fit the bill as "best country" according to your own criteria. Norway, Swiss, Denmark, and so on comes immediately to mind. |
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| irrelevant, japan will probably not last long if the population keeps decreasing at the rate it is rn |
 I AM THE ONE CALLED POWER! How foolish and conceited these humans be... |
Ryuk9428 said: Freshell said: Are you daft? I just explained to you why this "objectivity" you speak of is still just opinion. Maybe I really think that an armed citizenry is the most important thing in curtailing a tyrannical govermment, so the U.S. is the best country on Earth. This of course wouldn't be an objective judgement, because me valuing amount of guns in a country is completely subjective. I mean, you literally just appended "the amount of art created" as a criteria. That's a totally out of left field thing to value and is totally based on your preferences, not something objective. Good. Now flip the script. What does it say about Japan that El Salvador, Guatemala, etc. are all above Japan? You would think a normal person might conclude that Japan isn't so great but this is clearly cognitive dissonance at work. Those are just variables that explains the happiness they measured. GDP per capita for example is highly correlated with life satisfaction as is perception of freedom. Except that your example of an objective measurement makes no sense on any level. Mine is based on crime rates, life expectancy, democracy, involvement in armed conflicts, and production of media and entertainment, all of which pretty much anyone can agree are going to make life better or worse in your country. Or more likely there's something wrong with the way they are gathering data. Especially given that "dystopia" is a large part of why they are ranking so high. Furthermore though they rank Saudi Arabia higher on the "freedom to make choices" measurement than Japan. The country known for putting gay people to death, gender segregation, forcing its women to wear niqabs whenever they are out in public, and having just made it legal for them to drive a year or two ago is scoring high on freedom to make choices? That doesn't make any sense whatsoever. I agree with the GDP per capita and perception of freedom. But here's apparently their explanation of dystopia... "Dystopia is an imaginary country that has the world’s least-happy people. The purpose in establishing Dystopia is to have a benchmark against which all countries can be favorably compared (no country performs more poorly than Dystopia) in terms of each of the six key variables, thus allowing each sub-bar to be of positive (or zero, in six instances) width. The lowest scores observed for the six key variables, therefore, characterize Dystopia. Since life would be very unpleasant in a country with the world’s lowest incomes, lowest life expectancy, lowest generosity, most corruption, least freedom, and least social support, it is referred to as “Dystopia,” in contrast to Utopia." So basically this dystopia ranking is just how does it compare against the worst country imaginable. This seems like a nonsense category to me that artificially inflates countries happiness rankings. Once you control for dystopia, Japan's ranking in that list jumps up significantly. As just stated, all the other factors mentioned are just meant to be explanatory of what they measured. "The rankings in Figure 2.7 of World Happiness Report 2019 use data that come from the Gallup World Poll (for more information see the Gallup World Poll methodology). The rankings are based on answers to the main life evaluation question asked in the poll. This is called the Cantril ladder: it asks respondents to think of a ladder, with the best possible life for them being a 10, and the worst possible life being a 0. They are then asked to rate their own current lives on that 0 to 10 scale. The rankings are from nationally representative samples, for the years 2016-2018. They are based entirely on the survey scores, using the Gallup weights to make the estimates representative. The sub-bars show the estimated extent to which each of six factors - levels of GDP, life expectancy, generosity, social support, freedom, and corruption - contribute to making life evaluations higher in each country than they are in Dystopia, a hypothetical country that has values equal to the world’s lowest national averages for each of the six factors (see FAQs: What is Dystopia?). The sub-bars have no impact on the total score reported for each country, but instead are just a way of explaining for each country the implications of the model estimated in Table 2.1. People often ask why some countries rank higher than others - the sub-bars (including the residuals, which show what is not explained) are an attempt to provide an answer to that question." And going off this explanation, "dystopia" is a hypothetical country that does as bad in all the other correlated categories as the worst countries in those categories in reality. So attacking using "dystopia" as a benchmark is actually complaining about all the other factors, which, again, are just meant to be explanatory and didn't determine the results. There's no conspiracy to make Japan look bad. Sorry lad. I imagine this is the part where you claim the Japanese are just humble so of course they rated their happiness low. ;) Except that your example of an objective measurement makes no sense on any level. Mine is based on crime rates, life expectancy, democracy, involvement in armed conflicts, and production of media and entertainment, all of which pretty much anyone can agree are going to make life better or worse in your country. Doesn't matter if your measurements are objective. The determination of what country is best based on those measurements are what's subjective. Saying that people in general value, say, media and entertainment, is to appeal to the preferences of... *drum roll* subjects! Anyway, personally I dislike the notion of being in a conformist society. America was been there done that in the 1950s, then boomers, when they were cool, decided "fuck this shit" and decided to do lsd, make awesome music and have sex with each other's girlfriends. Me disliking Japan for a simple reason like that is just as valid as you saying you like Japan because it has a lot of art. You can just put a number on it. But so what? @Kosmonaut I'm already your SO? Wow. You didn't even wait for me to woo you on our Burger King date. |
Kosmonaut said: Oh yes, I can't wait to praise a country that's enjoying an absurdly high suicide rate, a rapidly dying population, a quite localized phenomenon of people refusing to leave their rooms due to social and family pressure, an absence of LGBTQ civil union rights, extreme xenophobia, a heavy social etiquette that makes people not feel like they have an identity and strips away any individuality, with all those eating disorders being hidden away to keep people as you described, a countryside dying and being abandoned behind for Tokyo in an attempt at better wages despite you using this as a selling point... But did I mention that people are thin? Or... Now, this is just a theory, don't quote me on this... Is this bias against the usually considered the best countries to live in (Iceland, Finland, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands) because they are 'soyboys feminist-ridden SJW dominated hellscapes' in place for great, amazing, gender-role-abiding, conservative, unaffected by the western sensitivities Japan? Hm, now that makes me have the big thonk. But I'll let my SO, @Freshell debate you, because he seems much more open to it than I am. If Japan's suicide rate is "absurdly high" then so is Finland and Iceland's, who's suicide rates are very similar to Japan's. Unlike Japan, however, all of the countries you mentioned have a higher homicide and crime rates, all of their life expectancy is shorter, and they struggle to contribute to the world in terms of entertainment, artistic, industrial, and technological creativity. Nearly any problem can be solved if your population is so goddamn tiny that the city of Tokyo overwhelms your nation's population. But Japan is a country of 125 million people that still manages to have the lowest crime rates, low government corruption, a high GDP, and the highest life expectancy in the world. |
Ryuk9428Nov 10, 2019 12:47 PM
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| @Freshell I didn't say there was a conspiracy to make Japan look bad. I just said the dystopia measurement doesn't make any damn sense and it still doesn't yet its being used to place countries like Mexico as 23rd in the world? |
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| Yeah I don't think so especially after what they did to Carlos ghosn he couldn't even hold a press conference and he was in jail on his birthday he couldn't see his kids etc. Let's not even talking about whaling etc. |
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Ryuk9428 said: @Freshell I didn't say there was a conspiracy to make Japan look bad. I just said the dystopia measurement doesn't make any damn sense and it still doesn't yet its being used to place countries like Mexico as 23rd in the world? It literally isn't being used for that. I just quoted their methodology my dude. You're going to make me repeat myself for a third time. It's all just explanatory. They could have left all that out and the rankings would be the same. Anyway, over the course of this discussion, I've had to repeat myself too many times and had other points conveniently ignored. I think I'll dip unless in your next reply there's a point that couldn't be addressed with a reiteration + elaboration. Have a good one. Sorry for being a bit rude. :P I get frustrated when I have to say something more than once. |
Freshell said: Ryuk9428 said: @Freshell I didn't say there was a conspiracy to make Japan look bad. I just said the dystopia measurement doesn't make any damn sense and it still doesn't yet its being used to place countries like Mexico as 23rd in the world? It literally isn't being used for that. I just quoted their methodology my dude. You're going to make me repeat myself for a third time. It's all just explanatory. They could have left all that out and the rankings would be the same. Anyway, over the course of this discussion, I've had to repeat myself too many times and had other points conveniently ignored. I think I'll dip unless in your next reply there's a point that couldn't be addressed with a reiteration + elaboration. Have a good one. Sorry for being a bit rude. :P I get frustrated when I have to say something more than once. Okay so the happiness rankings are based on people saying that "this is how happy I would say I am." But what this ranking really shows is that certain countries which are not great at all, have citizens who have made themselves happy, possibly through mental processes. A person living in a country full of poverty may say "well I don't have much money, but hey I'm not starving." And that produces happiness based on the knowledge that they could be living a lot worse. Which means that "happiness" can be influenced by how well the country is run but that it is also somewhat arbitrary. Some people are finding themselves happy when they have no rational reason for being so. In which case, you could literally become the greatest country on Earth by simply giving your citizens a shitload of serotonin pills and then saying "hey look, they're happy." So a country could literally be a utopia and run perfectly smoothly but the people are not necessarily the happiest in the world. This could happen because there's simply a hormonal process going on that nobody can do anything about. Thus why people in really shitty countries are scoring themselves weirdly high on this list. It doesn't mean that the country is failing or succeeding, however. As nobody should ever look at Mexico and consider it a success story. This is why I said that you are not guaranteed happiness even if you live in the greatest country on Earth. |
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| ye you make sense so overall Japan is a great country but damn the amount of xenophobia, overwork culture (that leads to karoshi) and shame culture (that leads to hikikomori) are like so bad |
deg said: ye you make sense so overall Japan is a great country but damn the amount of xenophobia, overwork culture (that leads to karoshi) and shame culture (that leads to hikikomori) are like so bad I'm not sure about much karoshi and overwork culture are a problem anymore given the extent to which Japanese companies are trying to reform. |
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Ryuk9428 said: But what this ranking really shows is that certain countries which are not great at all, have citizens who have made themselves happy, possibly through mental processes. A person living in a country full of poverty may say "well I don't have much money, but hey I'm not starving." And that produces happiness based on the knowledge that they could be living a lot worse. Sure. This suggests that the culture of Japan is so bad that even with material abundance, they rank low on happiness. Perhaps also coupled with a lack of future prospects for improvement, given that their GDP hasn't budged since the 1990s and their populationn is aging rapidly. No matter where you are, things feel dismal when your future doesn't look like it'll become better. And I mean, if your idea of utopia is one where a society can still be massively unhappy, leave me out of it, lol. Definitely don't want to be in your AI society. |
Freshell said: Ryuk9428 said: But what this ranking really shows is that certain countries which are not great at all, have citizens who have made themselves happy, possibly through mental processes. A person living in a country full of poverty may say "well I don't have much money, but hey I'm not starving." And that produces happiness based on the knowledge that they could be living a lot worse. Sure. This suggests that the culture of Japan is so bad that even with material abundance, they rank low on happiness. Perhaps also coupled with a lack of future prospects for improvement, given that their GDP hasn't budged since the 1990s and their populationn is aging rapidly. No matter where you are, things feel dismal when your future doesn't look like it'll become better. And I mean, if your idea of utopia is one where a society can still be massively unhappy, leave me out of it, lol. Definitely don't want to be in your AI society. If your graph is to be used as the sole measurement of what the best country in the world is, Japan's next step then should be to import a bunch of drug cartels and have a war in their country. Maybe have some public beheadings. Worked for the Saudis. You can't be an unhappy country if you kill all the unhappy people ;) |
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| There is a flaw in one of your points that on a technicality could eliminate Japan immediately. Specifically the one that states a country cannot have directly been involved in armed conflicts in the past 30-40 years. Mostly that you're really stretching the definition on this. For example Japanese troops have been actively deployed to other countries from 2004 onward, while they weren't permitted to engage in combat they are permitted to defend themselves and act as peacekeepers. Not to mention directly assisting and permitting operations by organizations such as NATO in which they are likely providing direct financial assistance. It's still hard to deny the factual statement that say Japan deployed troops to the Iraq war in 2004 where they stayed for 2 years although their duties were defined specifically in reconstruction. Which brings up the issue on your personal definition of "involved". |
Ryuk9428 said: Freshell said: Sure. This suggests that the culture of Japan is so bad that even with material abundance, they rank low on happiness. Perhaps also coupled with a lack of future prospects for improvement, given that their GDP hasn't budged since the 1990s and their populationn is aging rapidly. No matter where you are, things feel dismal when your future doesn't look like it'll become better. And I mean, if your idea of utopia is one where a society can still be massively unhappy, leave me out of it, lol. Definitely don't want to be in your AI society. If your graph is to be used as the sole measurement of what the best country in the world is, Japan's next step then should be to import a bunch of drug cartels and have a war in their country. Maybe have some public beheadings. Worked for the Saudis. You can't be an unhappy country if you kill all the unhappy people ;) LOL. I can smell the butt hurt from a mile away. Why is it so hard for you to admit that Japan isn't some utopia to be emulated, dumb weeb? But do tell, what should North America and Europe be learning from Japan? The good ol' 14/88? |
| fuck no. I'm still upset that most hentai is censored. japan is #10 #1 goes to norway according to this : https://www.socialprogress.org/?code=NOR counter arguments: -Japan is the most in debt in country in the entire world ($9 trillion USD), keep in mind Greece is #2 with $379 billion -The land is mostly mountains and the majority of the population is squished into the big city making natural disasters more threatening. -natural disasters -aging population -reliant on imports due to lack of natural resources its a bubble just waiting to be popped like other countries. if we talk objectively about just land and money, its not that good. anecdotally from personal experience, asian culture is fucking terrible in terms of promoting happiness and individual growth. |
jesteri said: Have you by any chance forgotten about the US?-Japan is the most in debt in country in the entire world ($9 trillion USD), keep in mind Greece is #2 with $379 billion |
“The most shameless thing in the world is political power that can be inherited regardless of ability or talent!” |
GamerDLM said: There is a flaw in one of your points that on a technicality could eliminate Japan immediately. Specifically the one that states a country cannot have directly been involved in armed conflicts in the past 30-40 years. Mostly that you're really stretching the definition on this. For example Japanese troops have been actively deployed to other countries from 2004 onward, while they weren't permitted to engage in combat they are permitted to defend themselves and act as peacekeepers. Not to mention directly assisting and permitting operations by organizations such as NATO in which they are likely providing direct financial assistance. It's still hard to deny the factual statement that say Japan deployed troops to the Iraq war in 2004 where they stayed for 2 years although their duties were defined specifically in reconstruction. Which brings up the issue on your personal definition of "involved". Can you link to a war in which Japan is considered a direct belligerent in the list and soldiers were deployed in order to fight in that war? I don't consider money or support to be direct involvement. |
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Ryuk9428 said: GamerDLM said: There is a flaw in one of your points that on a technicality could eliminate Japan immediately. Specifically the one that states a country cannot have directly been involved in armed conflicts in the past 30-40 years. Mostly that you're really stretching the definition on this. For example Japanese troops have been actively deployed to other countries from 2004 onward, while they weren't permitted to engage in combat they are permitted to defend themselves and act as peacekeepers. Not to mention directly assisting and permitting operations by organizations such as NATO in which they are likely providing direct financial assistance. It's still hard to deny the factual statement that say Japan deployed troops to the Iraq war in 2004 where they stayed for 2 years although their duties were defined specifically in reconstruction. Which brings up the issue on your personal definition of "involved". Can you link to a war in which Japan is considered a direct belligerent in the list and soldiers were deployed in order to fight in that war? I don't consider money or support to be direct involvement. That's the problem, you're using a subjective measure for one of the primary features according to your own argument which defeats the entire notion of this being objective. For an added bonus this is the first time you bring up they have to be a direct belligerent which is a vastly different metric than being directly involved. |
Freshell said: Ryuk9428 said: If your graph is to be used as the sole measurement of what the best country in the world is, Japan's next step then should be to import a bunch of drug cartels and have a war in their country. Maybe have some public beheadings. Worked for the Saudis. You can't be an unhappy country if you kill all the unhappy people ;) LOL. I can smell the butt hurt from a mile away. Why is it so hard for you to admit that Japan isn't some utopia to be emulated, dumb weeb? But do tell, what should North America and Europe be learning from Japan? The good ol' 14/88? Butthurt? Lmao. I'm merely making fun of your silly graph which claims Mexico is more successful than Japan, South Korea, Spain, or Argentina. Perhaps the Spanish should import some drug cartels too? Drug cartels for everybody! Poverty and drug cartels made Mexico so happy! I could tell you exactly what we need to learn from Japan but people would get too triggered. |
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Ryuk9428 said: Freshell said: LOL. I can smell the butt hurt from a mile away. Why is it so hard for you to admit that Japan isn't some utopia to be emulated, dumb weeb? But do tell, what should North America and Europe be learning from Japan? The good ol' 14/88? Butthurt? Lmao. I'm merely making fun of your silly graph which claims Mexico is more successful than Japan, South Korea, Spain, or Argentina. Perhaps the Spanish should import some drug cartels too? Drug cartels for everybody! Poverty and drug cartels made Mexico so happy! I could tell you exactly what we need to learn from Japan but people would get too triggered. Oh, do tell. Tell the U.S., Europe and all the other OECD countries what it needs to do in order to be a perfect society... that's less happy than Mexico and Saudi Arabia. :) No one will get triggered, trust me. I might laugh though. |
GamerDLM said: Ryuk9428 said: Can you link to a war in which Japan is considered a direct belligerent in the list and soldiers were deployed in order to fight in that war? I don't consider money or support to be direct involvement. That's the problem, you're using a subjective measure for one of the primary features according to your own argument which defeats the entire notion of this being objective. For an added bonus this is the first time you bring up they have to be a direct belligerent which is a vastly different metric than being directly involved. They're the same thing? A belligerent means direct involvement? You're just trying to overcome common sense by making the argument ridiculously broad. "They never fought anybody, but you know, they could have?" You could look up every war that has happened, you're not going to find Japan on the list of participants. Spain for example got knocked out of the running for this specific war... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_conflict |
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| Oh boy, CD has been too boring for a long time now. Great we got again some action here. I bet this thread will be closed in one day. |
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Freshell said: Ryuk9428 said: Butthurt? Lmao. I'm merely making fun of your silly graph which claims Mexico is more successful than Japan, South Korea, Spain, or Argentina. Perhaps the Spanish should import some drug cartels too? Drug cartels for everybody! Poverty and drug cartels made Mexico so happy! I could tell you exactly what we need to learn from Japan but people would get too triggered. Oh, do tell. Tell the U.S., Europe and all the other OECD countries what it needs to do in order to be a perfect society... that's less happy than Mexico and Saudi Arabia. :) No one will get triggered, trust me. I might laugh though. Refer back to "the best country does not mean it is a perfect society with no flaws." |
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Luchse said: jesteri said: Have you by any chance forgotten about the US?-Japan is the most in debt in country in the entire world ($9 trillion USD), keep in mind Greece is #2 with $379 billion https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/01/visualizing-the-snowball-of-government-debt/ https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/the-19-countries-with-the-highest-level-of-government-debt-a7340121.html https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/government-debt-to-gdp if we're talking about external debt, yeah, U.S is still #1, but the bubble keeps on floating. |
| With how outdated their attitude towards human rights is, not even close. |
Ryuk9428 said: GamerDLM said: That's the problem, you're using a subjective measure for one of the primary features according to your own argument which defeats the entire notion of this being objective. For an added bonus this is the first time you bring up they have to be a direct belligerent which is a vastly different metric than being directly involved. They're the same thing? A belligerent means direct involvement? You're just trying to overcome common sense by making the argument ridiculously broad. "They never fought anybody, but you know, they could have?" You could look up every war that has happened, you're not going to find Japan on the list of participants. Spain on the other hand got knocked out of the running for this specific war... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_conflict They're not the same thing at all, belligerent is a much more specific context and could even be more specific if you choose to focus on the aggressor. For example if I choose to say in that conflict Spain was involved in that they weren't the aggressor and it was in defense of attacks from a nationalist run terrorist organization you couldn't exactly fault Spain for that. This isn't overcoming common sense, in your direct response to me you yourself admitted you were using a specific definition of direct involvement which you only tried to narrow after I brought it up to force the argument to work. Like even the range of 30-40 years is completely arbitrary. |
Ryuk9428 said: Freshell said: Oh, do tell. Tell the U.S., Europe and all the other OECD countries what it needs to do in order to be a perfect society... that's less happy than Mexico and Saudi Arabia. :) No one will get triggered, trust me. I might laugh though. Refer back to "the best country does not mean it is a perfect society with no flaws." Oh me oh my. Apologies for not speaking precisely: Oh, do tell. Tell the U.S., Europe and all the other OECD countries what it needs to do in order to be the best* society... that's less happy than Mexico and Saudi Arabia. :) No one will get triggered, trust me. I might laugh though. |
GamerDLM said: Ryuk9428 said: They're the same thing? A belligerent means direct involvement? You're just trying to overcome common sense by making the argument ridiculously broad. "They never fought anybody, but you know, they could have?" You could look up every war that has happened, you're not going to find Japan on the list of participants. Spain on the other hand got knocked out of the running for this specific war... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_conflict They're not the same thing at all, belligerent is a much more specific context and could even be more specific if you choose to focus on the aggressor. For example if I choose to say in that conflict Spain was involved in that they weren't the aggressor and it was in defense of attacks from a nationalist run terrorist organization you couldn't exactly fault Spain for that. This isn't overcoming common sense, in your direct response to me you yourself admitted you were using a specific definition of direct involvement which you only tried to narrow after I brought it up to force the argument to work. Like even the range of 30-40 years is completely arbitrary. I didn't narrow it, I'm simply using the conclusion that any normal person reading it would've come to which is that Japan has not been at war with anyone. Spain cannot say that. |
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