Dear People of the World (formerly Dear Americans)

I just know the news Paris Hilton was ordered to return to the jail.

She was once released after her 3 days of imprisonment because of her medical condition. There was enormous criticism that she could have been released because of her fame and family's wealth.

This incident and Paris Hilton herself represent what is going on in America.

In Japan, a book "Cho-kakusa-shakai America no shinjitsu (Super Class society, The truth of America)" was published. It was written by Japanese economist, Yumi Kobayashi. She contends there are 4 distinctive classes in America.

The first is High-Society that Paris Hilton belongs to. In this class you have nothing to worry about. They are ruling class and their assets are secured. They control economy, politics and media. Even their offsprings do not have to worry. It is like middle-age European aristocracy.

The second is professional rich like IT tycoons such as Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. They are smart and succeeded what they want by their talents. They seem to represent "American Dream."

But there are two other classes that are left behind and growing.

One is poor class and the other is dropped-out. The middle-class is shrinking.

They are so poor that they cannot even get an opportunity to succeed. They grow up in families that cannot afford to send them to proper schools. Higher education costs so much money. Yes, US schools usually provide scholarships. But in order to be awarded scholarships, students have to have certain level of education. The schools they come to simply cannot provide that.

America used to be called "land of opportunity" where no matter how poor you are born, you all have opportunity to go to higher class. But the things have changed now.

But why that happened is easily explained. First America's system of wealth distribution had not been changed drastically since the Civil War. For example, our country, Japan's wealth distribution system was drastically changed by the war that ended in 1945. Japan was forced to redistribute the wealth by new authorities which was controlled by US occupied force. Ruling class of pre-war era lost so much fortune. Such things never happened unless the country experience the war or revolution.

Also, America's middle-class wealthy life-style that was appearent in 1950's and 60's was in fact supported by the fact that the world wealth was concentrated in America until those days. Other countries suffered from the loss of the war. Enormous amount of wealth was poured into Americans so that most of Americans could receive high standard of living.

After recovery of those nations, America was no longer the only key player for the world economy. Naturally in free market society, winner grow and losers shrink. The gap between the two is getting bigger and bigger. The result is now. Only top 5% occupy 60% of the wealth. 45 million people don't have medical insurance. 31 million are in hunger.

Maybe we should rethink about America's economical system and its value.

I do not care Paris Hilton goes to jail or not. But I am dissappointed to know that a girl who just happened to be born in a very rich family is spotlighted so much. She is treated like feudal society's princess.  

Can you believe this is happening in our country? Most conservative among advanced nations.

The couple is not just lesbians that you can normally see in SOHO in NY or Castro Street in San Francisco.

A woman on the left is Ms. Kanako Otsuji, former member of Osaka prefectural assembly. Now she is running in upcoming nationwide election campaign as candidate for the second largest political party, Democratic Party of Japan.

 She came out as lesbian two years ago while she was a member of the assembly.

 On this wedding she received the congratulatory message from the party leader, Ichiro Ozawa, known as conservative type of politician. Wow, what is happening in Japan?

 Well, as I wrote on this blog, our society used to be very open-minded to gays. We were very free sex nation.

But since westerners came in late 19th century, our view of sexuality has drastically changed.

We may be moving backward.

This week has been suicidal week for Japan. On Monday, minister of Agriculture and Fishery, Toshikatsu Matsuoka  committed suicide by hanging himself in the Diet members' residential building. He left several suicide notes including one to the whole nation. He was amid so many scandals. On the same day, famous singer, ZARD stepped down from the stair of the hospital, where she was hospitalized for her cancer cure. She did not leave any suicide note but it was speculated that she may have committed suicide. Next day, an old man who was the head of the organization linked to the minister's scandal jumped off the building.

Then on Wednesday, a high school girl hanged herself in her school. Everyday around 100 people committed suicide. It is estimated 1,000 attempted to kill themselves. Japan's suicide probability rate is double that of the U.S.

Why, so many?

We had the tradition that valued suicide act like harakiri of Samurai. It had been considered honorable.

We live in the society that an individual cannot speak out inner-self. It is called "Culture of shame."

We are living in kind of depressed society.

The theme to live in Japanese society is how to survive in such depressed and stressful environment.

I rent DVD of TV Mini Series "Shogun" aired in U.S., 1980. I remember when I first visited the U.S., American host family where I stayed played the video of this show to welcome me. It was a very popular show. So I just wanted to see it again.

The story takes place late 16th century in Japan, when Japan was not unified. An English shipper captain, John Blackthorne was saved by the Samurai Lord, Toranaga after his ship was wrecked by the heavy storm. Blackthorne then learned how to become Samurai. Later Toranaga became the shogun, the general who governs whole of Japan. Toranaga is actually named after Tokugawa Ieyasu, who founded Tokugawa dynasty that continued for 2 and half century just by his descendants.

It was almost 10 hour show. I enjoyed only first 2 hours. As for rest of the show, I fast forwarded just to see how Japan was depicted. More than half of the show was spoken in Japanese. I could not understand how American viewers could enjoy it although each Japanese conversation was interpreted by Japanese care taker woman for Blackthorne. Kind of frustrating to see for the English viewers, I wondered. But there are many new and exciting things introduced in the show especially for westerners such as Harakiri, a man and a woman taking bath together. Not common in modern Japan but typical and normal in that era.

 There was a very interesting thing even for Japanese. That proves that sometimes foreigners know better of our country's history. In the scene, Japanese care taker woman named Mariko told Blackthorne that he should choose a woman to sleep with for his health. Blackthorne declined. Then Mariko said "Do you prefer a boy?"

He was so shocked and got angry and then said "I am not God Cursed Sodomite! My intimate customs doesn't include boys." I was surprised, too. But the truth is in that era, Sodomite was considered normal in Japan.

If you want to know more about that, please read this post.