As far as I know, tattoos are still very much taboo in Japan. They are very much associated with the yakuza. There's a growing trend for what's called "fashion tattoos", but nothing like this.

If you're a westerner and you go to Japan with a tattoo, you need to cover it up to use a public bath.

It's a shame because the yakuza style tattoos are really beautiful, even if they have an ugly history.

Uhhh... you are aware of the atrocities Japanese soldiers committed less than a century ago during WWII, right? And I think you're confusing psychopaths (who may or may not be violent) with those suffering from a psychosis (a complete mental break with reality).

Either way, mental illness is a huge problem in Japan and in fact treatment of mental illness is one area where their socialized medicine is sorely lacking behind other countries.

I don't know of any credible studies that say that mental illness rates are lower in Japan than in other developed countries, but I do know that the overwhelming majority of crimes in pretty much any country are actually committed by people who are legally sane.

So, despite what you may believe, "genetic" predisposition is an unlikely factor in explaining Japan's crime rate. Besides which, criminologists agree that whatever role genetics plays in people becoming criminals it isn't nearly the most important factor and is dwarfed by environmental factors (see this for a scholarly article on the topic and <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29760212>this for a popular news article).

You're trying to paint this as two equal parts of the recipe for crime when in reality it's more like "add two cups of environmental and a dash of genetics/personality/whatever."

Crime does happen here. The kinds of stuff I hear about on a daily basis in the news: crimes of desperation (homeless guy stealing to survive), thrill-seeking crimes (stealing a bike because you're young and stupid and the chances of getting caught are pretty low), crimes of passion (i.e. domestic violence, drunken bar fights, etc.), organized crime (i.e. yakuza), and the big one--sexual assault.

Sexual assault is so prevalent in Japan that there are actual signs warning women of areas where they are likely to be groped or have men expose themselves. There are train cars for women only so they don't have to get groped on the way to work or school. I mean, how fucked up is that?

So it isn't all rainbows and unicorns over here. Crime happens, and unfortunately is much more likely to happen to you if you're a woman. Still, even accounting for that the crime rates here are ridiculously low, for the reasons I stated above.

I was just walking through Hokkaido's icy mountain ranges a few days ago (in Yakuza 5... >.<)

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Why is shit like this presented with such reverence? For all the ceremony and posh suits these are criminal thugs. They aren't just some other culture that does things it's own way and has finally accepted the guy as one of their own, they know exactly what they are and what they're doing.

I'm sure he got a very interesting look at the way a very secretive society is run. There will be a lot that he's seen and photographed that the rest of the world won't know about or have seen before. It's interesting, I get that, but I think it would be all the more interesting if juxtaposed with the bad stuff. Show the photos of them there, all solemn in their suits, but don't forget the kids who are starving to death as their parents rot in prison or are killing themselves slowly in some disgusting drug den somewhere, paying for everything the Yakuza have.

Everything they have is built on death, pain and suffering of others.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'documentary, japan, mafia, don' to 'documentary, japan, mafia, don, yakuza, gang, criminal, family, organized' - edited by lucky760

If you liked Suzuki's visuals and cinematography, I can only recommend Tokyo Drifter, a Yakuza movie that was a kind of pioneer in perverting the codes of the genre.

If you like 60s Japanese period flicks with a Sergio-Leonesque take on the Samurais genre, Suzuki also made a couple, but in that case do also have a look at Kenji Misumi's work, better known as the director of the original Zatoichi The Blind Swordsman, and of course as the main director of Lone Wolf And Cub, a.k.a Baby Kart. The two first movies were kind-of-butchered, re-cut and re-dubbed as "Shogun Assassin" in the USA; but the real thing is six movies long, and all of them are worth it in my opinion.

Czech that slick Yakuza lookin' hipster @ 1:33

When you consider Germany's infamous history with guns and the power used with them to manipulate their people's recent legacy it's not that "terribly" sad. Sad as it may be, Germany's pogroms of Jews rate higher on the WTF scale than the U.S.'s 'purging of the indigenous' genocide as far as shock value is concerned.

German's like the Japanese were kept in an international box after the second world war and their toys were put in a box as well that read, "Don't open till we say so."

Except for the Yakuza, Japan simply forgot they had a fucking toy box and but I believe you can hunt squirrels with a rifle if yer a good German these days...

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Very interesting, *quality video and discussion. I would say there is probably some under-reported aggression and violence in Japan- but in general a whole hell of a lot less than anywhere else I have lived. In 3.5 years there- never saw a fight, never saw any violence that I remember - there was one crazy guy who was running around yelling at people - but that's it. Violence by Yakuza does happen, but it seems aggrandised from films. I think Yakuza are mainly loan sharks, brothel owners and black marketeers.

For whatever reason, violence is baked into the US culture - tied in maybe with a rugged frontier individualist spirit. Americans love their guns. My family too. My dad always carried a nickel-plated '38 under his car seat, which he called his "merging assistance device".

>> ^legacy0100:

I would have to partly disagree on this one. I believe high density does attribute to more aggression. Dr. Frans de Waal points out that high density alone does not always lead to aggression, and that there are other factors that attribute to reconciliation and peaceful coexistence. This much I agree with. However, this should not be used to throw away the immense impact over population has on human aggression.
He gives several different examples, one including about the chimpanzees in tight confined space. I find his claims very hard to believe. Chimps get very frustrated and show abnormal, anti-social behavior when they are in a tight confined space for a long period of time. Their hairs fall out, they bite their own knuckles or even each other. They show aggression to inexperienced moms and to their babies. It could be that Dr. de Waal may be omitting some factors in here. The chimps he is referring to may be from a zoo where they are put in small confined space when it's time to goto sleep, but then are let out to a bigger enclosure where they can run and play. This may be a bad example, but we don't really know because he doesn't reveal the source of his data. Perhaps his research did confine the chimps to a tight space all throughout the experiment. If so, then the duration of dwelling in tight enclosure is a big factor, but he didn't cite anything about that either.
I also would like to point out that there's generally a lot less food intake and physical activity in urban Japanese society. Your typical Japanese sushi portions can testify for that, as well as various hikikomori symptoms people suffer in overly populated Japanese cities.
Dr. de Waal says there's less crime in Japan, but this simply isn't true. He is overly reliant on only the statistics reported by the government, and he isn't are of the deep rooted cultural practices that mask these aggressions to the outside world. Dr. De Waal never mentions about the various odd symptoms and personal sacrifice everyone must make in order to maintain the order there. Violence is everyday life in Japanese society, including the fairly well known presence of Yakuza. Japanese people often get bullied by the Yakuza, but they do not report these events because for one, they are afraid of retaliation, and two, Yakuza has deep rooted connections with the government. Yakuza usually do not engage anyone foreign simply because it would get the embassies involved, and they do cannot exert any influence in foreign lands. So they only stick to bullying Japanese people, and stay clear of foreigners. Even in high school physical violence is rampant. Students fight or bully each other all the time, but it is not seen as a crime, but merely 'part of growing up'. Nobody reports anything, so the crime data remains low.
Compare this with cities in Netherlands. It is highly populated, but enjoys abundance of resources thanks to laxed attitude toward drugs and sex, which are themselves ways to alleviate aggression. People in Netherlands are also very mobile because of their well developed transportation infrastructure including extensive bike lanes, roads and trains. They are also in close proximity to larger open areas in Germany or France where they regularly escape to thanks to their abundance in resource, while in Japan people are very much confined to their own living quarters and their workplace, who usually cannot afford to take frequent vacations due to high expectation from bosses as well as fierce competition towards promotion. Imagine regular US/UK office space antics times ten.
Overall I find Dr. de Waal's argument only partially credible and would like to look into his experiments and his citations before acknowledging this as fact.
I remember Dag and his wife saying they used to live in Japan. I would like to hear their opinion about this issue and Japanese society being used as proof to this theory.

I would have to partly disagree on this one. I believe high density does attribute to more aggression. Dr. Frans de Waal points out that high density alone does not always lead to aggression, and that there are other factors that attribute to reconciliation and peaceful coexistence. This much I agree with. However, this should not be used to throw away the immense impact over population has on human aggression.

He gives several different examples, one including about the chimpanzees in tight confined space. I find his claims very hard to believe. Chimps get very frustrated and show abnormal, anti-social behavior when they are in a tight confined space for a long period of time. Their hairs fall out, they bite their own knuckles or even each other. They show aggression to inexperienced moms and to their babies. It could be that Dr. de Waal may be omitting some factors in here. The chimps he is referring to may be from a zoo where they are put in small confined space when it's time to goto sleep, but then are let out to a bigger enclosure where they can run and play. This may be a bad example, but we don't really know because he doesn't reveal the source of his data. Perhaps his research did confine the chimps to a tight space all throughout the experiment. If so, then the duration of dwelling in tight enclosure is a big factor, but he didn't cite anything about that either.

I also would like to point out that there's generally a lot less food intake and physical activity in urban Japanese society. Your typical Japanese sushi portions can testify for that, as well as various hikikomori symptoms people suffer in overly populated Japanese cities.

Dr. de Waal says there's less crime in Japan, but this simply isn't true. He is overly reliant on only the statistics reported by the government, and he isn't are of the deep rooted cultural practices that mask these aggressions to the outside world. Dr. De Waal never mentions about the various odd symptoms and personal sacrifice everyone must make in order to maintain the order there. Violence is everyday life in Japanese society, including the fairly well known presence of Yakuza. Japanese people often get bullied by the Yakuza, but they do not report these events because for one, they are afraid of retaliation, and two, Yakuza has deep rooted connections with the government. Yakuza usually do not engage anyone foreign simply because it would get the embassies involved, and they do cannot exert any influence in foreign lands. So they only stick to bullying Japanese people, and stay clear of foreigners. Even in high school physical violence is rampant. Students fight or bully each other all the time, but it is not seen as a crime, but merely 'part of growing up'. Nobody reports anything, so the crime data remains low.

Compare this with cities in Netherlands. It is highly populated, but enjoys abundance of resources thanks to laxed attitude toward drugs and sex, which are themselves ways to alleviate aggression. People in Netherlands are also very mobile because of their well developed transportation infrastructure including extensive bike lanes, roads and trains. They are also in close proximity to larger open areas in Germany or France where they regularly escape to thanks to their abundance in resource, while in Japan people are very much confined to their own living quarters and their workplace, who usually cannot afford to take frequent vacations due to high expectation from bosses as well as fierce competition towards promotion. Imagine regular US/UK office space antics times ten.

Overall I find Dr. de Waal's argument only partially credible and would like to look into his experiments and his citations before acknowledging this as fact.

I remember Dag and his wife saying they used to live in Japan. I would like to hear their opinion about this issue and Japanese society being used as proof to this theory.

Aw man you could totally fuck with the Yakuza with one of these!

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Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Ima gonna let me finish, since I only did 14 back then.

15. I have an extremely boring day job that would put you to sleep if I explained it.
16. I am secretly plotting a return to the home of my birth - the USA.
17. Would like to write an SF novel, but fear I lack the discipline and talent
18. Would like to lose my American accent over here in Australia because I get tired of the first question with any stranger always being "where you from?"
19. I enjoy the show Glee - much to the dismay of most of my friends
20. No TV in our house for over 10 years
21. Started VideoSift after a 6 month, all-bank-accounts drained around the world trip with my wife and two kids
22. I once ran over a dog when delivering pizzas in high school, at night on snowy roads. It affected my driving for life
23. I can blow perfectly formed sprays of spit bubbles that float up into the air and last for up to a minute.
24. I spent a year in Salamanca, Spain as part of a university language program
25. I shat in an empty stairwell once due to explosive diarrhea that I could not contain.

Last one too much?>> ^dag:

1. I lived on the last federally granted homestead in the US in rural Alaska without running water or electricity for 5 years as a kid.
2. Had a ten speed when everyone else had a BMX, and thus never learned to tail slap.
3. Was an accomplice to deathcow stealing a LadyBug and Cosmic Adventure Colecovision cartridges from Art's Video Mart in 1984.
4. Bought my first 300 bps modem in 1985 for the Apple IIe.
5. Wore a spangly sequined vest in my high school's swing choir - and sang bass.
6. Attended Chaminade University of Honolulu for 2 years.
7. Attended Universidad de Salamanca in Spain for 1 year.
9. Worked in Osaka Japan for 3 years - probably for the Yakuza.
10. Married by a catholic priest to my Aussie wife in Japan.
11. Have acted in several community theater productions
12. Would like to have my head frozen at Alcor.
13. Can do good Sterling Holloway and Neil Diamond impressions
14. Founded best online community ever.

First, the western world has so many foundational ideas beyond Christianity that we take for granted. For instance, rights language. We talk about our right to this and that, but that is only after hundreds of years of getting it wrong and consciously working towards better models. The "east" only has one rival school, Confucianism, which the middle east does not hold. The middle east has no real rights language at all, spare religious orders.

One again, Japan isn't a "great" model for liberty, but compared to the dictatorships of the middle east, it is a pillar. I mean, just 50 years ago they had a emperors, and not just ceremonial ones. I don't want to breeze by all the very important points you bring up, they have a long way to go...and they still are very exclusionary in many ways. But comparable that to women being stoned for being in a room with a man that is not their husband.

I don't think any of his examples where bad, in fact, they showed the small case compared to the large cases. Japan has had partial implementation of western ideas and values, and has had partial success with social change for the better. He has to be careful what examples he uses. He can't use the USA as an example without being completely ostracized. And even then the United States has a similar story to tell about colonization and displacement of natives.

>> ^undefined:

Mmmm I don't know, I think his praisal of western culture comes from being frustrated with his own culture. In fact, what's so different about western world and the spread of Christianity vs the spread of Muslim teachings and its expansion to east and west? It's basically the same thing when you think about it. Both the west and middle east wanted to spread their teaching (by means of conquest most of the time). It's not like west did things any different than the Arabs.
And his examples are misleading. Japan isn't a great model for liberty and democracy. Japanese still very much live in a very closed society with limited exposure to foreign ideas. You don't hear of certain things on the news, females are still expected to behave certain ways, etc etc. The Yakuza still acts as the 'Samurai class' of the old days where they can get away with bullying its citizens. So much for individual liberty and freedom of ideas. However, its economy, technological innovation and civil infrastructure did benefit largely from western teachings tremendously, which it could not have gotten from within its closed society model.
Australia and South Africa was born out of colonization and by enslaving the indigenous population and this too makes for a terrible example. But in today's world these guys enjoy stability and happiness where its citizens are happy and isn't looking to revolt at any second because they too adopt western technologies and other foreign ideas and methods to cope with their own environment.
One thing I do agree with him is when he says closed society lag behind other nations. Japan certainly was a closed society before the Americans forced open its gates, and the Japanese ended up with an empire of their own in the East. America opened its gates towards all immigrants and saw an incredible rate of growth for the past 3 centuries. 15th century Europe got a huge boost in culture and technology when they started accepting knowledge from outside their own worlds like the Arab culture and the Far East Chinese.
Openness to other cultures, philosophies and technology gives benefits to your own. This is what this man was trying to say, despite all the bad examples