A police whistle shrieked, and I turned and saw a police officer absolutely booking it through the crowd, shoving through people, shouting at some perpetrator.
My American-cultured brain thought, "This is it, someone's about to die." It seriously freaked me out.
I watched, and he caught up to... a guy on a bike. It was a no-biking zone. He gave the guy a ticket.
So I did what any self-respecting Canadian would do, I decided to be a hero.. I wheeled it home and showed it to my wife she says 'you better do something with it' so a day passes and we show it to my mother in law and she decides to call the local police to come get it
Lo and behold they show up but right away the guy starts going at me 'why did you take another person's property?' treating me like a criminal i.e. guilty until proven innocent. He makes me sit in the back of his car, separates me from my mother in law, asks for my identification, takes my passport, my employment, the works
They even called the detective squad and three guys roll up in a van
It was some kind of interrogation, I felt like Otto Warmbier. He asked every question under the sun, apparently he thought my mother in law was calling to report me for stealing a bike and he explained that it was no different than a bloody knife or a stolen purse. I decided to take the comical side and laughed my ass off when he told me that. It was more about him saving face to his command at that point
I couldn't believe the ludicrous nature of the whole deal. My only saving grace was that I'm married to a Japanese national so that got me off the hook, along with an intervention by my father in law and the local member of city government who lives down the street, otherwise I may have gone missing and ended up deported for all I know
Bicycle crime is real dude and I can totally understand why asian people suffer from such glaring groupthink and disdain for helping anyone -- no good deed goes unpunished for real
Was this part necessary?
The reason that even minor crimes (stealing a bicycle) are taken seriously is that letting small things slide is the beginning of an erosion of the rule of law. You should probably learn your lesson and leave things that aren’t yours alone. Furthermore, the fact that you think your political connections got you off the hook tells us everything we need to know about your exceptionalist outlook.
People like you make the police skeptical of foreigners like myself who bother to learn and play by the rules out of respect for our host country.
I really love how you condensed it well. This is how I always observed in the wild.
"The broken windows theory is a criminological theory that states that visible signs of crime, anti-social behavior, and civil disorder create an urban environment that encourages further crime and disorder, including serious crimes. The theory suggests that policing methods that target minor crimes such as vandalism, public drinking, and fare evasion help to create an atmosphere of order and lawfulness, thereby preventing more serious crimes."
Doesn't seem like the best argument, because that isn't necessarily how the rule of law works. Taking abandon property isn't necessarily theft, even using a non-abandoned bike isn't necessarily theft but something like "unlawful usage", and if you don't intend to keep the object it is even less theft. It many countries it isn't a "minor crime" to leaving an abandoned bike with the police, but simply what you are supposed to do. But apparently Tokyo has a big problem with abandoned bikes [0]. You sentiment mostly just seems to confirm OPs suggestion that people should know their place.
https://www.nippon.com/en/japan-data/h00444/tackling-tokyo%E...
Most difference between crime in Norway and Japan is more likely down to Norway having much larger immigrant population from poorer countries.
I think your attitude easily ends up excusing police states. Japanese justice system is highly questionable. Almost nobody ever gets acquitted in the justice system, and prison is rather harsh. Norway gets away with low crime despite (or because of) probably the worlds most liberal prison system.
Don't get me wrong. I admire a lot about Japan, but I think you easily fall into the trap of thinking that everything great about Japan is directly the result of something bad.
I would argue more important factor causing law crime in Japan is much the same as in Nordic countries. Low levels of inequality. How people are socialized. Stricter gun laws.
And let us not forget that the average age is high in Japan. Older people commit a lot less crime.
Japan has actually been seeing a rise in crime among the elderly population lately: https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2016/11/22/500040363/...
In a country of literal ninjas and samurais, this is the most inconsequential of all the reasons you gave.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/309755075_Does_Gun_...
I looked very briefly at that study. It compares US cities to other US cities using data from 1990. I would be more interested in how the US stacks up against other countries that don't have to act within the limitations of the Second Amendment. More recent data would probably be valuable as well.
Norway was has a murder rate 2.5x that of Japan[1]. Norway is considerably less safe than Japan, albeit still very safe by global standards.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intention...
https://www.tokyoweekender.com/2017/06/sex-crimes-japan-go-u...
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/07/31/national/crime-...
Japan also has a huge issue with people admitting to crimes they did not commit. https://www.france24.com/en/20181207-japan-justice-99-system...
@nosuchuser2 said,
"Japan's official murder rate is widely believed to be significantly underreported"
in response to someone noting that Norway's murder rate is 2.5x Japan's murder rate.
None of the articles you linked to even mentions an elevated or misreported murder rate. Instead you linked to articles suggesting that sex crimes are underreported. Sex crimes are actually underreported in just about every industrialized country, US included.
Given that the official murder statistics are what they are, citation is still required
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory#Criticis...
Multiple detectives investigating a bicycle theft is absurd. This has positively nothing to do with the broken window theory, but instead is exactly what the article talks about which is an overstaffed police force with little to do.
And it doesn't have little to do because Japan is such a cultural gem. It has little to do because Japan is facing a population implosion as the population ages with few children. Youth and young adults are, unsurprisingly, responsible for most crime, and when you have few in that demographic crime drops. No surprise.
[1] It's interesting to think about this in the context of a Japanese person in, say, Canada. They meet with a ridiculous scenario with a ridiculous response, and when vocalizing to a coworker how ridiculous it is they are told that they are a smug foreigner and need to shut the hell up. That would be simply outrageous, and is the sort of thing the worst sort of racist would resort to.
Right now, property crime reports just blatantly go into the void in US cities.
Edit: moreover, this is a well known thing that foreigners do: https://www.google.com/amp/s/soranews24.com/2017/08/16/pleas...
I get your sentiment though. As a foreigner, tying to live here and have normal, fulfilling relationships takes a metric ton of work. In my experience, there's a bit of an endowment effect, where the coping mechanisms and language successes we pick up through the years get tied into our personal identities.
I've certainly gotten my jimmies ruffled by Outrageous Gaijin TM on many occasions, but I feel like there's a lot of room for mutual growth and 切磋琢磨ing through those interactions.
To flip things on their head a bit, mutual understanding and cooperation are held as socially high ideals here. I think most Japanese would agree those are better than dropping harsh judgement.
Anyway, if you just made a careless post after a stressful day or something, then let me buy you a beer (or tea, if you prefer). My email is in my profile.
b) I used the expression 'decided to be a hero' because in these situations everyone will tell you 'don't be a hero' but I didn't want the bike to rust any more or risk getting taken away so I wheeled it up to do my duty as a 'citizen' i.e. take accountability for its safe return
c) Yes I did adopt the tone of villainy, it's hard to pass through people's sarcasm detectors but don't forget you're reading my words in your perception of my tone of voice and we're all one cosmic consciousness experiencing itself etc
d) Yes, my last snarky jab is necessary because in Asian countries everyone will tell you don't step out of line it's about the rule of law and don't stick your neck out even more than western countries because the police forces here have a real fetish for upholding the iron rule of law
e) don't start labelling me based one anecdote, come and have a beer with me first and see where I'm really coming from.. I've got even worse ones to share that make everyone in a prefecture a thousand kilometres away eye you badly --
The normal thing to do in this case would have been to wheel it to the local kōban...
Back home in Toronto, we have this silly habit of picking people's lost clothing items and putting them up on fences and signposts in case they come back to retrieve them. Under these circumstances here it's safer to walk on by -- same goes with the bike in the generalized sense the burden of returning the bike gets far greater due to the simple fact that most people simply won't bother, hence the need for a gaijin hero to step in and set things to rights
My experiences with the Japanese police:
1. I once found a wallet and carried it all the way to a nearby police box. Had to fill out some forms but no problems.
2. Another time I found and captured a dog running around town and had the police come to fetch it. Again no problems.
3. Just today while renewing my driver's license, I had some time before the lecture started so I walked out of the classroom and searched for a vending machine. I probably looked like I was a bit lost, and a police officer asked me what was wrong.
- Anyway - The plural of anecdote isn't data but I've only had nice encounters with the Japanese police so far.
In what city did you interact with police?
Thinking back I left out a couple encounters.
4. Asked the police box staff if they knew how to get to my hotel (this was before smartphones were common), they helped me (Tokyo)
5. Filed a lost item report (my wallet was stolen, in Japan!) (Tokyo). Didn't turn up (duh) but I think I needed a piece of paper to get back my teikiken on my Suica card.
6. Filed another lost "item" report (a dog I was taking care of ran off. Man, that was nerve-wrecking). They actually helped me look for the dog I think! (No relation with the dog incident in Matsue.) (Shounan region, Kanagawa prefecture)
7. I was cycling to work and it was raining. I was holding an umbrella in one hand and a police car passed by and they used their loudspeakers to tell me to close my umbrella (but didn't stop me or anything). This was in a rather rural area of a rural town (Matsue). I think this is a recently introduced law -- someone holding an umbrella while cycling bumped? crashed? into someone and actually killed them. :/
8. Apparently police box officers walk around the neighborhood ringing on every doorbell and asking if anything's been up lately. That happened in Nagoya a couple weeks ago. I liked it.
I actually admire the fact that they take bicycle theft seriously there.
In my East London flat I look out on an otherwise secluded balcony where a certain gentleman stores an ever-changing selection of nice looking bikes. I suppose it's possible that he's a legitimate bicycle trader, but given the fact that it's a) a total crackhead flat, and b) he doesn't seem to treat these nice bikes with any respect, just dumping them in a heap, I'm 99% sure they're stolen. I'd report it if it wasn't totally pointless, because the London Police don't care about bike theft.
It's like an athlete in combat sports not hiding the fact that they are gassed. There has to be some attempt to guise the reality or the situation devolves even faster.
Imagine being this vilely racist while being married to an Asian person. I feel sorry for your wife.
I said that at the risk of being accused of having internalized racism as an Asian person, but the situation on the ground really does resemble what he said.
And I'm in relatively gun-free Australia.
In the UK and some other EU countries, you'd just pay on the spot (either the fine or the ticket price). Some things aren't worth that much policing.
Similar with bringing a bottle of a brand that the store sells into the store - how are they supposed to know if you brought it in or if you just took it in the store and opened it there on the way to the cash register? (which, by the way, is not super uncommon either and generally tolerated)
German police are not allowed to collect fines on the spot, it's a corruption prevention measure.
Yes, kind of my bad with the bottle, but it was half empty and was like 50 cents anyway.
You could limit collecting fines by card I guess, the payment would go to the authorities.
Just seems like such small infractions aren't worth the stress, there's operations raking in millions tax free that could be worked on.
How many more police would it take, I wonder, before London was considered as safe as Tokyo?
I think the real problem here is that the citizens of Japan police themselves, and the citizens of most western countries like the UK don't.