A Dangerous and Costly Photo in Japan | Hacker News Reader

A Dangerous and Costly Photo in Japan

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308 pointscuriously105 comments

So a dash of soy sauce for anybody reading this article without some familiarity with the background: Jake Adelstein is a reporter who shot to fame with his book "Tokyo Vice", which is about being the first Western reporter to cover the crime beat at a Japanese newspaper, not a small achievement. However, in the five years since, Jake's articles have been basically all yakuza all the time, and tend to imply that the yakuza are everywhere in Japanese society, pulling strings all the time.

However, in actuality, the yakuza are slowly fading away. The police started clamping down pretty hard in 1992 and have kept up the pressure ever since, with many traditional yakuza businesses like protection money, extortion becoming more and more difficult, and increasing societal pressure on yakuza members themselves. Consequently, yakuza revenues and membership have plummeted, and infighting between groups fighting for slices of the remaining cake (drugs, gambling, illegal prostitution, etc) isn't helping. Here's a summary, cowritten oddly enough by Jake himself, although he does somewhat unconvincingly claim that the yakuza are just going underground in response:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/09/where-have-...

But leaded fuel was banned in Japan in 1986.

Why is it, that whenever there is a FIFA WC or Olympics, that there seems to be ties to organized crime, poor working conditions, bribery and so on, but nothing ever happens, the games go through (every time) and everybody is watching, what is just a show of "panem et circenses".

Why do "modern" societies accept these kinds of festivities, with all what is surrounding them?

I think that it is merely a consequence of when you have a small number of people that get a huge benefit which is paid by the rest of society contributing just a little each. It is greatly in the interest of the smaller group to continue this by whatever means, even criminal ones. It is not really in the interest of the rest of society to end this because, as individuals, they contribute very little and it would take a huge effort to stop paying.

You get the same effect when, for example, governments subsidise an industry such as agriculture. A tiny group benefits (and lobbies for this to continue) but the cost to the rest of society is individually quite small, for example in Europe around EUR 5-10/person/week.

This is one of the things covered by public choice theory: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_choice#Special_interest...

>A tiny group benefits (and lobbies for this to continue) but the cost to the rest of society is individually quite small, for example in Europe around EUR 5-10/person/week.

and your individual power to affect things is even smaller than that.

Add to that that corrupting a multi-billion project results in the huge payoff to the participants where is successfully defending a project against corruption results in no payoff to the ones fighting against the corruption. Thus money and power is on the side of the former.

Thanks, read this once in (I believe) Freakonomics (regarding protective tariffs on sugar in the US), but did not get the connection. Your comment opened my eyes - so thanks a lot for putting my thoughts on the right track.

> Why do "modern" societies accept these kinds of festivities, with all what is surrounding them?

The question can be widen to 'Why do "modern" society still include organized crime, poor working conditions, bribery and so on'.

The non glamorous, pragmatic answer is that these people turn to these "out of the system" groups for things that are not possible or acceptable within the official set of rules. When will we have a "modern" society where people don't try to circumvent society rules ? Well...

Actually, we could view it as hacking around morality and social rules. And we know some people will always have an itch for hacking things.

It's a fairly vague question, but an interesting one from an economic or game theoretical perspective. I suppose the concept of "a modern society accepting" something is nothing more than the aggregate of millions of individuals' choices, and very few individuals are capable of significantly changing anything about the way governments or very large organizations operate. Making matters worse, the benefit of any small change an individual can make is shared among millions of other individuals.

Thus "good society" is a public good (at least when the society is governed by a democratic state), and like any public good, it is prone to being underproduced.

Because the "average person" neither cares, nor knows that these shenanigans go on. The "Olympics" brand creates a predisposition amongst most people to assume nobility, honour and "sportsmanship". This is what brands are designed to do, and they've done it brilliantly.

Exactly. Heads in the clouds, or heads in the sand. The sport world is rife with corruption, the big events are scams, and half the participants are doping. I won't miss robots replacing this lot.

Or, less cynically, heads in their own world. People don't have the time to learn and care about everything. They're much more concerned about things going on in their immediate life, on their local city, on their state, and on their nation.

What the major news outlets reports on also has a big influence here, and coverage of the olympics also tends to focus on the athletes, not on the olympic committee. As a result, I'm pretty sure what goes into creating the olympics generally ranks pretty far down on the list of people's priorities.

It is not just sports, we all ignore things, whether it be working conditions of those producing our goods, the environmental impact of the overseas factories, the suppression of unions by corporations in various parts of the world.

We do not, for whatever reason, act on the information we have.

Example: A documentary was widely watched here showing child labor and dangerous conditions involved in obtaining the materials for mobile phone components.

Do you think this changed the purchasing patterns of those who use mobile phones and watched the program?

> Do you think this changed the purchasing patterns of those who use mobile phones and watched the program?

You have to actually give people ethical alternatives before they're able to meaningfully change their buying habits. "Fair trade" is a real thing for many products, as well as labor and environmental certification (eg, UTZ).

Not everyone will care, but that number is certainly more than zero. The problem is that all major electronics manufacturers are some degree of awful.

Egos are the origination of they why it can occur.

Start with a municipality or country leader looking for ways to cement their "legacy." The leader will identify projects in which their name will can be associated to keep them in the forefront of the people using the people's monies. Be it fixed rail, stadium construction for a private team, or putting on an Olymipic event, the leader needs to fulfill their desire to do something.

Once the project, let us use the Olympics, are whispered as a possibility, an exploratory probe is performed; probes can cost anywhere from $100,000 to $1,000,000 as they include analyses of existing facilities and requirements. Elected officials are excited because there is a remote possibility that the Olymipics could be hosted and sign off on the small funds. Bidding takes a couple of million to draw up plans for the facility deficiencies and shuttle the IOC team around the city; the leader gets to hob nob with the IOC team, press photos, other elected officials get to bask in the glow from local newspaper reports. After the national selection, your city needs to be selected to represent the nation, you move on to global selection committee. Repeat the process and you are looking at $16 million dollars for a successful bid, Salt Lake City was the last American Olympic bid I could find.

If you cannot finance this undertaking you need to find investors willing to finance the program; criminal rings are perfect as they can provide liquid assets and assist with the process by leaning on their contacts.

The risk management for the criminal entities:

* Failure to achieve Olympics, still have a leader to approach when the organization needs assistance with an issue, good result

* Success to achieve Olympics, the leader has favored companies to go to for projects during the bid construction process, further cementing the organizations grip, great result.

The United States has the funds at the federal level to contribute to the Olympic proposals after selection is won.

Reference: I was a periphery in the bidding process.

The London Olympics didn't seem to have any particularly corrupt influences during its organisation.

Is it possible that the people on the FIFA and Olympic committees reflect the country and society they inhabit?

The social cleansing of East London was swept under the carpet.

Also remember that the original budget for the games was £2Bn, this spiralled to £10Bn at least. Where did that money go?

I think the cleansing was anything-but-swept under the carpet. It was boasted about as a good outcome. I'm not sure all would agree with that, but I don't think it was hidden.

I'm only aware of the £10b estimate. The places that was spent can be explored here: http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2012/jun/13/olympic...

> I'm not sure all would agree with that, but I don't think it was hidden.

In the modern media cycle anything that is not actively pushed into view is hidden.

- What is going on with ebola? Did the epidemic suddenly stopped.

- What is going on with CIA torture?

- What is going on with the jet shot over Ukraine ...

And these are big ticket items that got lots of coverage. The terrible working conditions in Quatar for the world cup has been thoroughly exposed. People read, are shocked and forget.

For a news to be hidden today - you don't need to actively cover up - just to find something else for the attention of the public for the time being.

Yes, it's awful how East London got great new transport links, sporting facilities and a huge park.

Fifteen Olympic officials spent $70,000 for one lunch seems a bit corrupt.

http://www.esquire.com/_mobile/blogs/food-for-men/olympic-ju...

Perhaps 'excessive' would be a better characterisation? I agree, but that doesn't really have much to do with the organisation/planning of the games themselves.

It is a UK receipt, but there is little evidence about who it was, if it is indeed genuine.

The same reasons any number of atrocities are committed without so much as a blip on our consciousness: Ignorance and apathy.

We're pretty limited beings :).

That's a question I've been asking myself a lot while I talk with my family.

I think there are two possible reasons :

1. There is big conspiracy between organized crime and governments on a worldwide level, which conclude in mutual help ( government <-> organized crime )

2. The rate of bribes and illegal business deals are overrated by media and actually there isn't such a thing as "massive corruption practices".

Those both reasons are part of what I figured out as the "conspiracy paradox", which ( ironically ) is again based on two statements :

1. There isn't any large conspiracy theory existing, because there is a statistically significant change of a whistleblower to come out and speak about that.

2. Statement 1 is equally true ( Edward Snowden ) and false ( Other unrevealed whistleblowers ).

You should really research & pick your "world axioms" wisely, if done so you wouldn't see paradoxes where there are none. There is currently no way for a whistleblower to publish any information that powers on different levels don't want him to publish. That naive "hollywoody" view that you just send some information to all major news outlets/police/your representative(s) and things somehow change for the best .. how many dead whistleblowers because of this 24/7 reinforced naive world view will it take, so much fakery and people are still in the dark(would expect more from this community - although I understand the temptation to fall for every false hero/honeypot organistation our powers throw at you in this medieval society)

> In addition to serving as the vice chairman of Japan's Olympic Committee, Tanaka is also the chief director of Japan's largest college, Japan University, and the president of the International Sumo Association

I was curious to learn more about Japan University, but it seems that there doesn't actually exist an institution that goes by that name! The Wikipedia page for "Japan University" does not exist, and a Google search for "Japan University" in quotes doesn't turn up any results for a Japan University on the first page.

It seems that he's actually referring to Nihon University; Nihon means "Japan" in Japanese.

The word "Japan" doesn't exist in Japanese, so I'm not sure what your point is...

The point is that "Japan University" is a mistranslation. The official English name of 日本大学 is Nihon University. A fairly reasonable mistranslation since 日本 is usually rendered as "Japan", e.g. 日本航空 is Japan Airlines.

> The point is that "Japan University" is a mistranslation. The official English name of 日本大学 is Nihon University.

Its an accurate translation; though the existence of an official English name would generally eliminate the need for any translation, as using the existing official English name of the institution would generally be considered more proper than translating at all.

Only if you assume that English should be the default language when it comes to higher education institutions' names.

And we all know Japan has a bit of a reputation for xenophobia. I wouldn't expect this to change any time soon.

> Only if you view assume that English should be the default language

If an entity defines an official English language name, then when operating in English, it would be more proper to refer to it using the official name in that language than to translate a name from another language to English, no?

You do have a point. One thing I am unsure of is whether we can know who referred to it by the incorrect translation first -- the university, or the public.

His point is that it's weird to have translated part of an organisation name where the organisation calls it something else. A bit like someone referring to "All Japan Airways", instead of "All Nippon Airways".

Well it is also weird that we can just call Japan Japan or Germany Germany all the time as those aren't those countries' names, yet we still do it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9VMY8X9rU8

That is called an "exonym". Many languages have them.

In Slovakia, the St. Lawrence River forming part of the border between Canada and the USA is called "Rieka svätého Vavrinca":

http://sk.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rieka_sv%C3%A4t%C3%A9ho_Vavrinc...

Well that's a direct translation of the name and using the Czech/Slovak version of Lawrence/Laurence/Laurent.

Rieka = river

Svaty = saint

Vavřinec = lawrence

A bit of fiddling around to connect the words together correctly (slavic languages are odd in this regard) and you get "Rieka svätého Vavrinca"

note: I speak awful Czech and even worse Slovak :)

This is different, as Nihon University and All Nippon Airways already have official English names.

Meh, to someone who actually speaks Japanese it's not so clear cut. The word for Japan is 日本, pronounced "nihon" or "nippon" but never "japan". But every Japanese person would know that for whatever reason "japan" is the word English speakers use to refer to their country. So to someone who speaks Japanese, "Japan University" and "Nihon University" are the same thing. They are both obviously referring to 日本大学. "Japan University" is only technically a wrong transliteration if you insist on an editorial policy of using an organization's official English name. However to someone who doesn't know Japanese, "Japan University" is a better translation because it reflects the actual connotation of 日本大学 a native speaker would recognize -- "University of Japan."

I speak enough Japanese to know this, but I still disagree. These organizations have an official and well known English name, and these English articles were written for English speakers, not Japanese speakers. It would be like calling China "Middle/Central Nation/Country", or just calling it Zhongguo.

No, it'd be like calling Zhongguo University "China University." Can you see how that is qualitatively different?

Is Zhongguo University the official English name of that university? If so, then no. The only actual university I can find with that sort of name is Zhonghuarenmin university, which has the official English name of Renmin University of China.

Oh it exists. For instance the NHK television channel announces itself as "Terebi Japan".

Usually, in print, it looks like ジャパン rather than "Japan", though.

After reading the article I spent the last half hour looking deeper into the Yakuza. It's quite amazing just how integrated they are into Japanese society, that they have a strong, highly respected morale code and the way they are semi-legal entities that the government/police (mostly) ignore.

> morale code

The yubitsume(†) will continue until morale improves.

† finger cutting

> It's quite amazing just how integrated they are into Japanese society

Only, they're not. I don't know why people keep repeating this. The Yakuza has been on the decline since the early 90s. The only place they're still integrated are in the shady areas of society (mainly, industries for vices. Porn, Pachinko Parlors, Soaplands, etc...) You're not going to find the Yakuza operating a franchise Burger King, clothing store or find them shaking down a mom & pop aquarium store.

Again, the Yakuza has been dying. All of the "real" powerful bosses went completely legit, only dabbling in white collar crimes (if at all). What's left are the scraps. Scraps without much power, pull or sway. They're basically just thugs who couldn't, wouldn't or didn't want to go legit. They're no longer the Yakuza we once knew.

True. I've been meaning to read the book Yakuza Moon for a while.

The fact that organized crime in Japan is so open and blatant blows my mind. This type of behavior has no place in a modern society. So crazy.

It's not open and blatant. They have publicly visible infrastructure and operate legitimate businesses. (on the surface) This doesn't mean their criminality is blatant. They hide that behind a veil of operational security that makes it difficult to catch them.

Think of how policing of organized crime works here. The authorities generally know who the leaders are, they may even interact with them semi-regularly. The leaders lead normal lives, and they lead criminal lives. Only the normal part 'shows'.

Just because you know someone's a criminal doesn't make it any easier to prosecute them. You have to build up a case and make it stick. When crime is organized, criminals can afford a stiff defense against that sort of thing. So the authorities have to take their time and get their paperwork in order. Time they don't have to take when it's just a few idiots robbing liquor stores.

So a known crime family in Japan can buy a big office building and staff it. It's not like they're hanging a sign out saying, "hey, lookie here, bad stuff going on in here. Come raid me pigs!" Do you know who owns all the office buildings in your city? It takes some journalist to make it publicly known.

Open criminal activity is far more prevalent in the US than it is in Japan.

> It's not open and blatant. They have publicly visible infrastructure and operate legitimate businesses. (on the surface) This doesn't mean their criminality is blatant.

This is exactly it. It's like someone seeing an ad on TV for the reality show "Mob Wives" and getting the impression that the Mafia is something that operates in the open in the U.S.

I'm not an expert on the topic; just a Tokyo resident. But it seems clear to me that there are advantages to this stance, too, which you may not be considering.

It's not possible to eliminate organized crime entirely. Not anywhere, unless you go full police-state with cameras inside every home and business. (And probably not even then.)

So keeping it semi-open and well-known makes it more manageable. It's a tradeoff. One reason we don't have much collateral violence from organized crime here, I think.

Is it like Discworld where Ankh Morpork has a Guild of Thieves and a Guild for Assassins?

Better the enemy you know...

In the Philippines we also have this, we call it the "Government"

Fun fact: I once bribed a police officer in the Philippines. Had a customs officer at the airport try to get a bribe from me (and I pretended to be ignorant to what he was getting at). It is pretty open there.

How did each of those conversations go?

For the police incident, a taxi I was riding in got pulled over because I (as the front passenger) wasn't wearing my seatbelt. So from the start it was quite obvious what the officer wanted. He got the drivers' license, held it up to the sun to see if it was genuine, was checking the quality of the car tires, if the license plate was properly attached at the front and back. Made a big show of it. Then he asked the taxi driver to come around the corner and talk. When the taxi driver got back, we asked "how much" and repaid him the bribe he had to give. $5. The good news about rampant corruption is police can be bribed cheaply.

For the customs officer, I was bringing a box of stuff into the country as gifts to family. He was reluctant to let me through. A lot of ums, hmms, and lengthy "thoughts". I knew his thinking would be quickened by a US $20, but eff that. I wasn't doing anything wrong, so no bribe for him. I eventually made it through.

Nope, globalisation, its the same everywhere*, the variables here are methods and "marketing"/pr - there is a smooth transition between banks and big-co's, intelligence communities, governments and organised crime .. like terrorism and ngo's, oc is just another tool in the toolbox(there were even papers published on this topic - read the non-revised versions - but I'm not here for this kind of work sooo no links)

Why does it blow your mind? Have we learnt nothing about democracy in the last hundred years? Why do we still think modern society has no place for corruption. I am sure societies two hundred years ago were saying the same thing. In fact I would suggest that technology and the global economy we live in has made corruption more accessible to the masses.

The fact is society has always been corrupt. It doesn't matter whether you are living in a democratic, socialist, communist country or dictatorship - there has and always will be corruption. It's human nature. You are never going to stop bad people doing bad things.

"Why do we still think modern society has no place for corruption."

What do you mean by that? Clearly corruption exists as you pointed out later but "has no place" usually means "unacceptable". I think the reason people believe that is because it's accurate.

Your acceptance of this kind of corruption is the very thing that enables it to flourish.

Recognition of the existence of a thing is not equivalent to approval of the thing.

Your acceptance of this kind of corruption is the very thing that enables it to flourish.

Here's a page that lists the different levels of access you get for donating to the UK's ruling political party:

https://www.conservatives.com/Donate/Donor_Clubs.aspx

There are so many ways to give influence via political donations, and the problem is just as you wrote: nobody gives a damn!.

I don't know how to solve the problem, any realistic chance of cleaning up politics seems to be an impossible task.

This is the argument I hear every time, and completely glosses over my last sentence. People have been trying successfully for thousands of years to stamp out corruption. It's a part of human nature.

In the case of FIFA (and reportedly) the IOC, delegates were given gifts. How do you suggest stopping the royal family of Qatar (who we have no jurisdiction or control over) giving a FIFA delegate a rolex? Short of putting an implant in everyone's head uploading everything they do, say or think to some giant all-seeing mainframe, I doubt we can track the actions of everyone and therefore stamp out corruption.

It's not about accepting the practice of corruption, it should of course be punished when proven. It's about accepting that it's human nature. You're never going to stop murderers murdering, or robbers robbing. People have been doing these things since the dawn of our existence.

I found some interesting reading around this subject [1].

> Earlier Enlightenment-era thinkers looked to society to bring structure and civilization in order to restrain naturally corrupted mankind from chaos. In 'The Confessions', as in his other works, Rousseau takes an opposing view. He asserts that man begins in a pristine, uncorrupted state at birth, and gradually becomes corrupted through the assertion of society upon the individual. The true state of nature, says Rousseau, is uncorrupted

Whether you believe society corrupts the uncorrupted human mind, or that humans are born corrupted is up to you. I believe that no matter what, corruption is part of us, and part of being in a society.

[1] http://www.academia.edu/1922627/Rousseau_on_the_Loss_of_Iden...

Sorry to be that guy, but your argument is totally flawed because it's such a blatant example of the black/white fallacy. The order of magnitude difference in corruption between different countries makes it obvious that it is possible to combat corruption, just as the sharp decline in all sorts of crime across pretty much the whole Western world shows that it is possible to combat other sorts of crime too.

You say it yourself. The "order of magnitude" is different. It's still present everywhere and always will be. Even places like Iceland, one of the least corrupt societies in the word has corruption: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_Iceland

Show me a single case of any society having never had corruption.

What you are arguing is either wrong or tautological. What is the relevance of the fact that nobody can get rid of all corruption? How do you even know it's a fact, except by some appeal to history?

You might as well be arguing that humans can't possibly fly because up until 1903 nobody had. "The Write brothers will surely fail! Show me a single case of anybody having ever flown."

Corruption is an extremely difficult problem to combat. But what reason do you have to say that it can't be solved? Maybe you should produce an example of some corruption for which there can be no possible manner of correcting.

The ease and at which you've adopted this attitude of cynicism and helplessness is not making the world a better place, nor does it provide an example of good decision-making or maturity. It's classic FUD.

> How do you even know it's a fact, except by some appeal to history?

Does nature create perfect humans? If your answer is anything but yes, then it's a fact that corruption is a part of nature, much like thunderstorms or a sun rise.

> But what reason do you have to say that it can't be solved?

Because it's inherent to our nature. Can you stop people from loving one another? Do you think that's possible? If your answer is anything but "Yes", then you have your answer on corruption. It's exactly the same thing. Trying to eliminate something that humans have been doing since our existence isn't something that can be solved with naive optimism.

The answer isn't to eliminate, but to mitigate and minimize its effects. It's very similar to the war on drugs. You're never going to stop people from doing drugs, so you work to minimize their usage - legalize it and regulate it so you can minimize the damage.

>Does nature create perfect humans? If your answer is anything but yes, then it's a fact that corruption is a part of nature, much like thunderstorms or a sun rise.

This is complete bullshit and you should know better. Nature also created smallpox, if you'll recall. But we killed that just fine. You're a part of nature, and you'll die too.

> Trying to eliminate something that humans have been doing since our existence isn't something that can be solved with naive optimism.

Like flight? I'm not advocating naive optimism. I'm advocating a rational exposition of possible solutions, and you are stubbornly obedient to your own expectations of preferred attitude in a way that has nothing to do with solving problems.

And don't try to use meaningless examples like 'perfect human' and 'love' to argue about corruption. Until you've got some firm grasp on what corruption is in a way that can be consistently communicated, you are doing nothing but trying to define yourself to be correct.

> Nature also created smallpox, if you'll recall. But we killed that just fine. You're a part of nature, and you'll die too.

You're not comparing apples and apples. You're comparing apples and oranges. If you want a more accurate comparison, it would be like if humans wiped out disease completely. And we're not even close to that. In truth, it would be impossible. Diseases will adapt and evolve to fight whatever cures we can throw at it. We can minimize and mitigate their effects, however.

> Like flight?

Do you think you could stop every human on this planet from loving? Again, if your answer is anything but "yes", then you're self-admittedly wrong. A hypocrite.

You can't eliminate something that is fundamental to human nature. It's silly and naive to even consider it.

> And don't try to use meaningless examples like 'perfect human' and 'love' to argue about corruption.

Why not? You're trying to eliminate something that is inherent to our very existence. Ok, so you don't want to use "love". Then how about laughter. Do you think it's possible to eliminate laughter if, for whatever reason, we wanted to get rid of humor?

It's a rhetorical question. No, you can't get rid of humor. And no, you can't get rid of corruption. They're the same exact thing. They're part of us. And always will be.

>No, you can't get rid of humor. And no, you can't get rid of corruption. They're the same exact thing.

Humor is corruption? That's how you intend to convince me that it can't be eliminated?

You're never going to stop murderers murdering, or robbers robbing.

FYI, crime rates including murder and robbery have been falling sharply for the last 20 years:

http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21582041-rich-world-s...

But those things will never go totally away is his point.

> In the case of FIFA (and reportedly) the IOC, delegates were given gifts. How do you suggest stopping the royal family of Qatar (who we have no jurisdiction or control over) giving a FIFA delegate a rolex? Short of putting an implant in everyone's head uploading everything they do, say or think to some giant all-seeing mainframe, I doubt we can track the actions of everyone and therefore stamp out corruption.

The person who is offered the gift says "thank you, that is very kind, but I am unable to accept gifts."

You then have a register of gifts. Anyone who is offerdd a gift notes that in the register.

But what about those corrupt people that want to accept the gifts? And who is going to enforce this policing of the gift registrar?

It makes it very easy to charge them for accepting the gifts once we find out.

Locks are for keeping honest people out.

And for increasing the expected cost for dishonest people to get in -- in the case of literal locks, by increasing the time and effort required to get in and the probability of being detected in the process (the variation in the quality and expense of locks is all about this second function, not about the function of keeping honest people out.)

Similarly with anti-corruption regimes -- they not only keep honest people from engaging in prohibited practices, but also generally include features designed to detect and punish defectors. While these obviously aren't 100% reliable, they are intended to increase the expected cost of defection.

> Your acceptance of this kind of corruption is the very thing that enables it to flourish.

Humans are inherently corrupt. You're never going to have a morally perfect society. It just can't happen. It's like asking the sun not to rise in the morning. Nature is not perfect so humans can't be perfect either. Flaws will appear.

Believing that corruption can be stomped out is as naive as believing in Santa Claus. Once you accept corruption, you can work to minimize and mitigate its effects. Which is the goal since you can never, ever eliminate it.

I don't think it has anything to do with democracy. Moreover, I don't think that we should be talk about "corruption" as some kind of a moral entity, it's not. What we call "corruption" is just a manifestation of the human nature to be selfish (combined with unability to think beyond scope of one's own person and family, something many people seem to suffer from). As long as what humans want is misaligned with what they can get, there will be corruption.

Note that, ironically, humans are so selfish that everything is corrupt, and yet not selfish enough as the economy would like us to be.

>"What we call "corruption" is just a manifestation of the human nature to be selfish (combined with unability[sic] to think beyond scope of one's own person and family, something many people seem to suffer from)"

Without going into the whole "altruism" vs "egoism" discussion. One simply needs to admit that there is a slight, never-zero skew for individuals to favor self and family over others. Hardly something you could use the word "suffer" for, without injecting your own personal bias into the matter.

What I refer to in parenthesis seems to me to be more of a cultural phenomenon than anything inherent in human nature (like selfishness is, understood amorally). I've observed that general culture emphasizes well-being of your own kin at the expense of the other people around you. I personally believe this to be a morally lacking attitude, but my own opinion on the morality of this doesn't change whether this has (or has not) an impact on what we call "corruption".

From what I've heard about it, seems as simple as the big organizations got so powerful they can afford to be open & blatant.

Why they are able to become so powerful is an interesting question, and seems to tie in to Japan's culture and the conduct of the yakuza.

And what about biker gangs (Hells Angels) and Italian mafia in the US/Canada?

You mean the Mafia that has been heavily targeted by the FBI in the papst 20 years? I can't speak on biker gangs, but the mafia is under a very watchful eye.

In most jurisdictions they lost the vast majority of the power they once had, so what about them?

What about the Italian mafia in the US/Canada?

When I see a Yakuza with only one finger cut, I know it's a good one : he made a mistake only once. I would not mess with this guy.

Btw I believe that like death and taxes organized crime is something no human society can go without. I'd rather have the Yakuzas than say MS13.

How does "Streisand effect" translate?

One of the names mentioned as a higher-up in the yakuza was clearly Korean; in general ethinc Koreans are at a disadvantage in Japan, so it surprises me that they can rise to high position in the yakuza.

How do we know these photos weren't photoshopped?

As a layman, I don't. But there are certain forensics you can do to be more certain. (Or at least be certain that it's a good `shop.) See eg https://superuser.com/questions/442352/detect-if-a-photo-has...

More than 1bn for a single photo? I say bubble.

> A police source said they will not specify the location of the injury "because it's something only the assailant would know, and we wish to weed out possible false confessions."

Whoa, Japan has cops who recognize that false confessions are a thing? Wish we had those in the US.

Don't get too excited. Japanese cops are infamous for coercing and even creating false confessions when they can't solve, e.g., a high-profile murder.

And for every Iwao Hakamada[1], you have to think there are many more innocent people convicted, who didn't become big media stories and are still serving time.

[1]: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/27/japanese-man-fr...

"Many Western human rights organizations alleged that the high conviction rate is due to rampant use of conviction solely based on confession. Confessions are often obtained after long periods of questioning by police as those arrested may be held for up to 23 days. This can, at times, take weeks during which time the suspect is in detention and can be prevented from contacting a lawyer or family.[3]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_justice_system_of_Japa...

Your snark is unjustified...Withholding public information about the particulars of a crime is common practice in the United States. The problem is not just false confessions, but false witnesses who claim to have seen something, but in retrospect, are only repeating second-hand information...this can hinder an investigation.

From all I have read the problem with US is not the quality of investigative work of the police, but the size of the mallets DA have at their disposal and their discretion of using them.

I think this is reasonable normal in most civilised societies.

In Japan, sacrifice for your family and organization are what bring you respect. The police take that into consideration.

In the States, meeting the bust quota so you earn your promotion for ridding the streets of scumbags is what brings you respect. The police take that into consideration.

Jake "The Fake" Adelstein has been outed several times, and has a long-running feud going with real journalist Christopher Johnson. eg

https://globalitewatchdog.wordpress.com/2013/11/09/jake-adel...

http://pastebin.com/XBtNgf1P (sorry I can't find the original)

btw that top photo in the Vice article is a fake, trying to find the original now....

Jake does indeed see yakuza lurking behind every pillar... but he's far more a "real" journalist than Christopher "Gaijin Gulag" Johnson (who also has a habit of posting anonymously: CJ, is that you?).

http://www.japanprobe.com/2012/01/20/christopher-johnson-und...

Are you Christopher Johnson? This is an obvious throwaway account. I've sometimes stumbled over this weird feud, and it seems that Christoper Johnson is not a "real journalist", but someone who may need psychological help.

lol nope, I'd hope the real Christopher Johnson would paint himself in a better light than saying he was involved in a childish feud with a self-styled reporter of the underworld.

You could say I'm just someone who is shocked at how badly everyone here wants to suspend reality and believe the yakuza story. Anyone who has met Adelstein knows within about 20 minutes of talking to him that he is just another Japan-weirdo with a big imagination.

That first article is hilarious.

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