Young Japanese people withdrawing?

[Illyrian]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23182523

Look at this. What the hell? Why aren't Japanese parents literally dragging these kids out of their rooms and sorting this out?

It's pretty well known that the amount of family pressure on kids in Japan is very high indeed, but that's the same for a lot of kids in other parts of the world as well.

What do you all think of this, and is it a phenomenon that only Japanese culture experiences?

[GaijinPunch]

Google "gomi yashiki". Another fucked up phenomenon here.

[BryanM]

It's a popular subject we touch on every now and again here. (Much of modern animu is practically medication for these guys.) I usually link to something about the utopian rat experiments, and then mumble something about women starting to enter the workface in the 80's combined with the productivity gains through technology turning the job market into a bloodbath, and how Japan is more of a canary in the coal mine (the native white population in the US has negative growth for example).

In the end, why does anyone do anything? Because it's in their own best interest. If they don't want to have sex and/or start a family, why would they want to go outside? What reward would there be for them in that?

[Xyga]

An extremely demanding and unforgiving society with way too high standards
+
Less and less decent job opportunities
+
Excessively consumption-centered daily life
+
Teh interwebs and Akiba providing unlimited crazy fap material VS. real girls and young women who seem completely out of reach
=
Overall stinking mentalities, mind-crushing self-authoritarian society made mostly of reactionary dumb assholes and useless depressed people.

"Nope. Nope. Nope. I'm fucking not leaving my room anymore"
-> kind of an expected phenomenon methinks

That kind of stuff began to appear outside of Japan too around the 2000's in all 'advanced/rich' countries.
My guess is that it will get worse with time, looking around in many European countries where the young were hit the hardest by the consequences of the financial crisis, there are no reforms in their favor.

[Lord Satori]

If they don't want to have sex and/or start a family, why would they want to go outside?

This is gold.

I can understand though.

[kilauea]

I can totally relate to no wanting to see other people. I live in remote place for a reason and that reason is 30 years living in cities and suburbs!
Can't stay inside too long though. Drives me round the bend.

Maybe that's the answer? Ship 'em off to farms.

[Skykid]

Jeepers. Uncomplimentary commentary about Japan and using the BBC as a source. Dangerous ground. I can think of one individual who may be thinking of grinding your bones to make his daily bread.

My thought is that there's no good excuse and it's basically called growing a pair and getting a life. I can't think of any acceptable reason to hamper your parents and deny social interaction to be a bedroom tramp.

Saito says sufferers are paralysed by profound social fears.

Quite clearly a huge social value issue at work here. It's a big question that probably needs a military scale solution.

[BryanM]

[farms]

A-are you suggesting we eat the otaku?

B-because getting them to breed might prove difficult.

[kilauea]

Eat them, yeah feck it. They don't need to breed, just keep pumping tentacle porn into their bedrooms and we'll have a steady supply of young flesh that nobody is going to miss.

[President_Obama]

Perhaps some sort of huge, destructive sea monster is required to give these people perspective?
Let's call it an intervention.

[Ruldra]

For a time one company operating in Nagoya could be hired by parents to burst into their children's rooms, give them a big dressing down, and forcibly drag them away to a dormitory to learn the error of their ways.

What could possibly go wrong?

sudden interventions - even by healthcare professionals - can prove disastrous.

No shit.

[Blinge]

Hah. keep up the collective man-up chants, blame people on an individual basis, sure. Pat yourselves on the back for being well adjusted individuals or whatever.

There's plenty of people in the West who seclude themselves too.. I've done it for short spells, and i can't describe what led me to that point or the whole experience as anything other than the almighty meh.
Lost a damn good friend to the hiki effect, actually. Making any contact with him in person or online was an uphill struggle, it's like all the genius of his being was devoted to rejecting the world and those who were once close to him.

Oh and if someone already well-known or talented decides to cloister themselves away, they're treated as a "recluse" with an air of mystery about it. As if it's guaranteed they're going to emerge from chrysalis with something to show for it.

[Icarus]

Why aren't Japanese parents literally dragging these kids out of their rooms and sorting this out?
It's pretty well known that the amount of family pressure on kids in Japan is very high indeed, but that's the same for a lot of kids in other parts of the world as well.
What do you all think of this, and is it a phenomenon that only Japanese culture experiences?

The problem is that in many strongly traditional Asian cultures, the path for the eldest (or only) child is generally already laid for them by their parents: marriage, a number of kids, big expensive house, high-paying job of some description, parents moving in when they retire so the family can look after them, etc etc. The main issue is that strongly traditional parents do not give their children much leeway in this regard - you must be married by a certain age or the parents intervene and arrange hook-ups to get you there (often with complete disregard for your own feelings on the matter), must have a job of a certain type else you're not earning enough to support everyone (a job which is often not what the child wants to do for a living), and so on. This creates a lot of pressure on the children to meet specific standards, and in many occasions they can never hope to attain those standards.

The biggest issue here is that many young adults do not know how to cope with this pressure, and end up withdrawing as a result, the easiest form of escape. This is obviously compounded by the fact that traditional families don't give their children much leeway or support. It's less commonly seen in Westernised Asian families, but you do still see it in some cases. As a British-born Vietnamese, I personally was in a position where I felt like I was withdrawing - I was helping my mother run the family business (a restaurant) and she even said that she expected me to take it over. I did that for six years, and as time went on, I hated every minute of it, especially as I wanted to return to my creative studies which I had neglected for years. The financial crisis and the resulting sale of the business was the perfect excuse to escape from home and do what I wanted to do, and I'm lucky that my mother was and still is supportive of my choices in life, as she now knows and understands I value my independence as much as I value my family.

Not many Asian kids are so lucky.

Therefore, the idea of "Japanese parents literally dragging these kids out of their rooms and sorting this out" isn't exactly helpful to anyone as a whole, given the situation many of the young adults face. The root of the problem is more deep-seated than you think. If anything, the right way for families to approach this is to offer more support and leniency from a lot earlier in their lives, and allow the child to live and express themselves the way they want to. They'll eventually return home and support the family, but by that time, they'll be much stronger and more well-rounded due to learning from their own mistakes and finding their own path, rather than having a direction in life forced on them from a much earlier age.

[Teufel_in_Blau]

One question that I have is: why is the state doing nothing?

We have from time to time cases here where the kids don't go to school over a long period of time but at some point the Jugendamt (child protective services?) forces the parents to bring the children to school or else they will take away the kid and force him/her with their own resources. As long as you are in the age range for compulsory education, you have pretty much no other choice than going to school. Of course this won't help after a certain age is crossed.

[Teufel_in_Blau]

Therefore, the idea of "Japanese parents literally dragging these kids out of their rooms and sorting this out" isn't exactly helpful to anyone as a whole, given the situation many of the young adults face. The root of the problem is more deep-seated than you think. If anything, the right way for families to approach this is to offer more support and leniency from a lot earlier in their lives, and allow the child to live and express themselves the way they want to. They'll eventually return home and support the family, but by that time, they'll be much stronger and more well-rounded due to learning from their own mistakes and finding their own path, rather than having a direction in life forced on them from a much earlier age.

That's all fine and dandy and everyone needs a time-out from time to time. But we are talking about people who are living in one room for years. Check out tohno-chan. There are enough people there who ended up as homeless on the streets because they lost all their money on plastic toys and anime and therefore had no money left to pay the rent. Some are posting from internet cafes from time to time. At some point you must realize that even if your life is maybe not the one you wanted, it's still better than living on the streets.

[kilauea]

I didn't much like the plan my parents had for me when I was a kid either. I just wanted to program video games, folks rather shortsightedly didn't think it was a viable profession and wanted me to study some boring shit at Uni.

I solved the problem by signing up and serving in the infantry

[Blinge]

You answered the call of duty one way or another..

... >_<

[Icarus]

That's all fine and dandy and everyone needs a time-out from time to time. But we are talking about people who are living in one room for years. Check out tohno-chan. There are enough people there who ended up as homeless on the streets because they lost all their money on plastic toys and anime and therefore had no money left to pay the rent. Some are posting from internet cafes from time to time. At some point you must realize that even if your life is maybe not the one you wanted, it's still better than living on the streets.

You're assuming the small number of hyper-extreme cases that are reported by the media are an indication of Asian culture as a whole. Also, stereotying. The point is that there may be a lot more deeper issues at hand that are more difficult to root out and fix that may be causing some of the more extreme cases - physical, social, psychological etc. A lot of these problems can often go unreported, and as a result we as the observers are only getting a fragmented view of the overall picture.
Just hand-waving at the problem and saying "get the fuck out of your room" isn't the most optimal way to deal with this.

[glitch]

i recently lost a relationship to this phenomenon.
shut everyone out, including me. shit ain't pretty.

the pressure traditional parents here put on kids to get married is insane.

[GaijinPunch]

One question that I have is: why is the state doing nothing?

Why would it do something in the case above and not any other case? The short answer is that it's seen as a family affair. I think at some point if a child isn't attending school they'll jump in, but the threshold is nothing like what you'd see in the west.

[Teufel_in_Blau]

You're assuming the small number of hyper-extreme cases that are reported by the media are an indication of Asian culture as a whole. Also, stereotying. The point is that there may be a lot more deeper issues at hand that are more difficult to root out and fix that may be causing some of the more extreme cases - physical, social, psychological etc. A lot of these problems can often go unreported, and as a result we as the observers are only getting a fragmented view of the overall picture.
Just hand-waving at the problem and saying "get the fuck out of your room" isn't the most optimal way to deal with this.

I'm not a father, so I am looking on this problem through rose-tinted glasses but if my son wouldn't want to leave the room, the first thing that would come into my mind is that he is being bullied at school. If that's the case, I would try to talk with parents of the kids or, in the worst case, change school. I understand that depression is a serious matter and should be treated as such but I never informed myself how to help those people tbh.

Aside from that, I hope I don't sound like a total asshole and I said it a few times here already, but life in general sucks. Holy fuck, does it suck. For the most part it's boring and the other part is just annoying. I'm really sorry to say it to you but 98% of your problems can be solved by "getting the fuck out of your room" and leaving your comfort zone. Getting the fuck out of your room is actually the hardest part of life. -> http://youtu.be/3p1T3sVX4EY?t=27s

[Xyga]

Do most of the Japanese actually give a damn about hikikomoris and freeters ?

I'm not an expert but they give that impression similar to many anglo-saxon cultures with christian heritage that if you can't manage to get yourself a life it's because you're lazy, deserve your misery, should blame only yourself and shouldn't ask for help (you parasite!)

When you think like that, then poverty isn't your problem, and it's not the government's as well.
You just ignore them and voilà !
Poverty and misery are actually silently welcome by many societies as examples of what will become of you if you don't conform.
Welcome as long as the poor don't get violent of course.

I mean we read and watch stuff about hikis and freeters in Japan, but none of these publications give us the slightest idea of how the phenomenon is perceived by the masses over there.
These young people are miserable and poor... but they don't protest or turn into criminals.
That must mean something.

[SuperPang]

Young Japanese people withdrawing

That'll be why the population's stalled then.

[glitch]

Do most of the Japanese actually give a damn about hikikomoris

yes. at least in my direct surroundings people seem honestly concerned when the topic comes up.

even if not everyone cares about these people themselves, there's still an awareness that there is a problem with the culture, and concern over the country's future (the japanese are real pros in being concerned about the country's future).

saw it pop up in a tv drama ("silent poor") as well the other day.

and freeters ?

fleeters aren't really a problem in the same sort of way hikikomoris are though.

[Despatche]

you can't just tell these people to "go the fuck out" because they haven't been able to comprehend the idea for a long time

you're going up against a mindset more limited than a child's plus the sheer stubbornness/cling-to-bandwagon-ness of an adult

(no, getting the fuck out is not the hardest part of life)

[Skykid]

Pin it on culture, it's ok. There are elements to blame, can't deny it.

But to be so defeated? I've stood and faced some real shit: life throws mammoth curveballs at all of us.

Curl up and die or make a change? We're all individuals with some kind of independence at heart.

I'm not saying it's easy to break out, but turning to superficial replacements for love and attention to ease the pain? I don't see that as any kind of life worth living.

[Xyga]

Every individual has his/her circumstances, what tells you none of them tried as hard as they could ?
I always hear the same argument from people bragging 'I've been through real shit but I fought and made it, it's the same for everyone kid!'... when actually no, it's not and we all know it.

Some people just fight tougher battles than we do and lose, have no strength left, deep wounds, regrets, and they'll remain powerless unless someone actually come and give them a hand.

I don't imagine shut-ins accepting or - worse - enjoying their shitty non-lives. It's a very painful and humiliating situation.
But you can't ask people to just become strong out of nothing after they've been defeated and have absolutely no coins left to insert for another try.

One thing I strongly believe in, is that it is better the other way around; asking them to help you.
It can give such a person a feeling of not being worthless, of being needed.
I think that's more efficient than basic single-sided help, and certainly much more than shouting 'move your lazy ass and fight!'

[broken harbour]

but turning to superficial replacements for love and attention to ease the pain? I don't see that as any kind of life worth living.

I think alot of people don't even know they're doing it, at least at first. If someone is self-aware, and can see it coming, they can do something about it, I think often, once they realize what's happening, they feel it's too late. For instance, if you grew up with say, a depressed family member, and were observant, you'd likely be able to see warning signs in yourself early on, having that 'head start' means you can do something about it before you are overcome with negative emotions.

Same thing applies here, if you find that you aren't getting any joy out of personal relationships and prefer the company of your video games and television, uh... warning.

Now the problem is also that the older generation often blames the video games or television themselves, thinking that those things are the problem, when in reality they are just the symptoms of a deeper issue. There's an epidemic of agoraphobia, depression, suicide, alcoholism, drug abuse, etc in western countries, and frankly I think it's all related to people's dissatisfaction with our lifestyle, social hierarchy, and family/social pressures. I don't think the hikikomori thing is much different.

[Skykid]

I just don't have any sympathy.

No matter what I try to muster, it's not a plight I can accept as a legitimate struggle. "Withdrawing" is the operative word.

[TransatlanticFoe]

Young Japanese people withdrawing

That'll be why the population's stalled then.

That's what I thought this thread was going to be about too