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A Little Christmas Conflict

This video has a few curiosities including: self heating sake, a look at the lifestyle of homeless in Japan, a rambunctious dog, and how to argue (or not) with someone who’s instant noodles you have ruined. The last part is a bit controversial among viewers. The video maker said in his description:

Before you jump all over me…I went back apologized and took him to the convenience store to replace his food and drink. SORRY! I overreacted!

24 comments - What do you think? Posted by Claytonian - December 24, 2007 at 8:17 pm

Categories: General Japan Tags: Foreigners in Japan, guestism, homeless in Japan

Chris

I don’t think you overreacted. That’s how pricks react. By laughing and immediately going on the defensive.

Claytonian

by “you” we’re gonna assume you mean the maker of this video.

Chris

Of course!!! And it doesn’t even requiring any assuming. Just a brain.

sod

oh one of the reasons i don’t like the majority of america’s

Karisu

Because you know what the majority of Americans are like, right? Clearly, we’re all exactly like this guy.

countdown

Read carefully. He didn’t say you’re all like that, he said the majority. Prove us wrong America, prove us wrong…

shazzb0t

Yeah, the video’s creator was 100% in the wrong. His Japanese might be decent, but he needs to understand Japanese manners. He was in the wrong and should have automatically recognized that.

The second he made a passing remark about his dog (which should be leashed) knocking over someone’s drink without moving at all to try and stop the contents from spilling out I knew this guy was a prick.

He walks right through a place were someone was obviously staying and doesn’t really seem to place any emphasis on the homeless even basic respect. That is troubling to me. In my opinion his handling of this situation makes him look like a total smug asshole gaijin trying to play the ‘hey guys, I’m in Japan. It is soo weeeeirrrrddd here’ role.

TheManiac

Gotta agree with you Shaz.
The maker of this video was kind of a dick to that guy.
Look people. I know there might be a rumor that some homeless people choose to be that way. But it’s just good karma to be nice to those less fortunate than you.

http://myso-calledjapaneselife.blogspot.com/ Shari

I’m not sure what country you’re from sod, but I think you wouldn’t like it if other people saw the bad behavior of one person from your country and then generalized that behavior to all people of your nationality. If you want to just hate Americans because it satisfies your need to be prejudiced, then just hate them. Don’t look for flimsy excuses.

It’s lovely to head into Christmas day with such open bigotry being expressed. :-p

At any rate, the dog should have been on a leash and the fellow should have apologized and insisted on compensation immediately. It’s inexcusable to blame the homeless person for leaving his food unattended while he sleeps. Isn’t his life hard enough? And to do all of this wearing a Santa hat… The spirit of charity should have been in his heart, not petty defensiveness.
ponta

I remember the news that Japanese high-school students attacked homeless people out of stress. Some people seem to think wrongly that homeless people do not have the dignity of their own. The homeless person said,” なめんなよ, Don’t think you can make a fool of me!”, which he didn’t translate for some reason. That is right. He can not make fool out of the homeless person. The video-maker’s act was insulting.
That said, I think he now knows he was wrong; He apologized.
D-san

The guy seemed smug from the beginning of the vid. there’s way too many guys and girls (gaijin) like this in Japan.
Kevin

This just makes me sad to see stuff like this. Why would he have to do something so plainly mean to the homeless guy. He tells the guy right from the beginning that the park isn’t is home, it’s a park, but I’m not exactly sure how that excuses the fact that his dog was eating the man’s food.
The whole video was a demonstration of how homeless people can drink warm sake, but who really cares when people like this guy exist to make homeless people’s lives suck.
countdown

I gotta agree. The video-maker is an obvious asshole, but the fact that he would boastfully post a video like this shows that he’s only vaguely aware of it. He says he took the guy to a convenience store after. Yeah, bullshit. As if he wouldn’t have filmed that too to enlighten us on his acts of charity.

Please, please Japanese people, don’t judge all gaijin based on losers like this. We can stand him either.

mommy seksi

waaah, i cldnt access the said video
but based from the comments, yeah, only a prick cld post a video like that…but i think, he did it deliberately to capture the incident and thought that japan and it’s people are laughable stocks…he sure ddnt realized the consequences when he arrogantly aired his video.

Jeff

I just shook my head through this whole thing.

I suspect he lives in Japan because he got tired of people beating him up back home.

Karisu

You got all that from that one video? Impressive.

Why do people make wild speculation about a person just because they don’t like them? It makes yourself look bad as well.

japan-fan

This guy is totally KY.

Why one feels the need to make a video about self-heating sake in the middle of a park is totally beyond me……

And then he begins to condescend this poor homeless guy. Cut tape idiot….why the hell do you feel the need to broadcast this over the interwebs?

Karisu

Are you new to the internet? Have you ever been to YouTube? These types of videos have been incredibly common for years.

There’s nothing wrong with someone making a video about an interesting product in the park, the fact that he’s an asshole has nothing to do with the product review.

http://www.youtube.com/tkyosam Tkyosam

Ah whatever, all you people are waaaaay over-reacting to this video. The guy is an overall nice/funny/informative human being who pissed off one homeless man and didn’t have his dog on a leash. Fuckin call the cops, why don’t ya?

YOU PEOPLE are the reason new foreigners to this country have such a hard time assimilating and understand this culture, especially when trying to get an idea about this place from a foreigners perspective. At least the gaiokokujin on youtube have the balls to show what they look like before voicing their opinions instead of hidin behind some bullshit screen name.

And, I also think it is quite pathetic and backwards of some of you to generalize Americans as a whole, from just viewing one person’s views and judgments on things.

Thats my 2 cents, like my balls, thank you

shazzb0t

We are the reason foreigners in Japan have problems assimilating? Perhaps they should try to take their foreign perspective off for a second and try to put on the perspective of the country they are in. Too much emphasis placed on the ‘strange and interesting other’ when it comes to Western individuals interested in Japan, and to be honest it makes for some rather boring and repetitive takes on Japan. This video was one in a line of many such videos. Its tired, its been done, and you aren’t some great adventurer into the wild unknown. Get over yourselves. These people are everything that is wrong with the idea of good ol’ rugged individualism the West (Americans in particular) loves to circle jerk to.

And that seems to be the root of the problem in this video, doesn’t it? A recap: Smug and self-interested foreigner goes on a magical mission to the park to try out a wacky self-heating can of sake and ends up being accosted by some mean old homeless guy who has nothing better to do that be pissed off. Is that all you see here, because only half of that is correct. If this guy would have put his ego on the shelf for a second and realized that he was in the wrong, homeless people aren’t generally known for having lots of money and food much less places to live and that he should right his wrong there wouldn’t have been much criticism from the faceless meanines on the internet to go around now would there?

So why shouldn’t we call this dude out for his crude actions? Because he is ‘brave’ enough to put these videos on the world’s most used video site? Is that why we should hold back our criticism of this guys conduct towards another human being? I think you are sporting a victim mentality there champ. Might want to brush your shoulders off.

TigressLea

shazzb0t, you are so right.

Besides it doesn’t matter where this video was made, the fact is: a person was offended and lost their property.
I find absolutely nothing nice or funny about that.
erika88

I agree with you so hardcore.

Trevor

Well, it’s a good thing you took him to a store to make up. Here is my take.

1. Take the video in a park, walk through the areas where the homeless live; these are really no problem. It is a public park.

2. Let your dog knock over their drinks and eat their food and chuckle as though it’s funny – uhm. I am frankly _appalled_. These guys, as you note, are civilized people who are down on their luck. They do not live like animals. They clean up after themselves and are trying to survive with nearly nothing. The most important thing to them is their food and drink.

3. Start justifying and making excuses for yourself as soon as the guy comes back – I’m even more appalled. You should have immediately apologized and given him some money for food. The tone you took was the tone of a complete asshole. “Anata no uchi janai desho”, “shouganai”, etc. Sure, say that if you are just trying to walk through the park and a homeless person has their crap all over the place in your way, but not if they just have a few things in a corner and your dog eats their food! Jeez.

4. At least you went back and got him some food. Sometimes all of us are out to lunch, but you demonstrated a real lack of respect for a guy who merely
wanted to keep his food. To eat. I am usually very very hard on the homeless and the idle. I usually don’t give them anything, because many just waste it or lie to get a drink. But even I wouldn’t be that callous.
Trevor

BTW, I realize that you did not make the video; didn’t mean to imply that in the previous post.

A Little Christmas Conflict

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