I was at a talk (about Japanese politics) yesterday. Good talk. But this is not about the talk. Instead, this is about one person who was also there in the audience. This is someone who cultivates a reputation for having opinions on lots of things. He is on a university faculty and sometimes writes about international relations for one or more of the local English-language papers.
On the way out, he put his trash out in a container and then remarked to the person he was with something to the effect of, “I don’t bother to recycle. There are lots of foreigners in the building where I live, so nobody hassles us.” Having seen this person around and being on the same elevator, I asked, “So you take advantage of this?” And he said, basically, “The last thing I want is for people to treat me like a Japanese.”
First problem: If we accept that recycling is a good thing, it is a good thing regardless of nationality. To not recycle is (a) to believe recycling does not make any difference or (b) to position yourself as a parasite on society. It is not a matter of nationality. It is a matter of maturity.
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Second problem: What is this “be treated like a Japanese”? There is only one pattern of Japanese? All Japanese are treated exactly the same by all other Japanese? The enormity of this stereotyping boggles the mind. There are lots and lots of different personalities, and people are treated many different ways. Yet this person who professional persona is built around understanding society and interpersonal relations and all blithely consigns all Japanese to a single mold, and then disdains that mold. Would he be equally comfortable if I wrote about slovenly foreigners with no distinction? I doubt it.
This is a very articulate person, but he has, I suspect, confused glib with intelligent. This is not, I trust, the result of his living in a university environment or his living in a building where there are lots of other foreigners or anything else. It is simple moral laziness. And if he is this morally lazy about his own behavior, what standing does he have to lecture other people and nations about what they should or should not do? None at all.