Safety first in Japan
Japan is a very safe place — so safe it might just kill you with boredom.
Swimming pools in Japan generally have two or more lifeguards on duty at all times, although it’d be pretty hard to drown since the water is never deeper than your waist, and dangerous things like diving boards are not allowed. My son and I didn’t realize what we were missing until we went to visit family in Maryland, and got to jump off the high dive at the local pool, something a non-Olympic swimmer could only dream of doing in Japan.
People are constantly bombarded with silly safety messages here, which remind you to “stand behind the yellow line” on train platforms because apparently trains are dangerous or something, and there’s even a voice to tell you how to get on or off an escalator safely in department stores.
Now the latest trend in obsessive safety thinking is condemning swings, sliding boards, jungle gyms and other equipment at playgrounds due to an infinitesimally small number of tragic accidents involving children at play.
Japan is nothing if not the land of duality, though, and just as it tries to “think of the children” on the playground, the country still lacks some of the basic safety attitudes we take for granted in the U.S., like always using approved child carseats when driving, using baby gates to keep little ones from dangerous parts of the home, and so on.
Poor Mari….she’s my favorite. If I ever become a j-pop singer and part of the...
Is that just a difference between culture of public safety and private safety?
February 27th, 2007 at 8:19 amPossibly, possibly…
Very funny that this was posted the DAY BEFORE some woman fell onto the tracks because she was texting and not paying attention.
February 27th, 2007 at 11:56 amWe’re just as safety crazy in the US case in point.
http://video.glath.com/view/bullshit.Safety_Hysteria
http://video.glath.com/view/bullshit.Safety_Hysteria_Part2
And as a result of the infantilization of adults which has led to frivolous lawsuits against honest manufacturers and marketers who are the victims of adults who are either too mentally retarded to function, or are intentionally injuring themselves to make money. Case in point, warning labels, as you read the list, think about this: almost all of these labels are the result of someone actually doing this stuff…
http://www.dumb.com/productwarnings.htm
I think there is a doctor out there with a theory about this. Basically we all have fear instincts which used to serve as a self preservation technique. Today, we are so safe compared to ages past in industrialized countries, that much of what this instinct was designed for is now no longer present or rare. We no longer are chased by carnivorous animals, we are in no danger of starving, and thanks to modern medical care most diseases are on the decline. In the United States, we are benefiting from record low violent crime ratings. However the instincts still remain.
If most real threats are under control, there is still a desire to find a threat. Due to the ubiquitous presence of the global media and government regulatory agencies that have to justify their existence, we are constantly bombarded by messages which tell us we are in constant peril and only government mandates can save us. Since most of us don’t have the time to consider the actual threats against us, we rely on these sources such as the news us about threats, and evaluate our safety according to the anxiety of those around us. As a consequence, we are vunerable to the time bias, that is to say we are most worried about what the media or the government is freaking out about today. Often with little stated evidence or statistics.
For example, there is currently a worldwide paranoia about terrorism. We are constantly hearing about how the next big attack is right around the corner, and we spend 100s of billions of dollars to “protect” ourselves. But only about 10,000 Americans have been killed in the past century by terrorism. Meanwhile some 30,000 Americans die every year in automobile accidents (25% of which are alcohol related), we hardly are spending 100s of billions of dollars to reduce car crashes. Recently, the US media heralded a “meth epidemic” in the Midwest, I live in the meth capital of the US (percentage of Idahoans addicted to meth are reported to be the highest in the US), as a result of this media campaign there was a public outcry and legislation in congress. Now we have to sign a ledger to by Sudafed, and if we buy over a certain amount in a month, you can be arrested. What was never mentioned was that this “epidemic” was composed of a jump in meth use from .6 to .8 percent of the population, Idaho with its “huge meth problem” clocked in at about 1.0%.
February 27th, 2007 at 12:04 pmhttp://drugabusestatistics.samhsa.gov/2k5/meth/meth.htm
The same logic goes for the playground equipment in Japan. It’s the perfect system, you have the government regulators pushing “safety” procedures, they release stats to the press, the press taking their cue blow the situation out of proportion, and in response the public feels unsafe and demands legislation, the government responds to it’s own hype and passes ridiculous laws so “safety moms” can feel safe from terrorism, bird flu, and child molesters; all while they let their kids ride bikes without helmets, don’t inoculate their children against common and sometimes deadly childhood diseases, and ride in cars without safety seats.
If we want evolution to take the next great leap, we need to get rid of safety instructions.
February 27th, 2007 at 12:58 pmIf I’m not mistaken, schools and towns in the U.S. began banning jungle gyms, whirlarounds and the like several years back — probably after some braindead parents sued because their precious offspring got hurt, and the insurance companies threatened to drop coverage, etc. etc.
February 27th, 2007 at 1:02 pmHasn’t happened here yet. Although I can still joyfully/painfully remember hazing/being hazed on the whirlarounds by sitting on them with a crew of six older kids spinning as hard as they could until a blacked out/fell off. Those were the good old days.
February 27th, 2007 at 1:10 pmI think I counted 5 different safety stickers on the inside of my Japanese bathroom. And yet I cannot count the number of times I have slipped on tiled walkways in the rain.
How about the smoking? The latest anti-smoking campaign is based on the threat of burning a child in the face with a lit cigarette. How about freakin’ cancer and heart disease?
February 27th, 2007 at 3:08 pmIt’s also got to do with responsibility, me thinks. No longer is the world where you can claim personal responsibility and be considered noble… It’s all about the personal injury claims and the snake lawyers who go after them. If we didn’t have so much unmitigated litigation in the US, and perhaps becoming the way to go in Japan, we could get rid of these safety warnings…
I should sue my landlord since he didn’t warn me that the steps up to the house became slippery when wet. I fell flat on my back, yes, on the steps, while my kids watched… Boy, did I want to yell bloody murder!
February 27th, 2007 at 4:02 pmI think this is an issue everywhere and probably some kind of generational thing is involved. I’m sure kids are relatively safer today with all these laws, but can anyone who grew up in North America recall what being a kid was like?
It’s a wonder any of us got to grow up at all considering the very unwise things we did and indeed a few young friends probably died. I should have been dead on three occasions from doing extremely stupid things involving trains, high mountains, and rather explosive chemicals. Not to mention when we were teenagers but I’m not even counting that. We did survive–barely.
Today a kid can’t ride a bicycle without a helmet and knee pads etc. and can’t ride on the road and certainly not on the sidewalk (not sure where they can ride–probably on artificial protected bike paths?)
Remember what kind of firecrackers and chemistry sets we had? TOTALLY illegal (even for terrorists) today. Just makes you wonder whether we finally woke up to protecting the kids or whether they are now over-protected. But like the guy said–evolution certainly isn’t going to happen because no one is likely to get de-selected by anything dangerous or by bad luck! Not sure which is better/worse.
February 27th, 2007 at 4:09 pmI think the US is, often unfortunately, way ahead in safety regulations. Some are good, but most simply anesthetize the public until they no longer feel the need to take responsibility for their own safety.
Try walking around Shanghai when the Chinese New Year fireworks are going off. Far more dangerous than many war zones. But sure keeps you awake and alert.
February 27th, 2007 at 5:02 pmKid Gloves?
Kids are in an interesting predicament in Japan. There is a low birthrate at present, in spite of the government’s New Angel Plan (PDF link to a JETRO special report from 2005, the first year of the population decline), which puts interesting pre…
March 30th, 2007 at 7:28 am