Edward Mills wrote:
> On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 05:25:42 GMT, necoandjeff wrote:
>
>> Danny Wilde wrote:
>>> "Edward Mills" <spam@hotmail.com> wrote in message
>>> news:1rc9b4yw1ymyz$.l5fs7xp1d5xl.dlg@40tude.net...
>>>> On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 21:27:40 +0900, Eric Takabayashi wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Back in 1987, it was TV and videos which first taught me
>>>>> conversational Japanese.
>>>>
>>>> You mean like the old guy that does the voiceovers for those TBS
>>>> retardathons? You know the guy who talks like a mix between an old
>>>> woman having a massive orgasm and a high school girl trying to
>>>> sound like a five year old girl?
>>>
>>> I don't know why people here want to insult Japanese TV so much and
>>> say how stupid the people on Japanese TV are.
>>
>> It's a fairly typical phenomenon among the not-so-deep thinkers
>> among us, actually. When in your own country, things are just stupid
>> and taken for granted, but when you are in Japan and you see
>> something stupid, rather than recall the fact that there are quite
>> likely things that are just as stupid back in your home country, it
>> becomes "that stupid Japanese [thing]," which is somehow unique to
>> the Japanese.
>
> I would strongly urge you to consider the logic you used to arrive at
> this conclusion, because it is highly flawed.
>
> hint: Just because Martians are stupid doesn't mean that Earthlings
> aren't stupid.

My conclusion is based on years of observation, not logical reasoning. If
people spoke precisely, I would agree with you completely. Unfortunately,
when many people make observations about things in Japan they are
subconsciously processing them as observations about the Japanese in a way
they do not when making observations about things at home. They hear
Hamasaki Ayumi sing, one of the most popular performers in Japan, and rather
than conclude that the most popular perfomer in Japan sucks, they expand
their conclusion to Japanese music sucks, or Japanese taste in music sucks,
notwithstanding the fact that Brittney Spears is one of the most popular
performers in the U.S., and sucks just as badly.

Jeff