Ed,
At 14:42 21/10/02 -0400, you wrote:
(KH)
<<<<
The behaviour of the Japanese boys is far from being irrational. It is
highly rational. Once they felt themselves forced out of their peer group
at school (far more important in Japan than in other cultures) -- almost
always because they couldn't keep up the academic pace (millions are having
to have additional cramming) -- then they don't want to shame their parents
by allowing the whole neighbourhood to know. They simply disappear (into
their bedrooms) and thus allow their parents to save face. And there are
well over a million of these young men in Japan (according to the expert
quoted on the programme).
>>>>
(EW)
<<<<
This kind of behaviour does not strike me as being rational. Surely
rationality has to include the ability to cope with one's social situation
by means other than hiding away from it. We had a case in Canada recently
in which a teenage girl avoided being bullied by commiting suicide. I
guess it worked, but was it rational?
>>>>
Well, if and when you see the documentary ("From our own Correspondent") I
think you'll agree that these Japanese adolescents and young men are in no
way irrational or perverse. (In England school drop-outs are stealing cars,
robbing old people in the streets, airspraying graffiti, etc) The Japanese
boys are deeply unhappy, of course, and they obviously can't cope with the
intense pressure of school or crammers but they are, quite
matter-of-factly, surplus to requirements, and know so. As are their
equivalents in Italy and Germany -- and as a slightly different category in
England, too -- not the hell-raising drop-outs as above, but the more
recent phenomenon of an older age group of males, sometimes with low-paying
jobs, who know that they could never afford to set up home on their own.
(KH)
<<<<
OK, I'm not going to push the IQ divide (even though it's quite clear to me
that the proportion and number of high-skill jobs are increasing in all
developed societies) until there's more evidence.
>>>>
(EW)
<<<<
Keith, keep pushing the IQ divide. I find the possibility of it very
interesting. It's just that I'm not persuaded ................ yet.
>>>>
The problem is that there is more disinformation and downright
misrepresentation occurring in the field of education than in anything else
these days. There's so much camouflage that it's almost impossible to see
what is actually going on.
Keith
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Keith Hudson,6 Upper Camden Place, Bath BA1 5HX, England
Tel:01225 312622/444881; Fax:01225 447727; E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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