HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: creubank@is.crl.sony.co.jp (Curtis Eubanks)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: It's Hangin' Time!
Date: 11 Jan 93 07:50:56 GMT
    <IfHGt8C00UhW451Xgc@andrew.cmu.edu> <1ijkdiINN34h@shelley.u.washington.edu> 
    <1993Jan09.200015.12514@gibdo.engr.washington.edu> 
    <1993Jan11.064730.5663@omrongw.wg.omron.co.jp>
Reply-To: creubank@is.crl.sony.co.jp (Curtis Eubanks)
Organization: Sony Corporation, Shinagawa, Tokyo, Japan.
X-Bytes: 1773

In article <1993Jan11.064730.5663@omrongw.wg.omron.co.jp> tnishi@lsa.ncl.omron.co.jp (NISHIYAMA Tetsuto) writes:

  >	   I happened to be watching t.v. last week when the subject of
  >executions in Japan popped up...I didn't really listen closely at the
  >time but from the little that I remember hearing, it seems that there
  >have NOT been any executions recently...something like 10 - 20 years?

Just one year, 1992.  In fact, discounting last year (and, I suppose
this year?)  there has been at least one execution in Japan every year
for something like 30 years.

  >(sorry, I wasn't paying attention)...Apparently, there are people who
  >are convicted and sentenced to the death penalty every year, but in
  >order for the actual hanging to take place, it must be approved by
  >some head of gov't...(I don't know the title)...and apparently, the
  >past three or four people who have held this position, have NOT signed
  >the approval papers...I remember hearing that they were reluctant to
  >sign it, but I didn't hear the exact reasoning behind this.  So, my
  >guess is that the Amnesty International figure of 1 to 3 executions
  >is either wrong or outdated...nothing concrete though...sorry.
  >=========================================================================
  >Teddy Nishiyama  (tnishi@lsa.ncl.omron.co.jp)  OMRON Corporation  (^_^;
  >R&D Support Dept(LSA), Shimokaiinji, Nagaokakyo-shi, Kyoto-fu 617  JAPAN
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Curtis Eubanks                   creubank@is.crl.sony.co.jp

Sony Information Systems and Telecommunications Research Laboratories
                       Information Systems Division
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: hiraga@Csli.Stanford.EDU (Yuzuru Hiraga)
Subject: Re: It's Hangin' Time!
Organization: Stanford University CSLI
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 10:52:53 GMT

In article <CREUBANK.93Jan11165056@crls15.is.crl.sony.co.jp> creubank@is.crl.sony.co.jp (Curtis Eubanks) writes:
>In article <1993Jan11.064730.5663@omrongw.wg.omron.co.jp> tnishi@lsa.ncl.omron.co.jp (NISHIYAMA Tetsuto) writes:
>  >	   I happened to be watching t.v. last week when the subject of
>  >executions in Japan popped up...I didn't really listen closely at the
>  >time but from the little that I remember hearing, it seems that there
>  >have NOT been any executions recently...something like 10 - 20 years?
>
>Just one year, 1992.  In fact, discounting last year (and, I suppose
>this year?)  there has been at least one execution in Japan every year
>for something like 30 years.

I don't think that's correct.
Cite the sources please.

>  >(sorry, I wasn't paying attention)...Apparently, there are people who
>  >are convicted and sentenced to the death penalty every year, but in
>  >order for the actual hanging to take place, it must be approved by
>  >some head of gov't...(I don't know the title)...and apparently, the
>  >past three or four people who have held this position, have NOT signed
>  >the approval papers...I remember hearing that they were reluctant to
>  >sign it, but I didn't hear the exact reasoning behind this.

I, think this more closer to truth.
The title is Houmu-daijin (Minister of Justice).

BTW:
I'm quite surprised to see this much TV interviews of convicts in the US,
as well as the detailed descriptions by the "public" witnesses of
the execution.  Another "cultural difference" I presume.
I don't think citizen witnesses are allowed/required for execution in Japan.
And they ARE reported, though the execution itself seldom makes
the top headlines.

-YH
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: justin@nx30.mik.uky.edu (justin sullivan)
Subject: Re: NASA and the Japanese Space Program
Organization: University Of Kentucky, Dept. of Math Sciences
X-Path: nx30.mik.uky.edu!justin
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 21:06:40 GMT

In <1iv0gm$923@agate.berkeley.edu> jcliu@four-lab4.Berkeley.EDU (James C. Liu) writes:

>We shouldn't rag on NASA's performance in the commercial market.
>While other nations benefit from the US R&D and space delivery of
>extremely high-tech spy satellites, they cut into the commercial market
>by offering lower prices for cheap space delivery of simple
>telecommunications satellites.  I'd like the Europeans to pay their fair
>share for the costs of technology which the world uses to defend
>democracy, instead of trying to undermine US market share in key
>commercial technologies, because the US is busy defending everyone
>else.  Otherwise, they should shut up and let the US ride herd over
>the world's economic markets in proportion to the military expenditures
>used to support democracy. Japan and Europe have a lot to learn about
>defending freedom by putting the money where their mouths are.

The world does not need a fleet of billion-dollar bombers to defend
democracy. You might need them to go stuff democracy and the American
way down someone's throat (which is precisely why we have such a ridiculous
arsenal in the first place), but not simply to defend freedom and/or
democracy (we are free, but we're not very democratic.. :)

The US should stop defending everyone else. It's not worth the time to
spend money that we don't have. Contrary to what they teach you in school,
the world does not revolve around America. The Japanese and Europeans
don't seem to be doing too badly without our forceful interventions.
From: blamb@hri.com (Bill Lambert)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: bad idea to post pictures of Miyazawa Rie
Date: 12 Jan 93 19:41:13 GMT
Organization: Horizon Research, Inc.

In article <2630@usna.NAVY.MIL>, wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.MIL
(Wm. Douglas Withers -- math  FACULTY <wdw@sma.usna.navy.mil>) writes:

=> I am sincerely concerned with the feelings of female readers of this newsgroup.
=> But I think disguising the fact that men find women attractive is a bit too
=> much to ask.

Hmmm... this is a tough question.

I too find women very attractive, including Rie. But I don't think
discussion of gifs or their distrubution here is a very cool
thing to do. Is this a conflict... to both find women
attractive AND to dislike the distribution of gifs and discussion
of their contents in s.c.j ?

I don't think so... but then again, I got extremely pissed at
the guy who was advertising for "financial support and love
from a mature, well-off Japanese woman"... or some such
horse poop. Others saw nothing particularly wrong with it.

I don't like censorship, but there's a time and place for
everything. Do what you want, but in the right time and place.
And that time and place is where people might expect it.

Now suppose there was a gif of a tattoo on the Japanese
Emperor's right big toe. Of course this immediaitely
becomes of interest to the readers of this newsgroup,
as it is the toe of the Emperor. When the discussion 
of that toe starts addressing the artistic merit of
that tattoo, or how well it was done, or how beautiful
that toe is - with or without that tattoo - then the
discussion becomes no longer applicable to the group,
and would belong more in rec.art.tattoo or alt.talk.toe.
That way, people who are offended (or even aren't
interested) in either tattoos or toes wouldn't have to
be exposed to the discussion unless they sought it out.

Or something like that....

- Bill
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: maierj@edmund.cs.andrews.edu (Joey Maier)
Subject: Re: Not a Myth at All
Organization: Andrews University
Date: Sun, 10 Jan 1993 16:04:16 GMT

>  MM> BTW, just to clear my thought, why Afro-Ameircans were discriminated
>  MM> against in the US?
>
>  MF> It's called racism.
>
>  MM> Then, what did (do) Afro-Americans have that made (or still makes?) 
>  MM> them suffer from racism?
>
>I think the point again, that Masuda-san is trying to make is that
>Blacks as a group disproportionately commit more crimes and continue to
>be stuck in poverty due to racism which they perpetuate by their criminal
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>behavior.  Most black American's don't commit crimes, but enough do and
>disproportionately, so that the discrimination continues.

This is sort of a red-herring to the "gaijin okotowari" thred, but I
thought I would mention it anyway.  The above statement makes a lot of
sense if you consider it in the light of the inner city riots after the
Rodney King verdict.  Stealing & looting from innocent shop owners
certainly is not a good way to endear yourself to the american people.

We even had adverse reactions to the verdict here, and a tiny
university, supposedly a place of higher learning where people can
examine their feelings on a subject before making some knee-jerk
reaction, in a fairly rural area, not near the inner city.  We woke up
to find "Rodney King Lives"  spray-painted onto several of the
buildings.  This action may have expressed displeasure with the verdict,
but it didn't help the situation.  In fact, all it did was to cause the
grounds department to spend more $$$ to clean up the mess, and to cause
suspicion and distrust in the general student body.

My $.02 worth.

If anyone out there wants to discuss this, without tying it into the
"gaijin okotowari" conversation, feel free to E-mail me.  (I don't want
to be accused of wasting soc.culture.japan bandwidth)

Joey
From: dcroz@twics.co.jp
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Brainwashed
Date: 3 Jan 93 21:50:36 GMT
Organization: TWICS, Tokyo, Japan


Dan Prener (prener@watson.ibm.com) writes:
 
<<If you take natural selection and evolution (both of humans and of bacteria)
into account, it is far from clear that antibiotics and prohibitions against
violent crime make life better except in the short run.>>
 
     You would argue that unchecked darwinism is "better" than a society that 
takes into account peoples' humanitarian leanings, since medicine and the 
strictures of society thwart evolution by promoting the survival of the less 
fit?
 
     How does Stephen Hawking fit into that argument?
 
     It is true that antibiotics can conduce to the mutation of bacteria into
resistant and more virulent strains, but I think it would be difficult to
demonstrate that this imperfection in the science reduces modern medicine 
from a positive good in human life to a long-term "evil."
From: cmort@NCoast.ORG (Christopher Morton)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Japanese Bands
Date: 11 Jan 93 02:33:24 GMT
Reply-To: cmort@ncoast.org (Christopher Morton)
Followup-To: soc.culture.japan
Organization: North Coast Public Access *NIX, Cleveland, OH

As quoted from <19475@mindlink.bc.ca> by Manjit_Bedi@mindlink.bc.ca (Manjit Bedi):

> One way of finding about Japanese bands it to read magazine likes Tokyo
> Journal and Kansai Time Out.  The more noteable and popular Japanese
> bands are bound to be mentioned in theses magazines.  Now the problem
> is finding these magazines. Finding the Tokyo Journal, I think is a
> bit easier.  I can get it at least one place here in Vancouver, Canada.

Whatever happened to "Japan Journal"?  Is it gone for good?  It was one of
my favorites.  It was the first place where I'd heard of the new wave of
Hong Kong films such as "The Killer".

Too bad....


> 

-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------  

"Well whose opinions did you THINK these were...?" 
------------------------------------------------------------------
From: 31babik@gw.wmich.edu (Lisamarie Gemma Babik)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Hiragana and Katakana
Date: 7 Jan 93 20:54:41 EST
Organization: Western Michigan University

I apologize if this is an inappropriate place to post this message, 
but this seemed the most likely newsgroup to produce a result for me.

I am taking Beginning Japanese at my university, and we are learning 
to write in Hiragana and Katakana (not Kanji!).  I was wondering if 
anyone knew of a word processor or computer font (for the Macintosh) 
that would enable me to write in Hiragana and Katakana.

Please e-mail responses, and I will summarize to the net.

Thanks for your assistance!
   Lisamarie

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
                         Lisamarie Babik
                      31babik@gw.wmich.edu
 CS MAJORS:  We do more after 11:00 p.m. than most people do all day.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,misc.education,misc.entrepreneurs
From: masuda@fcs280b.ncifcrf.gov (Michiaki Masuda)
Subject: Re: Not a Myth at All
Organization: Frederick Cancer Research and Development Center
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 18:32:07 GMT

In article <1993Jan7.160939.1571@island.COM> fester@island.COM (Mike Fester) writes:
>In article <C0GE9q.7JM@ncifcrf.gov> masuda@fcs280b.ncifcrf.gov (Michiaki Masuda) writes:
>>In article <1993Jan6.174645.3491@island.COM> fester@island.COM (Mike Fester) writes:

>>If TOEFL is not a racist exam, how a discrimination by Japanese basaed on
>>language difference is racist?

>Since when does anyone have to take a language test to enter a store? A bar?
>Any store? (Except of course, in Japan, where this is not at all racist, as
>you are assuring us.)

   I'm afraid that you keep missing the point. It is not a matter of taking
an exam. It is a matter of benefit that you could get from a command of
language.

> You are claiming that it is OK to require a language test of
>a customer.

   I'd appreciate it if you could stop putting your words into my mouth.
I am claiming that if you have the better command of Japanese, chances are
higher that you could deal with the shopowner who is reluctant to deal with
a customer who cannot communicate in Japanese.
 
>>  BTW, what would you think about the "irezumi okotowari" (No tattooed person
>>allowed) policy that you might have seen just below "gaijin okotowari"?
   
>Never saw those signs; I'm told they are more common in Kansai.

  So..., your answer to the question is?

>> What I'm trying to say is that it is possible
>>that the Japanese "racism" has different reasons compared with the American
>>or South African racism.

>Sure you are.

  Good to know that you finally realized it.

  BTW, just to clear my thought, why Afro-Ameircans were discriminated against
in the US?

>>>Mike
>>>-- 
>>>Disclaimer - These opinions are not so much opinions, as pearls of wisdom. Any-
>>>one disagreeing is obviously either a) a snivelling, whining, mentally-
>>>deficient, weak-willed, inconsequential, namby-pamby tool of some vague but
>>>conveniently defined conspiracy, or b) my wife.

>>Or c)

>Nope. It's a binary system.

  I didn't know that you wanted to make me your wife so desperately...
Sorry, but I can't accept it.

--Michiaki
From: yoichi@carson.u.washington.edu (Yoichi Ii)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: It's Hangin' Time!
Date: 13 Jan 1993 00:21:17 GMT
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
NNTP-Posting-Host: carson.u.washington.edu
Keywords: death penalty

fester@island.COM (Mike Fester) writes:
>According to a recent "Today's Japan" special, no one has been executed in 
>Japan for about 3 years. Part of the reason is the current re-evaluation of
>those cases where the only evidence against the defendant was his confession.

I just found an article regarding death penalty in Japan
in 4Dec92 issue of Shuukan Asahi. Some highlights;
 - There has been no execution since 10Nov89.  Four consecutive
   Justice Ministers (including the present one) have refused to
   sign the execution order.
 - There have been 570 executions since the end of WWII.
 - There have been executions every years since Meiji era except
   1964, 1968, and the years since 1989.
 - Interview with Satou Megumu, the previous Justice Minister.
   Tells about his moral opposition to death penalty.
 - Interveiw with a former chief of prison. Recalls executed
   prisoners and executions. Last word of one prisoner:
   "Kaasan, sayonara".

Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: jturley@netcom.com (Jim Turley)
Subject: Wanted: Japanese Popstar GIFs
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 
Date: Sun, 10 Jan 1993 07:38:47 GMT

Are there any FTP site for Japanese Popstars, like the Hongkong popstar
FTP at asia.lcs.mit.edu.

Or, if anyone has some, email them to me and I will return with
NAKED Rie Miyasawa GIFs (which are outstanding both in quality and
content).

Jim Turley....old asia hand
From: cb522@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Cathy Atwood)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Offered: GIFs of Naked Rie Miyazawa
Date: 11 Jan 1993 22:49:21 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
NNTP-Posting-Host: hela.ins.cwru.edu


My 2 cents--I don't know about morals, appropriateness of 
posting, or any other factors.  But this makes me uncomfortable.
There are getting to be a number of threads and a number of
posters which I have to remember to bypass.  I used to be able
to just have all the new postings from soc.culture.japan moved
to a file to read later.  But that was months ago.  Maybe you 
folks don't care that I have to do the selection process.  Or
maybe more of you should consider that some women are
uncomfortable, or even offended, by what men say about women.
Cathy
-- 
Cathy Atwood       Lincoln, Nebraska, U.S.A.
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: harkcom@spinach.pa.yokogawa.co.jp (Alton Harkcom)
Subject: Re: FLASH NEWS!!
Date: Wed, 13 Jan 1993 03:53:49 GMT
	<1993Jan6.190759.19498@Csli.Stanford.EDU>
	<HARKCOM.93Jan13092901@spinach.pa.yokogawa.co.jp>
Organization: Yokogawa Electric Corporation, Tokyo, Japan

In article <HARKCOM.93Jan13092901@spinach.pa.yokogawa.co.jp>
   harkcom@spinach.pa.yokogawa.co.jp (Alton Harkcom) writes:

 =}	   "Ms. Owada has now left her residence after having cooked her
 =}	   father eggs for breakfast."

   No...no...no...  Ms. Owada's father is not named "eggs" [Owada Tamago]...
If her father were named eggs then the news flash might have been worth
interrupting my TV...
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Date: Wed,  6 Jan 1993 02:04:31 -0500 
From: Rikiya Asano <ra01+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Gaijin Okotowari
	<1ic4r8INNgp5@uniwa.uwa.edu.au>

Freinds,

.

      As I have being following the thread "Not a Myth at all", for
quite some time now I have decided along time ago that this is wrong but
I had not solution to the problem that has caused people to take this
action. This is not apartheit! If you were black and lived with South
Africa and than came to Nippon to compare I sure you would realize the
truth. It is of a fact that Small/medium-neighborhood business owners do
this to protect their business from wanton destruction and humiliation.
I see it here. A few gentlemen have said in the pass that "the reason
that many here don't like this is becuase we(caucasian) aren't use to
this happening to us. I agree that the few shouldn't
suffer for the delinquencts of the most. But, Those people do have a
valid right to protect their business.

               Solution: Ban all forms of descrimmination based on the
human condition. Futhermore and in this case especially, create laws the
strictly punish ethnic intimidation in all forms. And severly punish and
fine those convicted of private and public property damage. I mean
Malaian style punishment. I can assure you that once a few of them gets
handed down a 7 and a 1/2 to 14 year jail sentence and a 475,000yen fine
for destruction of private and public property, they'll think of us in
almost the same light as Singapore!
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: rhb@world.std.com (Robert H Brueckner)
Subject: Re: American-cu Cannabalism
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 04:15:23 GMT

In article <2601@usna.NAVY.MIL> wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.MIL (Wm. Douglas Withers -- math  FACULTY <wdw@sma.usna.navy.mil>) writes:

   Dwight's article reminds me of a little puzzle:

   What form of cannibalism is practiced not infrequently in the USA?
   I'm serious here.  `Cannibalism' to be defined as the eating of human flesh
   by humans.  In fact I have had the opportunity to do this but I chose not to.

   If anyone wants the answer, I'll post it in a few days.
   -- 
   Els Withers 


I'm not sure this is the answer you're looking for, but I've heard of
couples eating the placenta after the birth of a child. Supposedly
this is a good way for the mother to replenish lost minerals and
vitamins, but it seems pretty weird to me. I've even seen this
recommended in some birthing books. Afterbirth sushi, anyone?

RB
-- 
|"The truth is cruel, but it can be loved, and it makes free those who  |
| have loved it." -- George Santayana  // Opinions expressed here, when |
| clear and persuasive, are my own. --Rob Brueckner (rhb@world.std.com) |
From: wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.MIL (Wm. Douglas Withers -- math  FACULTY <wdw@sma.usna.navy.mil>)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: What is culture? (was: Brainwashied
Date: 7 Jan 93 15:37:27 GMT
Organization: U.S. Naval Academy

In article <7577@bigbird.hri.com.hri.com> blamb@hri.com (Bill Lambert) writes:
>Now I know you revile the religious practices of the ancient Mayans,
>but they sacrificed some so that the Gods would not take the many.
>In fact, when the conquistadors forced them to cease this barbaric
>practice, shortly thereafter the european viral strains wiped out
>their entire population. Had they continued the sacrifices (and
>managed to rips the hearts out of quite a few of the Spanish soldiers
>as well) the Gods may have treated them quite more favorably.

Is this supposed to be a joke or not?  I have the uneasy feeling that if
I take issue with you here, you'll accuse me of having no sense of humor.
On the other hand I don't see any smileys here.

>Well... we think this is stupid, of course, but who is to say that
>the ancient Mayans aren't sitting in Mayan heaven right now laughing
>because the World Wars were caused by the Gods because of the lack
>of an outlet for our bloodlust.
>
>Stupid again, of course, but I'm just taking on the Mayan cultural
>biases, to argue points that can't be argued by any common means.

I'm not sure what your point is here.  This reminds me of those folks who
say:  "Why should I learn your white-male-dominated trigonometry, when I
know that crystals hold all the secrets of the universe?"  Are you in fact
denying the existence of objective reality, denying for example that the
link between human sacrifice and disease is testable by experiment?

If you claim that it is impossible to judge human sacrifice as wrong, then
surely it is impossible to judge the act of criticizing other cultures as
wrong.

>I believe American culture
>is in the process of redefining itself, and it needs it. The dream
>of America is in the process of being fulfilled for everybody,
>not just white males. We've come a long way, and still have a long
>way to go... but still moving in the right general direction.

I expect that those people (for example, some Japanese government officials)
who think that America is being held back by minorities will be much less
smug fifty years from now.
-- 
Els Withers                   email: wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.mil
          phone: (410)267-3192 / fax: (410)267-4883
When orbiting particle-beam weapons are outlawed, only outlaws will have
orbiting particle-beam weapons.
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan