I think you might be joking but OK, I'll respond like you're serious as this is HN.

You want to make vaping even more addictive than it already is?

They’re making a prediction, not a value judgement.

I get where you're coming from but I think your statement is a bit naive.

Education systems as we know them today are absolutely about indoctrination in so many ways. Capitalism, love of country, views on family units, beauty and aaesthetics, what has cultural value and what does not etc etc. Not to mention many school systems just straight up having classes on religion, allowing armed forces into schools to recruit and the like.

Whether you're worried about left wing or right wing indoctrination, it still holds true. All kids are being indoctrinated every time they go to school same as every time they watch TV.

Exactly. Which history lessons get taught, which books get assigned as reading, which clubs are available, etc. Even if they are taught to be critical of the assignments they get, if the selection is limited enough, kids will not have the breadth of knowledge to even see the alternatives.

I pay a lot of money for my 12-year to not be in the system you are describing and am grateful I can provide this for her more than I am grateful for just about anything else

I think the point is that part of having a functioning society (civic life, engagement, tolerance of others) is having people mix together. School is one of the prime places where that happens.

If you allow a lot of people to pull away from that "forced" engagement with others then you start to stress a lot of societal bonds.

You're right. It's _one_ of the prime places.

I don't know a single homeschooler that sits at home all day long. They work in family businesses, participate in bands, sports, and co-ops. Many belong to churches where families come from all different strata: our church has surgeons, line cooks, programmers, self-employed handymen, disabled vets. They interact with everyone—including kids. They do things like "kid markets" where they have a business. They watch their parents learn how the house works and how to manage finances.

There is no forced engagement—in fact the peer pressure is often completely gone. They are in an environment (their family) where they are much freer to be themselves.

> I don't know a single homeschooler that sits at home all day long.

Well, you wouldn't, would you?

Sorry, not to detract from your other points, but I thought it was funny.

All of our planes came back with the wings shot up!

Sure, but I don’t like how society is functions. I don’t like the direction in which society is headed.

That is why my solution is to be selective in who I socialize with, find a like-minded partner, and have lots of children.

My intent is to create a new society and culture free of the rot that infects every public space today.

The best functioning society that I experienced was when 90% of the people were (presbyterian) Christians. We replaced that with something very, very disfunctional.

I guess you can't just use a photo because it would make it too easy to use someone else's signature

There needs to be a balance

I live in Japna and have a high-intermediate level of Japanese. I wish I had been able to read and think about these well-expressed observations when I was just starting out as it would have saved me from having to intuit things over time.

Like Cure Dolly writes, no one tells you what you really need to know when you're learning Japanese (all languages?)

A lot of people think this is dangerous and distorting because it's presented in a way that leads people to believe that it is accurate

The majority of the population, including I'd say the majority of people on this site, think historical dramas are accurate. They may not phrase it as such but they implicitly believe things on the screen.

> A lot of people

Well, at least the couple people interviewed for the article who don't want casuals intruding into their newly democratized profession.

I think we ought to democratize more professions, like surgeons and dentists and airline pilots.

The word profession implies a level of professionalism that appears to be lacking.

I've rarely seen such an egregoius and disingenuous use of "democratization"

Is that not one of the main benefits that AI is supposed to bring though, and the way that that word is used in that context? Taking things that were previously the domain of experts who actually knew what they were doing and allowing the entire general public full ability to participate?

Producing complete nonsense isn’t participating.

Also why is it suddenly a good thing that people who know nothing can talk shit about it? Is the bar lowered so much already that “can type words in an LLM” is sufficient?

I presume you are referring to sekuhara (sexual harassment), pawahara (power harassment) and the like

Are the actual official Japanese words for sexual harassment and power harassment... just Japanese pronunciations / abbreviations of the English terms?

Yes. In Japanese this kind of abbreviation does not carry the childish/frivolous connotations it does in English.

In my experience, the connotations are very similar to English use. What matters is the context. Say sekuhara or sexual harassment at work: very serious connotation. Amongst friends or in media (comdey/anime/etc): potentially frivolous/unserious connotation.

It's very different IME. A catchy abbreviation of a serious subject would almost always be inappropriate in English-speaking spheres, especially in a business setting.

To balance this comment, if you are a full time employee you are super well protected and cannot be fired for any reason other than gross negligence or actively breaking the law.

Managing out a poor performer in Japan is a grinding process that can easily take two years from start to finish

That explains this: https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/16/bandai_namcos_layoff_...

> "Bandai Namco reportedly tries to bore staff into quitting, skirting Japan’s labor laws"

> Canceling some game projects and shuttering existing ones has helped, but facing the need for further adjustments, Bandai Namco has reportedly turned to the unspoken Japanese tradition of layoff-by-boredom by stuffing unwanted employees into oidashi beya, or "expulsion rooms."

> Do a quick online search for oidashi beya and you'll see plenty of websites explaining the practice, or otherwise discussing how difficult it is to fire people in Japan thanks to strong labor protections. It's not a new practice, either: For those that haven't been reading the Reg for the past 11 years, we even wrote about it way back in 2013 as a wave of the practice swept through Japan and hit tech workers at companies reportedly including Panasonic, Sony and other firms.

At a US F500 company, HR can still make it onerous to get rid of an underperforming employee. Wants multiple documented poor reviews to avoid any potential for follow-up legal action (which seems incredibly unlikely, but HR wants to cover their butts).

I suspect these processes are also there to prevent “rocking the boat”. There are a number of US F500 companies that are effectively static businesses with predictable market dynamics.

In a stable environment, in a large organization, it doesn’t really make sense to fire people in the hopes of getting someone better. You are more likely to get someone worse, or more expensive, or who has a long ramp up period. It’s possible that the manager trying to exit an employee is exercising subjective/uncalibrated performance guidelines- or is covering their own incompetence.

Totally agree. Nothing provable at all, and almost all of the links that the author could be illusory. Maybe something in the human psyche compels us celebrate certain things at similar times of the year in response to certain stimuli, in which case it is no surprise that we find somewhat similar festivals happening across multiple cultures. A smoking gun is needed if anyone wants to prove a real connection.