NinjaNewsJapan

(upbeat music)

So after the summer break,
or holiday, we’re back at it.

Very excited to be here.

It’s weird ’cause I read two
weeks worth of news instead of one.

Okay, there’s also so many
else you have to do with.

The last couple of episodes I have

because I bought a second
desk and I rearranged my room.

And somehow by rearranging
my room, I created a small echo.

So the last couple of episodes
haven’t sounded as good to me.

I’m assuming people noticed
or didn’t care or anything,

but I have not been
satisfied with the quality.

So I do plan to move
stuff around my room again.

And I’ve also bought a new microphone.

It’s not the microphones problem.

I don’t wanna disparage this
microphone that I actually love very much.

The first solution though,
the easiest solution

is to lean in closer to the microphone
and speak a little more quietly.

Therefore, reducing the ability
of the sound to echo off the room.

So if it sounds like
trying to be sexy, I am.

Because I’m always trying to be sexy
’cause we’re all always trying to be sexy.

That’s just something to
keep in mind is sexy to sell.

So the video will suffer because I will
be less animated, but the audio podcast,

this is going to be a new, sensual
experience for an engineer’s Japan.

And then when I get my new
mic, I’m gonna test that out.

It’s gonna be very exciting because
obviously I’m doing podcasting.

I like all this stuff.

I like the tech stuff.

I like to play with the things.

But what I’m really looking forward to

is just sitting really far back from the
microphone and screaming my head off

instead of whispering like
I’m trying to seduce your ears.

Which I am.

I’m trying to seduce your ears.

I just want you to know that.

I have gone a little quieter
than I intended, but once

you get started on this
path, it’s a slippery slope.

Like I can’t go deeper.

I don’t have a really deep voice,
but I do speak softly quite well.

So one of my voice gets soft like this.

I just wanted to know, it’s
like a fondue for your ears.

A sensual soaking the
inner ear in melted chocolate.

Fucking discord.

Of course, I didn’t turn it off.

All right, let me do that.

Okay, there we go.

Discord has been muted.

No one can make fun of me for that again.

So let’s get started.

I can’t whisper.

I want to speak low, but then as soon as
I start going low, I go into like too much.

And I start whispering.

I should just start the show.

I really should just start the show.

But I kind of don’t want to start the show.

When I take breaks,
I actually takes me a

weirdly long amount of
time to get back into it.

And now that I’ve discovered that I
have sort of a problem with my audio setup,

that I need to fix, I’m
now kind of nervous

about recording because
I wanted to sound good.

This is essentially, I
know I put it on YouTube,

but it’s essentially an audio
podcast and the audio podcast.

More than anything else,
I wanted to sound good.

So you can see every time I like slow down,

I start speaking more
softly, more wispy and it just,

it gets, again, that
fondue for your, your holes.

Okay, we’re gonna get
started with the news.

So let me do a transition sound and then
we’ll get started with our first story.

Welcome to NPR and NJ and NJ NPR.

I’ve completely, I should
put some candles on, turn all

the lights out, close the
blinds, put on some candles.

Let me whisper the news.

Forget the news.

It’s just you and me talk.

It’s just you and me.

I’ll just whisper in your ear
things that maybe you need

to hear like, I’m probably
the same age as your dad.

And I’m proud of you.

I, I like who you’ve become as a person.

I support you and your efforts
and I think the things you

do to try to make yourself in
the world around you better.

I think those are valuable.

Now let’s get to some weird Japanese news.

(phone ringing)

All right, I’m gonna try
to not whisper that much.

It is going to be hard
because I actually never sit

at the microphone.
The pop filter is right in

my face and the
microphone, I’ve angled it up.

I’ve tried to do everything
I can to avoid buying a new

microphone and I just like, fuck it, I’ll
go buy the stupidly expensive microphone

that’s supposed to take
care of that goes for you.

Now that I’ve bought
it, I have massive buyers

regret, even though I
haven’t even received it yet

because I feel like I could just
do some bad, I have whatever.

We’re not gonna talk about it anymore.

A 31 year old man calls the police.

And he says, “I figure it’s gone.”

Not my physical figure,
like honestly my figure

left like 20 years ago,
but my figure is gone.

What he means is his,
his, a toy, a figurine.

You’ll notice if you’re watching the video.

I suppose I shouldn’t like address
stuff that you can see in the video.

Oh, look, anyways.

On the shelf next to
me, I do have a tatikoma.

Tatikoma has a robot from
the Ghost and the Shell series.

It’s one of my favorite characters.

And so I have a figurine.

I don’t have a lot of figurines.

I don’t collect a lot, but I understand
it has great value to other people.

It’s not the sort of thing
that is valuable to me.

If someone took the
time to steal my tatikoma,

I probably would not call
the police, if I’m being honest.

Turns out, a former coworker and living
girlfriend was the one who took his figure.

She said she stole and
sold the figure from money,

which shows that she didn’t
really understand what she’s seeing.

One of the things I think is
important if you’re gonna be

a thief is that you understand the
value of the thing that you’re stealing.

I had this conversation, many episodes ago,

where I was talking
about like people stealing

Pokémon cards where you would
need to know which cards are valuable.

So it’s like the unarmed thief thing.

And this was I was doing an equivalency
of people who steal Pokémon cards.

This is the next version of art theft

because you need to have
a deep understanding of it

to know its value, to know
that it’s worth stealing.

And if you do that, well, then
you’re in really good shape.

But if you don’t, you’re
gonna end up like this girl

who stole a sorta from
Kingdom Hearts, the video game.

I’ve never played it, so
it’s a little obscure for me.

stole a sorta figure and was
managed to get 4,000 yen for it.

So I don’t consider 4,000
yen worth going to prison over.

I should probably won’t go to prison.

And being his girlfriend, do you
think he’s gonna forgive or let it go?

This is something that’s
come up multiple times

where a nerd has married
or engaged in a relationship

with a non-nerd who doesn’t respect how
much they value the stuff that they have.

Like they’re collectibles and things.

So they don’t understand
what they’re doing.

There is a couple of
instances I’ve read online

of, you know, a woman
is angry at her husband.

She goes in and smashes the
case where all his figures are.

And I don’t think in those
cases they actually understand

what they’re doing because
to them it’s a stupid toy.

They’re angry at their husband
still plays with stupid toys.

So they smash the stupid toys.

And you’ve read stories on
the Internet where it’s like,

if you want to date me
you have to stop playing

video games and stuff,
which is pretty unreasonable

if you really think about
it because you’re saying

you have something you love if you love
me then you will stop loving that thing.

So I just found this interesting
that this woman stole something.

I don’t think she understands
because she stole it.

And again, you have to kind of say
your motive, or the reason for stealing.

It’s part of the police report.

And she said for
basically living expenses or

entertainers basically
just spending money.

But 4,000 yen, again, the really
bad math is like 40 to 50 bucks.

You’re not going to have that
much fun on 50 bucks anymore.

You’re not going to be
going out and doing it.

You’re gonna get a really nice dinner
for 50 bucks somewhere in Japan.

But even then you’re not
talking about like high class stuff.

You’re just getting like a
really good mid-range meal.

So I think a couple of
mistakes have been made.

She wants you to have
to study what she’s stealing

before she steals it to, don’t
steal your boyfriend and stuff.

That’s not cool.

The Deputy Mayor of Tokyo.

This leads to an
interesting set of problems

when communicating to your
team at work on messaging apps.

So my work co-workers and I use Slack.

I think a lot of companies do.

Microsoft Teams is the one
that’s actually using this story.

There is a feeling that what you’re
saying in there is sort of private.

And that’s not true.

Now I’ve made the mistake
more than once of clicking

on the name of the
person I was thinking about

to talk about that
person to someone else.

So because I was thinking of person A,

and I wanted to talk to
person B about person A.

What I did was I clicked person A’s name

and started typing and they saw
it and it’s embarrassing and stuff.

But it’s also whatever.

You know what I think.

I’m not particularly shy about
sharing my opinion in real life anyways.

So you probably knew if we’re being really
honest, but that’s a different issue.

So this sense of privacy
comes with a problem in that

you feel that you can say
whatever you want on this platform

because it’s not public, but
you’re saying it to a group of people.

Now, do you have the full loyalty and
understanding of the people you’re speaking to?

I have now realized that there are
things you should not just write down.

This is very much related to the Ninja
News Japan Advice for Criminal Section,

which is now something
I should actually title.

Come up with a secondary theme song,
Ninja News Japan Advice for Criminals.

It’s not criminals, but you
don’t want to pay portrayal.

You don’t want to say negative
things about people and write it down.

You want that to be ethereal.

You want that to be in the atmosphere.

So you’ve said it, but then no
one can prove that you said it.

That’s the important part.

‘Cause what could happen in what
happened to the Deputy Mayor of Tokyo?

Is he decided it would
be perfectly acceptable

to call someone who works
for a different group, a pig.

He did a play on words on their last name.

So he called an assembly
member, a pig multiple times.

A copy of the team’s chest, with
someone screenshotted that chat,

printed it out and sent
it to the home of the

assembly workers, assembly
members, co-worker.

So what happened is someone who
didn’t like the Deputy Mayor of Tokyo.

And this is again, the first issue
is, if you’re gonna say shitty things,

you have to make sure
everyone agrees with you before

you say it, finding out
afterwards is a problem.

So this is like any sort of racist person.

You really need to test the
waters and find out if the person

you’re speaking to is also
racist before you say racist stuff.

If you wanna do it with
sexism, anything like that,

any sort of negative aspect
that you wanna present

into the world, you have to make sure
that the people you’re speaking to agree.

And then even then,
they might be putting up

a face that they agree
so they can catch you.

So you gotta be really careful,
going back to my original point.

Don’t write anything down.

So someone screenshotted,
printed out, and mailed it to snail mail.

The copy of this chat to the
Assembly Member’s coworker,

a press conference was held by the victim
and said, you know, be really good idea.

If we looked at all the
Deputy Mayor’s postings.

So basically saying, like, if let’s
see what kind of shit this guy has said

about how many people there
are in the world and how awful he is,

and let’s just get that
out in the open right now.

So I think honestly, it’s kinda awesome.

The Deputy Mayor offered to apologize

and then offered to make a face-to-face
apology in person to the offended party.

The offended party declined, saying
it’s because of a scheduling issue,

but I am betting it
had a lot more to do

with, I don’t want to
stand in front of a man

who has called me a pig
and accept his apology

because the problem
with apologies primarily

is there is an expectation that you
accept them, even if you don’t want to.

And I bet she doesn’t
want to because the guy

called her a pig but I bet
it’s because he is a pig.

So this did not end there.

He called the Assembly
Group, a group of idiots.

He also posted her home
address in the team’s chat.

That to me, he’s now
doxing her to a group so they

could maybe take initiative
and go ahead and do stuff.

That is problematic,
’cause that is a step above.

Calling someone a pig is bad.

I’ve called people names.

I’m sure people have called me names.

If I found out someone called me a name,

I don’t think I would actually
end up taking it that personally.

We all get angry, we all get annoyed,
we all want to throw some stuff out there.

I think that’s healthy to a degree.

You gotta be careful, of course.

I don’t ever actually want to offend
someone, but bad moods, whatever.

Taking someone’s home address and posting
it to a group of people is a step above.

That’s not you’re in a bad mood.

That is you are trying
to actually put someone

in a situation where they
could get hurt, the deputy mayor

of Tokyo had to resign,
which is completely appropriate.

I actually think they could
have taken a little further.

This border’s on the criminal,
as far as I’m concerned.

(upbeat music)

So I’ve been involved in teaching
for most of my adult career.

I have always wanted to
find ways to engage students.

Teams, young teens, pre-teens.

They’re sort of the
most difficult to engage.

Little kids are great,
you just sing a song.

They’re happy.

You have adults.

They’re voluntarily, so
the feeling is different.

So I find adults are the easiest
and little little kids are the easiest.

That in between group there,
that toughest ones to deal with.

So finding ways to engage
with them is important.

And I tried and failed,
and I tried and succeeded.

But one of the real
ways to get young people

to engage with stuff is to bring them
sort of real life into the classroom.

They like that because it
helps them feel like adults.

So they were going to
talk in this lady’s class

about drugs and where drugs
come from, like illegal drugs.

So she thought, “Ah, you know, hi, from
my break, “I’m going to go to Columbia.

“What I’ll do is bring
back some Coca leaves.”

Coca is quite famously the plant
where the drug cocaine is refined from.

There’s already a first problem.

She’s bringing back leaves from a plant

into a country which I’m
pretty sure everyone knows

you’re not supposed to
bring plants across borders.

Like, I know it’s primarily because
of invasive species and stuff.

But like, even like lettuce,
it carry bugs and stuff.

You’re not supposed to bring stuff

like vegetables and stuff
personally across borders.

So I was like, as soon as they said,
she brought Coca leaves to Japan.

I wasn’t thinking,
“Oh, she’s going to go

back “and break bad
and start making cocaine.”

Which she wasn’t.

But I was like, she must
know that this is not okay.

Just on a like, don’t bring
plants into countries, kind of issue.

She brought the Coca leaves from
a trip to Columbia, back to Japan.

She brought them into the classroom and she
was doing a lesson about drug precursors.

So essentially where drugs come from.

And then she did a how-to
on how to refine the leaf

into the actual cocaine
and got like a 99% purity

and then had everyone
take a bolt off the ground

and just that class rocked
for the rest of the day

for about 20 minutes and
then they all came down.

No, that isn’t what happened.

She actually did though.

She was trying to engage the students.

So I weirdly appreciate
what she was trying to do.

The problem is she did it.

So she was like,
“Hey, I’m going to bring

these leaves “from
another country to Japan.”

Of course, turns out the Coca leaf

is illegal to possess an
illegal to import into Japan.

So she’s in trouble.

She claims she didn’t know.

Now most of the time
on the engineer’s Japan,

a criminal will do
something and then claim

they don’t remember or
they don’t know and I will go.

You know, that’s a good tactic to try to
delay the police but you’re guilty clearly.

I think this lady may have actually
been ignorant of what she was doing.

She’s like, “Oh, I managed
to get some of these leaves

“that are freely available
in Colombia apparently.”

I thought this would also be a controlled
substance technically in Colombia.

I got them in my bag.

No one found them brought them to Japan.

Nothing happened so
clearly it must be okay.

I bet if they asked her to
surrender them specifically

at the border, she
probably just would have.

She wanted to engage the students.

So advice to teachers.

They introduced Japan as all about
making everyone better and everything.

Advice to teachers don’t
bring products that can

be refined into illegal
drugs into your classroom.

Criminals always want to break into houses.

That’s where stuff is and criminals
want stuff more than anything.

They would rather
actually have liquid funds.

They would actually have
money but money is also

in Japan and still quite
often stored in the house.

Breaking into houses is hard though.

So one of the ways
you could do it is to trick

the person into letting
you into the house.

And this was interesting
because I had not thought

of this as a feasible
way to get into a house.

So if someone came up to
my door, knocked on the door

and said, “Hey, I’m trying to be a
chest “of an indigenous Japan fame.”

A snake has escaped.

Can I stay in your house for a bit?

I would be like, I don’t see a snake.

Why don’t you just run away?

I mean, if there’s no snake visible here

and it’s a big snake big enough to
scare you, I don’t think it’s a problem.

I think if you just keep moving, you
will be safe and fine from the snake.

I would not let them in my house.

Other people are kinder than I am.

I’m not even gonna say gullible.

I’m just gonna say
straight up kinder than me.

So what happens there is
they let you into the house.

Now somehow this guy found 3.7 million yen

in his ladies house stole
it and then left the house.

The police picked about based on the fact

that his car is being seen on security
footage, sitting outside the house.

So they figured out who he is.

This was four months ago.

They arrested me and said, “I can’t remember
anything that happened four months ago.”

Just great.

So they were like, “Where
were you four months ago?”

He’s like, “I don’t know.”

This is a real experience I had.

So I was as a part of my company
sued by a former employee.

And the court process, I believe it was
two years before I actually was in court.

And the man, the defending attorney,
no, no, no, we were the defendant.

So the prosecuting attorney
asked me very specific questions

about things I said on that day that I was
actually working with this other person.

I have to keep the details a little vague,

but that’s actually not
relevant to the story.

So he asked, “Did you
say this specific thing?”

And I legitimately remembered, because this
was a pretty big event in my work life,

I did actually remember, but it
seemed very justified for me to say,

I don’t remember exactly what I said two
years ago, because I think it’s unreasonable

to expect people to remember
what they were doing two years ago.

So I was half lying,
half telling the truth.

“Did I just purgery?”

I just think I just purgured myself.

I had a recollection of the
sentiment of what I said.

I did not remember that.

So I guess we’re talking about laws.

Legally, I did not lie.

Spirit of the law, I
fudged the truth a bit,

because I did remember
the spirit of what I said.

I remembered a vague sense of what I said.

I remembered the
approximation of what I said.

Did I remember the exact
sense the specific words?

No, I didn’t.

Since he asked me if I
said something specific,

a negative answer
to that was not a lie.

So I did not purgure myself.

Excellent.

This means Japan, you
don’t swear on a Bible.

‘Cause I watched a lot of court stuff.

Used to watch a law and order and stuff.

And they go to court
and you swear on a Bible.

And I’m not religious, so that
always seemed weird to me.

But then I know I’m in a different country.

And you don’t swear on a Bible,

they just go like, hey, tell
the truth and you go, yep.

Swearing doesn’t mean anything.

Anyways, this guy, I actually think it
was the result isn’t that interesting.

It was the fact that he used
this very, to me, not very

convincing story to actually
get into someone’s house.

But he did it successfully.

And it seems like he did it multiple times.

And then also there’s this,
keeping 3.7 million yen in your house.

I currently have 10,000 yen, it’s
like a hundred bucks in my wallet.

That is all the money I keep in the house
because I generally use digital payments,

which means the best you
could do is steal my phone

and you need my fingerprint
to access anything on my phone.

So your snake story won’t work and I
don’t have any money for you to steal.

So don’t target me.

Don’t target anyone, stop stealing stuff.

So there’s a lot of games
I’ve played in my youth.

Here’s my moment to
try to appeal to the youth

and talk about games
that they’re clearly playing

’cause they’re in the news,
games I’ve never played.

Honestly, do not want to experience.

So there were three friends.

They’re out for an evening of cocktails
over, I assume the summer break.

I actually didn’t write
down the exact dates.

And they’d been imbibing,
so they were loose, let’s say.

What happened was they started a
game and in front of a crowd of people,

the two friends started taking turns
punching the one friend in the stomach.

This led to a point where the one friend

collapsed unconscious and
was then taken to hospital.

The two friends were arrested.

When the friend regained
consciousness, he

said, oh no, no, no, they
weren’t assaulting me.

We were playing a game of gut punches.

This is a game.

I practice judo.

If you’ve listened to an engineer’s
Japan for any amount of time,

you know that I spend
significant portion of my

life doing very awful
things to my body for fun.

This is not something
I’m a professional at.

It’s a hobby.

It’s a very important part of my life.

But, and it causes me
immense amount of pain.

So I did it last night, walk up this
morning, took a 10 minute ice bath.

I know ice bath has become kind of a trend
for, you know, douchebag, sports bros.

But, honestly, if you are
feeling pain all over your body,

and ice bath is a
pretty, pretty nice thing.

So if you do any sort of significant sports

that cause you pain, I’m not
gonna get into the ice bath.

You should look it up and
probably take it seriously.

You don’t need to do what they do,

like all the extreme stuff,
like 30% ice, 60% water,

and you sit in there for
two minutes and almost die.

I put cold water in a
bathtub and then throw in

some ice that melts
probably before I even get in.

And it’s cold, it’s not freezing.

Again, cause I’m not working at
a level where I would need that.

But the relief it has brought
to me has been significant.

I have some friends who’ve tried it.

They all have a very positive things.

I’m not gonna go ice bath bro on you.

Let’s start talking about that.

But, what I’m saying is I’ve done a lot
of damage to my body on purpose for fun.

I would never consider
playing a game of gut punches.

Back in 2015, there was
a jewelry heist in Japan.

Three men, I actually talked
about this not too long ago

because one of the men at the
time of the crime was underage,

but now that they’ve actually found them
and are prosecuting them, he is an adult.

I was very interested if
he’s being tried as an adult.

This may never come to pass.

They were talking about
extraditing them from

the UK where they live
to Japan to face trial.

Normally in this situation,
they just have the country

they’re in, prosecute on
the other countries that have.

But they want to extradite them to Japan.

They’re only dealing with,
there’s three people involved.

They’re only doing one at a time.

They are currently the UK
saying they will not extradite

the suspect to Japan because
of Japan’s human rights issues.

So people who are held in Japan
by the police, they get abused.

They’ve had multiple deaths in
Japanese holding cells for immigrants.

So people who are like their
visas of run out or their illegal

immigrants and stuff, they
get thrown in these holding cells.

They don’t get fed properly
or taken care of properly.

They’re talking about
human rights violations now.

The concern is that the
suspect may be in the hospital

the suspect may be made
to confess under duress.

And then Japan argues
back that the police interviews

are all recorded except for the
ones where the recording doesn’t work

and the person accidentally punches
himself to death, which has happened.

So I think people have a fairly positive
image of Japan as a society, as I do.

The police though is really mixed bag.

Now I know some cops.

The cops I know I like to believe.

They’re good and kind people and
would never actually do any of this stuff.

But the reality is there are regular
stories of people being held for no reason.

There’s a guy who was held for 40 days.

So he lost his job.

He lost most of his friends
on a false accusation.

And the police basically are like,
“Whoops, sorry, you can go now.”

Problem is his whole life is in shambles.

And in Japan, you can sue,
but what you get for suing them.

It’s not like enough to fix your life.

So in America, being
a very litigious country,

you get massive payouts
if the police wrong you.

That doesn’t happen in Japan.

So you get a couple thousand dollars,

but a couple thousand dollars
isn’t gonna get me my job back.

It’s not gonna fix my life.

So that’s problematic.

The other two are still waiting
in decision about extradition.

Japan, I didn’t know this.

Japan only has extradition treaties
with the US and South Korea.

So basically, if you
commit a crime in Japan

and you can get to any country
other than the US and South Korea,

it’s very likely they will not send
you back to Japan to face charges.

So my immediate thought is like,
okay, what country would I go to

that would be least likely
to send me back to Japan?

Actually better would be China.

If I committed a crime in Japan,

I can’t be giving advice like this
to Japanese criminals all the time.

But it is just the
way my brain works is

like, present a problem,
give me information,

and I start to go like, well,
what is the best solution to that?

I’ve committed a crime in Japan,

which country is least likely
to send me back to Japan?

I would at first think
it’s trying to because

they have such a
contentious relationship,

but then they might
send you back just ’cause

they don’t want you
who has a problem there.

And China is not really
big on human rights either.

So they’ll be like, ha
ha, go back and suffer.

It’s actually China might
not be the best choice.

I might have to do a survey
somewhere and see what everyone thinks.

If you commit a crime
in Japan and you’re not

going to the US, you’re
not going to South Korea,

where would you go in the hopes that you’re
least likely to be sent back to Japan?

The human’s right
issue actually brings it up.

So you need actually
a very liberal country.

So now I’m thinking my
home country of Canada,

they would not send
you back if there was

any possibility of a
human rights violation.

So I think doing years and years and years

in an introduced Japan has
led me to the conclusion that

I should start planning my big crime and
go back to Canada and not get extradited.

Some plans on the horizon I see.

So there’s a South
Korean DJ called DJ Soda.

She played a music festival in Japan.

Now DJ Soda at the end of her
sets goes down into the audience

and says hello to people
and talks to people.

And the problem is in Japan, she
was groped by both men and women.

Jaxi said the woman grabbed
her breasts the hardest

and was like most sort
of invasive with the groping

where the men like grabbed
her elbows and grabbed

her shoulders and stuff,
but they were touching her.

Now I don’t want to victim blame,
but I do want to give all the information.

So this was, I personally,
if I was that big personality,

probably would not go down
into the audience without security.

I absolutely wouldn’t do it
if I was an attractive woman.

And I’m not talking about the Japanese
audience, I’m talking about any audience.

The Internet went really weird on this one.

So you have the Japanese
Internet that’s trying to defend itself,

the Japanese Internet that’s trying to
apologize or be sympathetic to the situation.

You have the South Korean
Internet that is accusatory of Japan.

You have the South Korean Internet that
is judgmental of the way DJ Sota dresses

’cause she basically wears
short shorts on a bikini top.

And she’s a very sexual person,
but again, being a sexual person

doesn’t make it okay to
sexually assault someone.

They also had a porn star dancing on stage.

So the problem I see is
that this was a sexually

charged atmosphere and then
she went down into a crowd.

Now, I would actually
say that’s a bad idea.

Not, again, I don’t think it’s okay.

I think those people should get in trouble,

but I also think your
self-preservation needs to kick in.

This is, we got porn stars up
in bikinis dancing on the stage.

We, the audience is mostly
men and they’re mostly drunk.

I wouldn’t go down there.

As now, as a male, I still
would not go down there

because I’d be like, I don’t
believe it would be safe

to go down into a crowd of drunk people
if I have just like hyped up the crowd.

But again, I still don’t
think this is okay.

It leads me in a tough position because it
will sound like any sort of excuse I make.

We is victim blaming,
which I don’t think that’s fair.

She should not have been touched.

The audience should have
kept their hands to themselves.

Japan, having done as many stories
as I have on creepy people in Japan,

I do have an image of Japanese
men being kind of creepy.

So that’s problematic as well.

So is that true or is
that a bias I’ve created?

Like a confirmation bias
because I seek out those stories

for an engineer’s Japan
because they’re usually

interesting and weird
and funny and gross.

And that suits the
platform I’ve created here

where we’re talking about
interesting, weird, gross stories.

The interesting thing is this
morning, a news report on Japan today.

So I’m gonna read this
because I just got it this morning.

220 year old men surrendered to police
Monday and connection with the incident

where popular South Korean artist DJ
Sorda was allegedly groped by attendees

at a recent music event in Japan,
according to investigative sources.

So basically the police are like,
oh, the creators of the music festival,

we want to press
charges, civil and criminal

because we want to promote
the safety of our artists

who are the people who come to
this festival, we want them to feel safe.

So we’re actually pressing charges.

These two guys turned themselves in.

And they said, again, not
an excuse, but they said

they were drunk and this
really was gross to me.

They said we touched
her in a lighthearted way.

So I think what they’re trying to
say is we didn’t intend to grow per,

but you were touching
someone without permission.

So I mean, it’s the same whether
your intent was to be gross or not.

And this is the problem is something
like this depends on how it’s received.

You touch someone and
they like it, not a problem.

You touch someone and they don’t like it.

That’s sexual assault.

They’re really, it’s really
the person who’s on the

receiving end gets to
decide if this is okay or not.

And she’s decided it’s not okay.

I did read a lot about, again, the different
internets trying to lay blame elsewhere.

I don’t have an answer.

I, yeah, I think security should
have been down there, maybe.

I don’t think.

Do you remember Taylor Swift?

Went on to, she was receiving an award
and then Kanye West charges the stage

and grabs the microphone and
says like, I’m going to let you finish.

And then my only thought in
that was where was security.

Like security didn’t, you
have a guy, I know he’s famous.

He just walks on the stage
and just grabs the microphone

out of her hands just to
like take over that show.

Security should have like
pulled him off the stage.

Like just picked him up and walked him off.

And they’re probably thinking
like, oh, he’s rich and famous.

So we shouldn’t do that.

He’s an artist here tonight.

So we shouldn’t do that.

But man, I don’t think anyone
should be rushing up on anybody.

So I think security failed here.

Just like I feel like
they failed back then.

I think that might be where in my
mind, most of the blame should be.

So I think DJ Sona is absolutely
justified in being offended.

I think the fans turning themselves in was
actually probably the right thing to do.

The female fan who
she was literally the most

blame was laid on
did not turn herself in.

I bet she didn’t think
she did anything wrong

because it was a woman
touching the other woman.

We got a lot of cultural
issues all wrapped up

in that that we don’t
have time to go into today.

Because I got a couple more stories to do.

But it is interesting.

I’m interested to see where this ends up.

Because does DJ Sona go forward
with these guys getting arrested?

What happens to them and what comes
up after this would be very interesting.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

This is something I
didn’t know about at all.

And I’m super excited about it.

And I kind of want to try it.

And I know I end up spending
way more money than I should.

But there are online UFO catchers.

UFO catchers in Japan
is what I think they would

call crane games or claw
games in North America.

I haven’t been in North America long
enough to know what they’re called anymore.

But in Japan, it’s that big claw
comes down and you grab something.

And then, of course, it lets go halfway up.

And you go, oh, I almost got it.

You can do that online
with your smartphone.

This, I think, came about
primarily because of COVID,

because people couldn’t
go to our kids anymore.

They set up a warehouse
with these hundreds of

UFO catcher machines
and then cameras on them

so that you can control
it from your smartphones.

You pay money through the phone
and then you get a play and it picks it up.

And if you win, it picks
up the item and it drops it

and you actually win,
they’ll mail it to your house.

I don’t know why that got me going.

I assume he has the thing.

When I came to Japan, I
used to do UFO catchers.

I used to be really good at it.

And then the UFO catcher machines seem to
get like they paid out less or more scammy.

They clearly had
programmed the machines not

to give you stuff until it got
a certain amount of money.

More so than when I came.

So my skills didn’t go down.

The quality of the grab went down.

So I don’t play them anymore because
now I feel like they’re just rip off.

Whereas before I felt
like I had an actual chance.

So I probably actually
gave them more money

before what I would win
stuff every now and then.

Whereas now I don’t win anything.

So I don’t give them anything.

So imagine a warehouse with 500
machines and over 1,500 different prizes.

It’s mostly anime stuff.

So if you’re a nerd,
this is like up your alley.

I, with my touchy coma on
myself, 100% am down for this.

DMM.com, which is a big
website in Japan that does live

streaming and stuff,
they will move the prize

to make it easier
after multiple attempts.

They actually some places do this.

So like I try to grab
this big anime sexy girl.

And I drop it like five times.

You can call this staff and go,
can you please position it better?

And they want to move it closer to
the whole or closer to or like on its side.

So it’s a little easier to pick up.

It’ll give you a fair chance.

And after you spend so much
money, you’ve kind of paid for the thing.

So it’s a fair thing to do.

So dMM.com does that.

Taito and Sega also
have these online services.

I didn’t know about any of this.

Actually, that’d be a cool
thing to actually live stream

on Twitch is set a certain
amount of money and see

how much I can win, which
would probably be zero.

Because again, I’m assuming
now I’m even like my skills

that I would have had
before they’ve gone down.

And then doing it via the Internet.

I bet that’s actually really hard.

But I’m super interested in this.

They make 20 to 30
billion yen a year on this.

This whole industry I didn’t
even know about, which I think

that to me is the most interesting
aspect of this whole thing.

OK, creepy last story, creepy last story.

This happened to me two days ago.

And so I was shocked.

I was actually on TikTok.

But it turns out on
YouTube, there was a sudden

influx of older whole
advertising on YouTube in TikTok.

And an older whole is a
machine, a suction-based machine

with vibrating capabilities
for a male individual.

So it is a machine designed
for a man to take care of himself.

Now, the one I saw, I actually
tried to send it to my friends

because it was so disturbing
and gross when I saw it,

that I wanted everyone
I knew to see it as well.

So we could talk about it.

But what it was, it was one
that was stuck on a window.

No.

If I’m going to do sort
of my private activities,

I’m not going to do
it on an open window.

But I’m betting the suction cup
actually works really well on glass.

So maybe that wasn’t on purpose, maybe not.

Then they just turn on
some of the functions.

There’s no voiceover, no sound.

It’s just this tube stuck to a window.

And it has a touch panel at the top.

And they touch it.

And you can see it go, boom, boom, boom,
where it starts to vibrate and whatnot.

And then they take a thing.

It’s not a male PPE.

They take a long stick with ridges on it.

And they start putting it in there.

Then they did an internal
view of what it looks like

on the inside and how
it’s vibrating and stuff.

And then they did some
practical special effects.

I think it might be the best way to say it.

And then the video was over.

Because it is just like a 10, 15 second ad.

I know this is not what YouTube wants to
have advertised on its Japanese website.

I know it’s not what Japanese TikTok
wants advertised on their website.

So a lot of people freaked out on Twitter.

I guess I should start
calling it X properly.

As in why am I seeing these things?

They’re all gone now, but everyone
wants to know what happened.

I’m betting YouTube and TikTok
will not let us know what happened.

My guess, my honest to
goodness guess, is that this is

part of the influence of
AI in the algorithm creation.

So AI has been like, we have men like me,

who really enjoy looking at
gross weird stuff on the Internet.

Let’s show them some gross
weird stuff in the advertising.

And maybe they’ll be more likely to buy it.

Now that’s not true, but I was absolutely
willing to share it with my friends.

I wasn’t able to share it,
which I found interesting.

So I click the share button to
get the link to send to the Discord.

So my friends could be grossed out with me.

But that didn’t work.

So I’m actually thinking
the AI kind of tripped up

and said like, there is no actual physical
thing that is disgusting in this video.

Because there’s no body
member that you see,

like you don’t even see like a human
hand, you see an object and that object

goes into another object that gesture
would be very sexualized to a human being.

But to an AI, they’re
not seeing any body parts.

They’re not seeing any,
they haven’t been programmed

to understand what
aspect of this is sexual.

So to them, it’s probably not sexual.

I think this is one
of the first failures

I’ve seen at AI trying
to moderate a system,

letting the exact stuff it’s
supposed to filter out, go through.

And that is, I guess, our future.

(upbeat music)

(upbeat music)

[Music]

(upbeat music).

But I got Dave and Dave
doesn’t want to get out of the way.

What do I do with Dave?

This is a tough question for me.

I want to move the microphone closed.

Last time I had it
up here, it was good

positioning, but actually
echoed from the back

of the room, which was very annoying,
because I could actually hear it.

It’s not terrible, but it was enough.

But then you don’t get any Dave time
if I move the mic where I need it to be.

Which is about there.

That’s right in Dave’s face.

Alright, buddy.

Yeah, I need to do my thing.

That’s what I need.

I need to do my thing.

What am I going to do?

That’s a tough question.

You can see I’ve worked
on my positioning back here.

Dave.

As soon as I sit down to get
this started, he wants attention.

It’s like he knows I finished writing.

Maybe I’ll ignore him completely when
I’m writing, so that’s why he doesn’t.

He doesn’t, but he knows during this part
I might actually like pay attention to him.

Oh, what do we do, Dave?

What do we do?

Let’s get that up a
little more right there.

That down.

Yeah, like that.

That’s interesting.

Oh, he’s sitting down.

That’s very nice.

Okay, so let’s get started.

[Music]

Japan, as a country, is shrinking.

Not the actual, no.

Japan is a population.

So as a country, it’s staying
basically the same size.

I mean, there might be erosion going on.

I didn’t check that statistic.

I was looking at a different statistic
because you’ve been in his huge Pam before.

You know, I love the statistics.

Statistics are super fun.

Japan’s population
2022, so they take a lot of

time to resolve the
actual surveys and whatnot

from the previous year to
make sure they’re accurate.

So we got, there was an 801,000
person decline in Japan last year.

That’s a lot of people.

It’s the first time that all 47
pre-fractors have declined in population.

So usually Okinawa,
they’re down there in the

sun, they’re banging
them out, they’re increasing

the population the way,
you know, Okinawans do.

That’s now going to be a new,
like, weird, sexual phrase for me.

You know, like Okinawans do.

But even there, Okinawa,
I guess they got worn out.

They did not increase
the population this year.

This, of course, has prompted calls
to address the declining birth rate

from the prime minister
and programs and stuff.

We’ve talked about this a million
times in the Institute of Japan.

I’ve solved this problem many times over.

And yes, it’s not an easy fix.

It’s not an easy solution.

It’s not something that
can just be done quickly.

You need to change culture to be honest.

But I actually have
other news stories coming

up, the showing that
culture can be changed.

and things will get better.

Foreign residents Rose to
just under 3 million people,

and in Tokyo, actually saw
an increase in population.

So just Tokyo itself.

Because so many foreign people
were going there for jobs and stuff.

So you can see there’s
sort of a tentative solution.

Our next story, though,
is going to kind of show

how that solution isn’t
really going to work out.

[MUSIC].

“Kumamoto.”.

They wanted to include
the phrase, including foreign

nationals to its definition
of what a citizen is.

So that would mean that the
people like myself, foreign nationals,

living in kumamoto, would be
considered citizens by the government.

Now, this wouldn’t actually
give them any more rights.

I can’t vote in Japan.

Other people, so it wouldn’t
actually change anything.

It would just be like, hey, you
are now included in the city.

You are a citizen of
the city by being here.

You pay taxes.

You do all the things
that citizens have to do.

You follow the rules.

You’re a good person.

You are welcome here.

I think that was maybe
the underlying message

that you as a foreign resident are still
welcome and are a member of the community.

How could that go wrong at all ever?

Well, they did a survey,
basically asking if this is okay.

Public opposition to this was 90%.

So they went out and did
a survey of the community.

90% of the community
said we don’t want foreign

nationals to be
referred to as citizens.

It’s not going to change
their rights or anything again.

Let’s just be clear that,
but the idea of calling

them citizens was too
big a door to open up.

So they were like, no,
shut that down right now.

So the government of Komodo
has decided we are not going to add,

including foreign nationals in
their definition of what a citizen is.

The foreign numbers in
the city, though, they’re

recognizing that those
foreign numbers are going up.

So they’re like, well, you know,
we’re getting more and more foreign

people who live here, more and
more people are part of the community.

We want to include them in part of the
community. We should call them citizens.

The people on the other
hand are like, fuck those guys.

Fuck those people because
they’re not Japanese.

The government tried to
say that this was based on a

misunderstanding and not
like massively rampant racism.

This is the problem.

As a foreign person
living in Japan, you are

never going to be accepted
as a Japanese person.

You might say that’s because I look
different, but hey, what’s going on?

You might say that’s because
I look different, but I, this

is most of the foreign nationals
in Japan are other Asians.

So they’re from Korea, they’re from
China, they’re from other places in Asia.

So they don’t look different.

So the racism there is just straight up.

We don’t want anyone who isn’t
Japanese to be called Japanese.

The government again, they’re
trying to make it seem like the

people in the city aren’t
anti-foreigner, but of course they are.

They said, we do not
believe that not specifying

foreign nationals as
citizens will exclude them.

I think that having 90% of
your population say that the idea

of calling a foreign national
a citizen will exclude them.

Because basically the
people have made it very

clear what they think of
foreign people in Japan.

I have run experiments
like live experiments on

my students when I was
teaching classes in Japan.

And so they, I said, you know, if
I had lived as a foreign person in

Canada, if I had lived in
Canada as long as I have

lived in Japan, I’ve lived
in Japan for 21 years now.

If I had lived that long in
Canada, I would have been a

naturalized citizen and
everyone would call me Canadian.

I mean that of course was
racist everywhere, but then the

number of people who would
accept me as a Canadian huge number.

In Japan, I could live here
for the rest of my lives, let’s

say 40, 50, 60 years, and I will
never be considered Japanese.

I could learn perfect Japanese.
I could adopt Japanese

lifestyles and I could take
on their behaviors and stuff.

And I still would never be Japanese.
And that’s it. It’s just never.

And then my students would say, well
that’s not racism. You’re just different.

I’m like, well that’s
literally what racism is.

And so I put an experiment to them.
We were talking about police.

And I said, you know, I, when I was
young, I considered being a police officer.

My students say, oh,
you’d be a really good police

officer. You know, you’re
strong and you’re serious.

And you know how to, you know how
to, you could handle people really well.

And you know when to be strict
and you know when to be kind.

That kind of stuff. You’d be a great cop.
And then I said, in Japan.

And they all went dead silent.

And they all went dead silent
because the idea of a foreign person.

And now these were
not racist people really.

But they were saying,
like they accepted me.

They were taking these
classes with me as the teacher.

So they were like, you know,
we’re interested in foreign culture.

We’re interested in lots of stuff.
We’re open people.

But the idea of a foreign
person, a person, a non Japanese

person, having authority
over them in their situations.

Like I pulled them over. I said, like if
I did, I was a police officer in Japan.

And I did a traffic stop. I bet half the
people I pull over would not consider.

Like my authority. They wouldn’t,
they’d be like, well, he’s foreign.

He’s not a police officer.
So and they’ll just drive away.

I 100% think they would do that.

Because the idea of
a foreign person having

actual real authority in
Japan is inconceivable.

And again, this isn’t
rampant racism. It’s

kind of a more generalized
soft racism, maybe.

And that’s one of the issues
that Japan needs to get passed.

Because the declining population is really
only be saved in the short term by an

increase in foreign residents who do
jobs produce babies with Japanese people.

And you need a more mixed
society for Japan to survive.

And I know Japanese people,
that is the last thing they want.

And this survey, 90% of
the people in Kumamoto,

and Dave will not stay still. Okay, I got
to do something to get Dave’s son down.

So what I do is I take Dave’s
bed and I put Dave’s bed on my lap.

And then I put Dave in
the bed and he will sit down.

My lap, I think, is not
comfortable with that.

Shoo.

That nice, nice butt shot there.
So now, I think maybe my,

Oh, see, look at that. You are
immediately like starts laying down.

The problem is I got to get
close enough to the microphone.

Okay, so you won’t be able to
see him as much, which is too bad,

but you do get a lot more
Steven Seagal, which is great.

Okay.

My rant about racism has been
interrupted by my love for Dave.

And that’s how we stop racism. Love.

So I don’t know where
I was going with that.

But the solution, oh, the short
term solution to the population,

the decline in Japan is
to bring in more people

who are not Japanese
and make them Japanese.

But when you get in Kumamoto,
let’s say 90% of the people are

opposed to the idea of calling
a foreign person a citizen,

even if they pay taxes and do
all the things that citizens do.

Again, again, no increase
in their actual rights.

They don’t get to vote.

They don’t get to do other stuff.

They don’t get to hold public office.

That still was aligned
too far for these people.

Just giving them acknowledgement
that they’re part of the community.

Okay.

So Twitter recently rebranded to X.

Kind of a problem in
Japan, because then it’s

going to be X Japan is
what they wanted to call it.

In Japan, there is a glam
rock band already called

X Japan, so that name
is already trademarked.

It’s not trademarked
by like a guy like me who

Twitter could just like
bowl over with money

and just like take it from them,
which is exactly what they would do.

It’s not like they would, if I
owned X Japan, the trademark, they

would offer me a massive someone
money so that they could use it.

They would try to steal it from me.

This is one of those things
that you have to be really

careful about like these
big companies and stuff.

They’ll just take from you if they can’t.

But X Japan is a massive,
massive rock band in Japan.

I never really listened to them.

I don’t know if their music is good or not.

I’m not going to make a
judgment because I haven’t.

It’s not my thing.

So they’ve already run
into a problem there.

This has been very interesting
as someone who lives

in Japan seeing the way
Elon Musk is running stuff.

I’ve talked about Elon Musk on
Seamick being stuff like that in the past.

The issue is he doesn’t seem to
consider anything as he makes a decision.

He just moves ahead.

He just bowls ahead.

So when Elon Musk took over
Twitter, he fired a ton of staff and

he fired almost all his PR groups,
including the PR group in Japan.

The thing is, labor laws in Japan
are very much in favor of the worker.

And a CEO taking over a company is not
a justification for firing those people.

So every single one of
the PR people he fired

in Japan, because that’s
the group I knew about.

He fired them all like
basically right away.

They all had a massive legal case
against Twitter that they 100% could win.

Because the ruling in
Japan is that if his new CEO

takes over, he has to,
you can’t fire those people.

You can move them around.

You have to use the resources
that you have and not fire any people.

So a new CEO taking
over a company is not a

good, justifiable
reason to fire your staff.

You have to use that staff first.

And then if they fail to
meet some kind of like, what,

or whatever measurement
that you try to put out

there, then you could
start considering firing.

But that would have
to be after a year or two

years if you’re trying to
use the staff you have.

So I don’t know.

I don’t know.

That story went away really quick.

So I’m betting all those
people just got massive payouts.

The thing is, in Japan, is not America.

This is the problem
where I would actually say

Japan needs to be a
little more Americanized.

They don’t do punitive lawsuits.

So you would have lost this
much money for this year.

We’re going to pay you
out this like five million yen.

But whereas in America it would
have been like 50, 60, 100 million

yen because of the emotional
damages that went along

with the they don’t do
any of that extra stuff.

But like a company like Twitter, a guy
like Musk, he needs to be punished before

he’s going to change his behavior before
he’s going to take any of it seriously.

So for him, paying each
of these employees a

year salary to get rid
of them, that’s nothing.

And he’s just probably just
like settled, which is too bad.

Because I would like to see him get into a
little more trouble because he was absolutely

flaunting the rules and just being an absolute
douchebag that I think we’ve all come to know.

That’s what he is.

And again talking about abusing the
system, a couple was hiking in Goodman.

These were in their 50s.

Around 2 P.M., the husband
calls emergency services.

He says, “My wife has
been injured for left foot.

Oh, my wife, my dramatic
reading kind of fell apart.

My wife has injured her left
foot, is having difficulty walking.”

So of course, because they’re on a
mountain, they can’t just go get her.

They have to call out a helicopter.

So they call out a helicopter.

It’s dispatched.

And then they have
like three or four firemen.

They have some police officers.

They’re all out there.

She’s taken.

She’s airlifted and taken to a
hospital for an ingrown toenail.

And again, this is Japan.

So she didn’t really get
punished for this, which I

was like, did they make
her pay for the helicopter?

Did they make her do other?

They should have at least embarrassed
her because this was too much.

This was like the husband could have
helped her walk down the mountain.

They could have tried to cut the toenail.

I don’t know how bad it was.

But an ingrown toenail, she managed to
hike up the mountain to a certain degree.

Far enough that they couldn’t just like
pick her up with a car and drive her back.

So she, I don’t know, man.

It’s one of the things like how do you
punish people for abusing emergency services?

Because they’re not really ever
going to understand emergency services.

It’s the kind of person.

It’s the way they think.

This is kind of, you know, on
most cases, the same problem.

He thinks a certain way and he’s
not going to change the way he thinks.

He thinks he deserves
to be able to do whatever

he wants because of
the ways he lives his life.

Because the world has been
set up for him to succeed.

These people, they thought,
ah, we can call a helicopter

to come pick up my wife
because for a sword toll.

And that’s not going to change.

An employee took sick leave
from a government position.

So they had a doctor certificate.

So this was, you know, per-fquile eagle.

They were allowed to take their sick leave.

There’s no argument there.

Once you get a doctor certificate to take
sick leave, you get your time off in Japan.

There’s no sort of pushback on that.

During the leave,
though, they decided it

would be really cool
to go to cosplay events.

Gothic Lolita ones.

Okay.

I think I might be creepy.

I have done a lot of stories about
the 50-year-old dudes who are creepy.

And I’m in my early 50s
and so am I getting creepier?

It’s a concern I have because
I’ve done so many of these stories.

I’m wondering if that
is an inevitable path.

Like, is it the inevitability that I
will end up being the creepy dude?

I’m hoping my awareness
of it will reduce the reality.

But I don’t know.

I will never know until it’s too late.

That’s the problem.

I’ll do something.

Someone will say that’s creepy.

I’ll go, “Oh, no, it was me.”

But my first thought,
the reason I said that

was my first thought
was like, no pictures.

Because he’s at cosplay
events, posting pictures.

I wanted to see the pictures just to check
out what kind of cosplay she was doing.

It said like a Lolita thing.

I was like, “Okay, well, I’m interested.

What does that look like?”

But then I was like,
“Then I need a thought.”

I was like, “Oh, was that creepy of me?”

Because it’s research.

But does the fact of what
she was wearing matter?

No.

I just wanted to see the pictures.

When I read a story about something like
this, I always wanted to see the pictures.

Is it good cosplay?

That’s actually my first thought.

Is it good cosplay?

Is it bad cosplay?

What kind of cosplay is it?

Anyways.

So this lady’s supposed to be on say, “J.

Just through an I.S. research.”

I do.

T.B.F. I want to see them too.

Right?

It’s weird.

And okay.

But I may be, a couple of
times mentally, I’ve been like,

“Have I crossed the line with
wanting to see these pictures?”

If it’s terrible cosplay, why bother?

If it’s terrible cosplay, well,
okay, there’s more to this.

So that’s actually the
bit we’re going to get to.

I’ll do that maybe next time.

I’ve had a rough day.

I’m going to… Jade is very good
at getting me to tangent from the

story, but again, maybe
the more interesting bits.

This is not funny.

In the engineer’s Japan,
I try to keep things light.

But I’m exhausted today.

I finished work.

Yes, so many tangents.

But the thing is, the tangents are good.

Tangents are the good part.

Yesterday, I did an early shift
and I covered someone else,

and I finished it four
o’clock and I thought,

“Awesome, I’m going to
get home, like 5, 5, 30.”.

I can sit down, read all
my news stories, get all

my stuff prepped out for
an engineer’s Japan today.

This didn’t work out.

The train hit something.

Now, there’s only so many
things the train can hit.

I was in the car and
I felt the train hit it.

And it was probably a person
because we stopped the train stops.

We sat there for about 30 minutes.

The police show up.

Some firemen get on and
they check that everyone’s okay.

And then we sit there for an hour.

And then we sit there
for an hour and a half.

Because now, I’m sitting
in an active crime scene.

Then, I think it’s three hours, two hours,
and some we were sitting on the train.

And then it went back
to the previous station.

We all got off.

That train went away.

Had to wait for another train to come.

Got on that train.

It was crazy packed because no trains have
been going for the last two, three hours.

So it was one of those
cliche squishing people

pushing people onto
the train car kind of thing.

Get off like two, three stations.

A bunch of people get off.

So they’re actually getting home
so I’m happy about that’s not too bad.

By the time I get to
my transfer station,

it’s actually normal
amount of people again.

It’s old man.

There was lots of space
and you could get off the train.

It was old man was still in push mode.

He decides to push past the people
on my left and then push his past me.

I’m a large person.

So I weigh like 90 kilos.

I’m probably way 90 kilos now.

It’s like two, two, ten.

And this little Japanese old
dude tries to push past me.

I was so tempted to
just push him back or hold

him back so he
couldn’t get off the train.

And then he gets past me and he pushes this
other old man who gets really offended.

Who was getting off the train?

Again, there was no reason to push it.

Everyone was getting off the train.

So I got home last night at 8.30.

So I finished it for it.

It took four and a half hours to get home
last night because of this train accident.

So I went, got home, sat around and
watched some TV and then went to bed.

Got up, started doing my preparations.

So I’m just wasted today.

It might actually took
all my energy last night.

It’s crazy.

Anyway, back to this lady.

So she had been given sick leave.

She had a doctor’s note.

During her sick leave, she
thought it would be really cool to

go to cosplay events, showing
off her cosplay and her tattoos.

Now, if you have a government position,
you’re not really supposed to have tattoos.

It’s not like they can say they
won’t hire you because it had to.

But again, this is kind of going
back to one of the earlier stories.

These embedded philosophies or
way of thinking, they are not changing.

They still think people with tattoos
should not have government positions.

So probably she had tattoos like I
do where it was covered by a t-shirt.

So I have a tattoo of my shoulder.

I have one of my back.

But you would never see it unless
I took off my shirt to show you.

She probably rolled up her sleeves.

You could see her tats.

She thought she’s
having a really good time.

Under her pictures,
she posted things like, “I

still have a hangover
from the year-end party.”

That kind of stuff.

Because this was a few months ago.

The city got an anonymous tip.

So this was another thing.

These anonymous tips.

So that’s like a coworker
or someone who knows her.

They have to be angry at you.

This is another thing.

If you’re going to sort of break rules, you
got to keep the people around you happy.

I’ve broken rules at work.

But my coworkers, my immediate
coworkers, I’ve kept them very happy.

I’ve covered for them.

Therefore, I am pretty
sure they will cover for me.

I haven’t been flagrant
about breaking the rules.

But I know inherently
as a budding criminal.

It’s important to make
sure the people around

you are willing to
support you in small ways.

I don’t expect them to
put their jobs on the line.

But if it comes down to
like, “Hey, where’s Peter?”

“Well, I don’t know.”

Or, “He’s in the bathroom,”
or something like that.

100% they would do that.

So if you’re going to go on sick leave and
then go to cost pay of play events and show

off and talk about the hangovers
at the party you’ve been doing,

you got to make sure you keep
the people around you happy.

So someone was unhappy decided to do
the anonymous report that, “Hey, there’s

an employee who’s going to these
events when they should be on sick leave.”.

The woman was suspended
because during sick leave,

she should have been
making every effort to recover.

Which I guess is technically
true, but you could say going out

feeling good, having a good time
is part of your recovery process.

I think that would be fair.
Having fun helps you recover.

Not Ignat’s just put in the chat.

Fucking snitch. Yes, that is the feeling.

I agree. Emotional recovery,
I think is where it should be.

So here is, there’s sort of
an underlying theme of the,

you have to change the way
you think to be successful.

Because the world is changing.

In Hiroshima, there’s a garbage
collection company, in a garbage

collection, if I say garbage collector,
your immediate image is a man.

Because, traditionally, this
kind of job has been done by

men. That’s not saying it should
exclusively be done by men.

But if you are struggling to hire
people, there is a group of people that

you have not attracted to your garbage
collection company and that is women.

So this company decided we
are going to make some changes.

Around 2018, a new, a 2016,
a new young president came in.

Young, I think, was the optimal
word there, the important word.

It was one of the
complaints I have had about

politics in Japan. It’s
being run by 70 year olds.

It’s being run by people
who don’t understand the

Internet. People who don’t
know how a printer works.

People who still think we should
be, “Hunkoing things with stamps.”

That’s not cool. Those guys got to get out.
We got to get some young blood in there.

Young girl than me. I’m
actually now thinking I’m on the

precipice of two old to change
the world in a really positive way.

Because I’m going to be like,
“Tiktok is only like, “Well, I don’t

understand that. So we shouldn’t
have that. That’s just not a good thing.”.

No. Kids love Tiktok. They should have the
Tiktok. Don’t go crazy on it, of course.

But don’t go crazy on anything.
That’s just sort of a general rule.

This guy is like, “I’m going
to change the program.

I’m going to make a
worker-friendly environment.”

If I want to make a worker-friendly
environment for women, I need to have daycare.

In 2018, that’s where I
got the numbers mixed up.

2018, this new young president
introduces daycare for employees.

Most of that running the daycare
is covered by government subsidies.

He’s now providing free
daycare for his employees.

That free daycare is being
subsidized by the government.

He’s paying almost nothing
for this benefit, which is

again, this is some
brilliant thinking on his part.

Now, women start joining
the company. They’ve

set up a system where
your kid gets a fever.

We can either sequester them.
We can call you. Your superior

will call you and say, “It’s time
to take your kid and go home.”

They make flexible work hours.

If your kid’s sick, you
immediately just get the day off.

No questions don’t argument.
You’ve got to take care of your kids.

But knowing that the kid is safe, knowing
that the kid is knowing where they are,

because it’s back at the office.
I know where to go get them.

I know they’ll be taken care of
until I get there to take them home.

Or I can actually just
leave them there because

they have a whole area
for the kids who have fever.

Kids get fevers all the time.
It’s a really normal thing.

This means that now
40% of the garbage

collectors working for
this company are women.

You can’t say garbage man anymore because
it is. It’s garbage man, garbage women.

And that’s awesome.

And now they have enough people to do their
business and their business is flourishing,

where others are struggling to
hire people because it’s all men.

And the men don’t want to do this
job or they have other issues going on.

My wife worked for an accounting
firm, not anymore she used to.

And I was like, “You
get paid almost nothing.

What is the attractive
aspect of this accounting firm?

What he’s done is he’s hired
a whole bunch of married

women and give them
incredibly flexible hours.”.

So he pays them dirt.

But they can pack up and leave
anytime they have to do something.

So we’ve got to take the
kids to school, got to go

to a school meeting, going
to take care of something,

just pack up and leave, no
arguments, no complaints.

And these women were
overjoyed to have this job.

So everyone there was really happy
because they’re like, “I can make money.

I can do stuff that
it’s interesting. It’s

like counting can be
quite challenging work.”.

But I don’t have to sacrifice
taking care of my family to do it.

So if I need, again, kid gets a fever, I
just go pick up the kid, bring them home,

and I stay home with them for that
day or maybe the next two or three days,

and the company doesn’t
complain about it at all.

It doesn’t give me a hard time.

That worker, positive, friendly
environment, those women

were paid garbage, but none
of them would quit the job.

That’s cool.

And that’s again, sort of
the change in philosophy is

made these companies flourish
where others still struggle.

Okay, so the Barbie movie, an
Oppenheimer, came out in the same day.

And so that a bunch of people
were like, “Oh, we’re going

to go do a double feature of
the Barbie and Oppenheimer,

because the contrast,
the juxtaposition of the

two styles is going
to be really interesting.

Funny, ha ha, aren’t we quirky people?”

And it kind of got the Barbie
Heimer hashtag took off in the West.

The thing is Oppenheimer takes
a slightly different tone in Japan,

because this is one of the
places where they actually

dropped the bomb that was
created at the end of that movie.

So, Barbie Heimer was seen as
quite offensive by Japan, I think, fairly.

So, this led to a
problem where the official

Barbie English Twitter
account joined the

Barbie Heimer hashtag and
retweeted stuff and did all this stuff.

And they were making their
own, like, “Ha ha, isn’t it funny?

Barbie and Oppenheimer in the same day.

We love it.”.

This led to the Japanese
Barbie account apologizing sort of,

because what they didn’t
say they were sorry, they were

like, “It’s more like an
explanation what they said was,

we didn’t make the Barbie Heimer hashtag.

That was made by Americans.”

And we have no control
over what those Americans do,

much like making the bomb itself
and then dropping on us here in Japan.

But it’s regrettable if
you’re upset about it,

which is a very, very
common Japanese non-apology,

like just saying, “It’s regrettable.”.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t go see Barbie.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t
go see Oppenheimer.

I think they’re probably both great movies.

I probably will see them both myself.

But yeah, people in Japan were
a little annoyed by Barbie Heimer,

so they came up with the
no-Barbin Heimer essentially

trying to ban both
movies because of this.

And I don’t know, as Oppenheimer
been participating in any of this,

I actually didn’t see, it’s
all been on the Barbie side.

And they’re all trying to make light and
they made like a pink mushroom cloud,

and they had what’s in a Margot
Robbie with a mushroom cloud hair.

Yeah, I think in a place
where the actual bombs

gone off, that might be
considered in poor taste.

[Music].

There was the sub that went down to see the
Titanic in it and imploded and everyone was

all basically making
fun of it on the Internet.

Titanic therefore was sort of trending
in the whole space of the Internet.

Foody TV on June 24th
and July 1st scheduled

to play Titanic because
that’s what people want to see.

People want to see the movie
Titanic and everyone’s like,

“Oh, that’s in very poor
taste you shouldn’t show that.”

But it turns out they
made this schedule on

May 23rd months before the actual
Ocean Gate submarine thing happened.

So they were really just continuing
on with their scheduled programming.

So it’s a question of,
“If I make a schedule

to play a movie, an
incident happens that

relates to that movie, is it import
tastes to stick to my schedule?”

I don’t know.

So I think I go along
with people who are like,

“Look, Titanic, even if you like
it or not, is a very popular film.

It’s going to be shown on TV regularly.

If you don’t want to see it and
it offends you, don’t watch it.

It’s really that simple.

I don’t know what I would do.

If I was the head of
programming for Foody TV,

we’re like, “Okay, we’re
going to play Titanic

like it’s two hour, two
hour and a half hour movie.”

So that’s a huge block
of our scheduled time.

We’re going to play that today.

And then a sub explodes.

Implodes.

Very important to get the difference right.

A sub implodes.

Do you continue with your
scheduled programming?

I think you do.

Because the people have the choice.

This is one of the problems
with people and media.

Because people watch
media and then they get

offended and they start
to complain, they don’t

seem to realize they could at
any point stop watching that media.

This is not just TV, this is
TV, Internet, movies, whatever.

If you find something
offensive, don’t watch it.

If it doesn’t get watched, it goes away.

Well, except for this podcast.

No one watches this podcast
or listens to this podcast.

And I’m still here.

It’s like years and
years later, I’m still

saying the same dumb
crap into the same time.

I’m like, it’s sexy.

A new microphone from when I
started way better microphone.

HyperX Solo Cast.

6000 yen on Amazon.

There’s a group I work
with, a blind knowledge.

They are just a group of
podcasts that get in together.

They’re trying to get ads so we
can make some money, which is great.

So I’m going to practice.

I’m going to practice by dropping in
little ads here and there everywhere we go.

HyperX Solo Cast.

You can sponsor the podcast.

I’ll mention the microphone.

It’s up right in front of, if you
watch the video on YouTube.

I always stick it up in front of my face.

I’ve made sure I got a bright red cable.

USB cable to connect it to my computer.

Why?

Because it matches the
piping of my stupid chair.

I didn’t do that consciously, but
when I saw, oh, I need to plug it in.

It came with like a very long black cable,
which would have been sort of nondescript.

Then I saw I had this one in my,
in one of my junk drawers, basically.

And then I noticed it matches the
chair and I was like, I could have it.

And then I put a red
border around the screen.

That’s all I’m perfect.

People don’t think
of me as the kind of

person who does stuff for
aesthetics, because generally I don’t.

But I saw, I was like,
oh, I could match my

chair and my cable and
the border on the screen.

Yeah, why not?

Just click of a button.

Hyper-X solo cast for
solo casting your hyperness.

I don’t know.

I guess I have to work on that part.

Anyways, I don’t think
Fuji TV did anything

wrong by playing the
video about rich people.

dying when a bunch of rich people died
because no one cares about rich people.

You should listen to the last C McB to
get a good sense of why people don’t care.

I actually go into a little talk about
empathy and the function of empathy.

It’s very good.

If I’m being really honest,
I’ve done some shit episodes.

That was a good episode.

It drew in a lot of ideas.

You should definitely, if you
like whatever, just listen to that.

Finish listening to this first.

Don’t just like, oh, well, you told me
to listen to that stop and then go away.

Why is supposed to be already gone?

I already lost that group.

Oh well.

There’s a vice principal
and he was very helpful.

He put up some curtains
in a classroom for a

teacher and they had a
kerosene space heater.

So he went and got
kerosene and filled it up again.

And he decided that he
needed some appreciation.

He needed to be, you know, someone to show
him a very specific teacher, by the way.

She showed some appreciation
for the efforts he did on her behalf.

So amazing to ask for some kisses.

The little kids I’ve
filled up your space here.

A little kiss, please.

I put out some curtains for
what you look, please, please.

She seems to think this
was sexual harassment.

He’s just asked for a
little kiss here and there.

He actually asked for five and once tapped
on her shoulder and did a hugging gesture.

The teacher felt harassed, went to another
teacher and just sort of game the rundown.

The other teacher was like, oh, you shit.

No, this is not okay.

He was pulled into a
meeting and he said, I felt

that there were no
problems with my actions,

which therein lies the problem with his
actions because he thought that was okay.

I, let’s say I have a
coworker or something.

I find very attractive.

I know that going up
and asking for kisses for

mundane tasks is not
appropriate work behavior.

I might want to do it.

I’m like, oh, she’s very pretty.

I’d like some kisses.

I know that there is a problem
with me asking for kisses.

I just know that inherently.

I wasn’t even taught that.

Don’t sat down and
went through a list of rules

for me when I joined companies
and started working and stuff.

They never said
like, hey, Peter, if you

pick up a heavy box for a
lady, don’t ask for kisses.

They didn’t have to say that to me.

Apparently they needed
to say it to this guy.

It’s still probably wouldn’t have worked.

When he was being suspended, he hasn’t been
fired yet, but when he’s being suspended,

he had intended to improve
communication in the workplace.

How, again, how is the question
that never gets answered?

I want to be on these boards.

I want to be the guy on the
board who talks to these people.

I don’t know how I get that job.

The problematic board member.

No, that makes it sound
like I’m the problem.

The investigation into problematic
behavior of board member.

That’s better.

I want to be that guy.

When he says to me,
dead seriously, I intended

to improve communication
in the workplace.

I can look at him and go, how?

How does asking for kisses
improve communication?

Then listen to the incredible because
he’s going to have a dumb, long answer.

You know the answer is long.

The answer is long because
they’re trying to justify gross behavior.

That’s what these people do.

Again, he doesn’t think anything is wrong.

He’s going to have
reasons like, oh, if we do

more at kissing, we’ll feel
closer and work together better.

He’d say something like that.

He would be dead serious and he’s wrong.

Scam alert.

I wanted to look some more into scams.

That actually might be a
theme of a future podcast,

either in the ancient
New Japan or Seemingly.

Looking to some of the
bigger scams that have

gone throughout life,
scams are interesting.

What has happened is a
guy did an unboxing video.

Unboxing video was one hour and 38 minutes
long and he does not say a single word.

I didn’t watch the little thing.

He may actually speak at some point, but
he ordered 60 plus packs of Pokemon cards.

He’s a big fan of Pokemon.

He wants to Pokemon cards.

He did it through a reseller.

There’s a website called Marikari where I
could sell my HyperX solo cast microphone.

Should I grow tired of it and want to
upgrade to the HyperX quad cast microphone?

The quad cast microphone
is the one with lights.

It’s a little taller and
it has LEDs inside and

you can change colors
and you can make it vibrate.

Not vibrate physically, vibrate the lights.

Although if it did
vibrate, it’s weird when

you gross yourself
out because it’s like you

let the intrusive
thoughts just come out

before you filter them, much
like our man and his friendly kisses.

The scam, he bought a giant box.

He opened the box.

This is unboxing video of unboxing videos.

His unboxing video of
opening a box with more

boxes in it where he
unboxed each box in the box.

He went to Marikari where he
bought these from another seller.

There were more than 60, I think it
was like 64, 65, but a bunch of a lot.

50 of the boxes had juice boxes
inside them instead of cards.

So what this person had done, the scam.

He got actual Pokemon
boxes because every box

he unboxes is a real box and it’s
not like a real box someone made.

It’s a real box from the
Pokemon Corporation.

And shrink wrapped.

So this guy bought
the boxes, opened the

boxes, took out the
cards, got a juice box, put

it in, and then close
up the box and then

shrink wrapped it again
and then box the box

into a bigger box and
sent that big, big box

to this man who
bought it on the Internet.

That’s a lot of work.

Why did he fill it with juice boxes?

Well it’s because the juice box weighs
basically the same as a box of cards.

So the weight of the
big box with all the little

boxes in the box would
weigh the appropriate amount.

And so when he got it, he wouldn’t
be suspicious, he opens the box.

I bet you just put a
line in there like once

open, there’s no returns
or something like that.

And he’s actually kind of screwed
himself that way by opening

to check the boxes that
he’s unboxing from the big box.

I feel bad for this guy.

He’s one hour and 38 minute YouTube video.

I did watch chunks of ice skips
through it because he just opens the box.

He takes a box out
of the big box, the little

box out of the big
box and he weighs it.

So it has the right
weight and then he opens

it up and it’s a juice
box and then he puts

it to the side and then
he opens it up, juice

box, juice box, juice box, juice
box, juice box, juice box, juice box.

I bet the box of cards
though because this

guy’s a scammer and
he has all the equipment

I bet he’s taken out any
good cards and just put

all the crap cards into
the box that the guy bought.

Yeah, it’s kind of, it’s, it’s shit man.

I don’t enjoy unboxing videos.

The Japan consumer
agency, so this is the, the

monitor television and
advertising and stuff

to make sure you’re
not breaking any rules.

They would have to
dominoes and they give them

a warning because of a
service charge printed on flyer.

I have the, let’s say list of prices
and then delivery fee and whatnot.

That all should be together.

And then there is a
service fee on the other

side of the flyer and
that service fee was

in really small font which made
it really hard for you to see it.

Now it was about 300 yen, 6
to 7% of the cost of the pizza.

I was wondering what
the service charges for.

Like dominoes is a service.

So I’m ordering a service
from a service provider

to get the service and
they had a service charge.

That seems like bad service.

If I’m bringing really honest, it seems
like you know, appropriately bad service.

I’m not happy about that.

But I am happy with
the HyperX Solo Cast

microphone I have right
here in front of me and

the Dulce tones you’re getting through.

It came.

Oh, I should actually do.

I was about to do like I
should do the mic arm too.

The mic arm was 3000 yen.

So in total, the whole setup
basically cost nearly 10,000 yen.

It’s luling arts which is
a cheap manufacturer

but it’s just I don’t do moves
the arms around very much.

Once I put it in
position, it sits there

while I do the whole podcast
or I play games or whatever.

But it came with the
pop filter which is why

you’re not getting the posters
as strongly as you should.

At least I hope not.

And then it also came with a variety
of ways you can attach it to the arm.

So honestly, as far as
products go, the HyperX

Solo Cast plus the
Luling Arts arm for putting

it on my desk and
moving it around and stuff.

The arm actually makes a huge difference.

Okay.

I know this is like supposed to be a stupid
joke that I’m doing throughout the podcast.

Callbacks what not.

It is funny.

But if you are going
to do podcasting or

streaming or something
like that, you should

get a mic arm because it’s
way less effort to set it up.

If you have an open desk,
you can just swing it away.

Mine doesn’t, it has like a shelf to the
side but I can push it back into the corner

and I don’t have to
like set it up every time.

I don’t have to get a stand or anything.

That is the benefit of a mic arm.

So Domino’s had a service charge.

The service charge was 6 to 7%
of your purchase up to 300 yen.

Very technically, 299 yen.

But they said, oh no, we’ve gone in
trouble with the consumer agency.

The Japan consumer agency.

So we’ll get rid of that
service charge and we

will just increase the
price of pizzas by 9%.

And that was part of their apology.

We’re like, oh, we’re sorry we had the
service charge that was 300 yen, maybe 6, 7%.

of your pizza pie.

We’re sorry we did that.

We’re going to increase
the price of pizzas by 9%.

So they came out of this making
more money and I now, I hate Domino’s.

I never cared about Domino.

I didn’t have positive or negative
feelings about Domino’s before.

Now, totally 100% negative
feelings about Domino’s.

He just sends the bitches.

This is awful.

The price of everything
has been going up in Japan.

Like little bursts.

I have noticed costs of
things I just buy regularly.

I have gone up but onto a new topic.

What is a salt?

And it is, it’s a tough question
because it could be a lot of things.

And so this was one of the more interesting
assaults that I’ve read about only because

I’m as, I don’t want to
make any assumptions.

Let’s just go through the story.

A man was feeding his child an onigiri.

Onigiri is a usually
triangular packed rice ball.

The very basic one is just rice and salt.

They pack it into a
ball or they make a

little triangle is what you’re going
to get in like a convenience store.

Because they’ll push some
fish or something into the middle.

Give it a little flavor boost.

I do like the salmon ones
or the tuna and mayonnaise.

It’s like getting, I don’t want to buy a
tuna sandwich from a convenience store.

I wish I should buy an example
and actually do it on screen.

They make the sandwich
and it’s like a triangle.

And then there’s the
bit that faces out towards

you and it’s this
big fat thing of tuna.

And it’s because they’ve
taken a dollop of tuna

and put it at the very
front of the sandwich.

So it looks big.

But then if you open it up,
90% of the sandwiches empty.

They say it’s so that
you can spread the tuna

yourself, which no
one is ever going to do.

So essentially you take
one bite of tuna and then you

just have like white bread
for the rest of the sandwich.

Never bought a sandwich again.

Furious.

And that was all convenience
stores were judged

the same because of
this behavior of just one.

So the man is feeding
his child a rice ball

and then his wife starts
scolding the husband.

They don’t say what about
how he’s about the details.

I don’t know what you would scold
him or what was she pissed off about.

The man shoves the only
giddy in her face, which is a soul.

Like I’m not joking, it is a salt.

Now if you just shoved it in her
face, it wouldn’t have hurt her.

But that’s like spitting
on someone, spitting

on someone doesn’t hurt
you physically, but it is a soul.

So yes, it is a salt,
but usually we talk

about violence and I
was like, it’s not really

violence is it, but
then of course it is

violence because
again, the spitting counts.

So shoving an only giddy in
someone’s face should also count.

She calls the cops, cops
show up at the guy’s house.

She’s got rice all over her face.

That was apparently an
important point because that’s

essentially the evidence that
what she’s saying was true.

I was like, uh, she could call the cops
put rice on her face and then say he shoved

only giddy in my face
and he would get arrested.

Uh, and he was arrested.

I mean, there’s nothing to say about that.

He did assault her because it weddings.

It’s a tradition shoved
cake in your partner’s face.

Ha ha ha.

That’s a salt.

I think we better like crack down on that.

Actually, last week on Engineers Japan, I
talked about a guy who took a job online to

steal Pokemon cards,
drop them off and go to

a secondary location
and collect money for

his theft.

Uh, turns out it was a scam.

He stole the cards, gave him to a guy
who just disappeared and never paid him.

This is a weirdly
common trend recently in

the news of people
getting crime jobs online.

So a couple weeks ago, there was
a break in at a luxury watch store.

Three kids.

I mean, I say kids
because the one who got

arrested was like 19, but the
other two might have been older.

They didn’t know each other.

So actually, that’s why
I don’t know the ages

of the other people who
were the perpetrators.

They were part of this ring who got recruited
to commit this crime on the Internet.

They didn’t know each other.

There was someone sort
of coordinating all the stuff.

This one guy just got arrested.

What he did is he took
a job online and they

said, go rent a car,
park it in this parking

place, put the key on top of
the front right tire, let’s say.

He was on top of the tire,
but they didn’t see which one.

And then take off.

It was used in the
highest last week in Tokyo.

So he got arrested for
being part of the highest.

He didn’t even know what
the crime was going to be.

He just wanted to get
paid to pay off some debts.

So he took this shady job.

Man, guess what?

He never got paid.

So he participated in the crime.

He was part of the
conspiracy to commit a crime.

He did the crime and
never got anything for it.

So I’m like, if you’re
going to get arrested,

you might as well have
at least have committed

the crime or profited off the
crime you were trying to commit.

Like a bunch of guys got away with watches.

If they turn them in, they are dead stupid.

Like I know reselling, I
talked about it last time.

I wouldn’t know how to resell
a watch and not get caught.

I actually talked at
length about how I couldn’t

even like, launder money properly
because I don’t know about that.

I would have to go online
and research it and stuff.

And then they would
go through my browser

and find out that I’d been
researching how to launder money.

That’s my downfall right there.

But it is a bit
terrifying that all these

people are getting into crime
and getting ripped off in the crime.

But of course, if you’re going to commit
a crime, don’t trust the other criminals.

That’s like crime movie 101.

There’s don’t trust any of the
other people in your crime circle.

Whole life is a VTuber agency.

So they basically, I
was considered because

I never wanted to put
my face on the screen.

I thought of doing a VTuber.

So get a super cute anime girl
VTuber thing and not change my voice.

Not try to do a cute voice.

Just speak completely normally.

So I have the contradiction.

And it’s weird because as soon as I say
that people will have been done before.

Do you know how many
things have been done before?

Like everything, like music and stuff.

Like I get, I’m too late to be the first
at pretty much everything in the world.

But that’s fine.

If I do it and I do it
well, it’s still funny.

So I was thinking about doing
this podcast with a VTuber face.

I was thinking of streaming with a
VTuber face, all that kind of stuff.

But realistically, I just
didn’t want to go through

the effort of learning
another piece of software.

It’s really more than anything else.

I just didn’t want to learn the software.

If something else comes along, it’s
easy in the future and I might do it.

But I could do an avatar of my own face.

It would be such a lame avatar, whatever.

So they had whole life.

They are an agency for VTubers.

They were having a
shareholders meeting last week.

We also had a conversation
about shareholders.

And this guy showed
up and completely

inappropriately showed
up at the Nintendo meeting.

This guy shows up in full, I have to
get the name right, Roushia cosplay.

So cute.

VTuber girl.

This guy shows up in full cosplay.

And then he gets
really angry that he’s not

allowed in because to
get into the shareholder.

meeting, the company
actually holds a lottery.

So you don’t just like show up.

I’m a shareholder.

I can join.

I assume this guy is a shareholder
because he thought he could just walk in.

And they’re like, no,
you have to apply in

this lottery because we can only
fit so many people in the meeting.

And then the people
who win the lottery come

in, they can ask their
questions and whatnot.

Also we want to be
able to turn away certain

people who obviously
are not in the right

mindset for a shareholders
meeting, which is

not where we do full
cosplay and talk about stuff.

What did this person want?

They had some signs with them.

They started protesting
that they weren’t allowed in.

They started protesting about
the termination of Roushia.

So basically their
favorite VTuber was being

cut and they were
coming to the shareholder

meeting to demand
the reintroduction, which

was very similar to the
guy who showed up to

the Nintendo shareholder
meeting who was angry

that the female
inklings in Spat-splatoon

were being sort of
treated better or promoted

more than the male
inklings from Spat-Tune.

I have to be very careful
because I don’t play Spat-Tune.

So I don’t really know all the verbiage.

I read a thing and it said inkling.

I’m assuming inkling is
both male and female.

I can’t actually see that’s true.

What I can say is true
that the HyperX Solo

Cast microphone is one of the
best microphones for the price.

So I could just slide it in.

Just like DM’s, just slide that one in.

No one had even noticed if I just
kept going and didn’t point it out.

So the guy I never got in, Roushia still
terminated so a complete waste of time.

Okay, our last story is
because I learned a new word.

I don’t want to go
through this whole story.

Four and a half years ago, a man
married a virtual idol at Tsune Miku.

So he had a ceremony, had a wedding.

When I read about this
story, I was immediately

like, “I’m going to
make fun of this guy.

It’s going to be really funny.”

And then his backstory is pretty tragic.

So I stopped wanting to bully him because
that’s how he ended up the way he is.

He had confessed his love.

Oh, creepy Mcreaster in the chat.

He said that inkling is the race.

Thank you.

I actually worth knowing if I’m actually
going to ever talk about them again.

Hopefully I don’t.

It’s not like I’m anti-splatoon.

It seems to be a whole backstory
there that I don’t want to learn.

It’s all like post-apocalyptic
stuff too, from what I understand.

But thank you.

So an inkling is the race, not the gender.

Which again, I didn’t know.

I don’t want to judge
people based on gender.

I’m open.

Whatever gender– that’s actually related
to what I’m talking about right now.

So anyways, this guy,
he had confessed his

love in his youth seven times
and was rejected seven times.

So that hurts.

I mean, I, as a young man, tried
to ask out girls, got rejected.

But I was lucky
enough that I didn’t get

rejected so much that I kind of like
built up a wall to the world around me.

This guy on top that was
also bullied in high school

and university and then
on into the workplace.

And he had to take a leave of absence.

And so in his leave of
absence, this is where

all my sympathy started actually like
turning really quickly towards this guy.

In his leave of absence, when he was stressed
out and living like a shut-in, heard a

Hatsune Miku song and
the voice kind of inspired him.

I don’t personally like
Hatsune Miku music, but

the fact that it spoke
to him in that moment

and made him a happier
person, I am kind of on board.

I mean, I don’t like
stuff that other people

like, other people don’t
like stuff that I like.

I want you to be happy.

I want to be happy too.

So I suddenly was like, I don’t
want to make fun of this guy anymore.

They did a survey
and found that 10% of

university students
have romantic feelings for

a game character or a fictional character,
a game character, and an anime character.

Female university students, it’s 17.1%.

I don’t know what you can do with that
information, but at least if you want to talk

to 17% of the female
university population,

video game character, you should
ask them like what character they like.

There’s a 20% chance that they’re going to
get real excited about and talk about it.

That’s the first step is to
actually interact with people.

So this guy, after
experiencing years of

bullying, finding something
that makes him happy,

decides that in the real world he
wants to marry this virtual idol he does.

And his life is improved.

He decides that he’s going
to find other people like him.

And of course, like
there are 10% of university

students who have
those feelings, maybe

they don’t go so far
as to actually marry a

fictional character, but
they have those feelings.

He set up a support group and the
support group is for fikto-sexuals.

And like I said, I was going
to make a bunch of jokes.

I had a bunch of
jokes until I read the

story and then I was like, I have
nothing but sympathy for this guy.

And I hope he and the people
in his support group are happy.

He was talking about
how he goes through life

and people call him
disgusting and stuff.

And it’s horrible.

But I’m like, he’s not hurting anybody.

So if he’s actually
happy with his virtual

idol, I hope he stays
happy with his virtual idol.

Just like I’m happy with my
HyperX solo cast microphone.

I just realized that my
video could be tagged

for promotion, despite
the fact that I am

promoting the product, but
I’m not getting any money for it.

So I guess it’s paid
promotion is the issue.

This is literally just
promotion, not paid promotion.

So I guess it doesn’t count.

Unless HyperX solo cast wants
to reach out, I am willing to add

the HyperX solo cast
brand, HyperX in general,

brand into every story
I do on this news Japan.

And I will just again,
I’ll just slide it in.

People after a while
won’t even notice, it’ll

be like, uh, subliminal advertising
because I just be so smooth.

(electronic music)

Gotta work today so I don’t have the luxury of

time, but I know you’re hungry for the news,

you’re hungry for what the creepy people in Japan,

do I have it?

Don’t have that many creepy stories today, I’m sorry.

I actually think I need to turn on the light to better see my notes, whatever.

We’re not gonna worry about it, we’re gonna power through, ’cause that’s what we do.

We power through.

So a man decided it would be a good idea.

And whenever I start, a man decided it would be a good idea.

What I’m actually saying, ’cause I do start, I use that phrase a lot.

What I’m actually saying is, what mental process took this person to this point?

So he woke up in the morning, this is always my story.

Whenever we do like a weird crime, weird anything, is they woke up in the morning

and they got to a point in the day where they’re like,

this is a good idea, this is what I’m gonna do today.

So this guy starts calling the police station

on his mobile phone.

And over the course of two days, he calls them 47 times.

And he starts saying things like, the bomb has been completed, very dramatic.

I got a missile.

I’m going to blow up your police station.

So I’m betting, we did,

he claimed to have a homemade missile.

He claimed to have a homemade bomb

that he was going to use to blow up a police station.

Now we had the assassination of former prime minister Abe

last year.

And the guy who assassinated him used a homemade shotgun.

I was blown away at the amount of work

and effort it would take to make a homemade shotgun.

Not only the shotgun, but the ammunition that goes with it.

He had to make the ammunition, he had to make the shotgun and it worked.

That in itself was shocking.

This guy is claiming to not only have a bomb,

but also a missile that he’s going to use

to blow up a police station.

Now you may have noted, I said, he used his own cell phone.

So that’s going to be a pretty significant clue

for the police when they backtrace that phone

to find out who owns it so they can find the guy.

Now here’s the thing.

He was actually arrested a couple days after these phone calls

were made for intimidation, intimidation in a different case using the same phone.

So the police arrest this guy because he’s calling

someone unrelated saying intimidating things.

I’m not sure what.

Find out the phone number is the same as the phone number

that’s been calling the police station, threatening to blow up the police station.

He is now arrested for forcible obstruction of business.

(bell ringing)

(phone ringing)

Paper cranes in Japan, in Japanese culture, symbolize peace.

So burning them sends a different message

and the fire department was called around 6.30 in the morning in a park.

People had been hanging up paper cranes to symbolize peace

and someone else thought, hey, you know what’s a good idea?

Okay, sort of the same deal.

How does your brain get from?

I’m going to get out of bed today.

and set shit on fire that symbolizes peace.

Like it’s just, so I’m always of the mind.

I think the reason I don’t fall into my base or instincts, it may just be laziness.

‘Cause I wake up in the morning and I’m like, I wanna murder everyone I know.

And then I go, that’s a lot of work.

Maybe I should have breakfast.

And then after I have breakfast, I’m fine.

So all those dark thoughts, they’re like way more work

than I’d be willing to put in, maybe, maybe that’s it.

Maybe I’m just too lazy to be a psycho.

Because yeah, if you think about psycho people,

people who do psycho things, put a lot of work in.

Maybe that’s, I don’t know where I’ve gone right.

That it just be, I read a thing that if,

it did make sense, that if we instituted nap time,

it would end war.

Because the idea is that all these people,

they’re all really angry, and then you take a nap in the afternoon,

and no one wants to get up from the nap in the afternoon and actually do war.

I was like, actually, it kinda makes sense.

The problem is people are very upset.

Probably not getting enough sleep, they just need a nap.

And this is on a similar attack that maybe, maybe that effort is the effort.

So if they would just relax and chill out or have a better breakfast, I don’t know.

So the police show up in the park.

It’s 6.30 in the morning.

It’s also like, what time did he get up, get dressed and go to the park?

Five, maybe that’s the problem.

Is you’re waking up so early or in a bad mood.

I certainly am not a morning person.

Not enough of a morning person that I would go set stuff on fire,

but enough of a not of a morning person that I’m very cranky

and rude to my family, which I honestly should apologize for.

The police arrest is 23 year old government employee,

who straight up said, I started the fire.

We didn’t have a reason.

I do, again, I am always disappointed that we don’t get the reasons.

I get they don’t get the confession in the reason right away.

So it’s always like I wanna follow up that these stories like this,

they don’t tend to get a follow up, which is too bad.

Because I would like to always know,

what’s going on in your head that makes you think this is a good idea.

The first man, the man who is threatening to blow up

police stations and making threatening calls

to other people clearly just anger issues.

He’s just an upset, unpleasant, unhappy person.

This guy who’s 23 years old, these government employee,

he had no setting, a bunch of cranes on fire

wasn’t gonna work out for your day, I guess not.

So I have learned about Yemi Baito.

So it would be kind of translated to dark part time job or dark job.

So these are illegal, these are job requests

on social media, pushing, pushing is not right.

Offers of committing crimes.

So a couple of weeks ago there was a story

about three young men who didn’t know each other

who robbed a Rolex store.

And one of them got taken down like beat up and then arrested.

He said he got the job online.

So the watch thief went online, some guy said, “Hey,

I’m putting together a crew to Rob this Rolex store.”

And he like applied for the job and got it and then got arrested.

There seems like a lot of extra steps there.

There’s no, in that case there is no assurance.

that you have any support system.

So I could think of a crime, I’m gonna Rob a Rolex store.

I don’t really need, ’cause they weren’t, this wasn’t like Ocean’s 11

where they’re gonna do some sort of scheme and need people with skills.

They went up to the Rolex store, smashed everything

they could and grabbed what they couldn’t ran away.

And he just didn’t run away fast enough and got caught.

I guess the only legitimate benefit would be

you don’t know the other guys so you can’t rat them out.

I guess?

But still, I would like more assurance in my crew, like more support or value.

I don’t know.

It seems like you’re missing that sort of team element

that you actually want to be successful to work together well.

There was a secondary crime.

There was the man, I think we actually mentioned this one,

a man who robbed a Pokemon store of 1,500 cars.

That job was also posted on social media.

So he came up from Okinawa, took the shinkansen up to Tokyo, robbed this store.

He goes the same day to meet someone and drops off the cards.

The guy says, “Go to this secondary location and you will get paid.”

He goes to the secondary location and no one shows up to pay him.

So again, that would have been my first suspicion

is I’m dealing with people who think crime is acceptable.

Why would they not think that ripping me off was acceptable?

So he had what it was, I think it was one

point something million yen’s worth of cards.

He handed them over and got no money.

Went to a secondary location, didn’t get any

money, didn’t get paid and then he got arrested.

And he probably can’t rat out the guy,

for the guy on the other side of the social media, this is a great scheme.

But I’m gonna offer up these jobs, you do this thing.

I will pay you, make that promise and then just don’t pay them.

This is how crime works.

It’s almost like these guys don’t really get how crime works.

This, or dude, I guess I can’t feel sorry for him.

He had gambling debts, that’s why he was looking for jobs

on the Internet, that’s why he found his job

to Rob Pokemon store and that’s why he did it.

Now the cards were worth 1.15 million yen.

Yeah, I mean, he’s put himself in a bad situation,

he’s committed a crime and then had a weirdly

honor among thieves crime committed on him.

I guess I can’t feel bad for him.

He’s kind of set up his whole life that way but he clearly makes bad decisions.

I was just about to give advice to criminals.

if you’re gonna commit a crime.

Don’t take someone else’s job, take a minute,

sit down think, what can you do, where can you do it and commit your own crime?

Be independent and strong.

Be the strong independent criminal that we all know you can be.

And at least then you’re not gonna rip yourself off.

You’re still gonna get arrested.

’cause let’s face it, these criminals are not good,

they’re not practiced, they don’t think about things.

Again, a secondary reason is to why I would never

end up being a criminal ’cause I would think about,

I know, I’ve thought about and read about crime enough

that I know how many things have to go right for you not to get caught.

And then like let’s say I stole the Pokemon cards.

I wouldn’t know where to fence them.

I’m not in the Pokemon underworld.

I don’t know what to do.

So you have to almost be like established as a criminal to

be a successful criminal established in a certain CD world.

I know I don’t have those connections.

If I came across a bag of diamonds,

it would make no sense for me to keep them ’cause I wouldn’t know how to fence them.

And then as soon as I go find out

it’s gonna be an undercover cop who’s gonna catch me and I’m gonna get in trouble.

The only way I would be successful

would be if I found a bag of money and tried to keep it.

And then immediately my first thought is

can’t spend all the money in the same place at the same time.

So let’s say I have a bag with a million or 10 million in it.

My, I’m not talking about my, I don’t know how to longer money, right?

That’s the problem.

So I have 10 million in a bag.

My thought was I’ll take 10,000 yen out.

I can’t deposit in my bank account,

even just like 10,000 yen ’cause the serial

numbers, they might have the serial numbers.

I can’t spend a large amount of money

because again, it’ll get traced back to the purchase

that I made and I would have to explain that

or where that money came from.

So my thought was over the course of decades, every time I’m in a different area.

So I can’t always use the convenience store

where I work ’cause again, then they’d be like,

well this guy seems to buy stuff at this

convenience store at these regular amounts of times.

So all we have to do is post up a cop and then sooner or later he’ll come

and buy the stuff and we can catch him and talk to him.

So every time I go to a different convenience store, there are cameras though.

So that’s it.

I’m already kind of screwed.

Where can I spend physical cash.

where I’m not recorded on a camera?

Where can I use this money where I’m not gonna get caught?

It just doesn’t work.

So my thought is wait like a decade.

So I have to wait for years and years and years

and then every time I go to a convenience store I use a different 10,000 yen bill

but it has to be a different convenience store every time.

Even with the camera footage, if it was busy, maybe I could get away with it

but they would probably be able to tell the person

using 10,000 yen ’cause they see the person hand out to change to me.

So I’m already starting to see flaws in my incredibly

simple plan where I didn’t commit an initial crime.

I just found money.

How can I keep that money?

Where you use that money or longer that money?

I can’t.

Unless I can find a place with no cameras and then use a bunch of it at one time

but then again, you can’t do 10,000,000 yen at one time.

Yeah, I’m already like seeing so much failure in this possible plan that I have.

which is the lowest level of crime possible.

It doesn’t work out.

(phone ringing)

This is an explanation of why the world is doomed.

Toyota is a company.

I was very annoyed by this.

I actually may never buy a Toyota car because of this.

They invented the Prius, which is probably the most famous sort of first electric car.

Maybe Tesla’s more famous now, but everyone knows the name Prius

because it was one of the first electric vehicles.

But behind the scenes, Toyota was lobbying to keep internal combustion engines going.

They have recently sort of made their plans.

And what they’re saying is we’re gonna have

multiple avenues of ways towards green technology.

So what they wanna do is have the internal combustion engine.

So gas, they wanna have hybrid, so gas plus electric.

They wanna have electric and they wanna have hydrogen cars.

Japan’s really still stuck on hydrogen

and the rest of the world hasn’t gone that way, which is tough.

I agree with this philosophically if I didn’t know the truth.

And the truth is what they’re trying to do is keep the internal combustion engine

’cause that’s the most profitable one for them.

This is obviously gonna be backed by gas companies and whatever.

Toyota has been accused of trying to keep

the internal combustion engine as opposed to pushing

towards more green and cleaner technologies.

The current aim is technically supposed to be zero emissions by 2050.

And then they made their announcements.

Toyota shareholders rejected plans to better fight climate change.

So Toyota was essentially celebrated by its shareholders.

for making the world a shittier, more dangerous,

more likely to implode place.

This one of the executives said, what is important

is to better convey our efforts to shareholders.

And that was the sentence they got it.

Shareholders will always grab the short-term profit because that’s what profits them.

They are not thinking long-term.

They are not thinking sustainability.

They’re thinking number goes up.

Number that’s the only thing that matters.

I have been recently shocked that companies,

like giant gas companies and companies like Toyota,

don’t transition more smoothly.

We, I did a C-MIG-B last time was a list of technologies

or jobs or industries that don’t exist anymore.

Like the knocker upper was a great, just a

phrase ’cause we use that phrase differently now.

And that was someone who comes to your door

and knocks on your door at a certain time to get you out of bed.

And that was replaced by the alarm clock.

So you have this gas company,

giant corporation like BP, British, petrol.

They knew in the ’70s that fossil fuel was not sustainable over the long term,

but they’re like, well, we’re just gonna forge ahead.

It would have made sense to me.

I’ve done an executive member of BP is like, let’s maintain our gas corporation

but create a secondary BE, so British electric,

and start working on solar panels, start working on

secondary technologies, ’cause we know that this won’t last.

We’ve done the research.

We’ve seen that in X amount of years, even if it’s 50, 60 years away,

that the business model we have now is not sustainable.

So if we start transitioning now and we can be the first to do solar panels,

we can be the first to do hybrid and slowly transition.

When our original business model starts to fail,

we have a new business model in place to dominate the market.

How companies aren’t thinking that way is shocking to me.

So oil and gas companies, not being the first ones

to develop fossil, non-fossil fuel alternatives.

I’m like, how are you letting other companies take over?

Because when fossil fuels run out, your industry is gone.

I mean, that’s just, you know that.

They knew this.

They actually said this back in the ’70s.

I mean, let’s not even talk about climate change.

Let’s talk about self-interest.

The fact that you know that your business will die at some point.

Why would you not put steps into place?

So keep making all your money now,

just take a little bit of that money to make

a new business that goes along with yours.

And then as the fossil fuels run out,

you start to like ramp up the alternative energy collection.

And then your number one for fossil fuels and number one for alternative energy.

And as that transition happens, you remain number one in both.

Be like, you know what?

All the people who worked for us in gas and oil,

we’re gonna move you over to installing solar panels

so people don’t even lose their jobs or not as many

when your entire corporation collapses and goes bankrupt.

So this is the same thing.

So Yoda saying we want multiple avenues.

I actually think technically that would be a good idea

if you were doing it like we’re going to move

away from this thing that we know is dying out

and go towards something that will be a more sustainable future.

The shareholders going, yeah, fuck the environment.

If I make 20 bucks, that’s why shareholders should not be allowed to make decisions.

And yet that’s how corporations are built nowadays, which is why we’re all going die.

(upbeat music).

This was weirdly inspirational, but again, it all goes to shit pretty quick.

There’s some people, they’re like trying to get you to vote for a certain politician.

They come to your house.

This is pretty calm across the world.

Knock on this woman’s door, she’s a police officer.

And they say, oh, you know, we would like you to vote for this politician.

And just thank you for your time.

Here’s two loaves of bread worth about a thousand yen, seven dollars.

And I was like, holy shit.

Some expensive bread.

It’s really nice bread they gave off over there.

Then later, this police officer woman with some sort of integrity goes,

I actually accepted essentially a political

contribution which could be construed as a bride.

I’m gonna go to my immediate supervisor

and tell him about this present that I received.

And go like, look, I think I accidentally accepted a bride.

So, you know, I think we should report that

and make it very clear.

And then she was referred to prosecutors.

And she should be lauded for recognizing she

did something when we were bringing forth.

But she goes, honest cops are a problem.

So, like, I think a normal person would have

gone like, oh, shit, I accidentally took a bribe

or I took this thing and this could be construed as a bribe.

So, what I’m gonna do, she’s not telling anybody

you need the bread.

So, hide the evidence in the most delicious way possible.

And this police officer’s like, well, that would be dishonest.

I’m gonna go report this, be the best police officer

that I can be self-report, which is something we want

police to do all over the world and they never do.

And then what happens?

She gets sent to the prosecutor.

Now, again, the prosecutors might go, well, you

know, let’s take everything into consideration.

You were honest about it.

You made a mistake, you were honest about it.

You brought it to our attention.

We’re not gonna do anything.

Although, because it’s an open and shut case, I bet they just go through with it

because then it’s like a dick on that, like dick.

It’s a Freudian slip of some sort.

That’s like a dick on their board.

Like we have one more case that we’ve won.

So, I’m really disappointed with how this is all being

handled ’cause I would be like, she made a mistake,

maybe paid the $7 back and then apologized.

But I think we have one of the most honest

cops in the world just standing in front of us.

Maybe we should encourage her to keep doing that.

It’s a total side story since I got, I’ve run out of stories.

I once accidentally bribed a border guard when I was going into Korea.

So, I was in Ireland and I bought six bottles of whiskey

’cause I was like, I’ll have to give it to friends, I’ll have to give it to family.

I’m gonna join a judo club, I give it to the judo teacher.

I bought non-export, coal-rained whiskey.

And this is really just bush mills, but it’s the local stuff that they don’t export.

So, I was going to carry this stuff that had never been outside the country.

I mean, someone else has done the exact same thing.

But the idea is that I’m gonna take this non-export and

bring it with me somewhere and use it as presence and gives.

So, I think I had six bottles.

And then I was at the passport control

and I had to like, do you have anything to declare?

And I was like, oh, it says you can only bring

four bottles of alcohol into the country.

So, I thought, maybe I have to pay some taxes, but you know, it’s worth it.

So, I go up to the guy and he says, do you have anything to declare?

And I was like, yes, I have six bottles of whiskey and I took one out as an example

and I put it on the table.

And the man looked at me, took the bottle of whiskey,

and David was just being so sexy in the background.

Took the bottle of whiskey, put it down under the table and said, go ahead.

And that was it.

And then I walked out and I was like, oh shit,

I think I just accidentally bribe that guy.

‘Cause my intent was to show him the product

so that he could, you know, better assess it

so that he could better assess it.

So, he could charge me appropriately because it wasn’t like

the most expensive, highest end whiskey, but, you know,

it was not an export out of an off-thirst being issue with that.

So, I was like, oh, I’ll pay some one, whatever.

I have no problem with that ’cause it’s, or maybe you just

take two bottles away and that’s all I get, whatever, fine.

And then he took one, so I brought in five.

I lost one, which I guess was kind of my tax,

but I’m pretty sure that never went into the system.

I think that man just took that home.

So, accidental crimes are very much a thing and it’s very much possible.

Please be careful.

Now we should say thank you to that cop.

(upbeat music)

(upbeat music).

[Music].

(electronic music)

The Sakurai SoulKey, Crime Family Organization, is based in Shizuoka.

Due to a loss of membership, lower accrute, (imitates gun)

Fuck!

I thought I was gonna be able to do one with zero edits.

I was, that was kind of my goal.

I had a personal goal today.

Do an episode of Ninja Ninja Japan

and not have to edit it at the end of the day, impossible.

Due to low recruitment numbers and falling profits,

they ran mostly illegal street vending stalls,

which didn’t seem like the most, the best criminal,

so when I think of Yakusa and criminal families and stuff,

I think drug dealing, prostitution, murder, you know, maybe movie stuff,

street vending doesn’t seem like the way to build a criminal empire.

Wow, what do I know?

I don’t know.

‘Cause I’m not part of a criminal family, maybe that’s awesome, but apparently not,

because they, as a criminal organization, have decided to disband.

The president of the organization, or someone representing the organization,

went to the police for a dissolution notification submission

ceremony, which is something I desperately wanna see.

What is it?

So your head of a Yakusa family, and you go to the

police and say, “We are not a Yakusa family anymore?”

My first thought, like, is it a, like is it

a, okay, ’cause they even call it a ceremony.

Is it a ceremony?

Do they have like a dinner with the cops and they like, you know, hang out?

But my first thought was, I’m running a criminal’s organization.

I go to the police, I declare my criminal organization

disbanded and then we can do more crime with less scrutiny.

It seems the police chief, I don’t know if he’s rumored in,

he’s like, I hope you become a more sensible member

of society, which is kind of a bullshit thing to say from being honest.

So I, this is the first I’ve heard of, this is a thing.

So I’ve lived in Japan like 20 years now, and I’ve never heard of this before.

So I was really interested in this.

I can’t get any details.

It’s some kind of like secret ceremony between the,

the police and the Yakusa seem to have a very odd relationship anyways.

They, they seem to know about each other and

organize with each other and almost work together.

And then, you know, then there are crack downs and stuff.

I don’t know.

The crime rate in Japan peaked in 2002.

So crime has been going down steadily since 2002.

In 2002, they had 2.73 million criminal cases.

In 2021, there were 568,148 criminal cases.

That is 25, that is 21% of the peak.

So crime has dropped so much that we are now at 21%

of the crimes being committed annually as in 2002.

2002, just quite incidentally, is the year after I came to Japan.

So I mean, if someone could say there’s a correlation

causation kind of thing, I mean, if someone who is pale

is the moon, you know, stalked the streets at night,

punishing criminals to the point where they feared the ghost of Nagoya.

I mean, if that was the thing that happened

and drove down the crime rate, I mean, that person,

surely they should be thanked, but maybe because they live

a masked crime fighting lifestyle, you wouldn’t know who they are essentially.

I mean, it would be someone who knew a lot about stories

in the news and what was going on in the streets,

maybe even took time out as a hobby to report it to you.

If that kind of person existed, I mean, it might be worth saying thank you to them.

I’m certainly no superhero, and if I was,

I wouldn’t admit it because then that would

just give the criminals a target to go after.

So keeping that secret identity secret is very important to me.

But if, you know, on behalf of the ghost of the night,

the palest superhero that ever lived, you’re welcome.

I mean, if I knew him, and I knew what he would want

to say to the people, by reducing the crime

rate from 100% down to 21, I mean, I think a,

a thank you’s in order from everyone in the

country, but you’re welcome is also there.

Japan’s hydrogen efforts, they want a sixfold increase

over the next 15 years aimed at decarbonization.

They are looking for more hydrogen cars on the street by 2030.

They’re aiming for zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

There is sort of an issue with hydrogen,

I learned a couple of years ago, is that the hydrogen production.

So it says in the story, it says they are partnering

with Australia and other in some countries in the Middle East

to produce hydrogen because hydrogen, it’s very hard to get.

That’s the problem, but it is very effective.

It’s much more explosive, so it’s a little more dangerous to handle.

But what I learned is that to produce hydrogen in Australia, they use coal.

So they have a coal plant, produce the hydrogen,

ship the hydrogen in a big boat over to Japan.

So they produce zero emissions in Japan.

But if they produce the emissions on the boat

and in Australia, is that really zero carbon emissions?

That’s one of the problems of kind of the zero carbon

conversation because they talk about it in country.

But if the country is doing stuff outside of

country to get the hydrogen into the country,

then they’re not really zero greenhouse gases, aren’t they?

And so this is why I’m a little disappointed, because I think, again,

the intent is correct, but the efforts, the reality, isn’t quite there.

Will hydrogen catch on?

It doesn’t seem to have caught on anywhere else.

Japan, as a country, is still very, very pro-hydrogen.

They really want to make this work.

I mean, Japan has been referred to as the

Galapagos, several times and several things.

One of the things I noticed, so I came to Japan.

My sister had been here before, so this would have been the late ’90s early 2000.

They had mini-disc.

Now, in the West, we had cassette tapes, and it moved to CD.

And then it moved to MP3 after that.

In Japan, kind of only Japan, they had mini-disc,

which was like a hard, floppy disc, that had more capacity

than a cassette tape, but less capacity than a CD, I think.

But the fidelity was good.

It was basically an MP3 player.

But you could had to swap out little drives.

And that was only in Japan.

And so that kind of Galapagos feeling

means that something can be successful in

Japan, and not even get picked up anywhere else.

So maybe Japan will be the land of hydrogen cars.

Maybe not.

I have no idea.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens, because the world isn’t going that way.

Does Japan sort of stay course and keep doing the thing they’re doing?

It’s a very Japanese thing to do.

Or did they give in and join the rest of the world?

I don’t know what’s going to happen.

Gassy is– he was arrested last week, and I kind of didn’t want to talk about him.

It’s not that I didn’t want to talk about him.

When they arrested him, they didn’t say anything

particularly interesting about the arrest.

So there were no details.

He was arrested for intimidation, specifically of celebrity.

So I don’t know if that made it more of a case.

Because intimidating people should just be intimidating people.

Intimidating celebrities shouldn’t matter.

Shouldn’t make a difference.

But what I did find out is he made 100 million yen from his YouTube videos.

And let me just check.

I have made zero yen from my YouTube video.

So I’m following a little behind Gassy in the YouTube Finance area.

He had 100 million yen.

He was trying to move it around.

So he had multiple bank accounts.

He had, like in his parents’ bank accounts and

stuff like that, trying to hide it essentially.

So he didn’t want to pay taxes.

Or there was some sassy stuff going on with his 100 million yen.

Should I ever get 100 million yen from YouTube,

I will be very forthcoming and honest about what I do with it.

Because my lifestyle is very dull.

I will probably just put it in the bank and live the exact same life I live now.

I would probably quit my job.

And then just make videos and stuff all the time.

I don’t know.

Or I’d become a complete douche.

Who knows?

He admitted during questioning that in his videos,

he would expose everything a celebrity did.

But at the same time, he thought saying I will expose the most

private details of a famous person’s life was not criminal.

In Japan, a very privacy-oriented country, I think you would know that is criminal.

You know how in videos in America, they’re always like,

they took a picture of me without my permission.

You can’t do that.

And then the cops are like, well, actually,

if you’re in public, it’s perfectly acceptable.

In Japan, it’s not.

You actually can’t take pictures of people without their permission.

So if I take a picture, and there’s a whole bunch of people in the background,

technically I should get all their permission.

I think realistically, well, no, the reality.

That’s not really going to happen.

But if I wanted to put that picture online, I should blur out all their faces.

So you’ll see comic-con things and other pictures of groups.

And they’ve actually taken the time to cover out the faces.

Legally, they should be doing that.

I don’t think it happens all the time.

But again, there’s the reality.

And I think if I was pointedly taking picture of an individual,

they would actually have a criminal case against me.

A juvenile.

I didn’t show it.

I haven’t used the word juvenile.

I’m getting old.

I think I could start calling people juvenile.

Like just as young juvenile, you should–

I don’t have any of you follow up with that.

A juvenile was smoking in front of a convenient store.

And the police approaching their car.

He sees the cops.

He’s like, going to Scarper.

Here’s a British phrase for anyone in my audience who’s from the UK.

You’ll enjoy the very Canadian accent usage of the word Scarper.

So he did a Scarper.

The cops turn on the reds, and they start chasing him in a car.

Like, I’m already in my– Mr. Worm has jumped saying he goes, he lagged it.

So I’m trying to decide, should I do my Dick Van Dyke horrendous British accents?

Or should I just stick with the North American accent

that I have that is natural for me and do British phrases?

It’s actually a thing that was rattling around the back of my head for some reason.

Because if I did slang from another country

and did not put on the accent, it would be funnier and weirder.

Like, good day, mate.

There’s my Aussie.

And don’t do the accent.

So Mr. Worm has put in the– I’ll have to revamp.

Let’s start again.

A juvenile was smoking in front of a convenience

store, the police approach, and he lagged it.

The cops chased after him in a car.

I always thought that was a bit extreme.

Why are you chasing a kid who’s running in a car?

There’s actually a few downsides of that, but we’ll get to those in a second.

Kid jumps offence.

Perfect strategy.

I’m almost on the kids’ side, especially because I know the end of the story.

The cops start, turn off the siren, and they’re patrolling around.

They’re going to hunt down this kid.

This is what they do.

This is the problem with the white shadow,

the ghost of Nagoya, having brought the crime rate down

so low as the police have nothing to do, but chase kids who

were smoking a cigarette for the first time in their life.

So again, I don’t know who the pale ghost of Nagoya is.

I think maybe he has to work on his superhero name,

but he does apologize that the crime rate is so

low that the cops are doing this kind of stuff,

because I can tell you, the pale ghost of Nagoya

superhero would not waste his time chasing down a kid who was smoking a cigarette.

I might talk to him, be like, hey, you know, smoking?

Not cool.

So the cops turn off the lights.

They’re driving around.

They’re hunting for this juvenile delinquent.

They go down a one-way road the wrong way.

They see the kid somewhere up, maybe at the other side.

There’s an intersection.

They race after him, blare out into the street, and hit a car.

Three people are injured, a mother, a seven-year-old, and a one-year-old.

Now, please remember, this crashes the result of

them chasing a kid who was smoking a cigarette.

So the young scallywag, smoking the cigarette, I would say it’s not worth it.

I didn’t believe that it’s just it.

It’s not worth the risk of injuring other

people, because they didn’t have their lights on.

The car was just driving normally.

They booked it after this kid.

And then they smashed into a car.

The seven-year-old was hurt really badly.

So I’m assuming that one-year-old was in one of those

child seats that was really secure, and maybe just bounced around.

But the seven-year-old was just sitting like a normal seven-year-old.

He was hurt quite badly.

The I.G. police say that cops did not violate the law in the pursuit.

So driving up the wrong way of a one-way street is not a violation of the law.

Having their lights off while in pursuit is not a violation of the law.

I think maybe they need to find another way to spend their time

than chasing after a young scally-wag puffing on a fake.

Someone’s going to get upset that I said that word.

Even though I am, again, using British slang, that actually is the risk.

If I say that with an American accent, it does not come across as slang at all.

And therefore, I am just using a slur.

It is, I believe, pride month.

I’m very supportive.

I’m not going to show– [INAUDIBLE]

That’s– I support gay people and rights and equality.

I also support the right for me to not show my penis

to my friend who’s claimed that it is the wrong thing for me to do.

All right, so a while ago, a couple months ago,

sort of near the end of the corona pandemic,

there was a group of people selling corona super eggs.

So there were eggs you eat.

There were like 10,000 yen and egg or something stupid like that.

It was a pyramid scheme, multi-level market, and kind of deal.

I’ll sell you eggs, you sell the eggs, you sell the eggs.

And then the guys at the top made a ton of money off these essentially magic eggs.

Well, they’re not the only ones who thought to get on the scam train.

A Tokyo-based company sold water with medicinal properties in quotes.

And now the thing is, water does have medicinal properties.

Hydration is important.

If you don’t hydrate, you need to be hydrated.

Therefore, it is medicinal to hydrate yourself.

So you could, in the most technical sense, say that they didn’t lie.

I don’t think that’s true.

They were saying that the water is effective against influenza.

It would kill 99.9% of the influenza virus in your body.

In one minute, the company was called the Superl–

the company was called the Supermineral Research Institute.

Now, I don’t know why, but as soon as they said Superl, I’m like, it’s a scam.

If you said these are vitamins, I would go, OK, let’s take a look at the vitamins.

If you said these are super healthy vitamins, I’d be like, it sounds like a scam.

I think the use of the word super might be a scam indicator.

So be careful of that.

So a two-liter bottle of water costs 10,000 yen, which is insane.

The company made 430 million yen in five years.

So they were selling two-liter bottles of regular water for 10,000 yen.

It’s probably like $100 American.

And people were buying it year after year after year, no one sort of caught on.

So please be careful of anything with super in the title.

That’s claiming to be good.

So there’s acid.

He super dry the beer.

It’s just beer.

It’s saying it’s super beer, and it’ll get you super drunk.

That’s true if you drink enough of it.

The super healthy stuff, be careful of that.

Sushi dough.

So we had the Sushi terrorism kind of swept the nation.

The kid who licked the soy sauce bottle, the Sushi dough corporation came after him.

So they have decided to sue the family.

I said that it was tough, because how much do you

sue a family for Japan’s not particularly litigious,

but they’re like, we have to set an example of

someone so that people don’t keep doing this.

People keep doing this.

It’s going to destroy our company.

They are going after $67 million yen, which is $480,000.

So a kid, teen, went in with his friends, licked a soy sauce bottle, put it back.

Their friends video that put it on the Internet, it caused the stock price to crash.

I think it was– they said like $9 billion yen in stock value was lost.

It caused an incredible decrease in customers.

That’s actually the next part.

The video went out.

There was a sharp falling customers.

Oh, so I wrote it down.

$16 billion yen stock drop.

They had to install plastic sheets, like plastic

covers, to cover the Sushi that was on rotation.

That had a cost of $90 million yen,

because they had to do it at 600 different outlets.

So Sushi are going after this kid.

They’re not going after $16 billion yen.

They’re not going after the $90 million yen.

They’re going after $67 million.

I don’t know how they exactly came to that number,

but they were trying to get something, I think, just to prove a point.

The defense team for this kid is saying

that the video was for sharing amongst friends

and therefore is not causative to the drop in stock price and the drop in customers.

That is a pretty weak defense, because that’s

like saying, I didn’t intend to murder him.

I just pointed the gun and pulled the trigger.

The fact that the bullet hit him in the head, that sort of just happened stance.

And therefore, I shouldn’t be held responsible.

So the fact that they didn’t intend for the video

to be put online, but the thing is, I think,

is friends didn’t tend it, because they posted it online.

Because things going online is not accidental.

So someone had to purposely post it to, I think it was probably TikTok or Twitter.

Someone did that on purpose.

There’s multiple steps you go through to upload a video.

So I think the counter-argument to that is, yes, you did.

So the defense team’s claim is there’s no causal

relationship between the video and the drop in customers.

It could have been stiff competition.

The problem is, the competitors suffered the same

drop, even though they weren’t the initial victims.

So that argument also falls apart.

I’m not a prosecuting attorney.

But if this is the quality of the defense teams,

I think I have a chance to be a really good prosecuting attorney in Japan.

Yamunashi is a prefecture in Japan.

They are declaring a state of emergency because of population decrease.

This is the first state of emergency declared because of a population decline.

Back in 2000, there were 895,646 people in Yamunashi.

And in 2022, last year, there were 796,231 people.

That is a 100,000-person drop.

The fertility rate in that area is 1.40.

The target is 1.87.

You actually need a 2.01, like a 2.0-point

plus, to be able to maintain your population.

That’s not even a population increase.

You are basically– you make two babies to replace the two parents.

That will maintain population.

The problem is, some kids die.

So you need 2.0-something to be able to actually

maintain the population, not even increase it.

You need a 2.5 or something like that, to actually increase the population over time.

I’m wondering what this is going to lead to.

They’re saying they’re going to– if you’re worried about having kids,

we’ll have government stuff to help you with children.

I was wondering if they’re actually going to go with mandated sex, because they are.

I might be moving to Yamunashi.

That one wants my seed.

All right, last story.

Boom.

An online pawn shop.

I didn’t know online pawn shops were a thing.

But you can contact pawn shops on a Zoom meeting and say, hey, here’s my bottle cap.

Let’s do an assessment of the value of that bottle cap

and then decide whether I should sell it or not, sell it with your company.

So they do, basically, appraisals online.

This guy gets online.

He says, I want you to appraise my watch.

He holds a watch up the camera.

The lady looks at it.

He says, well, it’s maybe worth 10,000 yen or 100,000 yen or it looks like that.

That’s a great watch.

It’s worth a million yen.

And they have a little conversation.

He goes, great.

Next is this.

And then he shows them her dick.

Da, fuck to the sense.

Then he shows her his dick.

I guess I shouldn’t be gendering people.

But the guy with the dick was targeting women.

So there actually, that sentence can be gendered properly.

That’s something I used to never worry about getting right.

Now I actually have to think about it.

That’s not a bad thing.

So basically, he would try to fake them out, look at my watch, assess my watch.

And now, so my question– my question has always come hard and fast.

Did he stand up and pull down his pants for the camera,

or did he move the camera down to his exposed area?

Is actually the question I have.

The women, of course, this is sexual assault.

Sexual assault is not a joke, but the women did miss an opportunity for a joke,

because they could have appraised his penis.

They could have given it a really harsh realistic appraisal.

They could have been, you know, well, the girth

isn’t really what it could be, the length.

While average is not particularly impressive,

and therefore won’t garner you any sum of money

beyond the standard sum of money, does it do any tricks?

Something like that.

Like, she could have– do you have the original papers?

Anything, if they had done– it’d not been shocked.

I know it’s impossible.

OK.

And I do actually feel bad for these women.

But all I need is this one cold-hearted woman to the guy moves the camera down,

and you’re looking at his like weird-looking penis,

and she just starts appraising it correctly.

Would have been devastating and stopped him.

He was arrested pretty quickly, because he’d done this

like three or four times, and they sort of had his information to a degree.

And he was arrested, and he said he got off on the shocked look on the women’s faces.

We’ll see how that helps them hold up in prison.

In Japan, he’s probably not going to prison.

He’s probably just going to get a fine.

If he’s found guilty, it’s just too bad.

But if you would like your penis appraised, send a picture to– I shouldn’t do that.

Someone would actually send me a dick pick.

I don’t want your dick pick.

And if I say anything to the gender I am

attracted to, no, I’m committing sexual assault.

So let’s just end that there.

Don’t send noods to anyone.

I have no conclusion after that.

I should have planned out something.

I had the idea in my head of the appraising penis.

Next time, it should something like this come up again.

I’ll actually plan out a penis appraisal.

That is my promise to you.

That, and I am not the pale ghost of Nagoya.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

[Music].