7 Foot Vandal

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Yup.

It’s got a lot of updates.

Before I actually do that, we
have just started my summer break.

The kids around summer
break for like a month.

My work is me two weeks off.

So next week, this is the first day.

So I was able to record today
because basically nothing’s happened yet.

We haven’t organized anything yet.

But next week, I don’t
know if I’m going to get

an episode out or I
might get one out later.

I’m going to try.

I don’t know.

It’s a holiday and I don’t
feel obligated to entertain you.

That’s just the straight-up truth.

Now if I can entertain
you, I would love to do that.

The reality is, am I not?

Anyways, two weeks from now,
there will be a regular episode.

It will be back on.

It will be all awesome.

I’ve actually just inadvertently
implied that the holiday episode

I record will not be awesome,
but I’m sure it will be fine.

So let’s get to some updates.

I’m just letting you
know that maybe your

free entertainment may
not be available next week.

It may be.

Maybe if you pray
hard enough to the right

God, I will have enough
time to do the thing.

And then record it for you.

Now I don’t want to start.

I want to berate you in a
weird way to the point where

you now feel obligated
to pray to some annoying…

You’ve been playing Assassin’s
Creed Valhalla, so I think Odin.

Odin might be the guy before.

I’ve always been a big fan of Thor, both
the original version and the MCU version.

God, Chris Hemsworth’s body.

I know it’s all fake
because he’s he’s Jack

downstairs, but I’m damn
with that man takes his shirt off.

I respond and I’m a heterosexual male.

Still kind of respond to that in a
positive way if you know what I’m saying.

Alright, so I actually do the podcast now.

That wasn’t too much of a distraction.

I got to put on updates,
which I’m pretty happy about.

Last week, I talked about barbinheimer.

So that was the hashtag
that they came out

because Barbie and the
Oppenheimer movie are

coming out the same day and everyone’s
like, “Oh, we’ll make a double feature.

It’s so quirky and
ironic because one’s

super light comedy fun movie, the
other one’s very heavy and serious.”

I created the barbinheimer hashtag.

Now, Barbie is coming out in Japan.

Oppenheimer currently is not
slated to be released in Japan.

The Warner Brothers Japanese account issued
an apology for the barbinheimer hashtag as

it being relatively, you know, instant, not
instant seer, insensitive to, you know, the

historical reality of
what’s happened in Japan.

The Internet being the Internet, Internet
citizens were not super happy about that.

Internet people are always classy.

Let’s put it that way.

I spent a lot of time on the Internet,
stream, video games, do podcasts.

I spent a lot of time on
the Internet just for fun.

Yeah, I’ve run across some of
the joyous aspects of the Internet.

Always classy, always fair, always honest.

So in retaliation to
the lack of apology from

the American Barbie account, that’s
very specific is what they’re doing.

Because the Japanese account apologized
and they said, “That’s not good enough.

The American Barbie account is still
not acknowledging that this is insensitive.

It’s still not acknowledging
how gross this is.”

So because what they
were doing, if you go

in search barbinheimer,
you will find Barbie.

The one I found the first one,
which I did actually think was

pretty solid, was Barbie with
her hair as a mushroom cloud.

Okay, and it’s all pink.

The Internet was like, “Japanese” and
it was like, “We could play this game too.”

So they started shopping?

I guess shipping might
not be the right word.

I was about to say photo
shopping, which is the right word.

But then I thought maybe they’re
shipping to use some younger parlance.

9/11 images in Barbie
pink or with Barbie

overlaid or things like that, creating
their own memes in retaliation.

I don’t know how I feel about that.

I didn’t care about
barbinheimer because, sure,

whatever, people are putting
two disparate things together.

Whatever.

I didn’t take it too seriously,
but again, I’m not Japanese.

I mean, people are also like,
“You gotta be able to talk about it.”

But again, I guess it
is for them, it’s serious.

My feelings on it, I’m
torn, is what I’m saying.

I find the 9/11 memes they’ve made in
portace, but at the same time I find the whole

barbinheimer thing in
sort of in portace as well.

I do understand the marketing of it.

Those people jumping on, like,
“Hey, this memes happened.

It’s promoting both our films.

Let’s get on that.”.

I get why that happened.

I guess I just live in a real
world where gross things happen

and you kind of just let it go so
you can move on, move past it.

Not so for Japanese people in this case.

Not, I don’t want these people to
say that this is Japanese people.

They don’t represent all of Japan.

Most people in Japan
probably don’t even

know this is going on because
it is very much an Internet thing.

I talked previously about a YouTuber who
was playing essentially a visual novel, a

Stein’s Gate visual
novel and he spoiled the

ending and they sued
him because they’re saying

that this is giving away
the ending of a story.

Therefore people are
going to be less likely

to pay for that story
in the future if you

spoiled the ending
because people the whole

point of doing one of these
things is to get to the ending.

He wants two years in prison plus
like a million years or something.

And they said that
he must be punished

severely to prevent the
decline of the content industry.

The verdict came out yesterday,
but hasn’t been announced yet.

I was looking for it this morning.

It being August 8th as I recorded this.

So the verdict was supposed
to be brought down August 7th.

I don’t think he’s going
to get two years in prison.

But I could see a hefty fine.

Prosecutors being
prosecutors, they always ask

for massive, massive punishments
and they’re going to get less than that.

I think that’s kind of the strategy.

But yeah, it is
interesting that this visual

novel has had such an impact because to
me visual novels are really small things.

But again, it’s a whole industry in Japan.

People pay a lot of money for these things.

So ruining it for other people,
you’re ruining it for the company.

They’re going to take you to
court and I think they’re going to win.

So this was a very interesting development.

Over the last, it’s probably
like five, six months.

Sushi terrorism has been an ongoing theme.

There was the kid and he drank
from the soy sauce bottle directly.

So he licked it and stuff.

Then you put it back.

Other people use that
disgusting that went viral.

His friend recorded it
put it on the Internet.

Now these were just kids.

They were doing dumb stuff and recording
it and putting it on the Internet.

There was some other
kids who were licking and

touching the Sushi that was
going by on the conveyor belt.

Sushi, the conveyor
belt Sushi company is

saying like we had to change
our entire system because of this.

Our stocks dropped billions of yen.

This has cost us so much money.

We’re suing the kid.

They wanted they were suing
the family because he’s underage.

So they actually have to
sue the mom for 67 million yen.

I can guarantee that this person does not
have 67 million yen just in liquid assets,

they were able to spend on the fact
that his son licked a soy sauce container.

They have reached a settlement but
released no details, which is killing me.

Because I think what’s
happened is the company,

Sushi, they wanted
to make a lot of noise.

They wanted to make
sure everyone knows that

if you do this and we
catch you, we’re going

to come after you and they
took it all the way to the limit.

Then they said, look,
we don’t actually want

to ruin this lady’s
life for the fact that

her son, a teenager,
is just a bit of an idiot.

Every teenager is,
I was, might still be

sometimes, but I absolutely
was a bit of a dick and

an asshole in a dummy when
I was like 16, 17 years old.

The boy admitted
responsibility and they

have reached a reasonable
agreement, is what they’ve said.

I do want to know what the
reasonable agreement is, but because

he’s underage, I bet no
details are going to be released.

But I’m betting they got
to pace enough money

that it hurts the family, but
doesn’t ruin them completely.

Or there’s a payment
plan or something like that.

They’re not going to
take all 67 million yet.

This was just a show to stop other
people from doing the same thing.

I think.

And I think that’s
actually a fair thing to do

because Sushi does, they
got lawyers on retainer.

They can do this forever.

They can try, if she tried to
fight back, they could ruin her life.

Not being reasonable, normal human beings.

They decided not to
go that far, but they

still want to get the
message out there that

if this happens again,
we will go that far.

Try to think is a very
fair thing to be able to do.

It’s got to add on.

I’m actually quite happy
Sushi Rho didn’t fuck him.

They could have.

And you think of corporate people.

I think this is again a
Western image of corporate

people just being like absolute
bastards, ruining people’s lives were fun.

In Japan, yeah, they’ll go far,
but I think the level is different.

The attitude is different
and people are people still.

Like I’m sure there are
massive corporate assholes.

We actually have some other stories
going on that I didn’t actually write down.

There’s a car company
and they killed all the

trees outside of their
car dealership because

they were basically the trees were
obstructing your ability to see the cars.

Of course, all that’s illegal.

And then they got pulled up on getting in
trouble for scamming and lying and stuff.

That’s pretty standard
car dealership stuff.

It’s a bit shady as far
as an industry goes.

It has a reputation for a reason.

But I would say the
average executive maybe

is dumb in the way executives
are, but is not a complete asshole.

From what I’ve seen on the
Internet, I don’t know these people.

I don’t run in those circles.

I know that the president of JAL for the
last like 10 years has not taken a salary.

He literally said, I’ve made enough money.

I can survive for the rest of my life.

I will not take a salary.

I just want to make this business
the best business it can be.

You’ll support the workers and stuff.

So all the money he
would have made went

back into the company
into the employees and stuff.

And I thought, man, that’s awesome.

That is a completely
different form of corporate

thinking, which I can
get on board with.

And I guess maybe that’s also not
called, I don’t know which is more common.

Although Sushi Do in
this case didn’t go out

of their way to destroy a family just
because a kid was being a fucking idiot.

They did want to get a message
out, which I think they did successfully.

I’m going to have to
run my transition sound

again because I have
to get to the next story.

World Heritage Sites being
vandalized, is that like an Internet trend?

So we had the guy
vandalized the call of CO.

And then we had a kid named
Justin vandalized a temple in Japan.

And now I’ve read about two
more instances at the call of CO.

And the call of CO once, you
can get five years in prison for that.

Well, one of the most
famous temples, super

famous because I know
the name of the temple.

That’s how famous it is.

Not like I’m like a temple fan.

Toadaiji Temple was
vandalized with a picture

of a fairly poorly rendered cat, believed
to be scratched into a door by a finger.

Now, this is wood that is
literally thousands of years old.

So pushing your finger into
it is going to leave a Mark.

You don’t even have to use a nail.

Justin that little shit before, he actually
used his nail to scratch his name in.

Now I do want to give us some
credit to the vandal this time.

They didn’t write their name.

Actually, one of the
previous episodes I

was like, what you
should do is you’re going

to vandalize something
is don’t write your name.

Someone else’s name and then they’ll
be like, hey, Chuck, the beef chest.

Did you vandalize this?

I’m like, well, no, that says Brad Pitt.

So Brad Pitt must have been
here vandalizing it, not me.

So they drew a cat.

So unless a cat did
it, no, here’s the thing.

The height of the cat had like where
they did it was about 180 centimeters.

So I’m going to say,
let’s say someone who’s

slightly under six foot lifted
their arm up and drew a cat.

That’s how they got to 180 centimeters.

So the best we could say is this is someone
who is approximately six feet or so.

Because either they’re
six feet and they were

drawing at eye level
or they were less than

six feet and they were
drawing a little bit of

bum or they were like seven
feet and drawing but elite them.

Woo.

So we could have a seven
foot vandal on our hands.

They’re not doing the
CSI stuff where they’re

taking footprints and
then calculating by

the impression of the footprint and
how heavy the person isn’t stuff like that.

But it seems like
because of those initial

reports, it’s now in the
mindset of people visiting

these places and it’s
being, it’s like a thing.

But the fines for this are hardcore.

So like again, the ones
in Italy, five years in

prison, a couple million
dollars or whatever.

I actually think it was like
a few hundred thousand

dollars, but a few
hundred thousand dollars.

I don’t have that.

I can’t pay that.

No one’s in the Japan.

It’s the same.

It’s like millions of yen
and possible jail time.

Absolutely not worth doing.

Like again, I want, if
I’m going to do a crime,

I want them to be a benefit
for me and my legacy is not it.

Like I want money.

If I’m going to commit a
crime, it’s going to be for money.

It’s not going to be so
that I become famous

because that kind of
fame isn’t what I need.

I need money.

I should have started
dropping in like ways

you could donate money
to you right after that.

I need money and then do the donation.

That actually would make sense.

Still not doing it.

I’m not going to come out here and beg.

Look, okay.

So you want to support the
engineers Japan, tell other

people to listen to it, get
other people to download it.

The rate review thing that actually
helps with algorithms and stuff.

I would love that.

I’m not even going to ask for that.

All I want is people who
are interested in it to listen.

And if you really, really want to make
me happy, send me questions and stuff.

So I have more things
to I can gain Gauge with.

So I can follow up on
stories or answer questions

about being in Japan or
my opinions or whatnot.

Your questions and
comments are easily the most

motivating factor to doing an
engineer’s Japan and see me.

So if you want to support the
podcast, don’t send me money.

I mean, send me money, but don’t
send me money by a see me B T shirt.

That would be all right.

Because then you get
something out of it too.

But send me stuff that I can talk about
or react to or we can have an interaction.

That to me is the peak.

You can go to speak pipe.com/chocolateweefchest
and leave a voicemail, which I can

then drop into the episode
and then use as a segment.

So now that I’ve said that,
we’re going to move on.

This is maybe my pre
holiday begging for interaction.

Just a bit sad, isn’t it?

I’m so lonely.

16, 99% of people in their
30s and 40s never watch

Vtubers, which to me is
a surprisingly low number.

I actually would have thought hardly
anyone in their 30s and 40s never

watches Vtubers just because
Vtubers became a thing fairly recently.

So I would assume older
people aren’t aware of them.

It’s not like they hate them or something.

I consider doing this podcast as a
VTuber, but I just didn’t have anything

set up and by the time I started doing
video on Twitch and stuff, there was no

point and going through
another process to set it up.

Although I still think a
VTuber, a super cute anime girl

and me not changing my voice
at all would have been funny.

And then every time I say
that, people get this like shitty.

I had to lose been done before.

You want a list of things
that have been done before?

It’s fucking everything, man.

The only thing I can claim to be completely
original was Montana, L.D.A.B.L.O.

The audio podcast
choose your own adventure.

And the only thing, the only reason I think
that was original is because I may have

just been the first person to
organize it and put it together.

And it was a huge pain in the ass.

I have tentatively started working on
a second one, which hopefully would be

better, but sitting down and just writing
for hours and hours and hours is pretty.

Pretty hard to find that time in my life.

But that is probably, and then
even then, people will like, you know,

choose your own adventures
have been done before.

Adult ones that are supposed to
be funny have been done before.

It’s like, if you actually went by
things that have been done before,

there would be no reason to do anything.

And let’s face it, Montana, L.D.A.B.L.O.

It’s fucking better than
all the other ones anyways.

All right.

No, no, I’m not going to, I was going to
do this sound again and restart the story.

I’m not going to do that.

I’m just going to keep going.

I’m going to power through.

Okay, so people in their 30s
and 40s, one to two times a week,

13% watch V2 or three to four times
a week, four percent, every day, 14%.

It’s more men than women.

I think that’s just
generally on the Internet,

you tend to find more
men doing dumb shit.

watching V2 versus isn’t dumb.

It’s fine.

V2 versus are great.

That’s it.

I just, I actually
thought 69% they’re like,

whoa, it’s, it’s,
that’s not a surprise.

I thought it would have
been the 80s or 90s.

Because again, just older
people, not that in tune

with what’s going on on
the Internet and the stuff.

A 14 year old Turkish boy was arrested for

throwing a smoke bomb at security guards.

And what he said was, uh,
okay, so let’s give it a story.

He claims that he had been scolded before
with his friend, oh, but not his friend.

So his friends and him were
sitting outside this building.

They were playing loud
music and smoking cigarettes.

He’s 14 years old.

So he’s not supposed to be doing that.

Uh, and then he came and then a security
guy came out and scolded him specifically,

but not his friends, but
he claimed was discriminate.

discrimination.

So he said, don’t
discriminate against foreigners.

I’ll blow you up and then
through a smoke bomb.

And if I can give you a list of things
you should not do, smoking is number one,

uh, being playing loud
music in public is not great.

But I guess I’d give a pass on that
because there’s no law against it.

Claiming discrimination is possible, but
you’re not going to improve your case.

by throwing a smoke bomb at someone right
after saying don’t discriminate against me.

I’ll blow you up.

I’ll blow you up is a threat of
violence, which again is illegal.

So he’s committed multiple crimes.

Now he’s 14 again.

He’s underage.

He’s not going to be
going to jail or anything.

But he was arrested for our favorite
crime, forcible obstruction of business.

All right.

This is, I don’t know if
this is Saturn at 10 years

in a row, the demand for
rice has dropped in Japan.

It is 100,000 tons down to 6.81 million
tons of rice needed or wanted this year.

It’s the lowest since they
started keeping track in 1996.

It’s weird that they only
started keeping track in 1996.

I don’t know why that was one of
the bits to suck out on me in this story.

In 1996, they started keeping
track of how much rice they eat.

I think that would
have been like ancient

times, how many barrels
or bushels or whatever.

I don’t know how rice is measured.

Grains of rice, I guess just wait.

Tons of rice.

People eat.

Like it’s sort of one of those things.

It’s a staple of the country.

The Ministry of Agriculture
is encouraging farmers

to switch to other crops like soybeans or
wheat because they are more in demand.

So I’m wondering this is partially because
of the population of decline in Japan.

So it’s representative of
there being less people overall.

It is also partially demonstrating a
change in dietary wants or needs.

So people generally are eating less rice.

I would like to see a breakdown.

This didn’t give me enough information.

I would be really interested in
what the breakdown of that is.

Is it because there
are just less people and

therefore less people
eating rice or is it because

there are more people eating other
diets than just a rice-based diet.

Like is keto taken off in Japan?

I kind of looked at that a
little bit but didn’t find anything.

particularly demonstrable of what’s
actually happening with the diets in Japan.

But it’s a weird thing to see.

You think of Japan, you
think of Asia, you think of rice.

And Japan is a country
just eating less rice overall.

It’s very interesting.

That’s it.

I’m going to go eat some rice now.

I don’t know.
I’ll try to pop up the country.

I, again, just at the end, I want
to make sure everyone knows.

It’s summer holiday.

I’m going to try to get an episode
out next week if I have time.

It might be late.

It might not happen at all.

So I’ll see you in two
weeks worst-case scenario.

Propensity to consume

(upbeat music)

Kaiten Sushi.

It’s really big in Japan.

It’s big deal.

People love it.

You sit your table.

There’s a little conveyor
belt that goes by.

Sushi’s on it.

You like the Sushi.

Take it off.

Eat it.

Feel good.

Everyone’s happy.

Couple viral videos though.

May have ruined that for everyone.

So in the viral video,

it was a young man, of course.

And he would lick his finger.

And then he would
touch some of the Sushi

that went by, which
meant someone else

who takes it off and eats it, is
of course, ingesting his saliva.

But it didn’t stop there.

There were the bottles of soy sauce.

and a young man licked the end of that.

So anyone who went to that table afterwards

would be using soy sauce
that had been contaminated

with the saliva of the previous young man.

And then there’s the little.

cup.

It’s covered.

And you take off the cover
and there’s a little spoon

and it’s the green tea and you put that in.

You put in some hot water.

You have some nice green tea.

The boy took the spoon from that
and then licked it and then put it back in.

So it’s just young men being gross.

Three incidences of young men
being really gross at Kai-ten Sushi.

They videoed themselves.

They videoed themselves
and then put that online.

This is massive outcry in Japan.

And the problem is people think it’s gross.

Now in Japan, when
people think stuff is gross,

they’ll stop coming to your restaurant.

The company, the main company is Sushi-toe.

And what they wanna do is,
it’s not what they wanna do.

The main company is Sushi-toe.

They have contacted the police.

They want to proceed with
criminal and civil charges.

‘Cause this is obstruction of business.

So put a little ding up there for
another obstruction of business.

It’s sort of endangering other people.

‘Cause if you have
coronavirus or anything else,

’cause it’s obviously people’s mind.

If I lick my finger and touch the Sushi,

if I have a disease, I’m
giving you that disease.

So that’s kind of the problem.

Now, the interesting fallout for this.

is there was a 5% drop in
market value of Sushi-toe stock.

Now it’d be interesting,
of course, it’s a giant chain.

So there’s one near my
house, there’s one near my work.

Like everywhere I go, I could
probably find a Sushi-toe.

A 5% market drop for
Sushi-toe is 12 billion yen.

Chinese news outlets are
actually reporting this story

and then people are
canceling their trips to Japan.

So tourism is being
affected by some, I

know he’s underage
because of something

that comes a little later.

Some underage, like basically a teenager,

being gross and stupid.

But when it affects your stocks,
when it affects national tourism,

you know you got a big issue.

So Sushi-toe contacted
the police, they

have security camera,
they found the kid.

Now, I know it’s a kid because
they received a direct apology

from the customer and this guardian.

So you know if they’re
talking to the guardian,

it’s not an adult, they’re not
responsible for themselves.

The company plans to continue with criminal

in this civil case.

So here’s the thing,
imagine you’re that kid’s mom

and that this company,
this nationally famous chain

has showed up at your door and said,

“Your kid licked some Sushi,
it has cost us 12 billion yen.

What are you gonna do?”

‘Cause the mom can
apologize, the kid can apologize.

I can pretty much promise you
that kid’s not gonna do this again.

But at the same time,

Sushi-toe could ruin this family forever.

Like that’s it, it could just
be like gone, you’re done.

They could take all the money you
ever have and will make for themselves.

It’s just that simple.

Now there’s also, hama Sushi,

which is a competing Kaiten Sushi chain.

They called the police,
’cause a customer

was videoed taking
Sushi off the thing

that had no wasabi
in it and putting wasabi

in it and putting it
back on the thing.

So when the people got it,
they got Sushi with wasabi

that was not supposed to have wasabi.

It’s spicy, so it’s a little
prank, but then again,

I don’t know how common
wasabi allergies are,

but I have no significant
allergies other than, you know,

like seasonal allergies
and I just take some drugs

and I’m fine, none
of its life threatening,

but you know people
with peanut allergies

and people with other food allergies,
like this is stuff that kills you.

So this other kid, he’s basically
on the hook for attempted murder.

I know they’re not actually
gonna charge him with that,

but that is kind of the severity of
the thing that’s actually happening.

So, the problem, okay, I hate doing this,

I do this every time and I gotta stop.

It’s weird instinct, but budding criminals,

you have to stop videoing yourself.

I understand that the clout
is what people wanna go for.

The sort of notoriety
is what you want,

but what you’re doing
is committing crimes

and if you video yourself committing
crimes and put it on the Internet,

this is how they get attention
and once they get attention,

you’re screwed, you got
nothing left ’cause there’s proof.

They already got
this kid because of

security cameras,
but videoing it yourself,

put it out there.

Jade has just posted
in, look, criminals

being dumb as how
the police system works.

In Japan, 100% yes.

I would actually say investigators in Japan

probably do less work than
any other country I can see

because half the time
people turn themselves in,

the other half they video themselves
doing it and post it on the Internet.

These guys basically
just have to surf the net,

go what’s trending, which
crime is trending today?

And then they just
go like, oh, let’s find

out where that guy
lives and go arrest him.

So, the fallout now is they’re
going to put acrylic shields

in front of the Sushi thing,
so you can’t touch it easily.

They’re going to install more cameras,

so if you do this, you’re
more likely to get caught.

But the fallout really is,
people are already going like,

I don’t wanna go to Kaiten Sushi,
I don’t wanna go to Sushi dough

because there is
the possibility that

some dumb, gross
kid is touched my food,

which was always
a possibility, but it

came to light, it
came to the forefront.

when this became national news.

And last week, this was honestly
100% number one, national news.

(upbeat music)

You work in a prison and the
prisons aren’t very full anymore

because you know, it crimes down overall.

And people in Japan aren’t
committing, actually, no.

My last story is about how
crime is up, but different crimes.

People aren’t going to jail
as much as they used to,

maybe it’s more accurate.

So this guy, he’s like, I got
a lot of free time at work,

I don’t have to abuse prisoners.

So I’ll bring my PS Vita to work.

So the guard brings his PS Vita.

Already, weirdly okay again, being
someone who plays a lot of video games,

my first slide is PS Vita.

I mean, you don’t have a switch.

So the PS Vita
though was very popular

in Japan, because it
had a lot of functions

that honestly the switch doesn’t have.

You could download TV
to it, I actually don’t know.

My son has a switch, but I’ve
never played with it seriously.

So I don’t know what its capabilities are,

but the PS Vita,
you could download

like MP4 files to it
and you can watch TV.

So this guy, he
brings a couple games,

downloads a couple TV
shows, sits at his desk,

he’s playing some games,
he’s watching a little TV,

but of course, it’s noticeable.

He’s the guy who’s
supposed to be doing rounds.

He’s supposed to do five rounds a day.

His reasoning was, I was bored
because there were so few detainees.

He played games, he fell asleep,

he did not do his five rounds.

He watched TV saved on the console
for at least an hour, probably more.

I would assume, if I was the
boss of this prison facility,

I would assume that if I
caught one of my prison guards,

not doing his rounds watching
TV playing video games

on the clock, that he would be fired.

In Japan, gets a warning.

I was really shocked by that.

Like your literal one job is to watch,

to make sure people don’t escape.

I am playing a video game
right now with Mr. Warman’s,

called a way out where
we escape from prison.

And it was surprisingly
easy to escape from prison.

It was a couple of really simple puzzles,

had to get a screwdriver out of
the workshops, it’s stuff like that.

But if there’s two people,

I mean, I can tell you getting
out of prison is dead easy.

I’ve run the simulation
twice and success both times.

Even went on a little bit of a shooting
rampage at the end of the game.

So, prison guards got to be on the ball.

The prime minister, one of
the prime minister secretaries.

So last week we had one of
the prime minister secretaries.

Now, secretary is not like a
personal assistant kind of thing.

It’s like a serious job, ’cause
you’re like secretary of stuff.

It was his son last
week, got in trouble

for the scandal of
taking a government car

around Paris and places
and buying souvenirs and stuff.

He claimed it was for official duties.

Everyone else is
saying it was just for him.

That pales in comparison to this
dude, who is, he got to learn to shut up.

So the prime minister secretary
told reporters off the record,

he hates to see LGBT people and
would hate to have them live next to him.

So he was fired.

I mean, you want to give some
credence to the prime minister.

He was like, oh my God,
that was a dumb thing to say.

Usually in Japanese politics,
they say something stupid.

The government in power
actually backs them up and goes,

oh, he didn’t mean that or he
was taken out of context and stuff.

This was off the records.

You shouldn’t even have heard about it.

They make excuses.

I actually am gonna
give Kishita some credit

’cause he literally just
went, now you’re fired.

If Japan recognizes same sex
marriage, people will abandon the country.

It was another statement he made,

which I was like, I don’t
actually see how that’s true.

Because what are you saying?

Are you saying that people born in Japan,

if they live around or
are with LGBT plus people,

they’re gonna leave the country?

‘Cause they’re already here and
people are not leaving the country.

So that doesn’t make sense.

I struggled with what
they were actually saying.

Because basically this guy’s just saying,

I don’t like it, I think
it’s the short version.

It did bring me to a secondary story though

of some of the hypocrisy that’s
going on in Japanese courts

because Tokyo court upheld
a ban of same sex marriage.

But the same court said
that the lack of protections

for same sex families
violates human rights.

So you can see they
understand, like if you are a couple,

whether you’re a man or a
woman, a woman, a woman,

or whatever, whatever
combination you wanna put together,

you should have fundamental
basic human rights

supported for you by the
government, regardless.

But at the same time, they
like, but you can’t get married.

So I think maybe there’s some confusion

as to what these protections
actually are supposed to mean.

Because a lot of times
my view of marriage

is that it’s primarily
for taxation.

It’s representation in taxation.

You get married for love, that’s all great,

but that has nothing to
do with the government.

As far as the government’s concerned,

two people come together
and bring their finances together

that changes the taxation or
the structure of their finances

and taxes should be done differently.

It has very little to do with love
or gender or anything like that.

So my view of the
law is actually really

simple in that whether
you are cis or LGBT,

if you form a partnership,
it will affect your taxation.

Because again, laws
shouldn’t really be

concerned with gender
politics in any way.

It should be
concerned with people

and how they live
their lives and fairness.

And so that being the case, I
fully support same-sex marriage

and any sort of combinations
that are out there.

I’m like, “Hey, man, if you are happy

and your partner’s happy,
I’m actually okay with that.”.

Because what we’re
really talking about is

how you should be
taxed by the government

when you’re talking about a marriage.

Marriage ceremonies and
stuff, they’re all about love,

religious ceremonies,
I can’t comment on

if they think it’s bad,
that’s up to them,

but I would not join that religion.

So it’s really that simple.

But I’m really
happy that I got fired

because normally
they wouldn’t fire them.

Normally they try to cover it
up, normally they try to deflect.

And this time he’s just
like, “You know what?

“Now what you’re saying doesn’t
reflect my beliefs “and you’re fired.”.

(clock ticking)

I got it.

Oh, last week we talked about Luffy,

who was running a crime
ring from a detention

center in the
Philippines in Manila.

And my question was, how does
this guy who’s in the Philippines,

who, how did he
get a cell phone and

how is he running a
criminal organization

from the Philippines with
just a cell phone successfully?

Well, turns out he had six cell phones.

There were four people involved.

I think I’m giving too much
credit to the Luffy character

because his name came to the
forefront, but there were four people

and they were kind of running
this mini criminal empire.

They had six mobile
phones and police

when they went and
searched their cells,

they actually retrieved phones and laptops.

So I’m wondering how they got a
laptop in without anyone noticing,

or are the prison facilities, the
detention center facilities in Manila,

just that generous.

So I found that to be very interesting.

I would like to know
more about that system.

There seems to be the scams racked
up nearly six billion yen worth of money.

So we’re talking about home
invasions, we’re talking about scams,

we’re talking about just
stealing money from people.

It’s insane.

One of four of the guys
may not be deported to Japan.

So this week and next week,
they’re trying to deport them to Japan

so they can actually answer
for their crimes in Japan.

But one guy, because he committed
assault, is on trial for the assault

and when you’re on trial in the
Philippines, you can’t be deported.

You actually have to stay
there and go through your trial.

After his trial, he’ll probably have
to serve some kind of punishment.

After that punishment, he
could be deported to Japan

to be put on trial again for
the crime scenes committed

while he was in detention
in the Philippines.

It’s incredibly complicated.

It’s insane that it’s actually
happening, but there you go.

I will keep you updated.

I’m really interested in what
happens when he gets to Japan,

when the sort of the main dudes
get to Japan and they go on trial.

I would love to have more details
about how they were organizing it.

It’s how they organized it.

So I understand the crimes.

Home invasions, in this
case, were quite simple.

We show up, we pretend
you have a package,

you open the door,
they kick in the door.

Maybe they beat up the person, but
they just want to steal some money.

Ski wise, not that
sophisticated, but at

the same time, simplicity
and effectiveness

often go together.

But how did he organize it?

It must have just been
through social media

and stuff, but how
do you organize it?

How do you get people to do it?

How does he collect his profits?

If I’m the criminal
who’s kicked in the

door and gotten,
let’s say, a million yen

from that household somehow,

what motivation do I have
to actually send him his cut?

Is a really interesting question.

There’s a lot of those
details I would really like

to know about because it’s the machinations

of the machine they’ve
created that I really want

to hear about because it’s fascinating

that this was as successful as it
was for as long as it was from, again,

a detention center in another country.

makes it just almost mind blowing.

The first time, so
this actually relates

to my verbal gaff sort
of at the beginning.

For the first time in 20 years, in 2022,

it’s the last year, nine as
2023, when we’re recording this,

crime increased in Japan.

This is primarily an increase in
street crime, but it’s up 5.9% from 2021.

Now that sounds like crime has shot up.

over the last year, which
is not the actual case

because every single
year since the end of

World War II, which
is when they recorded,

it started recording crime stats like this.

The number has gone down every single year.

So this is just a tiny self correction

because you had coronavirus
actually put everyone away,

crime decreased
significantly during that time

because during that time,
people just weren’t out and about

and it was harder to commit street crimes.

Primarily, now people are
out back on the street again.

Street crime is more possible,
more than anything else.

Again, opportunity is a big part of crime.

So this is up 5.9%
from 2021, but we’re

talking about a decline
every single year

for the last 70 years.

So it’s just a little blip
upwards, comparatively speaking.

So I don’t think people should freak out.

There’s a lot of very serious crimes

that you wanna talk about,
but I was very interested.

Bicycle theft is up 14.4%.

So if you ride a bicycle, the bicycle
is a very common way of transporting

yourself around Japan.

If you use a bicycle,
the last year was a lot,

but not surprisingly,
the ransomware, cyber

attacks, that kind
of stuff, up 57.4%.

Because criminals may be
are shifting from street crime

to cyber crime because
it’s probably more profitable.

It takes less investment.

There’s actually
probably less risk at first.

As long as you can
cover your tracks, it’s

very hard for people
to actually find you.

90% of the crimes we talk
about in Indonesia, Japan,

the people get caught,
it’s surveillance cameras,

see them, follow them to the train station,

they take the train home, the
surveillance, you now know where they lived

and they please just
show up at their house.

So again, I’m not talking
about like deep detective work,

like Jade said earlier,
these guys are one step away

from turning themselves in
if you do a crime in person.

So cyber crime,
computer crime makes

a lot more sense in
the current situation.

When talking about
real life dumb ass crimes,

we have a man who was
walking around a supermarket.

and he walked out and
he didn’t buy anything.

He got really frustrated.

So he kicked a glass door
and the glass door shattered.

And when he was a red, the
police, so the staff called the police,

Mandra calls the police
and the police show up

and they’re like, “Hey,
what are you doing?”

He goes, “I was really frustrated
that there was nothing here

that I wanted to buy so I kicked
the door and shattered the door.”

That is obstruction of business.

And he’s going to be arrested for that.

I don’t think too much is gonna happen,

but I don’t know,
again, you didn’t wanna

buy anything so
you kicked the door?

Like what level of
frustration are you feeling?

How badly did you wanna buy something?

Clearly just dumb ass.

(clock ticking)

Which takes us into our last story
which was sort of pretty interesting.

They do surveys about like
consumption habits and sales

and this is all important to the government

because it all talks about GDP.

One of the most recent,
I think last week again

on the news Japan, I talked
about how 50% of Japan’s GDP

is basically just consumption.

It’s just people buying stuff.

Like it’s huge.

It’s really important that
people keep the economy going.

People under 35, their
propensity to consume is weak,

which is really bad for Japan as a country.

‘Cause again, Japan’s
economy survives on

the fact that the
money is moving around.

But why are, this is under 35,
so it’s technically younger people.

I would say mostly people in their 20s.

Why are these people in
their 20s not spending money?

I would go ahead
and guess most of

them aren’t making a
lot of money to spend.

Everything just went up 4%.

And again, I’ve talked a couple times about

my electricity prices
doubled compared to last year.

I, not as a young person,
but I am spending less money.

I am suddenly being way
more cautious with my money.

I saw a cool little figurine
that I really wanted to buy.

It was 8,000 yen.

I was like, I cannot justify
spending 8,000 yen on this figurine.

So what are these kids
doing with their money?

It’s a 20% increase of young people
saying they want to save for retirement.

This is compared to 2007 to 2009.

So they do these surveys
over a couple of years.

So basically, young people are now saying,

I have to keep money so that
when it comes time for me to retire,

I have enough money to retire.

I don’t want to be working
indefinitely in perpetuity.

because I actually want to
have at least some point in my life

where I’m not bound to a
desk or doing some kind of job.

And they’re saying
that this is the root

cause of stagnation of
the economy in Japan.

It’s actually people, young people,

being so concerned and
so worried about the future

that they’re preparing for the
future by not spending right now.

So this is part of why the
government has made a call

for an increase in the
lifetime wages of people.

Because like I said, I have a job.

It’s pretty stable.

I make the same money
I made last year, though.

So actually, my take
home earnings value-wise

has gone down 4%
because of the force,

percent increase in inflation.

Electricity in these
things have doubled

in price, which I
have no control over.

I still have to pay for electricity.

So I now have to spend money there.

I’m not spending money on something else.

That 15,000 yen, so it
went from 15 last year

in December to 30,000
this year in December.

That 15,000 yen is not
going into the economy.

I’m not buying little figurines
or toys or entertainment

or stuff to keep the economy going.

That’s going directly to the power company.

They might be building nuclear power plants

or something else to make
power cheaper in the future,

but as an older person, that’s
not really going to benefit me.

Hopefully it benefits these
young people who are saving.

But they’re seeing stuff like this happen

and they’re thinking, “I
need to hold onto my money

“so I have enough money for the future.

“and paid does not increase
significantly in Japan.”

So I’m not going to
get paid a lot of money,

so I need to hold on
to as much as I can.

That, the problem
they’re not really realizing

is that philosophy,
that core kind of thinking

is going to continue with them
throughout the entirety of their life.

They’re not going to, at 35, something go,

“Ah, you know what, I
have enough to retire.

“I’m ready to go.

“Let’s just start spending money.”

These are going to be a generation
of people who do not spend money.

And if we don’t, like, because of the way

the economy works in
Japan, if they don’t get people

to have more money, then
they cannot spend money,

and then you get into
this cycle of decrease,

where I’m not spending
money, so companies make,

maybe offer less
salary, like salaries go

down because
products are going down,

and it just keeps declining
as if, and then, of course,

I’m making less
money, so I spend less

money, and it goes
down and down and down.

It relates to a very weird different story.

I’ve always, the Chinese foreign minister,

this is about four years ago.

He was this amazing guy,

because he was just so
blunt and straightforward.

And they said, “Oh, China,
they were interviewing him,

“and they say, “China’s investing
a lot of money “in Indonesia.

“Why are you doing that?

“Like, what is the focus on Indonesia?”

And he just looked at him and goes,

“Indonesian people are
too poor to buy our products,

“so we want to increase
their economy enough,

“so they have enough
money to buy our products.”

So then they become our customers.

But you can see what he was saying was,

there needs to be
a fundamental level

of wealth for people
to be able to spend,

so we need to create essentially an economy

where people can spend
or people do not spend.

And it’s the same, the Japanese economy,

almost internally, functions
very similarly to that.

If people aren’t making enough
money, people do not spend.

People need to be rich enough to
spend money to increase the economy.

And if they do
that, then it will build

up and up and up,
it’s the reverse cycle.

of what I was talking about.

I am interested to see
over the next year or two,

how many companies
actually increase their wages.

‘Cause I honestly believe a
lot of them at this moment

cannot, it’s not that they
would, it’s just that they can’t.

And then going further from
that, going into the future,

how do they make sure that
people have enough money

so that they can spend money
to keep the economy going?

Because we gotta get, this
is like one step away from,

we have to just start giving
people money to spend.

Will that work? Probably not.

Because what’s gonna
happen is this generation’s like,

anytime I get extra money, I need
to put it away so that I can retire.

Which is one of the bleaker endings.

I usually end off in Indonesia, Japan,

with like a creepy guy story,
so I can make fun of him.

And sometimes it goes wrong and I
feel really bad at the end of the story,

but I mean, I’m
literally just talking

about the demise of
the Japanese economy.

You can see the solution
is actually increased wages,

but the reality is, most
companies probably can’t increase

wages, I think I just killed Japan.

(upbeat music)

(upbeat music)

[Music].