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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Anth" data-source="post: 6471176" data-attributes="member: 9636">I think "Honor" is a misnomer. I think pride/embarrasment or something similar would be a better name.Many of us westerners think that the japanese are strange. What many of us miss is that the japanese think us westerners are equally strange.It's easy to find lists like <a href="http://matadornetwork.com/abroad/10-japanese-customs-you-must-know-before-a-trip-to-japan/" target="_blank">10 customs you must know before a trip to Japan</a>But it's equally easy to find the opposite: <a href="http://mentalfloss.com/article/55140/10-japanese-travel-tips-visiting-america" target="_blank">10 Japanese Travel Tips for Visiting America</a>.We say that the japanese have this strange "lose your face"-thing that we don't have. But that's not true.We have many ways to lose our face in the western world, but for us such behavior is so unthinkable that we would never, never, never do that.How would you react if you went to the supermarket and saw a grown up man roll around on the floor, screaming like a five year old kid because there is no milk left?How would you react if the person in front of you on the train started to take off his/her clothes? And I mean all of it, including underwear.How do you react when you meet a drunk person before lunch?In all above cases we are talking about persons losing their honor and face in our eyes.The only difference between the western world and Japan is that they have another culture and norm.And if you're not looking at fantasy, but at IRL history, our forefathers had quite different values.Take a modern girl in summer clothing, like a top and miniskirt, and send her back 200 years in time. How would the 19th century people react?On the other hand how many of you can think of your parents/grandparents having sex? 200 years ago most families lived together in one big room, so parents obviusly had sex in the same room as their kids.The reason why we use the word honor is that we try to explain a normal japanese behavior that we think is totally alien.</blockquote>

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