You mean forgetting the fact that America just literally banned abortion because the country is run by religious nutters, and has more mass shootings than any other country in the world, including the very nice statistic that the leading cause of death for children is America is from firearms. So yeah, I'll take whatever Japan has thanks very much.

> America just literally banned abortion

This is simply not true.

While shootings get a lot of attention, the probability of getting shot is approximately zero.

We literally had a mass shooting where 10 died and 10 were injured, today. And the number 1 cause of death in children is gun violence, for the last few years.

> We literally had a mass shooting where 10 died and 10 were injured, today.

And? Statistically, every day over a 100 people die in motor vehicle incidents and a further 100 from fall related injuries in America. You're just proving my point.

> number 1 cause of death in children is gun violence,

Firearm related deaths are not all gun violence. The overwhelming majority of them are accidents.

It’s not zero at all it’s higher than dying from a bike accident

Just looked it up: 0.3% lifetime probability of dying by gun assault. Mass shootings are indeed lower at 0.01%.

The religious nutters who banned abortion (edit: better put, eroded protections on it) are literally the same people who are trying to get everyone to focus on a severely overstated crime problem, as the grandparent comment did.

In fact you can point to Trump for both of these. On crime: He came in with his outdated world view shaped by 1980s New York complaining of "American carnage in our cities" at a time when crime was at a 25 year low. On abortion: Then he filled a few supreme court seats.

Except that America literally did not ban abortion.

Abortion is technically illegal in Japan.

How kind of you to take one of the most racist and sexist societies that’s politically identical to the religious nutters you’re talking about.

America did not ban abortion and it’s less restrictive than in Japan.

Also weird to call out shootings when a Japanese PM was assassinated with a gun less than a year ago.

Abe was assassinated with a homemade gun because manufactured ones are so hard to obtain. Per capita, the rate of gun death in the US is 1600x Japan's. Hell, the total annual number of gun deaths in Japan is lower than the US's rate of gun death per 100k (~10/year in Japan vs more than 10/100k/year in the US). The US is so much worse on that aspect that it's laughably absurd you'd even make that point.

https://everystat.org/ https://www.businessinsider.com/gun-control-how-japan-has-al...

And yet a longtime head of state got assassinated with a gun. No peaceful nation has political assassinations. The people are just as violent but with fewer resources to act on that violence. The sexual assault of women is one notable projection.

Abe's assassination was an anomaly. Japan is far more peaceful than America (I'm an American)--rather than pretending Japan more violent than the US, you might prefer the more accurate argument: Japan's low crime is attributable to its strong traditional values, homogeneity, conformity, etc.

Lol none of that is true. If you want to cherry-pick stuff, go with mass incarceration or something.

> America just literally banned abortion

Our supreme court overturned a law that enshrined country-wide access to abortion. I personally disagree with this, but the phrasing as stated here isn’t representative of the truth. Individuals in progressive states and those willing to cross state lines in many cases still retain access to abortion.

We didn't ban abortion, the Supreme Court said that states could make their own rules (more specifically, it says that there is no constitutional right to abortion, but state constitutions can change that).

(I'm not defending the US, just trying to correct a misconception.)

I am not convinced that finding "job opportunities and career growth severely limited by the heavily patriarchal culture" is the same as "treating half the population as undeserving of a career".

In what way are they different?

It seems like a different description of the same thing.

One is hyperbolic. One can believe that there is some bias against women without believing that they are treated as undeserving of having a career.

Ok, I read the description as quite literal not hyperbolic.

And you think they are the same? How much experience do you have with the Japanese job market?

I am not a female in the Japanese job market, but I do have first hand accounts from them.

Are you a woman in the Japanese job market?

I am not a woman in the Japanese job market. I am merely a man trying to understand how "job opportunities and career growth severely limited by the heavily patriarchal culture" is the same as "treating half the population as undeserving of a career". I see "job opportunities and career growth severely limited" for women in many industries in the United States and yet it would be silly to say that many think they are "undeserving of a career".

I am skeptical of some claims made about specific industries and cultures being much worse than others.

The word choice may be the same, but Japan is significantly more extreme than the US.

In 2018 21.8% of Medical doctors in Japan where women vs 36.6% in the US and 48.6% in the UK. https://www.who.int/data/gho/data/indicators/indicator-detai...

You can find more and less extreme examples in various industries, but there’s a real difference between the two counties.

Does this existence of fewer women in a job mean that they are kept out by those who think them “undeserving of a career”? Only 4% of sewage plant operators are female. Is that because they are kept out of the industry?

Deserving of a career here implies the career is desirable.

So, I understand if reality makes you uncomfortable but reality doesn’t care.

The reality of the situation has not caused me any discomfort.

I remain unconvinced that the two phrases are descriptions of the same thing.

Both phrases where used to describe the same situation. So they quite literally where describing the same thing.

The two phrases were used by two different commenters. I questioned that one was equal to the other. I still do.

Do you honestly think they aren’t both describing the job situation in Japan as it applies to women from the poster’s perspective?

Because I can only assume you’re playing pretend at this point.

I take offense at your assumption. I have sincerely written what I think. You have implied that you can read my mind and that I am "uncomfortable" or "playing pretend".

User SoylentOrange wrote that his wife "found her job opportunities and career growth severely limited by the heavily patriarchal culture." That seems a very believable assertion to me, given what I have read about Japanese culture and seen in many industries outside of tech in Western cultures.

User lozenge rephrased that as, "treating half the population as undeserving of a career".

I have no idea if lozenge has any experience with Japanese culture. I read his statement as a summary of what SoylentOrange wrote.

I remain unconvinced that the median Japanese man thinks that women are undeserving of a career. I welcome those with first hand experience to share more than anecdotes to convince me.

To be accused of "playing pretend" when questioning hyperbole makes me reconsider commenting on HN at all.