Dogs and Demons_ Tales From the Dark Side of Japan - Kerr [129]
The kumi mentality obviously builds within its members a strong feeling of «we and them.» Them, the outsiders, are just that, those outside the group. Japanese children often use a special phrase during play, nakama hazure [cut off from the group], to distinguish between those outside the group and those inside. Nakama hazure has the special feeling of not being part of the intimate group and, therefore, of being rejected by it. It is often used in a taunting manner. Few children want to be rejected by their peers. Most make maximum efforts to be accepted by the group and remain securely within it.
The kumi system is certainly a lesson for future workers in industrial Japan, perhaps the biggest lesson they ever learn. As the noted scholar Edwin Reischauer has written:
Their emphasis is on the individuals' own groups – the «we» of the classroom, company, or nation as opposed to the «they» of all other groups. It is somewhat frightening to realize that in the uniformity of Japanese education all the children of a given age group are learning precisely the same lesson in much the same way on the same day throughout Japan, emerging with the same distinctive and often exclusive ideas about their own little groups or the large group of Japan. Broader world interests are given lip service, but in reality very little emphasis is given to the essential «we» group of humanity.
In grade school, subtle distrust of foreign people and things becomes a part of the curriculum. It's not intentional; the schools do not consciously set out to teach xenophobia. But so innocent are Japan's educationalists of the real issues of racism or ethnic bias that they end up teaching a condescending, if not fearful, attitude toward foreigners anyway. Textbooks depict foreign products as dangerous and Japan as the victim of international pressures. A typical lesson reads, «Chemicals prohibited in our country have been used on some of the food imported from foreign countries. It would be terrible if chemicals that harm humans would remain on the food.» Many textbooks feature photos of angry American autoworkers bashing Japanese cars, to impress upon children that the Japanese suffer from irrational foreign hatreds.
Nevertheless, in view of their power in the international economy, the Japanese learn that they must get along with these difficult foreigners. «At first, because of differences in language and culture, work didn't go well,» a character in a textbook states, referring to a Japanese factory abroad. «When we tried to have morning assembly before work, or radio calisthenics [exercising in unison to recorded music], they said, 'Why do all of us have to do this?' When we tried to cut tardiness and waste, they said, 'You're too strict.' » One little girl in a textbook cartoon series concludes, «Working with foreign people is awfully difficult.» The undercurrent: foreigners are lazy and unable to understand our advanced Japanese ways – dealing with them is a painful trial. Perhaps this is not the message that was originally intended, but it is the message that comes across, not only in this example but consistently in Japanese classrooms.
There is one more important lesson to be learned: schooling in Japan involves a surprising amount of pain and suffering, which teaches students to gambare, a word that means «to persevere» or «endure.» On this subject Duke writes: «To survive, the Japanese people have always had to gambare – persevere, endure – because life has never been, and is certainly not now, easy nor comfortable for most Japanese.» Definitely not. Even when suffering is not naturally present, schools add it artificially. Elementary-school students must adapt their bodily functions to the rules – or suffer. The