Hello to any and every Japanese aspies

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Yesterday the above funny posts made me chukkle I forgot to answer this.

I've considered some negative and positive facts on this, and my overall impression is that the society is a lot more tolerant towards diversity, possibly to the extent that will pleasantly surprise you. Examples will show you best:

-In villages there can be all kinds of 'different' ppl but they never seem to be ostracised for this (within my personal experience). I've wondered for quite some time if this is due to the fact that, in rural areas, you're basically stuck with the same faces all your lives so you've just got to be forgiving.
-I've also read that traditional villages were AS friendly and thus accomodated (and still do) higher concentration of the population. This is because the society was rule-bound and the routines are seen in positive light. Unfortunately I can't remember where I read this.
-I know of a company which employed an obviously gay North American. During the brief period before he left (no one spoke English and he Japanese), nobody complained of his being 'different', so much so that he was convinced nobody knew he was gay. We are mostly Buddhists so maybe no surprise there.
-An African American, having completed the work contract in Japan, went back to USA but soon came back to Japan because s/he liked how s/he was treated here. I have heard of this incident from three different sources, though this does not rule out the chance that it was the same story going around.
-I also know of a Japanese lady who loves being dressed up in unconventional clothes and doing unconventional things. She said to me once, 'if you just do it ppl will be like 'oh she likes that, that's OK'.

And of course I AM very different, but difference itself hasn't been the problem, not since primary school. Small children do pick on different ones, and Japan isn't any exception there.

My intention here is not to paint all rosy a picture, because in my opinion any one culture is more or less similar to any other in a larger perspective; an expression of human activities which are limited by our cognition. However, I do believe that the world media love to misinterpret Japan, jsut the way they do with AS/autism, and 'intolerance to difference' is one such point.

Last edited by whitedragon on 12 Jan 2008, 12:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

And also, even if Japan were a country intolerant to difference, that wouldn't rule out the possibility that aspies might appear less different in their society than they do in American society.