Pretty enlightening insight. I may not agree 100% with every point but I’ve had a gnawing thought for some time that the claimed black company life that Japanese salarymen, and even Chinese netizens, complain about is actually not even that bad compared to America.

Like, salaryman life videos are kind of my guilty slop pleasures and these guys are like woe is me. I work 12 hours a day, my rent is half my salary, I only save 25% of it every month, my boss sucks. Life is so grey.

And I’m just like, y’all are living better lives than most Americans and financially solvent, and the unhealthy food they complain about is 10x better than American synthetic slop, and they don’t even work more than salaried US professionals, and they get to live in a high trust low crime high infrastructure society, AND they get healthcare, it just amazes me that this is enough to drive so many salarymen into utter mental ruin when this is considered a very good life by American standards.

[–] purpleworm@hexbear.net 4 points 1 week ago

To be clear, I'm not saying one has it worse or that both people have it the same, I'm just trying to say that I don't think it's a categorical difference and also that I really don't like the way people talk about so-called "collectivist cultures," even ones that I would heavily criticize and say have many backwards values like you see in capitalist states.