[Aurornis]

> Personally (living in Japan) I've never experienced something like this, but it does happen.

I have some friends-of-friends living in Japan. It’s interesting to hear their experience with culture evolve over time. They openly admit that they get a free pass around some of the more difficult cultural situations due to not being born and raised originally in Japan.

Hearing their stories has definitely given me a different perspective on some of the overly idealized views of Japan that get repeated online. A lot of social media posters with experience in Japan fall into a routine where they post about how things in Japan are so much better and more straightforward than in the United States (and other countries) because it gets attention. They conveniently leave out a lot of the less romantic and positive differences though.

[mschuster91]

> A lot of social media posters with experience in Japan fall into a routine where they post about how things in Japan are so much better and more straightforward than in the United States (and other countries) because it gets attention. They conveniently leave out a lot of the less romantic and positive differences though.

That kind of whataboutism is a common issue in politics though. Why can't we all go and look for every field of politics look what other countries do and if what they do is better, then do that as well without taking the worse parts?

For example, look at Switzerland when it comes to education, to Germany's Mittelstand and trades education system for a vibrant and healthy SME business field, to the US for access to venture capital and cutting-edge research, to Austria or Denmark for their pension system, to Japan for public transport reliability...

[inglor_cz]

Often, because some entrenched interests stand in the way.

Famously, NYC builds new subway tunnels very expensively, about three times more expensively than Paris. What stands in the way of a substantial cost reduction? Many factors, including local unions that defend their lucrative turf.

The French withdrew from the project of the Californian High-Speed Rail blaming total governmental dysfunction and comparing Californian public sector negatively to Morocco, where a French-built HSR actually was built successfully.

[mschuster91]

Well, Morocco can hardly be called a democracy [1]. It's easier to (literally) bulldoze through obstacles when you're a kingdom looking for a fancy toy for the ruler to show off, compared to building infrastructure in a democracy.

[1] https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/538683/umfrag...

[inglor_cz]

Still, plenty of democracies managed what California couldn't, and built a useful HSR network.

Which in Cali would mean SF to LA, and that is probably not going to happen.

[mschuster91]

Many of these projects were started in times where the needs of the infrastructure had priority over local objections and environmental protection laws were not much of a thing though. There's a reason most of Europe's rail network is decades, sometimes centuries old, and there hasn't been much new construction for a loooong time.

[inglor_cz]

"There's a reason most of Europe's rail network is decades, sometimes centuries old, and there hasn't been much new construction for a loooong time."

I beg to differ. There is quite a lot of HSR construction in Europe going on right now.

Italy: Brescia-Verona, Verona-Vicenza, Vicenza-Padua, the Brenner Basis Tunnel to Austria, Turin-Lyon, Naples-Bari, Palermo-Catania-Messina

France: Bordeaux-Toulouse, Lyon-Turin to Italy

Spain: Murcia-Almería, the Basque Y, Burgos–Vitoria-Gasteiz, Madrid-Extremadura

Austria: Koralmbahn, Semmering Basis Tunnel

Germany-Denmark: Fehmarn Tunnel

UK: London-Birmingham

The Baltic States: Rail Baltica

All in active construction right now. Some with delays, as usual.