So there I was, sitting in a cozy cafe, surrounded by the glitzy ladies-wot-lunch brigade. The 40-somethings in front of me (at least, I think they were 40ish, but numerous plastic surgery had made them immortally aged) had been sitting inside for 20 minutes without once removing their diamante encrusted sunglasses or fur hats.
The botoxed-one with the impossibly thick fur coat must have been silently dripping with sweat, because the heating was on full blast. But she remained ashen-faced, and only really became animated (well, her lips moved - the eybrows stayed exactly where they had always been) when showing her new pink sparkly talons to her slightly wrinklier friend. It seemed that 3D flowers and massive diamante jewels were the 'in' thing in nail art in Tokyo. The caw-ing and cackling laughter was positively eerie.
Anyway, as I sat and watched the immortally preserved do the ladies-wot-lunch show, it became increasingly apparant in my mind that animal rights stuff (I'm thinking of the whaling debate now) that drives that rest of the world mad with indignation must simply remain a non-starter in Japan.
I mean, I thought that maybe, just maybe - Japanese people weren't really that into whale meat, for example. But their obvious lack of concern for animal rights indicates that possibly, ever so slightly, that they just don't get moved or incensed by animal cruelty in the way that some people in other countries do.
I suspect that the majority of Japanese people just don't feel that whaling or fur affects them enough to do something (kind of like in the same way that many an international politician buries their head about global warming or famine, or tribal warfare and human rights abuses in a suspiciously oil-free country, or other equally inconvenient subjects...).
And how did I come by this theory (which I readily admit is based purely on observation and very little evidence) - I hear you all ask? Well, I realised that the animal-skin-wearing, surgery-loving, ladies-wot-lunch-brigaders were not a unique sight... and that, in fact, I had been steadily observing an increasing fur takeover bid. It was impossible to miss. It was taking over Japan.
Fur was on handbags, hats, coats, scarves.... hair accessories... and it was definitely real. I'll admit that a large proportion of the fur on coats was quite visibly fake (and pretty ugly, too). However, there were swarms of real fur additions everywhere. When I mentioned this to a Japanese colleague she simply couldn't see it - she couldn't believe that this volume of fur was unusual.
So, I thought...."Hmmm, fur is so common it's considered normal, and Japanese women simply wear fur because it is fashionable, and they think it looks pretty damn good, right?". And then my brain did a super fast leap forward to the conclsusion that:
"Consequently, they wouldn't really give two hoots if it was reviled by the rest of the (animal-loving) world, because the opinions of other people (excepting those designers who simply revel in fur-obsessed haute couture and, obviously, uhm.. P Diddy) will never affect them, right?" "Right" I said to myself. "I am soooo right".
I think.
It was then that, oddly enough, my mind made the mental leap to whale meat - which is a delicacy here, but is conversely considered by some gourmands to be a fatty, boring, tasteless meat. (Sounds familiar - how else can the boiled innards of a sheep and a concoction of herbs be considered edible, unless it's repackaged and sold as a delicacy with a Scots name?)
And here was my carefully thought out and scientifically not-proven answer - The reason whale meat and fur still exists here without mass protest, is because no-one in Japan really cared what the politicians and lobby groups did.
Well, just possibly, it wasn't interesting enough, or it just didn't affect them enough personally. I guess that it is one giant mental leap from buying a product that looks good, tastes good, or makes us feel great, into imagining the total impact of one's behaviour on this world - and none of us are entirely innocent in that regard.
Think about it - we ALL shun the reminders that global warming is actually happening, despite the shocking concept that global warming is a threat to our very existence. And yet, we all still take jet planes on holiday and drive petrol-guzzling cars for convenience. We all still continue to produce massive toxic emissions (and not just after a McDonalds or a curry). And we just don't care that much, because we can't really imagine how it will affect us.
Just like the fur-obsessed fashionistas, or the whale-meat eaters, or the "what's the point, they're all the same" non-voters, or the people who think that buying fairtrade goods is pointless... we are all contributing to a general apathy towards the world and it's welfare.
Then again, I thought, how many causes can one person support, and who says the fur-clad ladies don't do charitable things or care about the world in other ways? Japan has, after all, one of the highest per capita rates of charitable donations. We're not looking at a 'me, me, me' society here. Even my own ladies-wot-lunch students are endlessly generous in their concern for charities like Unicef and its ilk.
Nevertheless, how much of an impact can one person make? How much do we have to do to make the world better? Is buying Fairtrade products enough? Will a bunch of do-gooders making themselves carbon-neutral really solve anything, when the big companies continue to spew out nasty toxins every day?
In fact, how much does one person have to do to make themselves feel better about the world? And how much does one person actually have to do to make the world a better place?
Anyway, I was dizzy with thoughts of whaling and global warming, and fairtrade practices, and famine (mostly mine - all this talk of food was making me peckish)...and so I picked up Vogue fashion magazine for some light relief, and innocently thought to myself, "Well, at least this resurgence of fashionable fur-obsession wouldn't happen in nice, sensible animal-loving Britain (or even the USA, where they, like, hunt stuff ALL THE TIME)"...
Ah bollocks.
Damn that Anna Wintour.
The botoxed-one with the impossibly thick fur coat must have been silently dripping with sweat, because the heating was on full blast. But she remained ashen-faced, and only really became animated (well, her lips moved - the eybrows stayed exactly where they had always been) when showing her new pink sparkly talons to her slightly wrinklier friend. It seemed that 3D flowers and massive diamante jewels were the 'in' thing in nail art in Tokyo. The caw-ing and cackling laughter was positively eerie.
Anyway, as I sat and watched the immortally preserved do the ladies-wot-lunch show, it became increasingly apparant in my mind that animal rights stuff (I'm thinking of the whaling debate now) that drives that rest of the world mad with indignation must simply remain a non-starter in Japan.
I mean, I thought that maybe, just maybe - Japanese people weren't really that into whale meat, for example. But their obvious lack of concern for animal rights indicates that possibly, ever so slightly, that they just don't get moved or incensed by animal cruelty in the way that some people in other countries do.
I suspect that the majority of Japanese people just don't feel that whaling or fur affects them enough to do something (kind of like in the same way that many an international politician buries their head about global warming or famine, or tribal warfare and human rights abuses in a suspiciously oil-free country, or other equally inconvenient subjects...).
And how did I come by this theory (which I readily admit is based purely on observation and very little evidence) - I hear you all ask? Well, I realised that the animal-skin-wearing, surgery-loving, ladies-wot-lunch-brigaders
Fur was on handbags, hats, coats, scarves.... hair accessories... and it was definitely real. I'll admit that a large proportion of the fur on coats was quite visibly fake (and pretty ugly, too). However, there were swarms of real fur additions everywhere. When I mentioned this to a Japanese colleague she simply couldn't see it - she couldn't believe that this volume of fur was unusual.
So, I thought...."Hmmm, fur is so common it's considered normal, and Japanese women simply wear fur because it is fashionable, and they think it looks pretty damn good, right?". And then my brain did a super fast leap forward to the conclsusion that:
"Consequently, they wouldn't really give two hoots if it was reviled by the rest of the (animal-loving) world, because the opinions of other people (excepting those designers who simply revel in fur-obsessed haute couture and, obviously, uhm.. P Diddy) will never affect them, right?" "Right" I said to myself. "I am soooo right".
I think.
It was then that, oddly enough, my mind made the mental leap to whale meat - which is a delicacy here, but is conversely considered by some gourmands to be a fatty, boring, tasteless meat. (Sounds familiar - how else can the boiled innards of a sheep and a concoction of herbs be considered edible, unless it's repackaged and sold as a delicacy with a Scots name?)
And here was my carefully thought out and scientifically not-proven answer - The reason whale meat and fur still exists here without mass protest, is because no-one in Japan really cared what the politicians and lobby groups did.
Well, just possibly, it wasn't interesting enough, or it just didn't affect them enough personally. I guess that it is one giant mental leap from buying a product that looks good, tastes good, or makes us feel great, into imagining the total impact of one's behaviour on this world - and none of us are entirely innocent in that regard.
Think about it - we ALL shun the reminders that global warming is actually happening, despite the shocking concept that global warming is a threat to our very existence. And yet, we all still take jet planes on holiday and drive petrol-guzzling cars for convenience. We all still continue to produce massive toxic emissions (and not just after a McDonalds or a curry). And we just don't care that much, because we can't really imagine how it will affect us.
Just like the fur-obsessed fashionistas, or the whale-meat eaters, or the "what's the point, they're all the same" non-voters, or the people who think that buying fairtrade goods is pointless... we are all contributing to a general apathy towards the world and it's welfare.
Then again, I thought, how many causes can one person support, and who says the fur-clad ladies don't do charitable things or care about the world in other ways? Japan has, after all, one of the highest per capita rates of charitable donations. We're not looking at a 'me, me, me' society here. Even my own ladies-wot-lunch students are endlessly generous in their concern for charities like Unicef and its ilk.
Nevertheless, how much of an impact can one person make? How much do we have to do to make the world better? Is buying Fairtrade products enough? Will a bunch of do-gooders making themselves carbon-neutral really solve anything, when the big companies continue to spew out nasty toxins every day?
In fact, how much does one person have to do to make themselves feel better about the world? And how much does one person actually have to do to make the world a better place?
Anyway, I was dizzy with thoughts of whaling and global warming, and fairtrade practices, and famine (mostly mine - all this talk of food was making me peckish)...and so I picked up Vogue fashion magazine for some light relief, and innocently thought to myself, "Well, at least this resurgence of fashionable fur-obsession wouldn't happen in nice, sensible animal-loving Britain (or even the USA, where they, like, hunt stuff ALL THE TIME)"...
Ah bollocks.
Damn that Anna Wintour.
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