This week america is as soon as once more reeling within the wake of a college capturing. In Nashville, a gunman murdered three elementary faculty college students and three lecturers, and in response, thousands and thousands of oldsters are asking why we haven’t taken extra steps to maintain our children secure, from higher gun management legal guidelines to higher psychological well being help.
One dad, Timm Chiusano, who just lately took a trip together with his household to Tokyo, Japan, posted a shifting video on TikTok about one of many causes he thinks American society wants to vary as a way to hold our children secure.
“We had been sitting on the subway in Tokyo throughout from an excellent cute mom and daughter,” the video begins. “No less than we thought they had been mom and daughter till the child who was possibly 6 years previous obtained up herself and obtained off the subway. I keep in mind Kelly and I one another and pondering: what the hell simply occurred?”
He goes on to clarify that the elementary faculty child driving the subway was simply the primary of many younger youngsters navigating town alone, from small youngsters working errands to older youngsters procuring and going to parks.
“On our final night time, we made a brand new good friend named Kela. As an area, we needed to ask him what was the take care of [kids being alone] together with the yellow hats,” he continued.
Kela then instructed him that, “Youngsters can commute to highschool and do errands beginning at a really early age. Briefly, it’s simply that secure in Japan. The actually younger ones with the yellow hats is security in crosswalks and to let adults know they may want just a little additional assist.”
He then realizes that the explanation youngsters may be so impartial is as a result of Japan as a society has taken accountability for them as a nation.
“In Japan, the concept is that the youngsters are the collective accountability of society to maintain secure. I’m going to repeat that: youngsters in Japan have a unprecedented quantity of independence as a result of they’ve determined as a society it’s their collective accountability to maintain their youngsters secure.”
Lastly, he ties it again to America, making reference once more to the college shootings and violence.
“It’s a selection they made. And for the lifetime of me, I can’t see? perceive? is there a phrase lacking right here? why we’ve chosen one thing totally different,” he completed.
What Chiusano noticed in Tokyo is frequent throughout the nation. Children are inspired to be impartial from a really younger age, and kids as younger as 3 or 4 are generally despatched on errands whereas elementary faculty youngsters usually stroll to highschool with out adults.
There’s even a preferred actuality tv present on Netflix, Outdated Sufficient, that showcases Japanese kiddos attempting to run errands (with hilarious captions).
It’s additionally essential to notice, although that Japan has strict gun management legal guidelines the place no residents exterior of the police or navy could personal hand weapons or rifles — hunters and marksmen could personal shotguns below strict situations. The result’s that whereas america had about 40,000 gun deaths in 2018, Japan, a rustic of 125 million folks, solely reported 9.
Some argue that Japanese tradition is the explanation that they’ve solely had one occasion of mass faculty violence in 25 years. Others argue that it’s that actual tradition that led to their gun legal guidelines.
Regardless of the case, it does appear clear that children in Japan have a neater time being impartial as a result of society as a complete is searching for them and supporting them — and since their dad and mom don’t have to fret a lot about one thing dangerous occurring. It’s one thing to consider.