Bullying in Japan

Bullying in Japanese schools is bad, real bad. At first I thought bullying was limited to isolated incidents of bad kids acting up (like Cartman and Penis Boy.) Now I know half the students at every school I go to are either victims of bullies or bullies themselves. Here are some examples of bullying:

Bad kids will steal whatever they feel like using at that moment. I’ve seen bullies steal other students pencil cases and proceed to dump the entire contents on the floor to pick a pen they wanted. Another example of theft is when the school lunch comes with a dessert (oranges, grapes, muffin, etc) the bad kids will steal the weaker student’s food right in front of the teacher. If the teacher (or more likely ME) tells the bully to give it back the bully just says, “No” and eats it. The teacher (or more likely me) gives the bad kid a dirty look and sits down powerless to stop the greedy gut bully.

Name calling and vicious nicknames are also prevalent. Fat kids are ridiculed for being too fat, small kids are ridiculed for being too small, and ugly or shy kids are bullied for being meek and aesthetically unappealing. Anyone that isn’t 100% Japanese is shunned and tormented unmercifully or worse, completely ignored by their peers. During a lesson about animals I’m showing a picture of a pig and a known bully yells out, “MIHO” instead of pig. Other students think this is hilarious because Miho is a girl who is slightly on the heavy side. Soon all the boys and most the the girls are yelling “MIHO!” Even the teacher is in on it! The girl Miho is embarrassed to tears. I’m fed up and stop the class and tell everybody to say ‘pig’ normally or I’m leaving. The homeroom teacher is pissed at me and says, “Why did you stop? Keep teaching.”

Of course there is a lot of the punching and hitting. Most of this is playful but other times it’s obviously bullying of weaker students. If I see it I break up the action and scold the bully, but since I’m not there 99% of the time there really isn’t much I can do. It really isn’t All Fun and Games.

All this bullying is happening at ELEMENTARY schools. I’d hate to see unpunished and brazen bad kids like Cartman and Penis boy 3-4 years from now in junior high, but that’s the case at Kim’s Warui Chugakou where good students are trying to survive as much as graduate to high school.

There is an average of one broken window a week and several minor and a few major injuries due to bad students abusing school property and other students. Recently a girl at Warui Chugakou attempted suicide by swallowing a whole bottle of pills. Why? She was a victim of bullying and didn’t see another way out. Four years ago a boy at Kim’s school died by being smashed by bullies into the glass part of a sliding door. The glass shattered and pierced his heart. No criminal charges were ever filed and the incident was ruled an accident.

This last week four of the worst bastard boys in a class Kim teaches colored their notebooks black and in white writing scrawled, ‘Death Note.’ The bullies were writing kids names in their death notes and telling them they were going to die. These are the same little bastards that bring knives and screwdrivers with them every day to carve up school property and threaten to carve up other students. The homeroom teacher is terriffied by the death note/knife wielding bullies along with the rest of the class.

*(Death Note is a popular manga, anime, and movie franchise (which was on TV recently). Plot: A teenager finds a notebook that can kill anybody whose name he writes down. He starts killing criminals and other people he judges as unworthy and believes he is a god carrying out righteous justice.)


So why do so many students bully others and never listen? Aren’t Japanese school children supposed to be little robot angels that never show any emotion? Hahaha. NO. First of all the teachers have no power to stop the bullies except for yelling or scolding them. After the 100^th or so empty threat the kids KNOW that the teachers are powerless to stop them. Teachers can’t kick the kid out of class because in Japan every child passes every grade and graduates no matter what and every child deserves an education.

The PTA in Japan is HUGE. Every mother and some fathers are active members in the PTA and teachers kowtow to these parents at every chance they can get because one pissed off mom of a bratty bully can mean a Japanese teacher’s job. Some teacher’s try to curb bullies ill intentions but most are so fed up they simply stand by and watch as bullying takes place right before their eyes. Other teacher’s try to get on the bullies good side and join in on the bullying and call the weaker students by the bully’s cruel nicknames, such as the Miho=pig example.

Japanese society is broken down into senpai (older master) and kohai (younger servant) relationships. The senpai pick on and beat up the kohai while the kohai wait for their turn to be senpai so they can pick on and beat up the kohai. This seniority relationship is supposedly a nurturing and mentoring bond, but all I see it used as is another form of bullying in schools and beyond.

I break up fights and play the mean looking gaijin act to scare kids straight, but I can only do so much. I wish I could change things but I can’t because the problem is on a societal level. I’ve mentioned to teachers that in America bad kids are sent to the principal’s office or get detention. The teachers are SHOCKED to hear this and say, “Wow American schools are so strict! I’ve never heard of such things!” Alone together one young teacher that has quite a few bastard children in her class confided in me and said, “Detention? That must be nice…”