>>279867925
>Japan is already a minefield and It would arguably be worse depending on what country you live in
I disagree. From an outsider's perspective, Japan's spiritual sense is just overwhelmingly hostile. Everything is out to kill you or destroy you or curse you for eternity and there's nothing you can do about it. It's like it justifies a hive mentality, where all the survivors follow the natural order or their superiors, and any deviation is met with merciless destruction for you, your family, and every generation hence forever.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Japan doesn't really have a "trickster" story, do they? Someone who can pull a fast one on the gods, or stand against impossible odds, through cleverness, deception, and mischief. China had the Monkey King, Subsaharan Africa had Anansi, Native North America had Coyote, the Greeks had Hermes, Prometheus, and Hercules, the Norse had Loki, the Mayans had the Twins of Xibalba, and so on. All of them are stories where man's condition may be hard, but by cleverness or stepping outside the social order, one can prosper or succeed. Japan has NOTHING like that. The closest they have to a trickster is their fox spirits, and even those are "You got tricked for going outside the natural order, the fox spirit kills you mercilessly." I have been to multiple countries, and even the worst of things had clear guidelines and limited their punishment to the offender. No country had such overwhelming misery and arbitrariness in their spiritual mindset as Japan.
