>>212258376
Japan's self imposed isolation was forced to an end by American military intervention, their navy basically, that was their wake-up call, that if they don't try to surpass the European at their game it'll be the end of them.
We were civilized back then. It's just that when euros came to colonize us feudalism was still the method of governance and rule while euros had long gotten rid of it, our leaders did all they could to sustain feudalism to the last, which fucked us over, it's not that were inherently inferior and they're superior.
The way they kicked off feudalism in yurop was that their all-powerful monarch was a weak idiot plus years of bad harvest and getting in debt fighting useless wars pushed the french to execute their monarch and implement enlightenment ideas, their their military got reinvigorated and Napoleon went spreading republican enlightenment throughout yurop. A string of bad events pushed them over the edge to make the transition, that didn't happen here.