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| quote: | Originally posted by beats and beeps
The japanese need to stop writing songs that have 1/4 english lyrics...why the hell would they want to be like us? |
"In 1852, Matthew Calbraith Perry embarked from Norfolk, Virginia for Japan, in command of a squadron in search of a Japanese trade treaty. Aboard a black-hulled steam frigate, he ported four ships at Uraga Harbor near Edo (modern Tokyo) on July 8, 1853, and was met by representatives of the Tokugawa Shogunate who told him to proceed to Nagasaki, where there was limited trade with the Netherlands and which was the only Japanese port open to foreigners at that time. Perry refused to leave and demanded permission to present a letter from President Millard Fillmore, threatening force if he was denied. Japan had been living reclusely apart from modern technology, and the Japanese military forces could not resist Perry's modern weaponry; the "black ships" would then become, in Japan, a symbol of threatening Western technology and colonialism."
This is when America first flooded Japan with Western Culture. Till then, Japan was a rather closed society, in which they could actually choose what they would absorb from the traders that would often go there. With trade there's also a cultural exchange, and the Japanese were very careful about this, as Christianism had already considered dangerous when the Portuguese were expelled from Japan, for example.
After Commodore Perry's threats, Japan was forced into opening their ports, so trade (as well as the cultural exchange) reached new levels, and this was one of the factors that triggered the Meiji Restoration, a decade later.
During the Meiji Restoration, Japan decided to become as powerful as the Western countries, so they would not have to face other threats. Culturally, it was also a great change, as they adapted many of the Western things and re-modelled their lifestyle. That's when their censorship became sharper, as they were seen as "indecent animals" by European/American leaders. As a matter of fact, there was some treaty in the 1st war that would consider Japanese people lower humans when compared to Europeans/Americans, and the United States had avoided Japanese immigrants for quite a while (reason why most of them came to Brazil).
Then, there was the second war, the atom bomb and the occupation
"Japan continued to experience Westernization in the postwar era, much of which came about during the occupation, when American soldiers were a common sight in many parts of the country. American music and movies became popular, spurring a generation of Japanese artists who built on both Western and Japanese influences."
Being an object of imperialism after WWII, Japan had to be a great economy, so they could stop Communism (which was already making its way in Asia). The United States once again "guided" Japan, and that's the second cultural flood.
As Otaku's become pathetically more Japanese than Japanese people themselves, nowadays Japan seems to be more westernised than most Western countries, which is a shame - all cultures have good sides and bad sides, and they seem to have learned the bad aspects of our culture quite well (such as individualism and competitivity).
Hope this answers your question.
Edit: I nicked some of this info from wikipedia but can't really be arsed to trace back where I got all the stuff... I'm sleepy 
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