keitai on the bus.

It may have been a while ago, but I remember a small discussion over at momus' place about using cell phones in public transportation.

So, lets say a person is talking on his cell on the bus. Even if it is annoying, it's his right, no? Therein lies the biggest single difference between Japan and the US.

Regardless of whatever right you may posess, using that right to the detriment of all around you is not acceptable here. Granting the individual freedoms X,Y and Z is a long way from saying that he or she should be able to use X,Y or Z to interfere with the well being of a large group of others. But ask an american to be a little quieter, or not smoke here, or stop cursing around the children, and you will, more often then not, get an ill-informed lecture about this being a "free country", or perhaps about the first amendment.
I'm on board with Philip K .Howard here. In an effort to avoid passing judgement on anyone, americans have legislated "rights" well beyond their logical end.

These rights have utterly destroyed any sense of ettiquette and reduced all corners of the public sphere to the lowest common denominator. Worse, they've turn every American into an island, even unto his or her own family. It sucks.

I see this stuff in only one place in japan, the schools. The most aggressive asshole of a student sets the level of behavior for the whole class, and so long as he acts within the bounds of a very liberal frame of rules, the teacher can do nothing to change it. In that he has no restriction preventing him from being a disruptive prick he's within his right, but it's hard to imagine that anyone thinks he should have the "right" to prevent everyone else from learning.

Japan usually believes that groups have rights. Sometimes the rights of the group are superceded by the rights of the individual and often vice versa. America, however doesn't see any rights for groups that aren't actually the rights of the individual members (excluding those of corporations, which in almost all cases surpass those of individuals).

(zusammenhang mit Dickenhass.)(dickenhass is my new favorite neologism, please use it in english.)