Japan - where an entire nation became corporate skufs and packaged it as cultural virtue.
The Salaryman Machine: Work until midnight, sleep at your desk, bow to bosses who bow to their bosses. Death by overwork has its own word - karoshi - because it’s common enough to categorize. Not a warning, just a statistic.
Lifetime employment traded ambition for security. The dream died in 1991 when the bubble burst. Instead of rebuilding, they chose stagnation. Three decades of near-zero growth while pretending everything’s fine.
The Comfort Trap: Convenience stores every 50 meters. Vending machines for everything - beer, ramen, companionship. They engineered frictionless existence requiring zero initiative.
Result? Herbivore men. Hikikomori - a million people who won’t leave their rooms. Birth rate collapsing. Rather than face messy reality of relationships and ambition, they retreat into anime and gacha games.
The System’s Genius: Corporations get obedient workers. Government maintains power through ritual. Media sells cute escapism. Everyone profits from keeping people passive.
They traded samurai spirit for Excel spreadsheets. Bushido became “don’t cause trouble for others.”
When did quiet suffering become your definition of inner peace?