"Is Water and Saftey free?"

"Water and safety are free". This is a symbolic sentence written in the famous book, "Japanese and Jews" written by Mr. Izayabendasan, which shows the Japanese recognition for safety. Japanese people have taken safety for granted for a long time. However, this faith has started to change. We are surprised to see the recent bizarre murders and serious crimes perpetrated for trivial reasons, which goes beyond our understanding of the conventional Japanese behavioral pattern. Considering this with the fact that the once boastful criminal arrest rate in Japan has been falling rapidly, it is important to recognize that it is not unrelated to the increase of illegal foreigners who are not registered in Japan.

On Halloween day in 1992, a 16 year old Japanese student in the USA was mistaken for a burglar and was shot dead on the way to a Halloween party.

The name of the student was Takehiro Hattori and he was shot dead with a gun, by Rodney Pears in the quiet residentaial street of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Although the conventional arguments, such as "fear of guns in society" and "the sickness of American society" were conspicuously reported from in Japan, the essence of this problem is not that simple.

It is a well known fact to those who have lived in the United States for a long time realize a mutual understanding to the possibility of being shot when one trespassing upon an individual’s property without notice. Although Rodney Pears gave a verbal warning “Freeze” to Hattori, Hattori did not understand it and therefore did not obey it. This misunderstanding literally became the trigger of Hattori’s disaster. The concept of owning guns is hard for Japanese people to understand, but in America you are permitted to own a gun under the U.S. constitution.

The right to bear arms seems to lack common sense in Japanese society, but it makes perfect sense in America. Since the right to carry a weapon in order to protect yourself is written in the U.S. constitution, it has become embedded in American culture and is an accepted policy to this day.

Now, there is a controversy in Japan’s parliament on what role should be played in Iraq’s recovery. The arguments of whether to dispatch the Self-Defense Forces to Iraq raises questions about the meaning of the war with which the U.S. caused, also about the consistency with the article 9 of constitution and whether or not dispatching troops is deemed necessary for the security of Japan. What a writer cannot admit is a simplistic opinion that dispatching should not be carried out because it is dangerous and does not have the guarantee of a life aside from the right or wrong of dispatch. After World War I, the collective security system was designed to present any possible international conflict. Under international collaboration, each country has an obligation to contribute to world peace according to the national power. One-country pacifism which regards a Middle Eastern dispute as an object lesson is not accepted in the common sense in the world.

End

Key Word

bizarre		trespass
perpetrate		controversy
correlation		one-country pacifism
conspicuously		object lesson