In today's class, we saw a handout titled
"Punchy posters urge Tokyoites to mind their
manners"
Let me first describe my overall impression
of this piece of paper. I think these pictures
successfully illustrate what is going on there,
that is, how embarassing their manners are, and
how they are responded to by others. These
posters are appealing in an effective and force-
ful manner to our visual perception. Conveying
a lot of things and convincing it would be even
without a word. Amazing and literally "punchy".
Next, I go on to the necessity or effectiveness
of "social remainders". Basically, I agree with
the idea. Some people may say it should be taught
at school or at home, not through social remainders.
There is, of course, something in this kind of
opinion, but given the current state of things,
just because s/he is in a teaching or "respectable"
position, it does not automatically mean that s/he
acts morally and can set an example to follow. We
know countless cases where parents and teachers
commit immorarities these days.
Things are getting a little bit complicated, but the
bottom line is, the idea of teaching respectable
manners in itself is good, but who will teach?
If social remainders are elaborated and based on the
consensus of well-mannared people, they will serve
as teachers(a received standard/roll models). To me,
it seems a more viable solution at least than we
naively expect all(or many of the) teachers and
parents to live enough morally to set an example.
