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「しょうがない」の精神
例えば今、世界を覆う不景気に対して、フランス人ならまず、責任者に抗議する。
一方日本人は誰かに抗議するでもなく、「しょうがない」の一言で済ませてしまう。
日本人によくあるこの傾向、何に原因があるのだろうか?
The shoganai spirit
As everywhere in the world, Japan is deeply affected by the economic recession, but there are some interesting differences in the way people react to the crisis.
One example can be found by observing French and Japanese people. I say Japanese and French, but I only speak for the people I know: I would not put people from Hokkaido in the same basket as people from Okinawa, they are too different; the same holds for French people from Paris to Marseille.
The first reaction of the French, when faced with a problem or a bad situation like today's economic crisis, is to protest, and blame (strongly and loudly) the people in charge, and then, demand they fix the problem.
The Japanese, on the contrary, do not consider protest as a knee-jerk reaction. Of course they have the same complaints about the financial situation as the French, but there is a tendency to gloss over the problem with the famous expression shoganai.
To be honest, I don't always support the French way of behaving, but the shoganai spirit is not helping to solve problems either.
I have always wondered where this shoganai spirit comes from, but in my experience here, I have realized that there are no opportunties to learn how to debate in Japan.
Learning how to debate helps us analyze and form objective opinions, because we have to convince the other party that what we are arguing is right. Debating is the way to learn opinions from people with different points of view, which can lead us to new solutions for any given situation.
But when I see Japanese people trying to debate, they mix their feelings up with their opinions, and end up using shoganai to bypass the argument and avoid hurt feelings.
This habit has become an obstacle to constructive discussions: People use it as a magic spell to close the discussion as if greater forces somehow decided the situation.
But escaping from any responsibility does not provide any solution.
Words are a mirror into the personality, and shoganai is no exception. How about banning shoganai from your conversations? I bet this will create interesting changes in the way you think and interact with others.
- (is)affected by 〜
- 〜の影響を受けている
- economic recession
- 不景気
- put 〜 in the same basket as 〜
- 〜と〜を同じ範ちゅうに入れる
- holds for 〜
- 〜に当てはまる
- when faced with 〜
- 〜に直面すると
- blame
- 責める
- people in charge
- 責任者たち
- fix
- 処理する
- on the contrary
- 反対に
- consider 〜 as 〜
- 〜を〜と考える
- knee-jerk reaction
- 無条件反射
- complaints
- 不平不満
- tendency
- 傾向
- gloss over 〜
- 〜についてとりつくろう
- French way of behaving
- フランス人の行動の仕方
- analyze
- 分析する
- form objective opinions
- 偏見のない意見を形作る
- convince 〜 that 〜
- 〜に〜だと納得させる
- the other party
- 相手側
- points of view
- 見方
- solutions
- 解決策
- for any given situation
- どんな状況の下に置かれても
- mix 〜 up with 〜
- 〜と〜をごちゃ混ぜにする
- end up 〜
- 結局〜となる
- bypass
- 〜を避けて通る
- habit
- 習慣
- obstacle
- 障害
- constructive
- 建設的な
- magic spell
- おまじないの文句
- mirror
- 鏡
- 〜 is no exception
- 〜も例外ではない
- How about banning 〜
- 〜を禁止してみたらどうか
- I bet 〜
- きっと〜だ