>>33988678If we're thinking of the same article, it was just some salty know-it-all expat who tried to rationalize it "No, let ME tell you why THEY are wrong!" armchair anthropology cope about why Japan doesn't work the way he wants them to. And "oh they have to waste so much time learning kanji that it leaves them behind in other aspects" is laughable, given that Japan also has higher scores in math and sciences, compared to the other "average western" education systems.
>Personally I'm baffled by just how bad nips are at learning English, look at your average ID, some of them came from shit conditions of poverty and still completely mog every single JP when it comes to eigo.The simple short answer is always just "because they don't really want to / because they don't really have to". Japan is still large enough, wealthy enough and culturally self-sufficient enough that the average Jap will see no detriments in his normal daily life for not knowing english. So they simply don't care, and treat the few years they have english in school for what it actually is for them, a pointless exercise not to be taken serious and quickly forgotten again.
It's different with people from poorer countries where knowing english gives tangible benefits and is a step ahead for access into participating with the larger global economy, etc. so they have much more immediate motivation to learn.
