Aso and his "religious" comments

For those of you that don't know about Japan's Prime Minister Taro Aso, his politics are not to far off that of our own political wreckage back home. Rivaling Bush with around a 20% approval rating, PM Aso is similarly famed for his [absurd] controversial comments. Besides occasionally bragging about his personal wealth during Deit sessions, his most recent comment, as documented in JapanToday, pushed me a bit over the edge of annoyance, enough to make me stay up past my bedtime and write this little [blurb?] about it.

Without getting into the details [you can read the full article in the link above], PM Aso, in an attempt to make a [contributory?] comment in a government meeting about the current global economic crisis, suggested that perhaps other nations should follow Japan in their work ethic, which he claims is based out of Japan's Shinto and Buddhism religions, as a way to recover from the economic crisis. He goes on to suggest that Judeo-Christian religions are in contrast with Japanese work ethic, because [this is the good part] in the Old Testament, Adam was given work as punishment (1), and therefore Judeo-Christian religions view hard work negatively [and are therefore lazy and totally responsible for the entire economic collapse????!!!-just inferring]. And the funny thing is, PM Aso is Catholic!

There are just so many things wrong with his position that I don't even know where to begin. How about Max Weber and his theories on how enterprise and capitalism were basically derived from Protestant work ethic itself?! After the Reformation, assurance of salvation was in essence, taken way from the church, and imposed onto the individual. Various religious sects, in an attempt to establish salvation for themselves, developed mentalities of self-reliance--and out of this spirit, developed the spirit of capitalism of western societies. Initially, Weber did make a distinction between Catholics and Protestants, claiming that capitalist societies contained more Protestants than Catholics, suggesting that more Catholics held onto to pre-capitalistic mentalities. However, suggesting that these pre-capitalistic [and post-capitalistic] mentalities are somehow intrinsically related to Catholicism [or to Protestanism] is a flawed assumption. Existing discrepancies between populations of Protestants and Catholics in capitalist societies [is?] was most likely attributed to old class systems. And even if you take Weber's observations as evidence of Catholic religion's supposed intrinsic effect on enterprise--that in itself is a shakey argument. The more reasonable deduction from Weber's observations is that as result of the Reformation, schisms occurred and people changed their religious beliefs along with their mentalities. These were sociological events, rooted in the evolution of the institution of religion in the lives of people, and it's consequential effect on people's struggle to grant themselves prosperity and salvation. This was not a product of certain Old Testament writings from the Bible [Torah]! Furthermore, Weber himself noted that the capitalistic spirit he attributed to Protestantism was not limited to [Protestantism] one specific religion. Take the Jewish religion and the Jewish communities that have notably prospered, for example.

Despite the hairbrained logic of Aso's Old Testament and western work ethic comments, the more bogus element of Aso's statements [in my opinion] are his assertions that the Shinto and Buddhist religions of Japan are the reason behind the Japanese [obsession] desire for hard work. As a Prime Minister of Japan, I would think he would be more cognizant of the fact that it is a lot more likely that Japan's work ethic is a product of it's hundreds of years of Samurai rule and culture. The Samurai work ethic is something of notable distinction in Japanese history, and is actually rooted in Confucian thought that came to Japan from China, often finding itself at odds with the Shinto and Buddhist mentalities of Japan's Teno [royal elite].

Regardless of the details of all of this, Aso's "advice" was simply foolish. It is obvious that he was implying that his beliefs on Judeo-Christian religion of the West are somehow valid, contributing elements in the recent economic crisis. Most people can [probably] agree that the more likely factors are related to a combination of lack of oversight [policy] and over zealous investors, bankers, corporations, etc., attempting to make profit--[ehm-greed]--hardly religion specific. In Japan, there's a saying がんばて[ganbatte], which means "fight for it" or "work hard, you can do it". Aso could have just as easily said that, and that would have encompassed any positive element in his initial statement, and would have saved him [and us] from the incongruous [and insulting] rhetoric he unknowingly wrapped himself in.

I guess politicians are truly the same everywhere. ugh.