You Are Important

This is the single most incredible piece of cultural insight I have had since arriving in Japan.

A few weeks ago, I had a class with some san-nensei (3rd year) students.  My teacher wanted me to talk about cultural differences between America and Japan that I had noticed.  I got into a part where I was trying to describe the greater centrality of the individual in America, and the way people insist on their rights or viewpoints.  I was trying to describe this in English they could understand, and as I was finishing my teacher started writing on the board.

He said one sentence I said had jumped out at him.  I looked at what he had written.  It was "I am important".  I had used that as something an American person might think as opposed to the possible Japanese thought "We are important".  Pretty broad strokes here because of language, but more or less what I wanted to say.  My teacher smiled at me.

"I am fifty years old.  I have never heard or seen this sentence, in English or Japanese."

My brain shorted out a little.  This particular teacher has exceptional English, is interested in theater, and very interested in multi-culturalism.  Still, the fact remained that he essentially never even conceived of the idea of the sentence "I am important".

I think American, and probably most Western, kids grow up with this idea all around them.  I consider it a mark of good parenting if your child believes this about themselves, and I do believe it of myself.  I don't know that I would go around saying it out loud, but I do feel it to be true, in perhaps a more complex way than the simple thought would suggest.

Mr. Kondo (the teacher) turned to the class.  "What do you think about a person who would say this?  Do you like this person?  Raise your hand if you would like this person."  Not a hand went up.  Mr. Kondo repeated the question in Japanese to make sure.  Still no hands.  "Would you dislike this person?  Raise your hands."  Almost every hand was raised.

I tried to explain a bit more completely, even working in a grammar point review to say that Americans think it's bad to think "I am MORE important THAN YOU".  I believe the kids understood, and I don't think they think I'm an arrogant asshole, but nevertheless, it was striking.  I talked to Mr. Kondo some more after class.  He said he thought it would be good for more Japanese children to grow up thinking "I am important".  I agreed.

The class taught me something so important about cultural differences.  These kids didn't have every possible line of cultural thought in front of them to choose from, they only had their own.  So, while an American child might be thought of as having low self-esteem if they didn't think they were important, these Japanese children didn't even consider that such a thought existed.  Their thinking about society and their place in it originates from an entirely different place.

Now, I'm still being rather blunt about this point.  I'm sure there are many Japanese people who consider themselves to be important in the same way that Americans do, and there is a ton of wiggle room in any cultural discussion/theory.  However, I see the impact and effect of it more and more in my students as I learn more about them.  They believe passionately in school events, their community, their clubs.  They are often shy about asserting themselves or putting themselves in front of a group, but work together very well.  Originality is sometimes lacking, but performance is usually very high.

There's no objectively right answer to this question, but I'd be curious to hear what all you Westerners think.  Do you believe a person should feel important as an individual?  Clearly, I expect there to be a pretty strong consensus in a certain direction given the people I'm asking, but still.  I also defined "I am important" in a later conversation as "I have a place in the world and something to offer it".

In any case, if you are reading this, I think you are important.  Be honest and speak your mind clearly, wherever you are.  It matters.