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Japan Is Dead. The 2.8 Million Shut Ins Tell The REAL Story. - Video học tiếng Anh
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Japan Is Dead. The 2.8 Million Shut Ins Tell The REAL Story.
Japan Is Dead. The 2.8 Million Shut Ins Tell The REAL Story.
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0:00
Police entered the home of an 83 year old woman in Togane City, Japan... and found
0:04
she had been dead for over a year. Her body was badly decomposed.
0:08
But she hadn't been reported missing.. She'd simply been left where she died.
0:12
She wasn’t alone. There was one other person
0:15
in the house, her 46-year-old son, Hisataka. When police asked why he'd hidden his mother's
0:20
death for more than a year, his answer was chilling: He didn't know what to do.
0:24
This wasn't a murder case. Hisataka was a Hikikomori, a
0:28
person who had withdrawn from society for decades, living almost entirely inside his childhood home
0:33
while his mother cared for him. When she died, the only world he'd ever known died with her. He
0:38
was arrested for improperly handling a corpse. But his case exposed a far bigger question...
0:43
What happens when an entire generation has no idea how to survive after their parents are gone?
0:49
It's a sad fact of life that most of us will outlive our parents. Eventually, there comes
0:53
a day when the people who raised us are no longer there. For the most part, parents pass on, knowing
0:59
that their child’s future is well secure. Except when they’re not.
1:03
Across the world, more young adults are living with their parents than
1:06
ever before. Rising housing costs, insecure jobs,
1:08
and the cost of living have turned adulthood into a much longer transition..
1:13
But for others, the launch didn’t just sputter out… it crashed.
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It’s estimated that 1.46 million Japanese people are currently living as Hikikomori,
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spending almost all their time in their homes, interacting with the world only through
1:25
computers. It’s estimated that half of this grim number are between the ages of 40 and 64.
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That means time is running out.
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For many, the safety net has snapped and they have little hope of building
1:36
a meaningful life for themselves. But that becomes a self-fulfilling
1:40
prophecy. When you don’t use a skill for a long time, it starts to atrophy.
1:43
The skill in this case is social interaction.
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The Hikikomori have seen their ability to interact with the outside world
1:49
deteriorate with every year they spend in their rooms. Now their
1:53
only link to the world is starting to pass away one senior citizen at a time.
1:57
These aren’t just kids playing video games. They’re fully-grown adults with no ability
2:02
to survive in the outside world without help from others. So how did millions of
2:06
adults become so scared to step outside that they let their life pass them by?
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Simple.
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Society let them down.
2:14
For generations, people were told there was one way to success. Work hard in school.
2:18
Get good grades. Go to college. When you’re done, a fruitful job awaits you,
2:22
and you can ideally keep it and keep advancing through your career. Boomer and silent generation
2:27
parents would often tell their children how they got their first job knocking on an office door,
2:32
and one quick interview and a handshake later, they had a job they kept for 45
2:36
years. To those just starting out in the job market, it sounded like the American dream.
2:41
For this generation, that’s all it was… a dream.
2:44
Millennials and Gen Z were hit with one crisis after another, and while some were localized,
2:49
several hit just about everyone. It didn’t matter whether you were trying to find a job in New York
2:53
or Tokyo, the 2008 recession devastated everyone’s prospects. Many people lost all
2:58
the progress they made, had to move back home, and started crawling their way back up. Then,
3:03
history repeated itself, just under different guises. The 2020 Covid-19
3:08
pandemic led to more massive job losses that many industries never recovered from.
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So many people just gave up.
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Some Millennials moved back home and never left. Many Gen Z just never moved out at all.
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Economic stagnation meant that buying a house seemed like an impossible dream,
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and rent would eat up half their monthly budget,
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even if they had a decent job. If they had loving parents who weren’t rushing them out the door,
3:30
they had little motivation to trade in a comfortable living arrangement.
3:34
But this led to a general sense of stasis. Many millennials and Gen Z found work online, allowing
3:39
them to stay home and earn money. They didn’t have the money or motivation to go out and date. Gen
3:44
Z in particular replaced old social vices like drinking with online gambling and screen time.
3:50
All the time, a ticking clock was hiding in the background.
3:52
For the older generations, there would be a standard path they would follow:
3:56
you work until it’s your retirement date, and then the combination of savings, Social Security, and a
4:01
private pension carry you on to the finish line. But that requires a job with pension benefits,
4:05
and the ability to save. Those are some things that the younger generation often lacks,
4:10
with freelance work becoming more common. It might pay well, but it has little safety
4:14
net if the company shuts down or chooses to outsource its work to a call center or a robot.
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That means a lifeline is running out.
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The boomers’ pensions are getting thinner and thinner. They’re done working, but many of them
4:26
are still supporting their grown children. Not only do they have to save money in their golden
4:30
years, but the inheritance that their children were counting on might wind up being depleted.
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It’s a widespread crisis.
4:36
Hundreds of thousands of young men could be facing a future of poverty
4:40
with no skills to fight their way out of it in less than a decade.
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But it’s not just the men… not even close.
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The stereotype of the nerdy adult son living in their childhood bedroom is so widespread
4:51
that it’s become a running joke. But there is no equivalent stereotype for women.
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That’s why it surprises so many people that nearly half of Japan’s hikikomori population are women.
5:01
This is a significant break from the stereotype of tech-obsessed young men with no social skills.
5:06
It's all about how we view them.
5:08
If you talk to the average parent of a female Hikikomori, you might be surprised by what they
5:13
say. They’ll probably start by talking about what a dutiful daughter they have,
5:17
how she’s so willing to help around the house. For aging parents, this can actually be a
5:21
blessing. As their body slows down, the person they trust most is there to care for them,
5:25
cook for them, and make sure they aren’t alone if they take a fall. In fact,
5:29
the fastest-growing demographic of Hikikomori is women over 40.
5:33
But as far as the media goes, they might as well be invisible.
5:36
To the outside world, they have a job: helping their aging parents. But they’re no less isolated
5:41
than the male Hikikomori, with the exception of them potentially having more life skills as
5:46
chores are a big part of their life. However, their social isolation is just as complete,
5:50
and when the parent they’ve dedicated themselves to passes on, they’ll be
5:54
just as alone. Surprisingly, some of these female hikikomori are actually married. They transition
5:59
from serving an elderly parent to serving an often older husband who provides for her.
6:04
That means the actual number might be far worse.
6:06
The estimated 1.46 million Hikikomori relies heavily on self-reported numbers. But how many
6:12
women who live as near-total shut-ins would classify themselves as such? How many would
6:17
instead call themselves a “dutiful daughter” or a “devoted housewife”?
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These women may be more financially secure than their male counterparts,
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but they are not more socially adept. The lost generation could
6:28
be larger than anyone knew. Is there a way to get them out of their isolation?
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To find out, we might have to look across the ocean.
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As bad as this crisis is in Japan, it might be even worse in the West.
6:38
The United States and United Kingdom have been facing economic headwinds
6:42
for the younger generations since 2008. In the United States alone,
6:46
1 in 3 adults under 35 live with their parents. In 1960 it was only 20%. If you take the men alone,
6:53
it’s the equivalent of the entire population of Florida living in their old bedrooms.
6:57
The United Kingdom isn’t much better.
6:59
The UK has always been proud of its robust social services system, but that can be a double-edged
7:04
sword. Critics have often argued that it's too easy to live on benefits instead of working,
7:08
but the stereotype has changed. It's no longer just the image of a middle-aged
7:12
man avoiding work. Across England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland,
7:16
countless young people are looking at the rough job market and seeing no hope.
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So they’re simply opting out.
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The UK currently has 2.8 million people listed as “economically inactive” due to medical conditions,
7:28
with long-term illnesses that are not expected to change. That’s larger than
7:32
the combined population of Manchester and Birmingham, the second and fifth-largest
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cities in the country. They usually have to do frequent check-ins with the public
7:39
welfare authorities to ensure their condition hasn’t changed. But while many of these people
7:44
are older and struggling with chronic illnesses or injuries, there’s a growing number of young
7:48
people who are claiming mental health-related issues keep them from working. This number has
7:53
skyrocketed since 2020. The traumas of living through a pandemic as well as the
7:57
still-not-fully-understood phenomenon of Long Covid knocked many people out of the workforce.
8:02
Now, we might be falling into the same trap as Japan.
8:05
If you still live with your parents, the odds are you get to hear their strong opinions pretty
8:10
often. But there’s one big area where they might have been right all along. They warned
8:14
that screen time could rot your brain. There’s growing evidence that it might be the single
8:19
biggest contributor to the Hikikomori foundation and its western counterparts. Millennials were
8:24
the first generation to be inducted into the digital world when they were young,
8:27
while Gen Z were digital natives, growing up with smartphones and tablets. Gen Alpha,
8:32
meanwhile, has been immersed in screens since the time they were babies. The
8:35
wonderful thing about tech today is that it can be used to do just about anything.
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That means there’s little reason to do anything else.
8:42
Many of the traditional work paths have been closed off to a large number of
8:45
Millennials and Gen Z. The blue-collar careers in factories were heavily moved
8:50
overseas. White-collar jobs are often incredibly competitive and require a
8:54
long and expensive college education. The easiest way to make ends meet and build a
8:58
resume was often remote work. It was easy to fit around your schedule. But for many,
9:02
it became the center of their life. They would log into their online job, complete
9:06
their assignments… then log into their Steam account and play some video games to destress.
9:10
Slowly, the computer became a digital cage.
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In the past, screen time was more passive. We all remember sitting in front of that television for
9:17
hours on Saturday morning, watching cartoons before being told to go out and play by our
9:22
parents. But now, it’s entirely possible to build a whole life through the screen.
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Millions of people have a network of friends they’ve never met, a job where they’ve never
9:30
gone into the office, and a host of interests that exist entirely in the digital space.
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The thought of going without access to the internet makes people uneasy.
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As the internet only gets more immersive, this isolation from reality will only get worse.
9:43
Video games now incorporate VR elements that offer a more emotionally intense experience.
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The advent of AI has led to countless people withdrawing from human interaction even more,
9:52
preferring to chat with AI chatbots rather than with real online friends. After all,
9:57
no AI chatbot has ever cut off a friendship over a dispute over a
10:00
video game, and no AI girlfriend has ever demanded you meet her parents.
10:04
When the world outside is this unappealing, who can blame them?
10:08
The world their parents grew up in just doesn’t exist anymore. It’s been replaced
10:12
with a world where everything is too expensive. There are no
10:15
well-paying jobs to be had. There’s no way to effectively save up for big purchases,
10:19
not when the small everyday ones eat up a huge percentage of your savings.
10:23
The grim truth is, the facts back them up. What’s the most important part of moving out
10:28
of your parents’ house? Having somewhere to move to. But that’s increasingly impossible,
10:32
as rent-to-income ratios frequently exceed 50%. That’s been shown to be a psychological threshold
10:38
that sociologists point to as the “point of withdrawal”. When you’re paying a majority
10:42
of your income just to have a roof over your head, the psychological motivation of working
10:47
starts to disappear. It just feels like you’re in a trap that there’s no way of escaping from.
10:52
Among the alternatives, living at home sounds okay.
10:54
As long as a young person has a good relationship with their parents,
10:57
it’s a safe, easy, and sustainable place to live with no major downsides. The alternatives include
11:02
paying through the nose for a mediocre apartment with no way to save long-term,
11:07
or finding a living arrangement with roommates. If you’re going to have roommates anyway,
11:11
why not have the ones you’re already used to living with for 18 years? If there’s one
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word that many millennials and Gen Z would use about the future, it’s “demoralized”.
11:20
But the current status quo isn’t sustainable. Time is running out for the baby boomer
11:24
generation. As they age, the lives they've spent supporting their adult children are
11:28
nearing an inevitable end. For some, there may be a lifeline. An inheritance, or the family home,
11:33
could provide the financial security needed to finally begin an independent life. But for
11:38
Hikikomori and other shut-ins around the world, the death of a parent often isn't an opportunity.
11:43
It's the moment everything falls apart. As the baby boomer generation enters old age,
11:48
governments are facing a problem they've never had to confront at this scale. More retirees need
11:52
pensions, healthcare, and long-term care, while a relatively smaller working-age population is left
11:57
to fund it all. That’s led to people fearing that systems like Social Security, Medicare, and the
12:02
UK’s National Health Service could go bankrupt. Someone has to make up the shortfall.
12:07
Boomers have been forced to tap into their savings to pay for their retirement expenses or unexpected
12:11
healthcare costs. Some have decided that it’s time to sell the house they raised their families in.
12:16
What happens when a dependent child becomes a dependent middle-aged adult? When they've
12:20
spent decades living in their parents' home, never building a career, never learning to
12:24
live independently... and then one day, their parents are gone. If the family home has to
12:28
be sold to pay for long-term care, there's no inheritance. No backup plan. No second chance.
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For many, it's a question too uncomfortable to ask.
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But the problem is becoming impossible to ignore.
12:39
To westerners, the hikikomori phenomenon in Japan seems like a unique cultural artifact,
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caused by a society that’s known for hiding its secrets. A society deeply
12:48
afraid of being publicly shamed. But that’s only the most extreme situations,
12:52
like the middle-aged man who was so scared of being alone that he cohabited with his mother’s
12:56
corpse for over a year. But for many, they’re not choosing to isolate themselves from the world.
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It’s just something that happens as they slowly live out the only life they know.
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The cost of anything else is too much to bear.
13:08
Societies are realizing they have a real problem on their hands. The problem is at
13:12
its most acute in Asia, where South Korea has recently recognized almost 538,000
13:17
“reclusive youth” in a recent government study. That led them to pioneer a new
13:22
program offering a government stipend where the government offers 650,000 Korean Won - around
13:27
$500 US dollars - to these shut-ins. If they sign up for help, they need to leave the house
13:32
for counseling and programs. Some say this is a good idea to solve a real problem. Others compare
13:37
it to a government paying ransom in order to have enough people to staff the workforce.
13:42
But re-socializing people may be trickier than it sounds.
13:45
If South Korea’s solution is desperate, Japan’s is bizarre. In 2019, the Hikikomori
13:50
problem made international news when the “Rent-a-Sister” program was announced.
13:54
Organized by the company New Start, it allows isolated young men to sign up for visits from
13:59
women who visit the shut-ins. At first, they talk with them through doors and then try to
14:04
coax them out of the house. The goal is to get these hikikomori to potentially
14:08
move into communal housing where they can make friends and take steps towards part-time work.
14:12
These programs have shown some progress.
14:15
But they’re also band-aids on a gunshot wound.
14:18
It’s easy to look at Japan’s bizarre phenomenon where millions of young people simply decide not
14:22
to engage with the world and assume it’s a specific problem. But the Hikikomori
14:27
aren’t a uniquely Japanese issue. They’re the canary in the coal mine, and we’re deep in the
14:32
mine. The time to get the next generation of shut-ins to embrace society is running out.
14:37
Because eventually, there’ll be no one left to tell them about it.
14:40
So what will happen when the luckiest generation in history are gone? Check
14:44
out “THIS Will Happen After Baby Boomer Generation Dies Off” to
14:48
see what the future holds for the rest of us. Or click on this video.
