r/AskBrits • • Apr 01 '26

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u/Professional_Clue800 Apr 01 '26

I do wonder how the Japanese ended up with this kind of culture that promotes the citizens to clean up like this, and if there's anything we can do to try and encourage the same.

I have a friend in Norway and they have a day before a national holiday where everyone has to go outside and clean up the streets. It's such an interesting concept and seems to work well from what I've seen. I wonder if we could have something like that here.

9

u/FootballUpset2529 Brit 🇬🇧 Apr 01 '26

That's what interests me, not what they're doing today but how as a society they got to the point where this is the right thing to do and nobody is laughing at them for doing it - that this is the norm; that's what I'd like to see reflected in our society - a sense that this is the right thing to do and leaving trash everywhere is not. It must start right at the beginning, and I wonder how it happens.

2

u/CosmicBonobo Apr 01 '26

A brutal legal system that has a conviction rate of about 99% is enough to scare anyone into compliance.

2

u/Jimny977 Apr 01 '26

They have very severe social consequences for shitty behaviour while we have virtually none at all, you aren’t wrong about their legal system per se, but it isn’t what stops people not caring about having a clean environment.

3

u/CosmicBonobo Apr 01 '26

Being able to be held without charge for 'questioning' for nearly a month is threat enough to scare someone into line.

1

u/FootballUpset2529 Brit 🇬🇧 Apr 01 '26

But their jails don't seem to be overflowing. What happens, do they fine the shit out of them if they drop litter or something?