ABSTRACT
At least from the times of Socrates, the youth has been a disappointment. Around 450 BC, he lamented the love of luxury, lack of respect, laziness and bad behaviour of the youth at the time. New generations have always been seen as problematic by the older, and Japan is no exception. In 1958, Osada Arata, President of the Japan Pedagogical Society, made the following analysis of this seemingly eternal conflict:
According to [proponents of the morals courses], children have bad manners, speak impolitely, are egoistic and selfish, do not listen to their parents or teachers, are immodest and lack self-criticism and introspection. But the reason that the critics are making such an outcry is that they are measuring today’s children with yesterday’s yardstick. [. . .] The members of the older generation [. . .] are too quick to equate the idea of ethics with the outmoded forms of loyalty and filial piety pursued in the pre-war period.
