Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Germany's "Heute Show" Making Fun of TEPCO, Japanese Government

The clip below is from their show in April, making fun of the NISA, TEPCO and the Japanese government over their handling of the Fukushima I Nuke Plant disaster. A very popular video in Japan now. Some are wondering why none of the comedians in Japan is able to do the same.

(English translation by 007bratsche (Viola) and captioning by Tokyo Brown Tabby)

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

0:46 "Well, it's a lawbreaking company, lawbreakers... working in a company."

hahahaha. German humor. They are suggesting that TEPCO's core business is to break laws.

FallOutMan said...

That's a bad sign for Tepco. The Germans are normally renowned for having no sense of humour at all. If the Germans are laughing at Tepco, then Tepco can be sure no one is taking them seriously anymore!!!!

IcePrincess said...

Germans will make fun of everything they fear. This has nothing to do with humour (which, I admit, is not one of our greatest achievements)
I think it's a sign of the fear that went through Germany at that time, combined with a not too little part of malicious joy.

Why Japanese comedians can't make fun of the accident like this? We have a strong anti-atom-movement here in Germany. We know this could have happened everywhere, even in Germany. It almost happened more than once, and we only found out years after. So, it's easy to make someone else the laughingstock. Maybe really to forget it could have been us.
If anything had gone wrong at Neckarwestheim worse than it did, I'd be in the situation of having to leave my home. And there are many Germans, who can understand that, since they are living in the famous 30-Kilometer-Zone around one or two reactors.

Anonymous said...

That was hilarious!

I'm smiling so hard now radiation immunity is guarenteed :D

Viola said...

By the way: Tokyo Brown Tabby found the original upload with japanese subtitles here, provided by user obenquaken:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kH00psyB4lc

Erik Hoffman said...

Japanese comedians or any 'talent' for that matter cannot speak out against TEPCO or the government's handling of this incident in any form for fear of immediate and permanent blacklisting by the corporate owned media here

Anonymous said...

Japanese comedians have been censored! ;-)

Anonymous said...

They would be killed. That is how far advanced Japanese democracy/freespeech is.

Japan is very un funny anyway. Except in a surreal sense.

Anonymous said...

Last Laugh, Irradiated Dental Fixture

Anonymous said...

The entertained folks had equal fun 100 yrs ago on the Titanic as she was sent down, game changer to build the (private) FED.

netudiant said...

The commentary would probably not pass muster in the US either.
I can't think of any mainstream media channel here that would accept a skit describing Citicorp or Goldman Sachs as criminal enterprises, even though we have the SEC settlements to support the claim.
So Japan is not so very different.

Anonymous said...

Germans will make fun of everything they fear. -> excellent cheap shot
Japan has the great comedian RYUK from death note, but that comes a little later in this game.

Anonymous said...

"So Japan is not so very different.

Green ppl lose their minds if someone suggests windfarming is energy negative. www.clepair.net/windSchiphol.html

Radiating ppl lose their minds if someone shows that their steam-age tech is 4-10 times energy negative...

... each needing more fossil fuel energy than they create. While known fossil fuel reserves top 2000year world consumption.

Any ppl lose their minds when details are surfaced displaying their own scheme... Reality hurts and has to be banned. Lets laugh mit übermenschen.

wingnut said...

In contrast to Japan political satire has a long tradition in Germany. Therefore it is widely accepted to disgrace authorities, especially when they talk utter nonsense like the Tepco guys or Japanese politicians.
There is a popular satirical broadcast called "Neues aus der Anstalt" (News from the (psychiatric) hospital) on German TV, where the protagonists are making statements, that are sometimes very close to agitation. I am not sure if our politicans watch this program with indifference.

arevamirpal::laprimavera said...

Japan also has a wonderful long tradition of political satire for hundreds of years, and there were writers and publishers willing to go to jail for that. Not any more, at least not when TEPCO and the Japanese government are concerned.

Naruhodo said...

Mario and Luigi were called to rescue but a Japanese Ambassador lodged a complaint, what are they going to do now?

wingnut said...

@arevamirpal
Your statement is a contradiction in itself. Authorities are the target of political satire. So if there was a "wonderful long tradition of political satire for hundreds of years" in Japan, it wouldn't stop when it comes to critizise the Japanese government and TEPCO. It's the 21th century, dude, and Japan is a democracy. Especially nowadays it should be easy to critizise authorities in Japan, but comedians don't, because there is no "wonderful long tradition of political satire".

Throughout the centuries, it was not possible to openly critize authorities in Japan and it is not different today. There is a long tradition of parody though (take the famous chōjū giga as an example), but that is something different than political satire.

arevamirpal::laprimavera said...

@wingnut, No I am not talking about paintings but actual political satire and criticism in Edo era and early Meiji era, where the writers and journalists were actually thrown in jail by the authority. What's different in Japan today in 21st century? Money from the sponsors for the TV programs.

I don't know about Japan being a "democracy".

Nuclear Skeptic said...

@anonymous 20111012,1209hrsEDT who said:

"Green ppl lose their minds if someone suggests windfarming is energy negative. www.clepair.net/windSchiphol.html"

As a former wind farm owner/operator I do not lose my mind, I just pity people who can be so deluded as to believe the pro-nuke or pro-fossil-fuels propaganda about renewables being ineffective.

But since my wind farm days I've got so p***ed-off about Big Energy that I have gone off-grid with solar PVs in my residence. This solar powered netbook computer is working just fine...

What is true about high level market penetration of wind and solar is that they are not "reliable" baseload in the normal sense, so various operational adaptations of the network have to be made to achieve acceptable levels of reliability. If Denmark had not succeeded in conquering the reliability problem, their royal family would be stumbing about the palace in pitch darkness, but apparently the lights are all blazing! ;-)

The original 19th century meaning of Übermensch (before the nazis co-opted it) had nothing to do with technocratic or corporatist overlords being bent on world domination. I'm not going to laugh along with the overlords ("mit Übermenschen"), on the contrary we should all be taking a healthy smile and laugh of satire and ridicule at their unconscionable behaviour, but only if it gives us the energy and resolve to force them from power. Laugh at rather than laugh with... ;-)

Anonymous said...

how long before they cannot ignore the fact that most of Japan becomes uninhabitable?

Anonymous said...

How long before the West Coast of America realizes that their death rates have already gone up since last years count? So has Arizona and Florida. I live on the East coast of America and am doing all I can to protect myself. I no longer trust the whores in my government or anywhere else.

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