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Japan_s Biggest Liar · THINK BEFORE YOU SLEEP

0:00
Speaker 1: Graffiti all over the wall. Somebody illegally dumped their household
0:07
Speaker 1: trash here. This has been here for weeks. There's even
0:11
Speaker 1: graffiti on the abandoned house. This isn't London. It's not
0:16
Speaker 1: New York. This is actually Tokyo, Japan.
0:20
Speaker 2: Never would I have imagined that a small video about
0:22
Speaker 2: graffiti would cause such a firestorm. For those of you
0:25
Speaker 2: who don't know, this is a YouTuber who goes by
0:28
Speaker 2: Oriental Pearl or Alyssa. A little while back, Alyssa made
0:31
Speaker 2: this video here called, What is Happening to Japan?, where
0:34
Speaker 2: she goes into various places in Tokyo and talks about
0:37
Speaker 2: criminal activity, teenagers in poverty, and homelessness. It's sad.
0:41
Speaker 1: There's a lot of elderly homeless people in Japan and
0:45
Speaker 1: an alarming number of young homeless, which was not very
0:49
Speaker 1: common in the past.
0:51
Speaker 2: In response, Chris Broad, who probably has the biggest foreigner
0:54
Speaker 2: in Japan YouTube channel based on monthly views, went onto Facebook, Twitter, Reddit,
0:59
Speaker 2: the YouTube community tab, and Alyssa's comment section to show
1:02
Speaker 2: his disgust at her video, calling her a grifter who
1:05
Speaker 2: produces sensationalist content designed to make Japan look bad in
1:08
Speaker 2: exchange for views and money, instead of, you know, a
1:11
Speaker 2: person who's trying to look after her community and reflect
1:13
Speaker 2: the interests of the local Japanese people. After seeing the
1:16
Speaker 2: comments that Chris made, Alyssa wrote a post on Facebook
1:19
Speaker 2: and made this video asking him to remove the comments,
1:22
Speaker 2: which I get why she said it, but in my opinion,
1:24
Speaker 2: this was a dumb decision because it sounds like she's
1:26
Speaker 2: trying to censor her critics.
1:27
Speaker 1: There's a lot of problems with this post other than
1:31
Speaker 1: just being malicious, unnecessary. I asked him to take it down.
1:35
Speaker 3: It's still up.
1:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, this was a bad move. Chris was accusing her
1:39
Speaker 2: of some pretty harsh and untrue things, but I don't
1:41
Speaker 2: think she should have said that. Anyway, now that we're
1:43
Speaker 2: all caught up, let's talk about this video here that
1:46
Speaker 2: Chris made where he copies Alyssa's title, What is Happening
1:48
Speaker 2: to Japan?, Originally, before Chris made this video, I wasn't
1:52
Speaker 2: really going to talk about this drama outside of a
1:54
Speaker 2: small mention in a different video that I was already
1:56
Speaker 2: working on. However, Chris's video was so dishonest and manipulative
2:00
Speaker 2: that I'm surprised that it wasn't made by Hasan Piker,
2:03
Speaker 2: and the worst part is that you can't tell he's
2:04
Speaker 2: being manipulative unless you know a lot about his channel,
2:07
Speaker 2: have insider information on the subject, and can interpret statistics.
2:11
Speaker 2: So of course everyone took Chris aside because his following
2:14
Speaker 2: is much bigger, and it requires at least 10 seconds
2:16
Speaker 2: of research to prove some of his points as false. Well,
2:19
Speaker 2: this video didn't help either, but the lack of fact-checking
2:21
Speaker 2: of Chris's video, particularly from other YouTubers, was disgusting. Now,
2:25
Speaker 2: full disclosure, I've been friends with Alyssa for about a year.
2:28
Speaker 2: She helped out a lot with my Japan trip, so
2:30
Speaker 2: I do have a bias. However, I've been a fan
2:33
Speaker 2: of Chris's channel for probably close to 10 years, so
2:35
Speaker 2: I think that cancels out the friend bias. I'm not
2:38
Speaker 2: taking Alyssa's side because we're friends. I'm taking her side
2:40
Speaker 2: because I think Chris is wrong on this subject and
2:43
Speaker 2: was highly manipulative, and also because in order to make
2:46
Speaker 2: his point, Chris essentially rubber-stamps vandalism, which particularly pisses me
2:50
Speaker 2: off because as an American, I'm tired of people constantly
2:53
Speaker 2: defending criminal behavior. It's not a violent riot where people
2:56
Speaker 2: are setting buildings on fire. It's a mostly peaceful protest. Oh,
3:00
Speaker 2: come on, the graffiti's not that bad. There's always been
3:03
Speaker 2: graffiti in Japan. Look, here's some graffiti from the 90s. Therefore,
3:07
Speaker 2: it's okay. That doesn't matter, Chris, unless the property owner
3:10
Speaker 2: consented to it being there. It's a crime, and it's
3:13
Speaker 2: not wrong for Alyssa to be upset about that. Clearly
3:16
Speaker 2: Japanese people don't think it should be there, because there
3:18
Speaker 2: are anti-graffiti signs everywhere in Japan. Anyway, let's get into
3:21
Speaker 2: Chris's video.
3:22
Speaker 4: The other day I started receiving messages from people asking
3:25
Speaker 4: me if Japan is okay, linking a rather ominous sounding
3:28
Speaker 4: video called, What is Happening to Japan? It wasn't just
3:32
Speaker 4: the title and thumbnail that were ominous, but the description reading,
3:35
Speaker 4: Is Japan cooked? I've seen a lot of changes and
3:39
Speaker 4: things seem to be getting worse. In an era where
3:42
Speaker 4: I'm now being sent daily AI videos and photos that
3:45
Speaker 4: sorely misrepresent Japan from bizarre and questionable accounts, it made
3:49
Speaker 4: an almost refreshing change to be sent something produced by
3:52
Speaker 4: a human being.
3:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, why didn't you have a crash out about that problem?
3:56
Speaker 2: I mean, those AI videos constantly spread false information about
3:59
Speaker 2: Japanese culture. Personally, I think that's a much bigger issue
4:02
Speaker 2: as YouTube is flooded with them. So where's the video
4:04
Speaker 2: about that? Anyway, let's talk about Tokyo, more specifically a
4:07
Speaker 2: part of Tokyo called Kabukicho.
4:09
Speaker 4: For half of the runtime of the video, the creator
4:11
Speaker 4: in question walks through Kabukicho in Shinjuku.
4:14
Speaker 2: Sorry about the instant pause, but you might notice that
4:16
Speaker 2: throughout the video, Chris continuously blurs Alyssa's face and her
4:19
Speaker 2: channel name, and calls her the creator in question instead
4:22
Speaker 2: of by her name or by her YouTube channel.
4:24
Speaker 5: Why is he blurring her face? Why is he blurring
4:27
Speaker 5: her face out? And no reference to the channel? Oh,
4:30
Speaker 5: no way. No way he did that.
4:32
Speaker 2: Allow me to point out that this is not to
4:34
Speaker 2: protect her from Chris's viewers harassing her, which is something
4:37
Speaker 2: that will happen anytime you criticize someone no matter what
4:39
Speaker 2: preventative actions you take. But Alyssa has a channel with
4:42
Speaker 2: over a million subscribers. Anyone who would write a mean
4:45
Speaker 2: comment about her already knows who Chris is talking about,
4:48
Speaker 2: so this is not an altruistic protective move. What's actually
4:51
Speaker 2: going on here is that he's using an old Twitch
4:53
Speaker 2: streamer technique of purposefully not mentioning people by name because
4:57
Speaker 2: big creators know that the easier they make it to
4:59
Speaker 2: find the person they're criticizing, the more followers they will
5:02
Speaker 2: bleed to their opposition because it allows followers to fact-check
5:05
Speaker 2: their favorite creator and sympathize with the person that they're criticizing.
5:08
Speaker 2: This is a strategy that Hasan Piker and friends love using.
5:12
Speaker 2: so that less people will find out that actually, the
5:14
Speaker 2: creator in question is not as bad as you made
5:16
Speaker 2: them out to be.
5:17
Speaker 6: Hasan calls out the haters and slop tubers.
5:20
Speaker 3: Oh my god, all the f * * * ing
5:21
Speaker 3: haters on like I suck my d * * * too.
5:23
Speaker 3: Oh my god, all the f * * * ing
5:25
Speaker 3: slop tubers.
5:26
Speaker 7: Obviously talking about me here, but he's never going to
5:28
Speaker 7: mention my name. Just in case one person from his
5:31
Speaker 7: audience checks out my channel and realizes that Hasan is
5:34
Speaker 7: a complete fraud and everything.
5:36
Speaker 2: Chris blurring Alyssa's face is him basically saying... I'm afraid
5:39
Speaker 2: of losing followers, so I'm going to intentionally make it
5:42
Speaker 2: harder to fact-check what I'm saying. I mention this because
5:45
Speaker 2: Chris very clearly tells his audience to not watch Alyssa's
5:47
Speaker 2: content or do any critical thinking for themselves. I don't
5:51
Speaker 2: care how bad you think the content is, outwardly discouraging
5:54
Speaker 2: your followers from watching the source material for themselves so
5:57
Speaker 2: they can come to their own conclusions is immoral. But
6:00
Speaker 2: you know, I wonder why he would say that. Maybe
6:01
Speaker 2: people would find out that he's lying about some things.
6:03
Speaker 2: Maybe he's avoiding important arguments. Maybe he edited things out
6:06
Speaker 2: of context or said she said things that she didn't say. Well,
6:09
Speaker 2: why don't we get into that?
6:11
Speaker 4: For half of the runtime of the video, the creator
6:12
Speaker 4: in question walks through Kabukicho in Shinjuku, Japan's biggest nightlife district,
6:17
Speaker 4: with a reputation for being dirty and gritty, filming bin bags, litter,
6:20
Speaker 4: and homeless people. And it's at this point I need
6:22
Speaker 4: to reiterate, if you don't know Japan, Kabukicho, or Shinjuku,
6:26
Speaker 4: can be a bit of a shock. And in recent years,
6:28
Speaker 4: it's been gentrified more than perhaps anywhere in Tokyo. It
6:32
Speaker 4: used to be genuinely quite dangerous. In the short-form content,
6:35
Speaker 4: the same videos show the litter being intercut at times
6:38
Speaker 4: with foreign tourists, who are queuing unremarkably to take a
6:41
Speaker 4: photo of the Toho Godzilla statue.
6:43
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know who edited this, but this
6:45
Speaker 2: shot looks like a bunch of Japanese people loitering, not tourists.
6:48
Speaker 2: So a real good example of your points. The next
6:50
Speaker 2: shot has tourists in it, which I guess Chris is
6:52
Speaker 2: using to suggest that Alyssa is a racist trying to
6:54
Speaker 2: make people hate foreigners, but also note that Kabukicho is
6:57
Speaker 2: a massive tourist spot, so it's really hard to take
7:00
Speaker 2: b-roll footage without showing tourists. More importantly, Chris avoids Alyssa's
7:04
Speaker 2: main point about Kabukicho, which is not about trash on
7:06
Speaker 2: the street, but about prostitution being made worse by COVID lockdowns.
7:10
Speaker 1: Right after the pandemic, a lot of runaways from all
7:12
Speaker 1: across the country, even really young kids, middle school and
7:16
Speaker 1: high school age, came and gathered here at Toyoko Kiroba.
7:21
Speaker 1: So there were the Toyoko kids, the runaways from Japan,
7:24
Speaker 1: all across the country that came to Shinjuku. They'd stay
7:26
Speaker 1: in the manga cafes. They'd work, you know, not legal jobs.
7:32
Speaker 1: during the daytime. But you don't see them so much
7:35
Speaker 1: anymore because it became so famous in Japan that the
7:38
Speaker 1: police had to get involved and put a stop to it.
7:41
Speaker 1: And I had never seen anything like this in Japan before.
7:45
Speaker 1: Not only the professional ladies of the night standing out here,
7:49
Speaker 1: but also the amateurs.
7:52
Speaker 2: The narrative from when she was in Kabukicho was not
7:54
Speaker 2: primarily about trash or rats. It was about minors fleeing
7:57
Speaker 2: from their homes because school shutdowns from COVID lockdowns were
8:00
Speaker 2: forcing them to be around their abusive parents a lot more.
8:03
Speaker 2: A lot of people don't realize this, but if you
8:05
Speaker 2: have bad parents, school sports and clubs can be a
8:07
Speaker 2: very effective escape from that. So because these kids couldn't
8:10
Speaker 2: use school programs to escape because they were shut down,
8:13
Speaker 2: teens ran away, and a lot of them were forced
8:15
Speaker 2: to turn to sex work to survive. I mean, Alyssa
8:18
Speaker 2: spends around 20% of the runtime of her video talking
8:20
Speaker 2: about this, but Chris just completely skips over the biggest
8:23
Speaker 2: tragedy in Alyssa's content and moves on to homeless people
8:26
Speaker 2: in Shinjuku, which I guess is easier for him to attack.
8:29
Speaker 4: The area is also synonymous with Tokyo's homeless population as
8:32
Speaker 4: far back as 2003, when the film Tokyo Godfathers shone
8:36
Speaker 4: a spotlight on the long-standing homeless population, which, according to
8:40
Speaker 4: the statistics, is thankfully going down. If you walk around
8:43
Speaker 4: there today, compared to 10 years ago, there are far
8:45
Speaker 4: less homeless people.
8:47
Speaker 2: Okay, so Chris has provided us with some numbers about homelessness,
8:50
Speaker 2: so let's fact-check them. Now, he did a terrible job
8:52
Speaker 2: of citing his exact resource, but thanks to AI and
8:55
Speaker 2: seven years of experience, I was able to find this graph.
8:58
Speaker 2: First of all, these numbers seem a little bit low.
9:00
Speaker 2: There's only a couple thousand homeless people throughout the entire
9:02
Speaker 2: country in a population of 120 million. That's very difficult
9:06
Speaker 2: to believe. How are these numbers being collected?
9:09
Speaker 6: This is another problem that people have is that they
9:11
Speaker 6: look at data, but they don't have any sort of
9:14
Speaker 6: understanding of how data collection methods work. And so they
9:18
Speaker 6: only can look at outcomes and they can't look at
9:21
Speaker 6: processes or, you know, basically the way that the data
9:25
Speaker 6: was collected.
9:26
Speaker 2: So apparently the Japanese government is notorious for undercounting homeless people,
9:30
Speaker 2: which is why Oriental Pearl was bringing attention to it.
9:33
Speaker 2: And if you actually look at the paragraph right below
9:35
Speaker 2: the headline, it says that these stats do not count
9:38
Speaker 2: people who live in internet or manga cafes, which is
9:40
Speaker 2: important because this was a major point in Alyssa's video.
9:43
Speaker 2: There's actually a newer article from the same website that
9:46
Speaker 2: also says that manga cafes were not counted. Not having
9:49
Speaker 2: a permanent residence means that these people are still considered homeless.
9:52
Speaker 2: For those of you who don't know, a manga cafe
9:54
Speaker 2: is basically a building full of cubicles with a bed
9:57
Speaker 2: and a computer, and you can stay at them overnight
9:59
Speaker 2: for anything from $ 13 to $ 16 a day, which is
10:02
Speaker 2: around $ 400 to $ 500 a month. People in Japan do
10:04
Speaker 2: this because you can't get in an apartment unless you
10:06
Speaker 2: have a stable job, and oftentimes you have to come
10:09
Speaker 2: up with the amount of six months of rent in
10:10
Speaker 2: advance before they let you live there, which is nearly
10:12
Speaker 2: impossible for some of these people to get. Japan is
10:15
Speaker 2: in serious need for some protective legislation for renters. But
10:18
Speaker 2: how many people are living in manga cafes? Well, here's
10:21
Speaker 2: an article that said they counted 4,000 people just in Tokyo.
10:24
Speaker 2: Just in Tokyo. So there's no way in hell the
10:27
Speaker 2: homeless numbers that Chris showed are accurate. But don't take
10:30
Speaker 2: it from me, take it from Joey, Chris's friend from
10:32
Speaker 2: Trash Taste.
10:33
Speaker 3: Apparently, according to a government study just last year in 2023,
10:37
Speaker 3: they found out that only 3,065 homeless people exist in
10:42
Speaker 3: the entirety of the country. If we go back to
10:45
Speaker 3: this Japan Today article, they actually look into the fact that, hey,
10:49
Speaker 3: the way that these numbers were calculated might be a
10:52
Speaker 3: little bit skewed. Second is the method by which the
10:55
Speaker 3: numbers were collected for parks and riversides. Local government workers
10:58
Speaker 3: visited the sites in the territories and reported the number
11:00
Speaker 3: of homeless people they saw there. So any homeless person
11:03
Speaker 3: out of sight or out of the park at the
11:05
Speaker 3: time of the site's visit was not included in the tally.
11:09
Speaker 2: That's interesting. We aren't even talking about them not including
11:12
Speaker 2: the manga cafes here. The numbers that they were counting
11:15
Speaker 2: in the government study weren't even accurate because as Joey
11:17
Speaker 2: goes on to say in his video, there could be
11:20
Speaker 2: like a tent left out, but if a homeless person
11:22
Speaker 2: wasn't there at the time of the tally, they wouldn't
11:24
Speaker 2: be counted. Also, look at what else he says.
11:27
Speaker 3: Nowadays, especially in Japan, there is actually a whole other
11:30
Speaker 3: crisis that is happening, which is actually resulting in a
11:35
Speaker 3: completely different demographic slowly becoming homeless. And that is actually kids.
11:42
Speaker 3: They're called Poryoko kids. Some ranging from as young as
11:46
Speaker 3: 14 years old. Maybe that's not on Japan's agenda right now.
11:50
Speaker 3: Maybe they're just too concerned of the whole tourism problem
11:54
Speaker 3: and the whole immigration problem and every other problem that
11:57
Speaker 3: Japan has been, you know, quietly sweeping under the rug
12:00
Speaker 3: to make sure that the rest of the world doesn't
12:02
Speaker 3: know about it, but, hey, unfortunately, they've got someone like
12:06
Speaker 3: me who is not afraid to pull the dust from
12:09
Speaker 3: under the rug and show you the unfortunate, ugly side
12:13
Speaker 3: to a country that is viewed by many people as
12:16
Speaker 3: a utopian society.
12:18
Speaker 2: I mean, that sounds a lot like what Alyssa said
12:20
Speaker 2: in her video. So I'll expect that Chris will now
12:22
Speaker 2: do an update accusing Joey of making sensationalist content about
12:25
Speaker 2: Japan for views and money. But going back to the numbers,
12:28
Speaker 2: undercounting might not be the only issue with the research.
12:31
Speaker 2: Most of the homeless people living outside are old men,
12:34
Speaker 2: so the number could be lower not because Japan has
12:36
Speaker 2: done anything about the homeless problem, but simply because they
12:38
Speaker 2: are dying off and their younger replacements are choosing to
12:41
Speaker 2: live in manga cafes. Either way, this is a really
12:44
Speaker 2: embarrassing level of research that Chris has done. Like, I
12:46
Speaker 2: haven't seen research this bad since the video on Noah Sampson,
12:49
Speaker 2: or maybe Ethan is online. Chris couldn't even read the
12:52
Speaker 2: paragraph directly below the headline that puts the numbers in question.
12:56
Speaker 2: How is it that this kind of incredibly lazy research
12:58
Speaker 2: happens every time I fact-check someone? But here's the most
13:01
Speaker 2: egregious part about the whole homeless situation, though it's going
13:04
Speaker 2: to require a little bit of backstory. To start, Chris
13:07
Speaker 2: made a big deal about Alyssa adding additional graffiti to
13:09
Speaker 2: her thumbnail.
13:10
Speaker 4: When I went to take the thumbnail for my video,
13:12
Speaker 4: I quickly noticed a few interesting differences between my original
13:15
Speaker 4: ungraded photos and the thumbnail of her video. It is
13:19
Speaker 4: a rather fascinating game of spot the difference.
13:22
Speaker 2: Alright, valid criticism. She said her reasoning for doing this
13:26
Speaker 2: was because she was standing in front of some of
13:27
Speaker 2: the graffiti, so she added a little bit more so
13:29
Speaker 2: that people would get the point. I'm not sure if
13:31
Speaker 2: this is a creative decision that I would have made,
13:33
Speaker 2: but personally, if her claim is that there is more
13:35
Speaker 2: graffiti in Japan and she proves it in the video,
13:38
Speaker 2: then I don't think this creative choice for her thumbnail
13:40
Speaker 2: is the biggest sin in the world. Every creator who
13:43
Speaker 2: is popular sensationalizes their thumbnails in some way, and even
13:46
Speaker 2: Chris admits to doing that.
13:48
Speaker 4: Some criticisms leveled at me is that I also make
13:50
Speaker 4: sensationalist content and that I only show the nice side
13:53
Speaker 4: of Japan. And to that I would say there's a
13:55
Speaker 4: big difference between sensationalist content and clickbait titles and thumbnails.
14:00
Speaker 4: I hate having to pull a stupid face. I hate
14:02
Speaker 4: my thumbnails and titles. But it is simply a matter
14:05
Speaker 4: of survival on an increasingly crowded platform that doesn't share
14:08
Speaker 4: your content unless it has a high click-through rate. And
14:11
Speaker 4: I tried to make up for the stupid faces and
14:13
Speaker 4: titles by delivering content that does the subject matter justice.
14:18
Speaker 2: Right, so it's okay when you clickbait your thumbnails and titles,
14:20
Speaker 2: but not when Alyssa does it. It's sensationalizing when other
14:23
Speaker 2: people do it, but when you do it, it's not
14:25
Speaker 2: sensationalizing because you said you don't like doing it. Great cop-out.
14:29
Speaker 5: Day in my life, living in Tokyo was a mistake.
14:31
Speaker 5: Do you actually mean it was a mistake? So, like,
14:33
Speaker 5: are you planning on moving out? Because, I mean, otherwise,
14:36
Speaker 5: this is clickbait. Hey, look, in my most humiliating moment
14:39
Speaker 5: in Japan in 10 years, it's pretty awful.
14:41
Speaker 2: Oh, is it awful?
14:42
Speaker 5: Oh, my gosh, what happened to him? He never uses
14:45
Speaker 5: or adopts any form of sensationalistic title in order to
14:49
Speaker 5: get how many? One million views. One million views. You
14:53
Speaker 5: literally pointed the finger at a person you blurred out,
14:57
Speaker 5: telling us... how awful she was because of her sensationalistic
15:02
Speaker 5: and click-baity titles in order to get the views, and
15:05
Speaker 5: you do worse.
15:07
Speaker 2: Though here's the funny thing. It's only been a couple
15:10
Speaker 2: of weeks and now there's like twice as much graffiti
15:12
Speaker 2: on that building that Alyssa used for her thumbnail, so
15:14
Speaker 2: you could say that she was ahead of her time
15:16
Speaker 2: on this one. Now, as far as the homeless stuff goes,
15:19
Speaker 2: this thumbnail drama is actually not my big issue. I'm
15:22
Speaker 2: just establishing how Chris says he doesn't like people using
15:24
Speaker 2: the editing to distort the truth even though not long
15:27
Speaker 2: after the upload, more graffiti was put on the building. However,
15:30
Speaker 2: in regards to the homelessness issue, there's a particular clip
15:33
Speaker 2: that Chris shows of Alyssa that makes her look really
15:35
Speaker 2: bad during this part here.
15:36
Speaker 4: A few years ago, a friend showed me a clip
15:38
Speaker 4: of a video in which the same person walked through
15:41
Speaker 4: an economically deprived part of Tokyo filming homeless people.
15:44
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, this is a rough area. Yeah, that
15:47
Speaker 2: looks pretty awful. It looks like she's making fun of
15:49
Speaker 2: homeless people here. And because of this cut that Chris made,
15:52
Speaker 2: Alyssa showed me that she got tons of comments from
15:55
Speaker 2: his fans, saying that she was laughing at homeless people.
15:57
Speaker 2: But that's not what actually happened in this video that
15:59
Speaker 2: Alyssa made. So for context, let me show you where
16:02
Speaker 2: that audio comes from. In this situation while she's filming,
16:05
Speaker 2: a homeless guy calls her over to talk to her.
16:08
Speaker 2: They talk for a bit, and this is how the
16:09
Speaker 2: conversation ends.
16:12
Speaker 1: What do you mean?
16:13
Speaker 7: What do you mean?
16:16
Speaker 5: You guys, what are you doing?
16:18
Speaker 8: Sex only.
16:19
Speaker 9: Two sexes.
16:21
Speaker 10: So the audio that Chris used comes from her talking.
16:24
Speaker 1: To a homeless person, and the clip of her laughing
16:30
Speaker 1: is actually her laughing uncomfortably.
16:50
Speaker 2: Because she was being sexually harassed. Chris decided to cut
16:53
Speaker 2: that up and put it with different B-roll to make
16:55
Speaker 2: it look like she was laughing at homeless people. I mean,
16:57
Speaker 2: that kind of sounds like defamation, buddy. And I know
17:00
Speaker 2: he's aware that what he did was wrong because he
17:02
Speaker 2: cut it out of the video. This is what the
17:04
Speaker 2: video looks like now.
17:05
Speaker 4: A few years ago, a friend showed me a clip
17:07
Speaker 4: of a video in which the same person walked through
17:10
Speaker 4: an economically deprived part of Tokyo filming homeless people under
17:13
Speaker 4: the guise of showing the real Japan.
17:15
Speaker 2: It was in the video, and now it's not. So Chris,
17:18
Speaker 2: who is Mr. Moral's, cut this moment out in the
17:20
Speaker 2: YouTube editor after people noticed what he did. And, you know,
17:24
Speaker 2: maybe this was a mistake, so you would expect an
17:26
Speaker 2: apology or some sort of public acknowledgement of the clip
17:29
Speaker 2: and an explanation for why it was cut. But nope,
17:31
Speaker 2: he tried to memory hole something that millions of people
17:34
Speaker 2: saw before it was removed, which, again, sounds a lot
17:37
Speaker 2: like defamation. Alright, let's talk about graffiti.
17:40
Speaker 4: The other half of the runtime in these videos was
17:42
Speaker 4: dedicated to Nakameguro, a trendy district that's historically one of
17:46
Speaker 4: Tokyo's most artistic neighborhoods.
17:49
Speaker 2: Wait, Chris, that's not true. The second half is not
17:52
Speaker 2: just about Nakameguro. There's a pretty large section of that
17:54
Speaker 2: video dedicated to graffiti in Shibuya.
17:57
Speaker 1: Here we are in Shibuya now, and of course you're
18:01
Speaker 1: very familiar with the Shibuya Crosswalk, which is right ahead
18:05
Speaker 1: of us. But what you're less familiar with is what
18:11
Speaker 1: I want to check out today. Graffiti again next.
18:14
Speaker 2: To Louis Vuitton.
18:15
Speaker 3: Check this out.
18:20
Speaker 1: This is right by my Chinese school. I have to
18:22
Speaker 1: see this every freaking day. The city actually did come
18:26
Speaker 1: and repaint this whole bridge because it looked like that
18:28
Speaker 1: green wall before. But as you see, it's already back.
18:33
Speaker 1: That's a new one. That's a new one.
18:36
Speaker 2: It's really interesting to pay attention to which things that
18:39
Speaker 2: Chris chooses to leave out, especially considering that I've been
18:42
Speaker 2: a viewer for many years, so I know why Chris
18:44
Speaker 2: might want to leave Shibuya out of his criticism of
18:46
Speaker 2: Alyssa's content, despite it being a large section of her video.
18:49
Speaker 2: I also find his reassurance to people in his Twitter
18:52
Speaker 2: crashout that Shibuya is not that bad to be a
18:54
Speaker 2: little suspicious as well. And that's because Chris owns a
18:57
Speaker 2: bar in Shibuya that's really close to that famous crosswalk
19:00
Speaker 2: that Alyssa shows in her video. I've actually been to
19:02
Speaker 2: Chris's bar, I was just there about a month ago.
19:05
Speaker 2: and it was exclusively foreigners, like exclusively his fanbase. I
19:09
Speaker 2: don't think any of the locals go there, it's clearly
19:11
Speaker 2: a tourist trap. So you can understand why Chris might
19:13
Speaker 2: want to forget to mention a place that Alyssa was
19:15
Speaker 2: suggesting had a ton of graffiti, and thus a higher
19:18
Speaker 2: crime rate than other places in Tokyo, considering that it
19:21
Speaker 2: was not that far from his business. Actually, Kabukicho isn't
19:24
Speaker 2: even that far from it either. Like, if you were
19:25
Speaker 2: planning a day trip, you would hit Kabukicho slash Shinjuku,
19:29
Speaker 2: Meiji Shrine, and the big Shibuya crosswalk, which is by
19:31
Speaker 2: Chris's bar, all in the same day. So again, it's
19:34
Speaker 2: a little suspicious that he chose to not bring up
19:36
Speaker 2: the Shibuya part of her video on his YouTube channel,
19:39
Speaker 2: where it would have far more reach than his Twitter account.
19:41
Speaker 2: But anyway, let's continue with Tokyo's Meguro district.
19:44
Speaker 4: A few years ago, I think it was 2019, there
19:46
Speaker 4: was quite a lot of graffiti, and the local schools
19:48
Speaker 4: got together to paint over it, and then the graffiti
19:51
Speaker 4: came back again. But when Japanese TV made a video
19:54
Speaker 4: on it, interviewing locals, interestingly, they didn't intercut it with
19:57
Speaker 4: shots of Asia's biggest nightlife district and call it, What
20:00
Speaker 4: is Happening to Japan? They called it, Residence Express Discomfort
20:04
Speaker 4: at 37 Graffiti Sites Found Around Nakameguro Station. And maybe
20:08
Speaker 4: that's why, despite having twice the number of subscribers, they
20:10
Speaker 4: only got 100,000 views. instead of almost half a million.
20:14
Speaker 4: Silly traditional media attempting to present news in an objective
20:18
Speaker 4: manner in 2025.
20:20
Speaker 2: He's essentially saying that it's fine if Alyssa talks about graffiti,
20:23
Speaker 2: but not if she talks about graffiti and Kabukicho in
20:26
Speaker 2: the same video? YouTubers are only allowed to cover one
20:28
Speaker 2: problem that Japan is having per piece of content? Outside
20:32
Speaker 2: of that, after hearing that last point from Chris, I
20:34
Speaker 2: have fully started to believe that he is either retarded
20:37
Speaker 2: or highly manipulative. because anyone who is big on this
20:40
Speaker 2: website would know that Alyssa and this Japanese news channel
20:43
Speaker 2: are appealing to different audiences, and thus, they will get
20:46
Speaker 2: different outcomes. The English market on YouTube is far bigger
20:49
Speaker 2: than the Japanese market, because more people speak English, so naturally,
20:53
Speaker 2: just by putting your video out in English, you are
20:55
Speaker 2: more likely to get views.
20:56
Speaker 6: But this is also an example that's in Japanese, and
21:00
Speaker 6: so you can't really compare that to an English video.
21:03
Speaker 2: Actually, speaking of, most of the reason that I have
21:06
Speaker 2: an issue with Chris's stance on crime in Japan... is
21:08
Speaker 2: because he's saying it in English, meaning that it's not
21:11
Speaker 2: really going to affect the ideas of Japanese people. However,
21:14
Speaker 2: it will have an effect on Westerners who already have
21:16
Speaker 2: incredibly soft on crime stances, which is a part of
21:19
Speaker 2: the reason why America has massive crime rates compared to Japan.
21:23
Speaker 2: After watching that girl get stabbed on a train by
21:25
Speaker 2: a crazy violent felon who was let off when he
21:27
Speaker 2: should have been in prison, of course I'm going to
21:29
Speaker 2: get mad when somebody with a big audience on YouTube
21:31
Speaker 2: says in English,' Come on, guys, graffiti isn't that bad.' Actually,
21:35
Speaker 2: sometimes it looks kind of cool, so it doesn't matter
21:37
Speaker 2: if the property owners don't want it there. Anyway, this
21:40
Speaker 2: comparison between Japanese media and Alyssa's channel is retarded for
21:43
Speaker 2: numerous reasons that have nothing to do with Alyssa being
21:46
Speaker 2: an evil profiteer who is sensationalizing Japan for money. What's
21:49
Speaker 2: actually happening is that this Japanese channel is, one, in
21:53
Speaker 2: a different language and therefore in a different market, Two,
21:56
Speaker 2: it's one of those news channels that uploads like a
21:57
Speaker 2: million videos a day, so none of their videos do
22:00
Speaker 2: particularly well despite their high subscriber count. I scrolled down
22:03
Speaker 2: through two weeks of content and zero videos hit half
22:06
Speaker 2: a million views. Most of their well-performing videos were about
22:08
Speaker 2: the new prime minister, actually. And last, they do their
22:11
Speaker 2: content in the style of old media, which young people
22:14
Speaker 2: find boring these days. Also, the title the news company
22:17
Speaker 2: gave the video is really bad and not formatted for
22:19
Speaker 2: YouTube success. But Chris, how are you not able to
22:22
Speaker 2: see this as a channel with 3 million subscribers? Again,
22:25
Speaker 2: he's either retarded or he's being super dishonest here to
22:27
Speaker 2: make Alyssa look bad, and he can get away with
22:29
Speaker 2: it because normies don't understand this stuff about media. And
22:32
Speaker 2: on a final note, on the graffiti part, outside of
22:35
Speaker 2: his bar being in one of the areas that Alyssa
22:37
Speaker 2: was talking about, I'm not even sure what Chris's issue
22:39
Speaker 2: was because all the Japanese people I see commenting on
22:42
Speaker 2: this in videos are essentially agreeing with Alyssa about the graffiti.
22:46
Speaker 8: So in this case, I don't think Oriental Pearl is
22:49
Speaker 8: exaggerating or sensationalist seeing that much graffiti in Japan.
22:54
Speaker 9: It's not usual.
22:56
Speaker 10: So that corner is actually here. It was actually, it's
23:02
Speaker 10: actually getting worse. 2023 versus now. So if her point
23:08
Speaker 10: is like, oh yeah, Japan's getting more graffitis everywhere and
23:11
Speaker 10: trash everywhere. Yeah, I didn't know about this myself. It
23:15
Speaker 10: seems like she's actually true.
23:16
Speaker 2: There are also multiple news reports of Japanese people saying
23:19
Speaker 2: they don't want the graffiti there. So why are you
23:21
Speaker 2: defending criminals by saying it's not that bad, Chris? It
23:24
Speaker 2: is bad. 90% of the graffiti looks like shit and
23:28
Speaker 2: it's expensive to remove.
23:29
Speaker 1: Living here for all these years with my Japanese husband,
23:32
Speaker 1: I've never seen the vandalism this bad. It's obvious. We
23:36
Speaker 1: can see it every day. It makes me very sad
23:39
Speaker 1: too because this is a provable news story going on
23:42
Speaker 1: across Japan. Like this recent story from Kobe where two
23:47
Speaker 1: guys graffitied the wall in the middle of the night
23:50
Speaker 1: causing thousands of dollars in property damage. In Niigata, the
23:54
Speaker 1: same thing happened and it cost $ 40, 000 almost to clean
23:58
Speaker 1: this up. It's no surprise that some cities can't afford
24:01
Speaker 1: to clean this up. Even though Japanese really do hate graffiti,
24:06
Speaker 1: and there's a theory that this will cause more crime
24:09
Speaker 1: in the area.
24:10
Speaker 2: Allow me to add a fact-checking note to say that
24:12
Speaker 2: the headline said it costs 4 million yen to remove,
24:14
Speaker 2: which is about $ 26, 000, not $ 40, 000. Before it would have
24:18
Speaker 2: been around $ 40, 000, but the yen has gotten much weaker. Well,
24:22
Speaker 2: either way, it's still expensive to remove, but that won't
24:24
Speaker 2: stop Chris from minimizing criminal behavior.
24:26
Speaker 4: So at this point you might be thinking, okay, right,
24:28
Speaker 4: so what's happened to Japan? What happened next?
24:31
Speaker 8: Lean in.
24:32
Speaker 4: Come closer. Come over here. That was it. That was
24:36
Speaker 4: literally it. In a country of 120 million people, they
24:40
Speaker 4: were all cooked because of some bin bags in a
24:42
Speaker 4: red light district and some spray paint on a wall
24:46
Speaker 4: down six or seven streets in the capital city.
24:49
Speaker 2: Again, he's avoiding the issue of child homelessness that was
24:51
Speaker 2: brought up in the video. That was the primary reason
24:54
Speaker 2: that she was in Kabuki Cho. As for the title
24:57
Speaker 2: and the description, one, no one reads the description of
24:59
Speaker 2: any video ever unless they're clicking on a sponsor link
25:02
Speaker 2: or a donation link or the creator directly tells people
25:04
Speaker 2: to look. So no one is reading this here before
25:06
Speaker 2: the video and thinking, oh my god, Japan is cooked,
25:09
Speaker 2: because no one ever reads the description before watching any video. Two, realistically,
25:14
Speaker 2: I don't think either of those are saying that it's
25:16
Speaker 2: the end of Japan. I think taken into context with
25:18
Speaker 2: the video, it's just like, hey, there's a lot of
25:20
Speaker 2: graffiti in Japan and it keeps getting worse. Japan might
25:23
Speaker 2: be cooked in terms of graffiti. Also, there are some
25:26
Speaker 2: other problems, which I think is a fair point to
25:28
Speaker 2: make because as Chris's friend Joey said earlier, Most foreigners
25:32
Speaker 2: seem to have this idea that Japan is this magical
25:34
Speaker 2: fairytale anime land where everything is great and no bad
25:37
Speaker 2: stuff ever happens. I don't think it's a problem to
25:39
Speaker 2: talk about the issues that Japan is having, like the economy,
25:42
Speaker 2: or the constant pressure to be an alcoholic, or the gambling,
25:45
Speaker 2: or the lowering birth rates, or the mass availability of
25:48
Speaker 2: pornography with no barriers to keep children from seeing it,
25:51
Speaker 2: and how that might be turning people into porn addicts
25:53
Speaker 2: who don't want a relationship. There are plenty of things
25:55
Speaker 2: to talk about, and just because you, Chris, don't think
25:57
Speaker 2: graffiti is a big deal doesn't mean Alyssa can't feel
26:00
Speaker 2: that way. Clearly, Japanese people think it's a problem, and
26:03
Speaker 2: they also have the perception that if they allow for
26:05
Speaker 2: crimes like vandalism to grow rampant, then it will invite
26:08
Speaker 2: in more serious crime. Now, statistically, I don't know if
26:12
Speaker 2: this is true, but I'm inclined to believe in whatever
26:14
Speaker 2: crime-preventing ideology that Japan has, because there is so much
26:18
Speaker 2: less crime there compared to America. Okay, but let's take
26:21
Speaker 2: a pause here, because I think Chris would say that
26:23
Speaker 2: that's not his core issue with Alyssa's content. Chris had
26:26
Speaker 2: a problem with Alyssa's video because it's a part of
26:28
Speaker 2: a growing trend of sensationalist content creators who are making
26:31
Speaker 2: content at the expense of Japan and talking about its downfall. Well,
26:35
Speaker 2: for one, does this content even have an effect on Japan?
26:37
Speaker 2: It's all in English, so Japanese people probably aren't watching it. Two,
26:41
Speaker 2: if this is such a massive trend, then why is
26:43
Speaker 2: Alyssa the only person that you bring up in the video?
26:46
Speaker 2: Surely you have at least one other example. Now, Chris
26:49
Speaker 2: brings up Johnny Somali, but that's not the same type
26:51
Speaker 2: of content. And the suggestion that talking about homeless people
26:54
Speaker 2: in Shinjuku is going to inspire a million Johnny Somalis
26:56
Speaker 2: to come to Japan is retarded. Plus, I think that
26:59
Speaker 2: maybe Johnny Somali and Vitaly going to prison forever for
27:02
Speaker 2: nuisance streaming is probably a pretty big deterrent from that
27:05
Speaker 2: kind of behavior. This might be a shock to Chris
27:07
Speaker 2: as he has done nothing but run positive PR for
27:10
Speaker 2: petty crimes, but the answer on how to stop those
27:12
Speaker 2: nuisance streamers is just to enforce the law and put
27:14
Speaker 2: them in prison or revoke their ability to come to Japan.
27:17
Speaker 2: I know it's shocking for a Westerner to hear this,
27:19
Speaker 2: but if you want to stop criminals, then put them
27:21
Speaker 2: in jail. Alright, speaking of other stuff that pissed me
27:24
Speaker 2: off about Chris' video, there's a reason why I related
27:27
Speaker 2: Chris to Hasan Piker multiple times. A part of that
27:30
Speaker 2: is because Chris is in the same social circle as Hasan,
27:33
Speaker 2: so it's not ridiculous to believe that they've talked before.
27:36
Speaker 2: But also, he keeps using fan-favorite disinformation tactics that Hasan
27:40
Speaker 2: and his stupid fan club love to use. For example,
27:43
Speaker 2: if you can't find someone saying something bad, then go
27:45
Speaker 2: to the most radical comments on their videos and use
27:48
Speaker 2: that to accuse them of saying what the comments say.
27:50
Speaker 4: If you look at the comment sections, particularly on those shorts,
27:53
Speaker 4: you will see the most vile, hateful, angry comments that
27:56
Speaker 4: you can find.
27:57
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, that one was actually funny. I mean, if
27:59
Speaker 2: you think that someone saying, looks like Japan is enjoying
28:02
Speaker 2: the benefits of diversity is as vile as the internet
28:04
Speaker 2: can get, then allow me to point you in the
28:06
Speaker 2: direction of all the people who cheered on Charlie Kirk
28:08
Speaker 2: getting murdered. Or the people who said that Irina Zerutskaya
28:11
Speaker 2: deserved to be stabbed on a train because white people
28:13
Speaker 2: deserve things like that. I mean, you're really reaching on this, Chris.
28:17
Speaker 2: This is probably the most polite, mean comment section that
28:19
Speaker 2: I've ever seen. Were these really the worst comments that
28:22
Speaker 2: you could find? But I see what you did there.
28:24
Speaker 2: You couldn't find Alyssa saying these things that you know
28:26
Speaker 2: your audience would find offensive. So you had to go
28:29
Speaker 2: into the comment section and use what other people said
28:31
Speaker 2: to make everybody think that Alyssa believes what the commenters
28:34
Speaker 2: are saying. For longtime fans of this channel, you might
28:37
Speaker 2: remember Noah Sampson using this technique of, let's look at
28:40
Speaker 2: the worst comments I found, to get people to think
28:43
Speaker 2: that I hate Jews during the Illumation drama, which is
28:46
Speaker 2: just so ironic considering that just a few months later,
28:49
Speaker 2: he would start uploading non-stop Jew hatred content. And obviously
28:52
Speaker 2: I don't hate people for being born Jewish. But as
28:55
Speaker 2: for Chris, he's trying to convey that Alyssa doesn't like foreigners,
28:59
Speaker 2: and she's trying to make other people hate foreigners for money.
29:01
Speaker 2: which obviously is not the case. She obviously disagrees with
29:05
Speaker 2: these comments, considering that Alyssa, at multiple points in her video,
29:09
Speaker 2: tries to lower the temperature on the anti-foreigner sentiment. Here's
29:12
Speaker 2: an example from the video that Chris is reacting to.
29:15
Speaker 2: where she directly addresses these types of comments and says, hey,
29:19
Speaker 2: we don't know who's doing the vandalism.
29:21
Speaker 1: When I did a short video the other day about
29:23
Speaker 1: the changes I've seen in Japan, the comment section was wild,
29:27
Speaker 1: and I did not expect that. Everyone had something to
29:30
Speaker 1: say about whodunit, you know, a lot of finger pointing,
29:34
Speaker 1: it was this group, it was definitely them, it was whatever.
29:37
Speaker 1: We don't know who did the vandalism. It's not like
29:42
Speaker 1: I'm saying graffiti is a new thing. It's never existed
29:45
Speaker 1: in Japan before. What I'm saying is I see changes
29:47
Speaker 1: over the years and there's places where there's more graffiti
29:51
Speaker 1: than I've ever seen before.
29:52
Speaker 2: She's saying that we don't know who did the graffiti
29:54
Speaker 2: to try to stop the anti-foreigner comments. Now, honestly, to
29:58
Speaker 2: be fair, do I think this was an effective way
30:00
Speaker 2: of doing that?
30:01
Speaker 8: No.
30:01
Speaker 2: Sorry, Alyssa. She should have said it at the start
30:04
Speaker 2: of the video to prevent the more prejudiced people watching
30:06
Speaker 2: from making assumptions early on. In fairness to her, though,
30:09
Speaker 2: Alyssa doesn't do a lot of controversial content. In fact,
30:12
Speaker 2: she actually tries to avoid it, so she doesn't know
30:15
Speaker 2: to do the stuff that I'm recommending. She doesn't have
30:17
Speaker 2: a sense of how much where you place things in
30:18
Speaker 2: your videos matters when you're talking about negative subjects. But
30:22
Speaker 2: whether or not her action was effective, if you watch
30:24
Speaker 2: the whole video, which I hope Chris did, if you
30:27
Speaker 2: watch the whole video, you can see that Alyssa is
30:29
Speaker 2: trying to get rid of the anti-foreigner sentiment, so her
30:31
Speaker 2: motivation is clear. And it's even clearer if you watch
30:34
Speaker 2: multiple videos from her. Though wouldn't it be a shame
30:37
Speaker 2: if someone made a video with 1.8 million views on
30:39
Speaker 2: it that directly blames foreigners for vandalism, and thus spreads
30:43
Speaker 2: anti-foreigner sentiment?
30:44
Speaker 4: Don't carve your fucking name into the bamboo trees of
30:47
Speaker 4: Kyoto's Arashiyama Forest, as has happened with over a hundred trees,
30:51
Speaker 4: often damaging them irreparably to the point that they have
30:54
Speaker 4: to be chopped down.
30:55
Speaker 2: Why is it okay when you complain about vandalism, but
30:57
Speaker 2: not Alyssa? Though despite the fact that she obviously does
31:00
Speaker 2: not like all the anti-foreigner sentiment going on in Japan,
31:03
Speaker 2: Chris accuses her of promoting it anyway. which caused a
31:06
Speaker 2: lot of people to suggest that she's some sort of bigot.
31:09
Speaker 9: Bro, what is with white people? They have to, wherever
31:13
Speaker 9: they go, they have to do Tyler Oliveira-style videos, I think.
31:18
Speaker 9: Complaining about foreigners in Japan as a foreigner is the
31:24
Speaker 9: most insane thing I can think of.
31:28
Speaker 2: Brother, you're the foreigner. Like, what are you talking about?
31:32
Speaker 2: Hasan is reacting to that moment where Chris says that
31:34
Speaker 2: Alyssa used b-roll footage of foreigners in Kabukicho, and was
31:37
Speaker 2: suggesting that that footage of foreigners was malicious because it's
31:40
Speaker 2: put next to pictures of garbage bags, which has to
31:43
Speaker 2: be one of the most retarded points of evidence that
31:45
Speaker 2: he uses to say that Alyssa is anti-foreigner, because Kabukicho
31:48
Speaker 2: is a huge tourist spot. I mean, how the hell
31:50
Speaker 2: do you take b-roll in Kabukicho without catching tourists? That
31:54
Speaker 2: is genuinely difficult unless you're thinking, well, Chris Broad might
31:57
Speaker 2: react to my video and accuse me of being a bigot,
31:59
Speaker 2: so let me just make sure I don't catch a
32:00
Speaker 2: foreigner in this footage on accident when I talk about
32:02
Speaker 2: the problems of this area. Like I said, this guy
32:05
Speaker 2: is either an idiot or highly manipulative. Where are the
32:08
Speaker 2: critical thinking skills? Though, to be fair, Chris's main point
32:11
Speaker 2: here is that Kabuki Cho has gotten better. But he's
32:14
Speaker 2: still ignoring Alyssa's point of, hey, the government did some
32:17
Speaker 2: things during COVID, and now it's getting worse again. which
32:20
Speaker 2: is an okay point to make, even if it's still
32:22
Speaker 2: better than it used to be, as it's going back downhill. Anyway,
32:26
Speaker 2: Chris continuously tries to relate her to hatred of foreigners
32:29
Speaker 2: at multiple points in his video.
32:30
Speaker 4: And coupled with the fact there's rising anti-foreign sentiment in Japan,
32:34
Speaker 4: it makes me concerned and uncomfortable.
32:36
Speaker 2: Right, that's what this is about. He's mad about the
32:39
Speaker 2: new Prime Minister of Japan. He's mad because she wants
32:41
Speaker 2: to put reforms on tourism and foreign entry into the country. Now,
32:45
Speaker 2: why would Chris be unhappy about that? Well, I just
32:48
Speaker 2: so happen to notice that Chris's entire business relies on
32:51
Speaker 2: foreign travel. His YouTube channel is essentially a channel that
32:54
Speaker 2: promotes Japanese tourism. His bar only has tourists in it.
32:58
Speaker 2: He runs an eSIM card business, which is a tourist business.
33:02
Speaker 2: For those of you who don't know, eSIMs are how
33:04
Speaker 2: you get internet on your phone in Japan. Last, Chris
33:06
Speaker 2: has been featured on the channel Tokyo Creative numerous times.
33:09
Speaker 2: Tokyo Creative is a tourism marketing agency, So I'm sure
33:13
Speaker 2: Chris is on that channel for a reason. And make
33:15
Speaker 2: no mistake, post-COVID lockdowns, tourism is a huge industry in Japan.
33:19
Speaker 2: Like it's millions of people per year. Since the last
33:21
Speaker 2: time I've been in Japan, this is my third time now.
33:24
Speaker 5: Yeah.
33:25
Speaker 9: I've seen a lot more fucking white people out here.
33:27
Speaker 11: Oh, for sure.
33:28
Speaker 3: Oh, yeah.
33:28
Speaker 1: I don't like it.
33:30
Speaker 6: I don't like it.
33:31
Speaker 2: It's a white guy living here. You don't get to
33:34
Speaker 2: say that. I don't like it. Okay.
33:37
Speaker 6: I feel that when you show up.
33:39
Speaker 3: 2024, I think we talked about it last episode.
33:42
Speaker 2: It's the most.
33:42
Speaker 8: Amount of foreign tourists ever.
33:46
Speaker 2: It wasn't even close.
33:47
Speaker 12: Yeah.
33:48
Speaker 2: I don't think it's going to go down.
33:49
Speaker 4: And it's all in Tokyo.
33:50
Speaker 2: Like everyone goes to Tokyo.
33:51
Speaker 6: It's not like America where you'll get a mixed in
33:53
Speaker 6: like New York, you'll get Chicago, you'll get whatever, you know,
33:56
Speaker 6: it's all in Tokyo pretty much.
33:57
Speaker 2: I mean, also Osaka and Kyoto, but yeah. Why do
34:00
Speaker 2: you think Chris opened up a bar in Tokyo right
34:02
Speaker 2: next to the Shibuya crosswalk, which is one of the
34:05
Speaker 2: biggest tourist attractions in Japan. I was there on a
34:08
Speaker 2: random weekday in October and the place was full. I
34:10
Speaker 2: had to wait to get in. So I guess like
34:12
Speaker 2: good business move. It's working. but also understand that Chris
34:15
Speaker 2: has a financial interest in the tourism industry growing and
34:19
Speaker 2: making sure that Shibuya maintains a good reputation because tourists
34:22
Speaker 2: are worth a shitload of money. As for this Tokyo
34:25
Speaker 2: creative company, they do paid sponsorships that are targeted at tourists.
34:29
Speaker 2: here's Chris and his fiancee or whatever doing a paid
34:32
Speaker 2: sponsorship for East Japan Railways on that channel. So today,
34:35
Speaker 2: we're going to take you around to some of.
34:37
Speaker 3: Our favorite spots and show you why we love it
34:40
Speaker 3: so much. So today's video is sponsored by the East
34:42
Speaker 3: Japan Railway Company. They have just opened up the Japan.
34:46
Speaker 1: Rail Cafe, and you can pop in there and get
34:49
Speaker 1: some information.
34:50
Speaker 3: About your trip.
34:50
Speaker 2: Some of you might have noticed that the tourist stand-in
34:53
Speaker 2: for that ad was also a YouTuber. Hidden secret maybe,
34:56
Speaker 2: but a lot of these foreigner and Japan YouTube channels
34:58
Speaker 2: are being paid by the government or private companies to
35:01
Speaker 2: garner interest in tourism. Here's a different video where it
35:04
Speaker 2: looks like Chris was again sponsored by JR lines that
35:07
Speaker 2: got millions of views. For those of you who don't know,
35:10
Speaker 2: Japan Railways is like a conglomerate that is THE train
35:13
Speaker 2: company that you use in Japan. This is a huge business.
35:16
Speaker 2: Like he was probably paid a lot if this was
35:18
Speaker 2: a sponsor. And I'm fairly certain it was a sponsor
35:21
Speaker 2: as personally I would never include a direct link like
35:23
Speaker 2: this to a huge business in the description of a
35:26
Speaker 2: video unless I was getting paid. A YouTuber would be
35:28
Speaker 2: stupid to devalue their brand with free advertising like that.
35:32
Speaker 2: Here's another 6 million view video that looks like it
35:34
Speaker 2: was sponsored by Japan Railways, except it looks like the
35:37
Speaker 2: link was removed or he forgot it.
35:38
Speaker 4: Today, Ryota and I have been invited by JR East,
35:41
Speaker 4: the company that owns the bullet trains, to try Grand
35:44
Speaker 4: Class for the first time ourselves, with rare access to
35:46
Speaker 4: film inside the cabin. If you are a foreign tourist,
35:49
Speaker 4: you can take advantage of the JR East Rail Pass,
35:52
Speaker 4: where for five days and 19,000 yen, you can go
35:54
Speaker 4: anywhere you want in all of Tohoku region. It's a
35:57
Speaker 4: fantastic offer.
35:58
Speaker 1: When you travel around Tohoku using JR East Pass, do
36:01
Speaker 1: not forget to take this Welcome Suica card.
36:03
Speaker 2: It's like a cash card.
36:04
Speaker 4: For more information on how to grab the JR East Pass,
36:07
Speaker 4: you can find the details in the description box below.
36:10
Speaker 2: Again, this almost certainly was a paid sponsor for Japan Railways.
36:13
Speaker 2: They also own the Welcome Suica card that was showed.
36:16
Speaker 2: I mean, it sucks that it was filmed right before
36:17
Speaker 2: the lockdown, so JR probably took a hit. but it
36:20
Speaker 2: is an evergreen video, so I'm sure they got their
36:22
Speaker 2: money back eventually. I would be shocked if Chris wasn't
36:25
Speaker 2: paid a considerable amount of money for this video. So
36:28
Speaker 2: let's talk shop for a second. If you're not brand safe,
36:31
Speaker 2: you don't get these types of sponsors. You guys have
36:33
Speaker 2: no idea of the insane amounts of money that I
36:35
Speaker 2: have lost just by covering controversial topics. From what I
36:39
Speaker 2: know about brand deals, I am easily losing into the
36:41
Speaker 2: six figures per year because of the topics that I cover.
36:44
Speaker 2: And these are small YouTuber sponsors, not a massive conglomerate
36:48
Speaker 2: like Japan Railways. This is huge money. You think creators
36:51
Speaker 2: make a lot of money on Google AdSense? The real
36:53
Speaker 2: money on social media is made with brand deals, especially
36:56
Speaker 2: if you can do niche audience content like Japanese tourism. However,
37:00
Speaker 2: if you want to make the big bucks, you have
37:02
Speaker 2: to be squeaky clean or brands will not sponsor you. Like,
37:05
Speaker 2: you can lose hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars
37:09
Speaker 2: by not being brand safe. So here's where I'm going
37:11
Speaker 2: to be less generous towards Chris. Personally, I don't think
37:15
Speaker 2: he merely forgot to talk about the teen runaways in
37:17
Speaker 2: the Kabuki Cho section. which was a significant part of
37:20
Speaker 2: Alyssa's video, and it was her big argument for why
37:23
Speaker 2: certain things are getting worse in Japan, I think he
37:25
Speaker 2: didn't talk about that topic on purpose. Because talking about
37:28
Speaker 2: bad stuff happening to minors is very much not brand safe.
37:32
Speaker 2: And I imagine that it's extra not brand safe for
37:35
Speaker 2: a guy who's trying to be buddy-buddy with a bunch
37:37
Speaker 2: of tourism companies, especially considering that Kabukicho is a big
37:40
Speaker 2: tourist area, and some of the topics in Alyssa's video
37:43
Speaker 2: might deter tourism. So if Chris talks about this stuff,
37:46
Speaker 2: he could potentially lose hundreds of thousands of dollars from
37:49
Speaker 2: not getting future sponsorship offers. Or, he can conveniently just
37:53
Speaker 2: keep his mouth shut on that part of Alyssa's video
37:56
Speaker 2: and go over points that are easier to win on.
37:58
Speaker 2: It doesn't matter if Chris had a sponsor on the
38:00
Speaker 2: video or not. If a brand sees you doing things
38:02
Speaker 2: that aren't brand safe, they just won't contact you for
38:05
Speaker 2: future deals. Or, if you've been negotiating a contract, they
38:08
Speaker 2: might just ghost you, and they'll almost never tell you why.
38:12
Speaker 2: So understand that there are certain things that he will
38:13
Speaker 2: not talk about because it will cost him a shitload
38:16
Speaker 2: of money. And also understand that he's not exactly transparent
38:19
Speaker 2: about how him being in the tourism business affects his
38:22
Speaker 2: bias against Alyssa's video. And also, again, and furthermore, the
38:26
Speaker 2: lack of transparency in general is to the extent where
38:29
Speaker 2: if I'm right about these being sponsors, they might be
38:32
Speaker 2: an FTC violation in America. Because in America, you're supposed
38:36
Speaker 2: to make it obvious that you're being financially compensated to
38:38
Speaker 2: promote a product. Last, Chris is not very transparent about
38:42
Speaker 2: the fact that his business structure obviously heavily incentivizes him
38:45
Speaker 2: to only talk about how great Japan is.
38:47
Speaker 4: And the claim that I show, only the over-romanticized, utopian
38:51
Speaker 4: version of Japan, is simply ridiculous. Does this look romanticized?
38:56
Speaker 4: Is this a utopia? Does that look romanticized?
39:00
Speaker 2: But wait, in the video, he said he does talk
39:02
Speaker 2: about bad stuff. Look, he talked about a natural disaster.
39:06
Speaker 2: You've got to be kidding me, Chris. That is not
39:08
Speaker 2: the same thing as saying, hey, the government is lying
39:11
Speaker 2: to you about the homelessness problem, and their decision to
39:13
Speaker 2: close down schools during COVID led to a bunch of
39:15
Speaker 2: domestic abuse and runaways. But that's not my only issue
39:19
Speaker 2: with Chris's line of argumentation on this topic, because one
39:22
Speaker 2: of the videos that he cites where he's talking about
39:23
Speaker 2: the negative parts of Japan is basically an advertisement for
39:27
Speaker 2: a luxury strawberry company, a wake-up phone call business slash
39:31
Speaker 2: fishing company, an advertisement for a chopstick company, and a
39:35
Speaker 2: small hotel.
39:36
Speaker 4: So this is Ichigo World, literally Strawberry World, and in
39:40
Speaker 4: this greenhouse alone there's over 12 tons of strawberries, and
39:43
Speaker 4: now I'm going to go and eat them all. These
39:46
Speaker 4: are the most premium strawberries that you can purchase here.
39:48
Speaker 4: They're literally called Migaki Ichigo, polished strawberries. And if you
39:52
Speaker 4: look at them, there we go. Look at that. The
39:54
Speaker 4: absolute best strawberries money can buy. 5,000 yen for a box,
39:58
Speaker 4: that's $ 50. But each and every one of these strawberries
40:01
Speaker 4: has been cultivated to absolute perfection.
40:04
Speaker 2: Does this not look like an ad? These strawberries are
40:06
Speaker 2: so perfect. Here's how much they cost. This is the company.
40:09
Speaker 2: Make sure the box is in frame with the company
40:11
Speaker 2: logo so people can see it. These are all notes
40:14
Speaker 2: that a brand would give you if they're sponsoring you.
40:16
Speaker 2: And luxury strawberries are a big tourist item. There's also
40:20
Speaker 2: this link in the description, and it appears to be
40:22
Speaker 2: a small hotel or an inn that he advertises at
40:24
Speaker 2: the end. This is a place that he has visited before,
40:27
Speaker 2: and the owner thanks him for promoting her business.
40:29
Speaker 7: Now, I don't know Japanese law.
40:31
Speaker 2: However, like I said, in America... If you're being paid
40:46
Speaker 2: to promote someone's business or receiving compensation, it is illegal
40:50
Speaker 2: to not disclose that. But it may not be illegal
40:53
Speaker 2: in Japan. I know the Japanese government will pay YouTubers
40:56
Speaker 2: to make videos advertising certain spots or certain businesses that
40:59
Speaker 2: tourists can go to. He might have received money for
41:01
Speaker 2: that on this video, and he might not legally have
41:03
Speaker 2: to disclose that. However, assuming that I'm wrong about all
41:06
Speaker 2: this and he received no sponsorship money or government money
41:09
Speaker 2: for this video, he still vastly misrepresented what it was.
41:13
Speaker 2: He says, I talk about the negative issues that Japan
41:15
Speaker 2: is having. I'm not always positive. But when you watch
41:18
Speaker 2: the video, the content is completely positive and he's basically
41:21
Speaker 2: advertising businesses the whole time. Not to say that these
41:24
Speaker 2: aren't good businesses. I probably would buy these strawberries. And
41:27
Speaker 2: the owner of that inn had a really tragic yet
41:29
Speaker 2: compelling story. Her loss was very sad. However, that's not
41:33
Speaker 2: what he said the video was because the implication when
41:36
Speaker 2: he says utopian and sits that next to what he's
41:38
Speaker 2: accusing Alyssa of is that he's talking about the real
41:41
Speaker 2: controversial issues that Japan is having, and he's not afraid
41:45
Speaker 2: to speak up about things, even if that might make
41:47
Speaker 2: him or Japan look bad. But that's not what he's
41:49
Speaker 2: doing here. He's talking about how great everything is, or
41:52
Speaker 2: how good of a job people are doing. He's literally romanticizing.
41:55
Speaker 2: Listen to the intro.
41:56
Speaker 4: I've come to take a look at the past, present,
41:58
Speaker 4: and future of the region, to hear the incredible stories
42:01
Speaker 4: of the people whose destinies were forever shaped by the tsunami.
42:04
Speaker 4: From a destroyed farm that went on to cultivate Japan's
42:07
Speaker 4: most expensive and luxurious strawberries, to an inventor who redesigned
42:10
Speaker 4: one of the world's most wasteful products. We'll meet the
42:13
Speaker 4: fishermen who lost everything but went on to redefine their industry,
42:16
Speaker 4: and hear the inspiring story of Ichiro Kano, the owner
42:19
Speaker 4: of an inn who lost her home and her family,
42:21
Speaker 4: but refused to close her business. These are the extraordinary
42:25
Speaker 4: stories of what happened after the tsunami.
42:27
Speaker 2: Does that clip not fit the definition of romanticizing? Now,
42:31
Speaker 2: he shows a second video that I was able to find,
42:33
Speaker 2: I think he only showed two. It's hard to tell
42:35
Speaker 2: because he didn't do the best job of citing the
42:37
Speaker 2: exact videos of where the footage he used came from.
42:39
Speaker 2: The second one didn't have all the product placement, but
42:42
Speaker 2: it's not really a risky topic. No sponsor is going
42:44
Speaker 2: to drop you over a video about Fukushima, and no
42:47
Speaker 2: one's going to say, wow, this guy's a real asshole
42:50
Speaker 2: for sharing those people's heartwarming stories. Also, I have yet
42:53
Speaker 2: to hear Chris talk about any problem that Japan is facing...
42:56
Speaker 2: that would deter tourists. So again, even if none of
42:59
Speaker 2: this is sponsored content or paid for by a local
43:01
Speaker 2: tourism group, at the very least, these evergreen videos are
43:05
Speaker 2: still funneling people into his tourism business. He's not taking
43:08
Speaker 2: risky positions or brave stances or really doing anything that
43:11
Speaker 2: would harm Japan's reputation. So I think he was completely
43:14
Speaker 2: misrepresenting himself there. I mean, this video here was the
43:17
Speaker 2: most advertiser-friendly pro-Japan shit that I've ever seen. And mix
43:22
Speaker 2: that with the endorsement from the Japanese lady who said
43:24
Speaker 2: how effective Chris' video was at bringing in new business,
43:27
Speaker 2: it's like an advertisement to advertisers. It's not dystopian to
43:30
Speaker 2: talk about how heroic Japanese people are. This type of
43:33
Speaker 2: content is exactly what would make people believe that Japan
43:36
Speaker 2: is a utopian society. But you know, I saw this
43:39
Speaker 2: livestream clip where Chris is talking to his YouTuber friend Connor,
43:42
Speaker 2: and there was something he said that caught my interest.
43:44
Speaker 11: I'm sure people will react and dredge things up and
43:47
Speaker 11: there'll be lots of horrible sh * * coming my way.
43:50
Speaker 11: but that's the price I pay for doing it. And that's,
43:53
Speaker 11: I'd accept that.
43:54
Speaker 2: What exactly are you afraid of people digging up? Is
43:56
Speaker 2: this it? Is it the fact that a lot of
43:58
Speaker 2: your videos are not done out of journalistic integrity, but
44:00
Speaker 2: are just paid advertisements? I mean, genuinely, is this an
44:03
Speaker 2: FTC violation? He's clearly advertising tourism products and says in
44:07
Speaker 2: the video that you can only get a JR pass
44:09
Speaker 2: if you're a tourist. And the Welcome Suica debit card
44:12
Speaker 2: is specifically for tourists because it's only valid for a month.
44:15
Speaker 2: You primarily use these cards to ride the train without
44:17
Speaker 2: having to buy a ticket. But Japanese people or foreign
44:20
Speaker 2: residents get the green Suica card or use the phone app.
44:23
Speaker 2: They don't use the red card. That's for tourists. Also,
44:26
Speaker 2: make sure that you show your friend buying food with
44:29
Speaker 2: his card so that tourists know that it's not just
44:30
Speaker 2: for the train. And further note that this is probably
44:33
Speaker 2: not his personal card because it's a red tourist card.
44:36
Speaker 2: It was probably loaded with money and given to him
44:38
Speaker 2: by Japan Railways for the ad. This guy is a resident,
44:41
Speaker 2: so if he was spending his own money, then why
44:43
Speaker 2: wouldn't he just use a green Suica card? This moment
44:46
Speaker 2: looks like compensation for doing an ad. Why would you
44:49
Speaker 2: spend your own money to film an advertisement for someone
44:51
Speaker 2: else's product? I'm saying this because the implication is that
44:54
Speaker 2: Chris and his friend paid for everything themselves.
44:57
Speaker 1: This is it.
44:57
Speaker 8: This is the pinnacle of railway travel. It doesn't come cheap, though.
45:02
Speaker 8: It is about $ 750 to ride in this seat from
45:06
Speaker 8: Tokyo to Hakodate in Hokkaido.
45:08
Speaker 4: As amazing as Grand Class was, I'm not sure I
45:11
Speaker 4: could justify spending my pocket money on it again any
45:14
Speaker 4: time soon.
45:15
Speaker 2: This makes no sense. Why would you burn $ 700 on
45:18
Speaker 2: a ticket plus the $ 100 or so ticket for the
45:20
Speaker 2: other Shinkansen ride that was shown in the video because
45:23
Speaker 2: this is an ad so you have to start by
45:24
Speaker 2: showing how great the economy option is for the people
45:27
Speaker 2: who can't afford first class.
45:28
Speaker 8: I'm still in awe of the amount of seat pitch
45:30
Speaker 8: you get on the standard seats. These seats here are, what,
45:34
Speaker 8: 98 centimeters of pitch. I can barely reach the seat
45:37
Speaker 8: in front of me if I outstretch my arm, and
45:39
Speaker 8: I've got a normal human-sized arm.
45:41
Speaker 2: So it's those tickets plus the $ 100 to $ 200 economy
45:44
Speaker 2: train ride home. Why would you burn all this money
45:47
Speaker 2: and possibly pay for your friend's ticket for being in
45:49
Speaker 2: the video when you could easily just have Japan Railways
45:52
Speaker 2: pay for this stuff? That would be financially stupid considering
45:55
Speaker 2: they already pay creators for advertisements, a year later Chris
45:58
Speaker 2: took a sponsorship from them, and this isn't like a
46:01
Speaker 2: critical product review that the company wouldn't like, so of
46:03
Speaker 2: course they would pay for a video like this. All
46:06
Speaker 2: Chris does the whole time is glaze Japan railways. I
46:09
Speaker 2: think the only negative thing he said was that it
46:11
Speaker 2: was too expensive for first class, but he's also like,
46:14
Speaker 2: even though it's too expensive, you could buy the ticket
46:16
Speaker 2: for a special occasion.
46:17
Speaker 4: Would you ride this... No way.
46:29
Speaker 2: This is not a paid sponsorship. Now, Chris isn't in America,
46:32
Speaker 2: but you know, the video is in English, so part
46:34
Speaker 2: of the target audience for this ad clearly is Americans.
46:37
Speaker 2: I don't know if the FTC would have any legal
46:39
Speaker 2: jurisdiction over this, but they do have this nice set
46:42
Speaker 2: of social media guidelines that can be found here. Even
46:45
Speaker 2: if he isn't legally at fault here, If this was
46:47
Speaker 2: a paid ad by Japan Railways, I certainly think he
46:50
Speaker 2: is morally at fault. The guidelines say that you have
46:53
Speaker 2: to make it obvious that you're being compensated, but if
46:55
Speaker 2: I look at this as an average viewer, I would
46:58
Speaker 2: not be able to tell that this is an ad.
47:00
Speaker 2: I only recognize this as a paid sponsorship because I'm
47:02
Speaker 2: a YouTuber, I've done brand deals before, and I know
47:05
Speaker 2: how sponsorships work. So Chris, if you're being financially compensated
47:09
Speaker 2: for this video in any way, like being given free
47:12
Speaker 2: tickets or a discount or free food or being paid
47:14
Speaker 2: a flat rate, and not disclosing that to your audience,
47:17
Speaker 2: then you're a real piece of shit. Like, that is
47:19
Speaker 2: super deceptive if that's true. Certainly, if I wasn't being
47:23
Speaker 2: financially compensated for something that looks this much like a
47:25
Speaker 2: paid sponsor, I would make it very clear to my
47:28
Speaker 2: audience that I wasn't getting money. But this is like
47:30
Speaker 2: sort of an open secret amongst Japan YouTubers. A lot
47:33
Speaker 2: of these foreigner and Japan channels are being paid to
47:35
Speaker 2: advertise tourist attractions, and they aren't all super open about
47:38
Speaker 2: videos being sponsored. Okay, full disclosure, this is Editor Sean
47:42
Speaker 2: doing this at the last minute. Normally I would weave
47:45
Speaker 2: this in smoothly so you wouldn't know it's last minute,
47:47
Speaker 2: but I'm tired, it's been over two weeks, and I
47:49
Speaker 2: just want to get this video out. So if there
47:51
Speaker 2: are any continuity errors past this point because I don't
47:53
Speaker 2: want to re-edit everything, that's why. Some of this video
47:57
Speaker 2: I had to record while I was sick so I'm
47:58
Speaker 2: sure you heard that because I didn't have time to
48:00
Speaker 2: re-record the audio. Anyway, this whole Tokyo Creative thing is
48:04
Speaker 2: a huge rabbit hole, and a lot of creators that
48:06
Speaker 2: you might recognize are openly a part of it, which
48:08
Speaker 2: is fine. Most creators who have a decent sized following
48:10
Speaker 2: have brand representation. Chris has since moved on from Tokyo Creative,
48:14
Speaker 2: but now he has his own company that he runs
48:16
Speaker 2: called Sekai Studios, where you can see on the website
48:19
Speaker 2: that their business interest is in promoting tourism. This is
48:22
Speaker 2: something that you can just Google. Which, again, is fine.
48:24
Speaker 2: That's all well and good. What's not fine, though, is
48:27
Speaker 2: the disclosure to the viewer. As I said earlier, I've
48:29
Speaker 2: watched Chris's channel for close to a decade, I believe,
48:32
Speaker 2: and I didn't know any of this stuff until the
48:34
Speaker 2: past two weeks. I say that because these old videos
48:37
Speaker 2: very much look like advertisements for Japan Railways, I didn't
48:40
Speaker 2: know that when I first saw them, and if they are,
48:43
Speaker 2: my big issue is the extent that Chris went to
48:45
Speaker 2: make you believe that it wasn't an ad. Which begs
48:47
Speaker 2: the question, what other videos are ads? For example, this
48:51
Speaker 2: video where he goes to a racetrack with Connor that
48:53
Speaker 2: is like $ 30, 000 a person. This video is definitely an
48:57
Speaker 2: ad for that racetrack as well as Epidemic Sound. The
48:59
Speaker 2: good part, though, is that in this case, I think
49:01
Speaker 2: he makes it pretty clear that he was being sponsored
49:03
Speaker 2: by Epidemic Sound, and more importantly... He makes it clear
49:06
Speaker 2: that they were being given track time for free.
49:08
Speaker 4: Wigarigawa Club is one of the most exclusive members-only driving
49:12
Speaker 4: circuits on the planet. The team here kindly gave us
49:15
Speaker 4: access to the track. And look, we're a bit out
49:17
Speaker 4: of our depth here because a full permanent membership can
49:19
Speaker 4: cost Do you see how that was different from the
49:11
Speaker 4: Japan Railways video? In this case, when he openly states
49:13
Speaker 4: that there is no way he could afford this, he's
49:15
Speaker 4: making it clear that he didn't pay. So when he
49:17
Speaker 4: does an ad for the racetrack later in.
49:18
Speaker 2: The video, The free use of the club was his reimbursement,
49:40
Speaker 2: but the problem is that these channels don't always make
49:42
Speaker 2: it that clear. Alright, that's the end of the last
49:45
Speaker 2: minute edit. Either way, it is still very clear to
49:47
Speaker 2: me that Chris has a massive financial incentive for calling
49:50
Speaker 2: Alyssa a liar because of what she talks about, and
49:53
Speaker 2: he has a massive incentive for avoiding important and difficult
49:56
Speaker 2: issues that Japan faces, especially the ones that might negatively
49:59
Speaker 2: affect tourism, like crime and homelessness. The moral grandstanding here
50:03
Speaker 2: is just ridiculous, you know, considering the pro-tourism brand that
50:06
Speaker 2: he owns. And it's also ridiculous because he talks in
50:09
Speaker 2: the video about how he just had to speak out.
50:12
Speaker 4: I had to say something. I chose to bring attention
50:15
Speaker 4: to it publicly. I hate myself sometimes that I can't
50:18
Speaker 4: keep my mouth shut on certain things. But when you
50:20
Speaker 4: feel something is profoundly wrong in here, you have to
50:23
Speaker 4: talk about it.
50:24
Speaker 2: He just had to speak out because he's such a
50:26
Speaker 2: good person who will make false defamatory edits to make
50:28
Speaker 2: his opponents look bad. So when Chris cries about this shit,
50:32
Speaker 2: I have a hard time believing that it's not actually
50:34
Speaker 2: because he's afraid of losing money from lower amounts of tourism.
50:38
Speaker 2: I don't think he really cares that much about misinformation.
50:40
Speaker 2: He spreads tons of misinformation in his videos due to
50:43
Speaker 2: lazy fact-checking, if I'm being generous. Or he's intentionally doing
50:48
Speaker 2: it to keep his sponsors and protect his tourism business.
50:50
Speaker 4: It is increasingly hard to compete when you're producing videos
50:53
Speaker 4: to a higher standard, when you have to fact-check everything.
50:56
Speaker 4: What I'm saying is social media platforms... don't care. They
50:59
Speaker 4: don't reward accuracy. They don't reward nuance or objective reason.
51:03
Speaker 4: They reward clicks. They reward attention. They reward sensationalism. Journalistic
51:07
Speaker 4: integrity really doesn't count for much online, unfortunately, to an
51:11
Speaker 4: always dystopian degree.
51:12
Speaker 2: Bro, you do like the worst kind of journalism. You
51:15
Speaker 2: obscure your resources to make it harder for people to
51:17
Speaker 2: fact-check you, and you actually go out of your way
51:20
Speaker 2: to tell people to not watch the source material. You
51:22
Speaker 2: essentially defamed Alyssa with that homelessness edit and tried to
51:25
Speaker 2: cover it up after millions of people saw it, instead
51:28
Speaker 2: of doing a retraction or making some sort of effort
51:30
Speaker 2: to let people know that she wasn't making fun of
51:32
Speaker 2: homeless people. Not just that, but you remove important context
51:36
Speaker 2: at multiple points in the video, and then you tell
51:38
Speaker 2: your audience that Alyssa believes the exact opposite of what
51:41
Speaker 2: she actually believes. You really know better than Hasan Piker.
51:44
Speaker 2: This is the exact type of journalism that he does,
51:47
Speaker 2: and I'm not shocked at all that Chris is friends
51:48
Speaker 2: with Connor and Ludwig, who are both friends with Hasan.
51:52
Speaker 2: Remember when Hasan was on Trash Taste right after Ethan
51:54
Speaker 2: Klein's content nuke, which was after Hasan had been promoting
51:57
Speaker 2: terrorism for over a year? These guys sat there and
52:00
Speaker 2: tried to run positive PR for him for two hours. Now,
52:03
Speaker 2: I don't know if Chris and Hasan are friends, but
52:05
Speaker 2: since Hasan has been to Japan multiple times and hangs
52:08
Speaker 2: around people in Chris's social circle, I love visiting Tokyo.
52:12
Speaker 2: I wouldn't be shocked if they've had a conversation before.
52:15
Speaker 2: Maybe it was about journalist integrity or lack thereof. This
52:18
Speaker 2: dude seems like a douche or something. No, Chris is
52:20
Speaker 2: the man. No, Chris is the fucking man. I really,
52:23
Speaker 2: I like Chris a lot. Around this event, Chris has
52:25
Speaker 2: stated that there are all these issues that he has,
52:28
Speaker 2: but he's kept quiet. He's been the bigger man and
52:30
Speaker 2: held his tongue. But I find it really convenient that
52:33
Speaker 2: the one time he does speak up, just so happens
52:35
Speaker 2: to be on an issue that affects his income. What
52:38
Speaker 2: a coincidence. What a coincidence that Mr. Journalistic Integrity Over
52:42
Speaker 2: Money was just bitching about a video not doing well
52:45
Speaker 2: at the same time that he attacked Alyssa.
52:47
Speaker 11: One thing about the YouTube and creating videos and stuff
52:51
Speaker 11: is that it does feel like right now there is a.
52:54
Speaker 7: Massive reward for just making videos that.
52:58
Speaker 11: Just lie or play on people's kind of political leanings.
53:04
Speaker 11: It's scary. I mean, even look at my video.
53:07
Speaker 12: It's got.
53:08
Speaker 11: an insane number of views in a very short space
53:10
Speaker 11: of time.
53:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really unfortunate when a creator lies and gets
53:14
Speaker 2: an insane number of views in a short period of time.
53:16
Speaker 11: I'm sure a lot of people are clicking on it,
53:17
Speaker 11: waiting to be angry about something, and it's probably not
53:20
Speaker 11: what they expect. And it's sad, because you put so
53:24
Speaker 11: much effort into the recent Wacky Weekend, it obviously isn't
53:26
Speaker 11: going to do as well, it's not as sensational. I mean,
53:29
Speaker 11: it's a bit of an easy one, racing around. I mean,
53:32
Speaker 11: the video that upset me the most this year was
53:34
Speaker 11: the Volcano documentary we spent... Boo hoo, welcome to YouTube.
53:37
Speaker 12: The last thing viewers want to hear is.
53:38
Speaker 11: A creator crying about how their video didn't do well.
53:41
Speaker 11: Has anyone ever heard me complain about a 10 out
53:44
Speaker 11: of 10? Right, it's because the audience doesn't care.
53:45
Speaker 4: If they cared, they would have watched the video.
54:04
Speaker 2: Look, I have a really hard time sympathizing here when
54:06
Speaker 2: you call my friend's content lazy slop content, which is
54:09
Speaker 2: yet again another Hasan strategy, demeaning all the work that
54:12
Speaker 2: goes into your opponent's videos. I swear I've watched that
54:15
Speaker 2: stochastic terrorist animal abuser let his fucking chair react to
54:19
Speaker 2: other people's work that took over a week or more
54:21
Speaker 2: to make, and he has the audacity to call other
54:23
Speaker 2: people's content slop content. What work do you do, Hasan? Now,
54:28
Speaker 2: I don't have a problem with livestreamers reacting to content
54:30
Speaker 2: as long as there's actual commentary on the video, But
54:33
Speaker 2: to pretend that watching someone else's video is more work
54:35
Speaker 2: than it took to create it is like criminal levels
54:37
Speaker 2: of dishonesty. Anyway, let's take a look at this for
54:40
Speaker 2: a second, because we haven't really looked at Chris's social
54:42
Speaker 2: media posts. First, he starts out by saying, Look for
54:46
Speaker 2: bad things, and you'll find them. Look for good things,
54:49
Speaker 2: and you'll find them. But unfortunately, positivity doesn't drive clicks. Chris,
54:54
Speaker 2: most of Alyssa's views come from positive content, so I
54:56
Speaker 2: have to say that this no-nuance take is very negative, sensationalist,
55:01
Speaker 2: and not very reflective of reality. Next he says, If
55:04
Speaker 2: you enjoy Oriental Pearl, oh wow, he's saying her name
55:07
Speaker 2: now that it's not on his main social media platform
55:09
Speaker 2: and he's less likely to bleed audience members. If you
55:12
Speaker 2: enjoy Oriental Pearl, allow me to recommend you a few
55:14
Speaker 2: of her videos. White girl speaks Japanese. Japanese people shock, surprise, amazement.
55:20
Speaker 2: There's also, White girl speaks Japanese, you won't believe what
55:24
Speaker 2: the locals did next. Wow, he is really harping on
55:26
Speaker 2: her race here. Last I checked, Alyssa never mentions her
55:29
Speaker 2: race in her titles. Why are you so insistent on
55:32
Speaker 2: bringing that up? You're saying it like a slur. And,
55:35
Speaker 2: my personal favorite, Japanese react to white girls speaking Japanese. Sugoi, incredible. Man,
55:41
Speaker 2: he is so jealous. Is he also friends with Miskif? Guys,
55:44
Speaker 2: don't watch Alyssa. Her content is stupid. I'm the real
55:48
Speaker 2: content creator. Watch me. The real stupid thing here is
55:51
Speaker 2: that he's acting like giant displays of skill hasn't been
55:53
Speaker 2: a huge market since like the beginning of time. They
55:56
Speaker 2: literally have a show for it called America's Got Talent
55:58
Speaker 2: that has tons of viral clips. Though the bigger reason
56:01
Speaker 2: that it is insulting for him to call Alyssa's content
56:03
Speaker 2: slop content that takes no effort is because he clearly
56:06
Speaker 2: doesn't understand why a video like this does well. Like,
56:09
Speaker 2: why does this video have 47 million views on it? Well,
56:13
Speaker 2: it's because she's speaking three different languages in it fluently.
56:16
Speaker 2: Not only that, but she picked a topic that addresses
56:18
Speaker 2: a common anxiety that people have and debunks their preconceived
56:21
Speaker 2: notions by saying that if people are speaking a foreign
56:23
Speaker 2: language around you... they probably aren't saying anything bad.
56:26
Speaker 1: In these 10 years of living in China and Japan,
56:29
Speaker 1: I've sometimes caught people talking about me, but I've never
56:32
Speaker 1: caught anyone saying anything bad. That is the truth. Not
56:36
Speaker 1: saying that it doesn't happen, but a lot of it
56:38
Speaker 1: is definitely in our heads.
56:39
Speaker 2: To make a 15-minute video essentially suggesting that this girl
56:42
Speaker 2: is a racist or hates foreigners is ridiculous. How about
56:46
Speaker 2: this video? Why did it do well? Maybe it's because
56:48
Speaker 2: she speaks four different languages in it. Can you do that, Chris?
56:52
Speaker 2: This is not slop content. The hard work is the
56:54
Speaker 2: decade of studying for ridiculous hours to be able to
56:57
Speaker 2: speak Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. And English would be the
57:00
Speaker 2: fourth language. But saying that this is easy would be
57:03
Speaker 2: like watching America's Got Talent and going, well, that's not
57:05
Speaker 2: that hard. They just did a 60-second performance, ignoring the
57:09
Speaker 2: years of practice that it took to be able to
57:10
Speaker 2: do that 60 seconds. He speaks Japanese, so he should
57:13
Speaker 2: know that it's a lot of work to get to
57:15
Speaker 2: Alissa's level of Chinese and Japanese. I mean, Alissa's fluency
57:18
Speaker 2: level isn't that high, that is possible, but she took
57:21
Speaker 2: graduate courses in college with classes that were completely in
57:24
Speaker 2: these languages. Her fluency level is very high. On top
57:27
Speaker 2: of that, just from talking to Japanese people in Japan
57:30
Speaker 2: and through speaking lessons, I do think that Japanese people
57:33
Speaker 2: get a lot of exposure to foreigners because of tourism. However,
57:36
Speaker 2: I don't think very many Westerners in Japan speak Japanese
57:39
Speaker 2: at more than a very basic level.
57:41
Speaker 12: According to a survey to foreign workers, about 70% can't
57:44
Speaker 12: speak Japanese well. Among them, 30% hardly speak, and about
57:49
Speaker 12: 50% only manage a basic conversation. Another survey to foreign
57:52
Speaker 12: residents says just about 20% thinks that they're able to
57:56
Speaker 12: speak enough. But he finds it totally unsurprising, as many
57:59
Speaker 12: foreigners only stick to other foreigners.
58:01
Speaker 2: So it's genuinely impressive for someone to start the conversation
58:04
Speaker 2: in Japanese, and then switch to Chinese. I know people
58:08
Speaker 2: have a skewed idea of how much work it is
58:09
Speaker 2: to learn a foreign language because of all these asshat
58:12
Speaker 2: fake polyglots who pretend to speak 15 languages at like
58:15
Speaker 2: 20 years old and tell you that you can be
58:17
Speaker 2: fluent in Japanese in a year with 30 minutes of
58:20
Speaker 2: study per day, which is an incredibly unrealistic expectation. Nobody
58:23
Speaker 2: gets fluent in Japanese in one year. Being able to
58:26
Speaker 2: say your name and your age and what hobbies you
58:28
Speaker 2: have in a video that you can edit does not
58:30
Speaker 2: mean that you are fluent in a language. So where's
58:32
Speaker 2: the video on this, Chris? Why don't you speak out
58:34
Speaker 2: against that? Anyway, the amount of effort that it takes
58:37
Speaker 2: to be able to do what Alyssa does is at
58:39
Speaker 2: least four hours of language practice per day for five
58:42
Speaker 2: to ten years. Alyssa spends a crazy amount of time
58:44
Speaker 2: studying languages. It's at least four hours per day. She's
58:47
Speaker 2: a big fan of language schools, and some of those
58:49
Speaker 2: language schools have you doing like six hours a day
58:51
Speaker 2: between class time and homework. Even though it's this much work,
58:55
Speaker 2: Chris is still like, Alyssa's content is so easy to make,
58:58
Speaker 2: I could film it in an afternoon. I mean, the
59:00
Speaker 2: filming part, yeah, of course you can. You have a
59:02
Speaker 2: full team. Alyssa does this by herself.
59:04
Speaker 4: It is increasingly hard to compete when you're producing videos
59:07
Speaker 4: to a higher standard, when you have to fact check everything.
59:10
Speaker 4: The creator of this video claimed it took 50 hours
59:13
Speaker 4: to produce this video. A claim I find to be
59:15
Speaker 4: quite frankly, baffling. I'm not sure where the 50 hours went.
59:18
Speaker 4: And you might think, well, he does sound kind of
59:20
Speaker 4: jealous now. Maybe she's right. Maybe he's just not getting
59:23
Speaker 4: the views. And I say far from it. I could
59:25
Speaker 4: go out and make this content in one afternoon in Tokyo.
59:28
Speaker 4: What I'm saying is social media platforms don't care. They
59:31
Speaker 4: don't reward accuracy. They don't reward nuance or objective reason.
59:35
Speaker 4: They reward clicks. They reward attention. They reward sensationalism. Journalistic
59:39
Speaker 4: integrity really doesn't count for much online, unfortunately.
59:42
Speaker 2: I mean, at least for your response video, your journalistic
59:44
Speaker 2: integrity and fact-checking ability is dogshit. I think this aspect
59:48
Speaker 2: about social media actually works in your favor. So maybe
59:51
Speaker 2: you could do the filming for this and have other
59:53
Speaker 2: people finish the video for you in 24 hours. However,
59:56
Speaker 2: you don't have the language skills to do what Alyssa
59:58
Speaker 2: does in most of her popular content. Like, I can't
1:00:01
Speaker 2: understate how petty Chris is in this video and around
1:00:03
Speaker 2: this whole event. And it's that mixed in with how
1:00:06
Speaker 2: he straight up sensationalizes, for lack of a better word,
1:00:09
Speaker 2: he sensationalizes the level of income that Alyssa made from
1:00:12
Speaker 2: the video that he didn't like as if it were
1:00:14
Speaker 2: generational wealth.
1:00:15
Speaker 4: The most unsettling thing is it's never been easier to
1:00:18
Speaker 4: monetize sensationalist slop content. And if you do it, you'll
1:00:22
Speaker 4: be richly rewarded for it. Case in point, this video,
1:00:25
Speaker 4: the creator pointed out, made... $ 1, 500, which is a seriously
1:00:30
Speaker 4: impressive amount of money, going around filming some bin bags
1:00:33
Speaker 4: and some spray paint, in a video that would have
1:00:36
Speaker 4: taken a matter of hours to record.
1:00:38
Speaker 2: I mean, that's not that much money for a YouTuber, Chris.
1:00:40
Speaker 2: How much were you paid to do those tourism propaganda
1:00:43
Speaker 2: videos for Tokyo Creative? How much did you get paid
1:00:45
Speaker 2: to advertise Japan Railways? I'm sure it was multiple times
1:00:48
Speaker 2: what Alyssa made on this video.
1:00:50
Speaker 4: Case in point, this video, the creator pointed out, made $ 1, 500.
1:00:53
Speaker 4: That's it?
1:00:56
Speaker 2: Right, that's not that much money to a YouTuber. Later
1:00:59
Speaker 2: in the video, he's like, wow, guys, if people learn
1:01:01
Speaker 2: they can make $ 1, 500 by filming a video in Japan,
1:01:04
Speaker 2: then we're just going to get endless nuisance streamers like
1:01:07
Speaker 2: Johnny Somali. Chris, not only is it messed up to
1:01:10
Speaker 2: say that Alyssa is the same as Johnny Somali because
1:01:12
Speaker 2: she doesn't like graffiti, but $ 1, 500 doesn't even cover the
1:01:16
Speaker 2: plane ticket. That amount is not making anyone think pre-recorded
1:01:19
Speaker 2: nuisance content in Japan is some get-rich-quick scheme. To compare
1:01:23
Speaker 2: her to Logan Paul or Johnny Somali is ridiculous, especially
1:01:27
Speaker 2: considering that if you actually watch the source material, you
1:01:30
Speaker 2: can see that people want her around. Also, Chris removed
1:01:33
Speaker 2: context from this moment where she shows her income. The
1:01:36
Speaker 2: only reason that he has that monetary stat from Alyssa
1:01:39
Speaker 2: is because she showed it to point out that she's
1:01:41
Speaker 2: actually taking a loss on this video. Most of her
1:01:43
Speaker 2: money comes from sponsors, not from YouTube ad revenue. And
1:01:47
Speaker 2: the types of sponsors that she can get won't pay
1:01:49
Speaker 2: for a video like this.
1:01:50
Speaker 1: Here's an actual snapshot of the revenue from the video,
1:01:54
Speaker 1: which is far below my average because most content is sponsored.
1:01:58
Speaker 1: And I did this one as a passion project because
1:02:00
Speaker 1: I saw a lot of changes in my neighborhood. It's
1:02:03
Speaker 1: not made to make money. There's no sponsor that's going
1:02:06
Speaker 1: to sponsor that kind of content.
1:02:08
Speaker 2: Real convenient for Mr. Advertiser Friendly to remove the context
1:02:12
Speaker 2: of most of Alyssa's money coming from sponsors, not AdSense.
1:02:15
Speaker 2: He removes the context that it's actually better for her
1:02:18
Speaker 2: wallet to make positive content like he does. She's taking
1:02:21
Speaker 2: a loss on this content, and he must know that.
1:02:23
Speaker 2: I know he knows about brand rules. I know he
1:02:25
Speaker 2: knows how much money you can make from brand deals,
1:02:27
Speaker 2: especially the channels who do not cover controversial content. Plus,
1:02:31
Speaker 2: it's really rich for him to bitch about money when
1:02:33
Speaker 2: he's almost certainly far richer than she is. So it
1:02:35
Speaker 2: really pisses me off to hear him say that she's
1:02:37
Speaker 2: lying about Japan for money when she has to sacrifice
1:02:40
Speaker 2: brand deals to make a video like this. And he
1:02:43
Speaker 2: knows that when it comes to Japan because of tourism...
1:02:45
Speaker 2: There is way more money in the type of content
1:02:47
Speaker 2: that he makes. I mean, how much is he going
1:02:49
Speaker 2: to take her out of context? How much is he
1:02:51
Speaker 2: going to lie about her beliefs, when if you actually
1:02:54
Speaker 2: watch her content, you can see she believes the opposite?
1:02:57
Speaker 2: Like I said, I get why Alyssa was mad, and
1:02:59
Speaker 2: I get why she asked him to remove that Facebook comment. Again,
1:03:02
Speaker 2: I don't think she should have done that, but you
1:03:04
Speaker 2: can start to see why she was so upset when
1:03:06
Speaker 2: you see how much she is misrepresented by Chris. Now,
1:03:09
Speaker 2: it's fine to remove context. We all have to do
1:03:11
Speaker 2: that as creators for brevity, but to remove context and
1:03:14
Speaker 2: then tell people that she believes the exact opposite of
1:03:16
Speaker 2: what she said is what a liar would do. This
1:03:19
Speaker 2: was not a money-making scheme from Alyssa. This is not
1:03:22
Speaker 2: even her typical content. The reason that she made this
1:03:24
Speaker 2: video is because she saw certain problems in her local
1:03:27
Speaker 2: community getting worse, so as a resident who is married
1:03:30
Speaker 2: to a Japanese citizen, she felt compelled to speak up
1:03:33
Speaker 2: about it. Again, the comparison to Logan Paul and Johnny
1:03:36
Speaker 2: Somali or other nuisance streamers who don't live in Japan
1:03:40
Speaker 2: and don't have to deal with the consequences of them
1:03:41
Speaker 2: degrading a high-trust society for money, is ridiculous. Also, it's
1:03:46
Speaker 2: one main channel video that she's made this past year
1:03:48
Speaker 2: about crime, yet Chris is out here basically saying, this
1:03:52
Speaker 2: racist white girl hates foreigners and wants you to believe
1:03:55
Speaker 2: that Japan is dying. This is a money-making scheme where
1:03:58
Speaker 2: she's lying to you to fatten her bank account. It's
1:04:01
Speaker 2: one YouTube video, Chris. It's just one video. Then the
1:04:04
Speaker 2: rest of the content is stuff like, Born in Japan,
1:04:07
Speaker 2: but too tall for everything. Oh, but what about the
1:04:10
Speaker 2: Instagram videos? They didn't make any money. They were too
1:04:12
Speaker 2: short to make money. Nobody makes money on shorts unless
1:04:15
Speaker 2: they're over a minute long and get like 5 to
1:04:17
Speaker 2: 10 million views. Alyssa gave me her total revenue for
1:04:20
Speaker 2: Instagram for the month the video was released. Chris shows
1:04:23
Speaker 2: this ominous screenshot of her getting 1.7 million views on
1:04:26
Speaker 2: Instagram from the Japan is over content. $ 13. That's how
1:04:31
Speaker 2: much she made on Instagram that month. Oh, but what
1:04:34
Speaker 2: about TikTok? I see 400,000 views. $ 60 for the entire month.
1:04:39
Speaker 2: She didn't make any money on this content. This is
1:04:41
Speaker 2: not a get-rich-quick scheme. So again, it's one video. Now,
1:04:45
Speaker 2: I can understand if you have an issue with how
1:04:47
Speaker 2: a creator goes about a topic they talk about. That's fine.
1:04:50
Speaker 2: That's YouTube. But to complain about someone making $ 1, 000 when
1:04:53
Speaker 2: you easily made over $ 10, 000 on this video that you
1:04:56
Speaker 2: said you knew was going to do well and was
1:04:58
Speaker 2: probably only a few days of work is ridiculous. Oh,
1:05:00
Speaker 2: and you know, to end this all off, this grand
1:05:02
Speaker 2: money-making scheme from Alyssa to exploit Japan and exploit homeless people...
1:05:06
Speaker 2: Speaking of $ 10, 000, remember this video here where she got
1:05:09
Speaker 2: 3 million views and then donated all the profits to charity?
1:05:12
Speaker 2: Remember that? What a money-making scheme. What's also messed up
1:05:16
Speaker 2: is that Chris is acting like all of Alyssa's videos
1:05:18
Speaker 2: are either no work or require no money to make,
1:05:20
Speaker 2: which is untrue. Outside of constant language studies and the
1:05:23
Speaker 2: cost of that because language schools aren't free. So outside
1:05:26
Speaker 2: of that, she often travels for her content and that
1:05:28
Speaker 2: costs money and time. She films all over Japan, not
1:05:31
Speaker 2: just in Tokyo. Even if the videos cost no money,
1:05:34
Speaker 2: like my videos are mostly free to make, but the
1:05:36
Speaker 2: cost is my time and research, and time in organizing
1:05:39
Speaker 2: the ideas in an order that I think will be
1:05:41
Speaker 2: interesting to the audience. That takes shitloads of time, and
1:05:44
Speaker 2: so does editing. And unlike Chris said, you can't just
1:05:47
Speaker 2: make 50 of the same video. People will get bored,
1:05:50
Speaker 2: so a lot of time in a YouTuber's day is
1:05:51
Speaker 2: simply spent trying to decide what to talk about. Deciding
1:05:54
Speaker 2: what to talk about, especially after people have gotten bored
1:05:56
Speaker 2: of a meta, is the most difficult part of this job. Anyway,
1:06:00
Speaker 2: so the aftermath of Chris's crashout is that the Japanese
1:06:02
Speaker 2: people don't really agree with him. They were actually more
1:06:05
Speaker 2: on Alyssa's side. However, that didn't stop droves of creators
1:06:08
Speaker 2: who were Chris's fans and don't know anything about Japan
1:06:10
Speaker 2: from immediately taking his side and accusing Alyssa of some
1:06:13
Speaker 2: horrendous things, while largely just reciting points that Chris made
1:06:17
Speaker 2: in his video. They also didn't really show any indication
1:06:20
Speaker 2: that they did their own research or fact checking to
1:06:22
Speaker 2: verify if what Chris said was correct.
1:06:24
Speaker 7: She doesn't really seem to adjust this heavily in her video.
1:06:26
Speaker 7: That homeless population has, objectively speaking, been going down over
1:06:30
Speaker 7: the past few years. So focusing on this like it's
1:06:33
Speaker 7: a big problem that's degrading Japanese society, it's weird as
1:06:38
Speaker 7: a choice?
1:06:38
Speaker 2: I mean, that looks a lot like a zoomed-in graph
1:06:40
Speaker 2: about homelessness that Chris used where the article admitted that
1:06:43
Speaker 2: it was probably not accurate. Did this guy even read
1:06:45
Speaker 2: the article? It looks like he just took a screenshot
1:06:48
Speaker 2: and put it in his video without any fact-checking.
1:06:50
Speaker 7: If she does background research, she's not crediting it, which, frankly,
1:06:53
Speaker 7: this is my opinion, but I think that's malpractice.
1:06:57
Speaker 2: Gee, wouldn't it be a shame if you talked about
1:06:59
Speaker 2: research that viewers would not be able to look up
1:07:01
Speaker 2: because you didn't show any reference material for it on
1:07:03
Speaker 2: screen or put a link in the description? Isn't that malpractice?
1:07:06
Speaker 2: As for the videos of Alyssa's that he's talking about,
1:07:09
Speaker 2: I'm guessing he's referencing the What is Happening to Japan
1:07:11
Speaker 2: video and this one about homeless people. Neither of these
1:07:14
Speaker 2: videos require source citations. They are largely just telling personal stories,
1:07:18
Speaker 2: so the source is the story. Outside of that, she
1:07:20
Speaker 2: talks about the Toyoka kids, but that's a popular news
1:07:23
Speaker 2: story in Japan, and things that are common knowledge don't
1:07:25
Speaker 2: require source citations. The video that does require source citations
1:07:29
Speaker 2: is her follow-up video on Chris Broad, and she does
1:07:31
Speaker 2: show reference material. And actually, let me just go on
1:07:34
Speaker 2: a slight tangent about the homelessness stuff. because how much
1:07:37
Speaker 2: Alyssa was lied about really pisses me off. There's this
1:07:39
Speaker 2: narrative that she's stuffing her camera in the faces of
1:07:42
Speaker 2: homeless people.
1:07:43
Speaker 7: I also find it quite distasteful how she takes her
1:07:45
Speaker 7: camera and shoves it in the face of homeless people
1:07:48
Speaker 7: in the street who probably really don't want that attention
1:07:51
Speaker 7: on them. They're just minding their own business.
1:07:53
Speaker 4: And I worry in an era of nuisance content creators
1:07:56
Speaker 4: coming to Japan doing things that are unspeakably bad, they
1:07:59
Speaker 4: might see this sort of content and go, wow, you
1:08:03
Speaker 4: get $ 1, 500 for that? Maybe start to wave cameras around
1:08:05
Speaker 4: in the faces of homeless people, potentially leading to even
1:08:09
Speaker 4: more nuisance content.
1:08:10
Speaker 2: If you pay attention, you can see that yes, she
1:08:12
Speaker 2: is filming homeless people, but nobody's face is on camera.
1:08:15
Speaker 2: How else are you supposed to show the problem without
1:08:17
Speaker 2: filming it? She's not pestering people like Johnny Somali. In
1:08:20
Speaker 2: this video here, the one that Chris used to defame her,
1:08:23
Speaker 2: she's invited over by the homeless guy. And in this
1:08:26
Speaker 2: last video, the one that the Dungeons and Dragons guy cites,
1:08:29
Speaker 2: she's working with the homelessness outreach program, she's invited to film,
1:08:32
Speaker 2: And she shares some quite humanizing stories about the homeless
1:08:35
Speaker 2: population in Japan. She's also trying to get donations to
1:08:38
Speaker 2: help these people and spends her own money on these programs.
1:08:41
Speaker 2: But I mean, what homeless outreach work have you done, Chris?
1:08:44
Speaker 4: And in fact, I've been speaking with the homeless shelter
1:08:46
Speaker 4: about doing a documentary, but it's a serious topic and
1:08:49
Speaker 4: these are people's lives and I need to tackle that carefully.
1:08:52
Speaker 2: So nothing. Well, I was gonna, I was gonna make
1:08:55
Speaker 2: a video. I'll get to it eventually. Meanwhile, Alyssa has
1:08:58
Speaker 2: been working to help Japan's homeless population for like three
1:09:01
Speaker 2: years now, and has also been doing garbage and graffiti cleanups,
1:09:04
Speaker 2: by the way. This is why she was mad about
1:09:06
Speaker 2: the graffiti and trash. And moreover, she's also been working
1:09:09
Speaker 2: with this homeless outreach group called Don't Give Up that
1:09:12
Speaker 2: does most of their charity work in Shinjuku. Alyssa's like
1:09:15
Speaker 2: the big social media face of this group. Guess who
1:09:17
Speaker 2: fucked that up? Right, Chris did. Chris's video where he
1:09:21
Speaker 2: edits her out of context and says she's taken advantage
1:09:23
Speaker 2: of Japan's most vulnerable people for money. And you know what?
1:09:27
Speaker 2: Now people won't take her seriously on it because she
1:09:29
Speaker 2: got millions of views by calling her a lying grifter
1:09:32
Speaker 2: who makes slop content and said, actually, homelessness in Japan
1:09:36
Speaker 2: is not really a problem. So thanks for that, Chris.
1:09:39
Speaker 2: She was already working on a video for Don't Give Up,
1:09:41
Speaker 2: and because of you, now she can't release it because
1:09:44
Speaker 2: it will give them negative press. Here's the other messed
1:09:46
Speaker 2: up part of this. If Mr. I-spend-tons-of-time-fact-checking-which-is-why-I'm-a-real-YouTuber actually spent some
1:09:52
Speaker 2: time fact-checking, he could have easily found out that Alyssa
1:09:55
Speaker 2: does this outreach work. Like, this guy does not fact-check shit.
1:09:58
Speaker 2: He fact-checks like CNN fact-checks. Anyway, back to the Dungeons
1:10:02
Speaker 2: & Dragons guy.
1:10:03
Speaker 7: And look, as someone who went to J-School and, like,
1:10:05
Speaker 7: did street interviews for class, I can tell you, they
1:10:09
Speaker 7: have their place in journalism, but not as research.
1:10:12
Speaker 2: He's talking about the homeless stuff here again. One, this
1:10:15
Speaker 2: stuff doesn't require, like, a peer-reviewed research article. Her point
1:10:18
Speaker 2: is that people who take the data are hiding how
1:10:20
Speaker 2: bad the problem is, and she's showing you how they
1:10:22
Speaker 2: hide it. That is literally investigative journalism. That is research.
1:10:26
Speaker 2: That is the most difficult research, because she has to
1:10:28
Speaker 2: go out and do it herself. She can't just Google
1:10:30
Speaker 2: for a bit and call it a day. And this
1:10:32
Speaker 2: is why she's mad at Chris for citing government data,
1:10:35
Speaker 2: because she knows firsthand that it's wrong, and she's showed
1:10:37
Speaker 2: that in her videos.
1:10:39
Speaker 7: I don't want to lie to you like Orientalist Pearl does.
1:10:42
Speaker 2: Right, it's peak journalism training to assume the motives of
1:10:44
Speaker 2: your subject. You should sue the school that educated you.
1:10:48
Speaker 2: Not only did they not teach you how to cite sources,
1:10:50
Speaker 2: but they didn't teach you ethics either. Though maybe the
1:10:52
Speaker 2: school was woke, I can tell you that he's heavily
1:10:54
Speaker 2: on the left because he has a gun on the
1:10:56
Speaker 2: table that's facing towards him instead of a safe direction.
1:10:59
Speaker 2: That shit was bothering me the whole video. Not to
1:11:01
Speaker 2: say that I don't ever assume the motives of the
1:11:03
Speaker 2: people that I'm talking about, but I also don't claim
1:11:05
Speaker 2: to be a journalist.
1:11:06
Speaker 7: I'm grateful that Chris Broad brought this to my attention.
1:11:09
Speaker 7: I'm grateful that he is on the side of critical
1:11:12
Speaker 7: thinking and media literacy, because dang it, we need more
1:11:16
Speaker 7: people fighting for it.
1:11:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm so glad the guy who did everything he
1:11:19
Speaker 2: could to make it as difficult as possible for his
1:11:21
Speaker 2: audience to fact check what he said is on the
1:11:23
Speaker 2: side of critical thinking. Now, I'm leaving out a lot,
1:11:26
Speaker 2: but this was pretty much the sum total of people
1:11:28
Speaker 2: reacting to the situation all in one video. It was
1:11:31
Speaker 2: mostly Chris fans who knew nothing about Japan, echoing his
1:11:34
Speaker 2: viewpoints without really doing any of their own research, followed
1:11:37
Speaker 2: by glazing Chris while getting tons of stuff wrong. I
1:11:39
Speaker 2: think the only moderate or well-done video I saw was
1:11:42
Speaker 2: done by Dogen, who was clearly talking about this drama
1:11:45
Speaker 2: without openly stating it. For every 10-second reel of a
1:11:48
Speaker 2: foreigner walking by a broken window in Kamata, or some
1:11:51
Speaker 2: graffiti in Nakameguro. As a connoisseur of dog whistles, I
1:11:55
Speaker 2: really appreciate hearing a good one. I thought this was
1:11:58
Speaker 2: actually a pretty good example of a well-done and fair
1:12:00
Speaker 2: video in terms of trying to accurately communicate the viewpoints
1:12:02
Speaker 2: of its subjects, even though it wasn't directly about the drama.
1:12:06
Speaker 2: It was more so made in response to the drama.
1:12:08
Speaker 2: But going back to Alyssa vs. Chris, Alyssa has kindly
1:12:11
Speaker 2: shared additional images with me of the graffiti, and some
1:12:14
Speaker 2: of the areas have already gotten worse just in the
1:12:16
Speaker 2: time that this drama has gone on. I will note
1:12:19
Speaker 2: that these pictures are from about two weeks before the
1:12:21
Speaker 2: release of this video, and I will also note that
1:12:24
Speaker 2: some of the areas have already gotten cleaned up, so
1:12:26
Speaker 2: maybe saying something was a good thing after all. Last,
1:12:29
Speaker 2: I just want to bring this up because I'm sure
1:12:30
Speaker 2: somebody will. If you've watched other content from me, you
1:12:33
Speaker 2: might have seen that my sentiments towards foreigners are a
1:12:35
Speaker 2: little stricter than Alyssa's. That being said, I've expressed anti-foreigner
1:12:39
Speaker 2: sentiment in conversations about Japan towards a particular type of foreigner.
1:12:43
Speaker 2: That's because after watching all the shit that's happened in America,
1:12:46
Speaker 2: I think we need to be a little bit more
1:12:47
Speaker 2: hostile towards people who don't want to assimilate or refuse
1:12:50
Speaker 2: to assimilate, and by that, I mean I don't think
1:12:52
Speaker 2: people should just be deported for being illegals or committing
1:12:55
Speaker 2: violent crimes. I also think lighter things should get you deported,
1:12:58
Speaker 2: like if you don't speak English after five years, and
1:13:00
Speaker 2: if you don't follow American customs, then you shouldn't be
1:13:02
Speaker 2: in this country. And I think a lot of Japanese
1:13:05
Speaker 2: people would agree with that in respects to their country,
1:13:07
Speaker 2: as many of them are saying they don't appreciate it
1:13:09
Speaker 2: when newcomers refuse to learn their language. It's not just
1:13:22
Speaker 2: an annoyance to not be able to communicate.
1:13:24
Speaker 12: With newcomers because they refuse to learn your language.
1:13:47
Speaker 2: But it also changes the cultural traditions. You know, if
1:13:50
Speaker 2: you import tons of people who don't celebrate Halloween or Christmas,
1:13:53
Speaker 2: then there's going to be a lot less decorations up
1:13:55
Speaker 2: in the neighborhood. Which sucks, because kids these days don't
1:13:57
Speaker 2: get the kind of communities that we had in prior generations.
1:14:00
Speaker 2: And this is why immigration should be limited to give
1:14:02
Speaker 2: newcomers time to assimilate. Speaking of the language thing, Chris
1:14:06
Speaker 2: also believes that you should learn the language of the
1:14:08
Speaker 2: country that you live in. Now, I've always said if.
1:14:09
Speaker 4: You're moving to Japan, for God's sake, learn the language.
1:14:12
Speaker 4: You'll find it deeply rewarding, and also as a matter
1:14:14
Speaker 4: of courtesy. I think it's only right you should learn
1:14:16
Speaker 4: the language of the country you're moving to.
1:14:18
Speaker 2: This is actually respectable. Note that in the West, you
1:14:20
Speaker 2: are typically called a racist for saying that you should
1:14:22
Speaker 2: learn the language of the place that you live in,
1:14:24
Speaker 2: so this is the first brave stance that I've seen
1:14:26
Speaker 2: Chris take. But as for the tourism stuff, the reason
1:14:29
Speaker 2: Japan is going so hard on bringing in tons of
1:14:31
Speaker 2: foreigners … is because they're trying to use tourism to
1:14:33
Speaker 2: fix their economy. Among other reasons, Japan really took a
1:14:37
Speaker 2: huge hit from COVID, but I think it's stupid to
1:14:39
Speaker 2: fix a broken economy with multiculturalism. In the West, it's
1:14:42
Speaker 2: only made things worse, and as for Japan, it's not
1:14:45
Speaker 2: really fair to the locals to flood millions of people
1:14:47
Speaker 2: into major cities every year who don't know the culture
1:14:50
Speaker 2: or the language. It takes time to learn cultural rules
1:14:52
Speaker 2: like what side of the escalator to stand on when
1:14:54
Speaker 2: you're on the subway, and rules like this are important
1:14:57
Speaker 2: because they'll piss off Japanese people if you don't follow them.
1:15:00
Speaker 2: Mix that in with like 1 in 5 people not
1:15:02
Speaker 2: speaking the language in certain areas and having to deal
1:15:05
Speaker 2: with the frustration at maybe your job of constantly struggling
1:15:08
Speaker 2: to communicate. It would be much less of an inconvenience
1:15:11
Speaker 2: if that number was like 1 in 10 or 1
1:15:12
Speaker 2: in 20. But when Chris is talking about anti-foreigner sentiment
1:15:16
Speaker 2: in Japan, in addition to commentary from Westerners on Twitter
1:15:19
Speaker 2: and Instagram that he brought up, what he didn't say
1:15:21
Speaker 2: in his video is that a lot of his energy
1:15:23
Speaker 2: on this topic is more specifically coming from foreigners in
1:15:26
Speaker 2: Japan getting blamed for stuff that isn't their fault. Like
1:15:29
Speaker 2: there was a rice shortage in Japan, and foreign tourists
1:15:31
Speaker 2: were blamed for it. I'm not going to get into it,
1:15:33
Speaker 2: but if you look at the full details of the story,
1:15:35
Speaker 2: the problem was obviously not caused by tourists. Chris is
1:15:38
Speaker 2: correct in believing that there are a lot of stupid
1:15:40
Speaker 2: news stories in Japan blaming foreigners for things that aren't
1:15:43
Speaker 2: their fault. Though the reason they can get away with
1:15:45
Speaker 2: blaming tourists for this is because Japanese people are frustrated
1:15:48
Speaker 2: by over-tourism because they're bringing in too many foreigners, and
1:15:51
Speaker 2: no amount of political framing can fix that. As I
1:15:54
Speaker 2: keep saying, you can't simply train that many people on
1:15:56
Speaker 2: Japanese culture all at once. Imagine people just constantly not
1:16:00
Speaker 2: following the escalator rules because it's their first day and
1:16:03
Speaker 2: they don't know any better. So bringing in a bunch
1:16:05
Speaker 2: of people who don't know the rules is going to
1:16:07
Speaker 2: piss off the native population. And a part of me
1:16:09
Speaker 2: thinks that Chris is making this problem worse by constantly
1:16:11
Speaker 2: encouraging more tourism. But to add one final point of nuance,
1:16:15
Speaker 2: after scrolling through his entire main channel and his second channel,
1:16:19
Speaker 2: I finally found a video where he said something critical
1:16:21
Speaker 2: of Japan that might discourage tourism. Here's a video where
1:16:24
Speaker 2: he's talking about Kabukicho.
1:16:25
Speaker 4: The story we're going to read out today is actually
1:16:28
Speaker 4: in Kabukicho. There's one rule you need to follow if
1:16:31
Speaker 4: you do go there, and that is never, ever, ever
1:16:33
Speaker 4: follow one of the touts into a bar. Unfortunately, a
1:16:37
Speaker 4: lot of people do follow the street touts. They're pretty
1:16:40
Speaker 4: nice people. They're very engaging and good at what they do. Now,
1:16:42
Speaker 4: the touts that target foreigners specifically... They're actually foreigners themselves.
1:16:47
Speaker 4: They're not Japanese. They're Nigerian guys that have been given
1:16:49
Speaker 4: visas to come over and basically kind of do this
1:16:52
Speaker 4: and work for these organizations in the area.
1:16:54
Speaker 2: Looks like someone is starting to notice. All cultures aren't
1:16:56
Speaker 2: created equal, and Africa is notorious for having lots of scammers.
1:17:00
Speaker 2: All you have to do is watch the black expat
1:17:02
Speaker 2: videos on YouTube to know that. It's the first thing
1:17:04
Speaker 2: they'll warn you about. So there's a reason why I
1:17:06
Speaker 2: have strict beliefs on immigration and travel, and there's a
1:17:09
Speaker 2: reason why I believe that much softer things should get
1:17:11
Speaker 2: people deported, like refusing to learn the language. By the way,
1:17:14
Speaker 2: when I say that, I mean high-level fluency. A lot
1:17:17
Speaker 2: of the H-1B visas coming to America don't actually speak
1:17:20
Speaker 2: English past a basic level, if that. But maybe instead
1:17:23
Speaker 2: of applying a band-aid solution to the economy through massive
1:17:26
Speaker 2: amounts of tourism, Japan should actually fix its core issues.
1:17:30
Speaker 2: I don't know, maybe they can make a factory or
1:17:32
Speaker 2: something to encourage people to move out of the expensive cities,
1:17:35
Speaker 2: and into a place large enough to raise a family.
1:17:37
Speaker 2: Maybe pass some workers' rights legislation so companies can't just
1:17:40
Speaker 2: abuse their employees into having no free time for themselves.
1:17:43
Speaker 2: Whether or not those are solutions, there are always ways
1:17:46
Speaker 2: to solve this internally, without importing tons of people, and
1:17:49
Speaker 2: unless the core issues are solved, the problem will still
1:17:51
Speaker 2: be there. Anyway, that's my thoughts on all this. Subscribe
1:17:54
Speaker 2: to the channel, follow me on Twitter, and I'll see
1:17:56
Speaker 2: you in the next video.