Asia
My Japan
My Japan, one of the most unusual documentary films ever made, dares to question America's invincibility. But I wonder whether in fact it's the unheralded first film of the atomic age. Is it too far out to imagine that its real purpose was to desensitize Americans to the horrors of the A-bomb? By citing American weaknesses and vulnerabilities and seeming to praise Japanese patriotism, strength and resolve, it challenges Americans to support a strategy of total war. Its stealthy assertion: that the Japanese military machine will not be broken without an unprecedented effort. It supports this assertion by presenting highly charged and emotional images with an bogus "insider" narration that is at once deceptive and inflammatory.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Apr 03, 2025 -
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Category: Propaganda, Thought Control and Brainwashing, 1940s, Asia
Kazuya Kosaka & The Wagon Masters
Posted By: Paul - Wed Feb 12, 2025 -
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Category: Music, Cultural Borrowings, Appropriations, Overlays and Transformations, 1950s, Asia, Mistranslations
Japanese Rice Festival
I haven't been able to figure out what the name of this festival was, but it included the feat of strength shown below.But I gotta wonder, what would happen if the guy realized he couldn't actually support the 1000 lbs (or more) of weight they've got stacked on him? Were there occasional fatalities?
Des Moines Register - Dec 6, 1964
Posted By: Alex - Wed Nov 06, 2024 -
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Category: Human Marvels, Parades and Festivals, 1960s, Asia
“Snail’s Gallop”
More on the artist here.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Oct 05, 2024 -
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Category: Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Avant Garde, Performance Art, Asia, Twenty-first Century
A New Sound from the Japanese Bach Scene
Just what you'd expect: Bach played on Japanese instruments. Player is embedded below the Tracklist.
Posted By: Paul - Wed Sep 18, 2024 -
Comments (5)
Category: Music, 1960s, Asia, Europe
‘Sanity clearance’ for Japanese drivers
In the 1960s, Japan experimented with two ways of improving road safety.First, it required that new drivers obtain a "sanity clearance" from a doctor. This was supposed to keep psychotic motorists off the road.
Second, it urged pedestrians to either raise a hand or wave a yellow flag to indicate to drivers that they wanted to cross the road.
Both efforts failed and were quickly scrapped.
The "sanity clearance" was too easy to obtain and people disliked the expense. (Imagine flunking your driving test because you failed a sanity clearance!)
The hand-raising promotion actually increased pedestrian deaths. Apparently pedestrians seemed to believe that, as long as they raised their hand, they had "permission to ignore all traffic rules and boldly march out in to the middle of the road whenever they felt like it."
Sydney Morning Herald - Mar 24, 1968
Posted By: Alex - Tue Sep 17, 2024 -
Comments (2)
Category: Regulations, 1960s, Asia, Cars
Follies of the Madmen #604
"No more washee, washee! Melican man wear celluloid collar and cuff!"
Posted By: Paul - Thu Aug 29, 2024 -
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Category: Fashion, Stereotypes and Cliches, Advertising, Asia, Nineteenth Century
Don’t Fool with Fu Manchu
The group's Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Aug 03, 2024 -
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Category: Mad Scientists, Evil Geniuses, Insane Villains, Music, Stereotypes and Cliches, Books, 1960s, Asia
Aki Sasamoto: Delicate Cycle
The creator's Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Jul 25, 2024 -
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Category: Art, Performance Art, Hygiene, Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Asia
An inglorious Columbus : or, Evidence that Hwui Shn and a party of Buddhist monks from Afghanistan discovered America in the fifth century, A.D
Why waste your red paint and enmity on statues of Columbus, when it was really the Chinese who discovered America?Read it here.
Posted By: Paul - Sun Jun 30, 2024 -
Comments (4)
Category: Explorers, Frontiersmen, and Conquerors, Fables, Myths, Urban Legends, Rumors, Water-Cooler Lore, Asia, North America, Nineteenth Century
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| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1. Contact Us |