In his Aug. 13 letter, "So much ado over use of drugs," David Williams laments the fact that Japan is "50 years behind America when it comes to the 'evil of drugs.' " But I think that sometimes being behind the times is actually a good thing. It's a horrifying thought to imagine Japan "progressing" so as to be more like the West when it comes to drug use.
Drug use is adamantly opposed by the vast majority of people in Japan as well as in neighboring South Korea, the land of my birth. Most Japanese and Korean people simply do not want drugs in their countries, period. Why can't Williams respect that? He seems to be engaging in cultural arrogance — wanting to import a Western cultural phenomenon that most East Asian people do not want, all in the name of being up with the times.
Williams presents three U.S. presidents as examples of people who became successful despite past drug use. But their experience is more than outweighed by that of millions of people in the West whose lives have been literally destroyed by drugs. I don't blame the Japanese for keeping this tragic reality out of their country.
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