I like them, but it always kills me when people are all like, “Why can’t we be as polite as Japan??”

It’s like, we could - any country could - but do you really want there to be government-operated loudspeakers making daily announcements about how you should raise your kids? There are some smaller towns where the speaker system is built right in their homes. You really want that?

Again, I like the neighborhood announcements, but they’re a little-known example of just how much the municipal government gets involved with your life, and how that mythical “homogeneity” is actually created and gently enforced by public institutions.