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The story
On Yomiuri TV’s “Niketsu!!”, which Kendo Kobayashi appeared on alongside Chihara Jr., he revealed that after warning some kids who were playing a card game in the road, his own actions ended up showing up on his phone as a local “suspicious person alert” — something like “middle-aged man approached minors” — leaving him laughing ruefully, “That’s… me.” The story sparked a wave of posts on 5ch expressing confusion over just how blurry the line is for what counts as a reportable “suspicious person” incident, with many users sharing similar experiences of their own. Opinions split over whether to view this reporting culture as “overreaction” or as “necessary self-protection.”
Nov 12 (Thu) 20:04
Kendo Kobayashi and Chihara Jr. of the Chihara Brothers appeared on Yomiuri TV’s “Niketsu!!”, which aired on the 10th.
When the topic of “suspicious person alerts” came up, Junior said, “They pop up on your phone sometimes, right? Like ‘suspicious approach to a woman near such-and-such station.’” Kenkoba nodded along: “Yeah, they show up on my phone too these days.”
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Guess total silence is the safe move.
The only time it's okay for a middle-aged guy to greet kids is while hiking in the mountains (where trail greetings are customary).
The other day,
some nursery school kids were out on a group walk nearby,
teacher in tow, of course.
An old man passing by said "hello" to them.
The kids said nothing.
The old man snapped, "Not even gonna say hi back, huh."
Honestly, they didn't owe him a reply.
If you report it, it turns into an official case and worst case he gets arrested.
No, I meant Kobayashi should report the kid to their school.
This isn't some backwater town, there's no way to know what school district a kid's from.
They don't even wear name tags anymore, so there's no telling which school some random brat belongs to.
Pretty sharp of the woman to clock that as a pickup line.
Woman: "I'm gonna go gargle with a rock real quick." (so cringed out she needs to scrub her mouth)
It's supposed to be the moon, not the stars.
How is that "sharp"?
and ended up with a suspicious-person alert put out on me.
Given the time and place, I'm pretty sure that was me —
it said something about "walking briskly, breathing heavily, following [someone]."
Well yeah, I was power-walking, of course my breathing was up.
Was the twist that you were walking stark naked because it was hot?
Yeah, you've gotta tack on "because it's dangerous" or "because you're in the way."
And it shouldn't be "do it," it should be "you'd probably better do it."
Kids in the way are annoying, but for someone Kenkoba's age, a bunch of kids huddled in one spot playing a card game is actually kind of a wholesome sight.
Ball games or tag, though — those make you want to yell, because those are genuinely dangerous.
If you don't help, you get blamed for standing by and letting them die, right?
So what are you supposed to do after calling for help?
Stand around cheering them on with the other kids?
He was just trying to help, and he still gets treated like a suspicious person?
They should just slap a title on stuff like this —
tacking on the real reason at the very end just turns it into one of those comedy punchline contests.
I got a little heated and told her pretty firmly that it was dangerous, and she started crying — suddenly I'm the villain.
A crowd gathered too, I thought my life was over.
Well yeah, getting yelled at by some strange middle-aged guy would be scary.
It's basically just spite:
"He scolded me so now I'm pissed, I'm telling my parents he's a suspicious person."
"Local suspicious-person alerts come through" — what do you even have to sign up for to get notifications like that?
I was wondering if phones even had a built-in feature for that,
but apparently every prefecture's police department has its own app lol.
Re: #93
Why does Kenkoba even have an app like that installed in the first place…
Guess they're raised with proper manners there.
That's because they think you're the suspicious one, that's why they're greeting you.
These days people report at the drop of a hat even when nothing's actually wrong — calling the cops as casually as ordering McDelivery, it's kind of absurd lol.
You've gotta think about how many actual criminals were hiding behind that "friendly old guy" act, though.
I mean, she was probably just being kind.
A guy gets treated as suspicious just for saying something to someone.
Wait, no app installed but it still "comes through for your area"?
We're talking about phones here, right? Not some neighborhood notice board passed door to door, lol.
Re: #96
This sounds like an old person…
that's probably you they're talking about…
Asked ChatGPT about it,
and apparently if you're in Kanagawa it'd be apps like "Kanagawa Police," "Yahoo! Disaster Alerts," or "Google Local News."
I'm not installing any of that.
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
These “suspicious person alerts” aren’t the result of direct police surveillance or confirmed cases — in most instances, they’re distributed through local safety apps or mailing lists, like “Kanagawa Police” or “Yahoo! Disaster Alerts,” based on self-reports from residents. In other words, an incident doesn’t need to be formally investigated or prosecuted to get broadcast: the moment someone feels “a stranger spoke to me and it scared me,” it can become alert-worthy. The thread split between those who see this system as “stifling overreaction” and those who see it as “necessary self-defense to protect children,” though there was broad agreement that greetings or warnings themselves aren’t inherently bad. What readers tend to misunderstand is that this kind of information doesn’t carry the same weight as an arrest or a criminal record — most of it is unverified sightings and reports based purely on how someone felt in the moment.
*This article is compiled as an excerpt/summary of a 5ch (Entertainment/Sports News+) thread titled “Kenkoba warns kids playing a card game in the road → his own phone shows a “suspicious approach by a middle-aged man” alert, leaving him saying “That’s… me”.”
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