It has come to light that at the Esuka shopping center in Oshu City, Iwate Prefecture, middle school students have repeatedly engaged in disruptive behavior — playing dangerous games on the escalators, charging their phones without permission, leaving half-eaten food trash lying around, and loudly filming videos for social media. In one case a student even hurled abuse at a customer who told them to stop. The store has now taken the step of banning middle schoolers from entering alone. On a 5channel thread, opinions split over whether responsibility for discipline lies with the school or the parents, and many pointed out how hard it is to curb this kind of misbehavior now that corporal punishment is banned.
Escalators run amok, unauthorized phone charging, half-eaten trash left behind, loud filming for social media… abuse hurled at customers who spoke up — after repeated nuisance behavior, store bans middle schoolers from entering alone — Oshu City, Iwate
Thu, 9/10, 6:00 AM JST
IBC Iwate Broadcasting
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Read the original article here
No wonder Japan is falling apart.
Blame the Baby Boomer Juniors (Japan's second baby-boom generation, born early '70s).
They're just there to teach subjects.
They're not obligated to handle life guidance too.
Whether the kids actually learn anything or not is on them personally.
Teachers get two days off a week.
The one in Enoshima is called 'Escar.'
Kids who look like a mixed-nationality group sit right down on the sidewalk outside a department store, scarf down food, and leave the trash behind.
There's a security camera right above them, and I thought 'seriously?'… but then it turned out the guard just picks up the trash after they've left.
Apparently if you say something to them you get assaulted, so cleanup only happens once they're gone.
Same thing on trains — people flying into a rage when called out.
At least the guard's decent enough to pick up the trash after they leave.
Back in the day you could just beat some sense into them and toss them out of the store.
These days it's the opposite — the person who says something gets beaten up and it ends up streamed online.
https://www.esca-sc.com/access/img/parking/img_01.jpg?20250801
Is an elevator an 'Ereve' then?
When you say 'Esca,' it's gotta be Escaflowne.
There's also caregiving work, I guess.
Just doing that would leave these little punks with nowhere to hide starting the next day.
Why isn't anyone doing that?
Realistically, the only thing here that's actually a crime is stealing electricity, no?
It looks like it says the police are cooperating on patrols, though?
They're middle schoolers — a bit of rowdiness like this should be fine.
Why don't you have them rampage in front of your house every day, then?
This is way past 'tolerance,' lol.
'They're middle schoolers' really tells me everything about how your brain works, lol.
Back in the day the scary old guy from the neighborhood would've chewed them out something fierce.
Now that corporal punishment is banned, it's tough to know how to handle them.
The PE teacher used to patrol around, and if he found troublemakers he'd smack them straight, no questions asked.
Ash: "Yeah, fair."
Shallie A: "Yeah, fair."
Shallie B: "Yeah, fair."
Wilbell: "Meteor!"
(Characters from the Atelier video game series; "yeah, fair" renders their Kansai-dialect agreement, and "Meteor" is Wilbell's signature spell.)
What was the PTA doing? Was anything reported to the board of education?
If monkeys wander into human territory, of course you chase them off —
if nobody does, well, then it's just a monkey mountain.
Isn't it obviously the parents who are the worst here?
You don't even need to imagine what kind of people raised kids like this.
Well, telling parents who let their kids leave trash everywhere isn't going to fix anything.
When it comes to actually dealing with the problem, nothing changes unless the school takes action.
So it's basically a 'Buy-Now-Pay-Later (Shoplifters) Family,' huh, lol? (a pun combining "zan-kure" installment car loans with the film "Shoplifters," implying a family living beyond its means)
at least up until the end of the Showa era.
See, conscientiousness score is low, right?
https://media-lab-brains.as-1.co.jp/wp/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/19144934/kenminsei_img2.jpg
Background and Key Talking Points
Cases of commercial facilities imposing measures like banning middle schoolers from entering alone have been reported in various places in recent years, typically used when staff warnings alone fail to curb disruptive behavior. This article doesn’t say whether the store consulted the school or parents beforehand, or how many students were involved. Where the thread’s opinions split was mainly over where responsibility for discipline lies — some argued schools have a duty to provide life guidance, while others countered that a school’s role is limited to teaching academics. Many also pointed out that with corporal punishment now banned, adults have few tools left to stop bad behavior on the spot — though this reads less like a call to bring back corporal punishment and more like frustration at the lack of alternatives. There was also discussion of the gap between urban and rural educational environments, though none of it identified specific students or stores.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5channel (Breaking News+) thread ‘[Iwate] Escalators run amok, unauthorized phone charging, half-eaten trash left behind, loud filming for social media… abuse hurled at customers who spoke up — store bans middle schoolers from entering alone.’
