By Muhammad Ravid Valiandi/16518387-STEI

Within the video “When I Die: Inside Japan’s Death Industry” posted by Al Jazeera in July 2015
for their 101 East segment, the reporter takes a look at how Japan says its final goodbyes. Its
stated that death has become a major industry in Japan, with more than a million deaths in
2014, an aging population, a falling birth rate (Pulvers, 2006, more relaxed and enjoyable
section, para. 4) and a social climate more open to discussions and new ideas regarding one’s
burial, it is certainly rich soil for such industries to grow. One of the focuses of the video is that
the Japanese people are spoiled for choice in ways that they can be buried, from having their
ashes scattered across the stars, to having it be buried below cherry blossoms with other
families, to even having their ashes stored in a necklace to be kept close by their loved ones.
One of the questions the reporter has asked a coffin seller was whether or not death has
become too commercialized within Japan, due to the number of funeral-related businesses that
cropped up between 2014 and 2015, along with the fact that at least one such business had
their stock value almost double in 2014 (Clenfield, 2018, beginning section, para. 3). The vendor
responded by expressing that this recent surge of funerary business is less due to the
commercial profit it can offer and more due to the changing attitudes of the Japanese people.
This is especially apparent in the modernization of Buddhist temples into skyscraper complexes,
as well as the rising popularity of shukatsu, meaning “Preparing for the End”. The cultural
landscape of Japan is changing when it comes to matters of the end, and this is not the first
time this has happened. Pulvers wrote, “cremation was for ages widely opposed by many
segments of Japanese society. Confucianists, for one thing, considered it ‘barbaric and unfilial.’
It may come as a surprise to many that right up to the time of World War II, a full 50 percent of
those who died in Japan were buried without being cremated” and “Today, cremation is by far
the most popular method of dealing with the dead body.” This is one of the effects of the
increasingly cynical world we live in, I myself am quite inured to the death of loved ones. It is in
my opinion that these changes would continue to grow as time passes and the population
continues to decline.
Another worry the reporter hears of is that of increasing simplicity, that because of Japan’s
aging population and the costs involved, funerary rites would become increasingly simpler to
accommodate lesser incomes. His worries stem from the fact that even supermarkets are
offering cheap funeral plans and that one could go online and get a cheap funeral for 80 USD.
This worry is mirrored by a monk the reporter interviews later on, who says that Japan has
relegated Buddhist rituals merely to funeral rites and that such rites and the temples the
remains of the dead are stored may not even conform to the values of Buddism. While many
worry that this is the case, the monk in question is quite a bit more pragmatic about it,
expressing that perhaps these changes are for the best. And it is mIt is in my opinion that the
monk is right. The fact of the matter is that, the dead have passed and it is for the best that
they do not become a burden for their living relatives to carry. My grandfather, for instance,
was granted a simple funeral that does not burden my family.
One of the central focuses of this article, and of the video is based on, is “do people have a right
to die in a special way that they want”, and it is no doubt a question many debates have sprung
over. In my honest opinion, the answer is yes, so long as the chosen method does not overly
hinder or burden the living family of the deceased. This is both to ease the financial burdens
that normal funerals may cause, - in one case just a plot of land in a city cemetery would cost
over six thousand USD, cremation could cost well over one thousand USD, while more esoteric
methods, such as sending the cremated ashes to space, may cost a staggering twenty-two
thousand USD (Andelstein, 2017, para. 10) – and to ease the family burden of taking care of the
gravesite, which is usually accomplished through natural burials or cremation (Pulvers, 2006,
from woe to go section, para. 3).
That is not to say that such ceremonies should not be allowed, the death of a family member
can greatly affect their living relatives, as I can attest to after the death of my grandfather, and
these funerals are a part of the family’s mourning. I merely implore that any such an expense
should be within the family’s own financial means to fund, and insist that if a family is lacking in
money it would be alright for them to use with simple cremation or burial by a cherry blossom
to send their relatives to the afterlife, even if the deceased wished for a grander funeral.
In conclusion, it is within this writer’s honest opinion that everyone should have a right to
choose how they should be treated once they have died, but they must choose funerary rites
that are actually within their family’s means of accomplishing.
References:
Andelstein, 2017: https://www.forbes.com/sites/adelsteinjake/2017/09/04/at-japans-funeral-
death-services-expo-endex-everything-ends-well/#47f092774fc3
Clenfield, 2018: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/06/29/business/business-death-
bright-future-japan/#.W-LlRvZoTIV
Pulvers, 2006: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2006/12/03/commentary/dying-
traditions-open-up-new-choices-after-death/#.W-LmW_ZoTIU, and
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2006/11/26/commentary/dealing-with-death-the-
japanese-ways/#.W-LpXfZoTIX