Uproar as Japan junior high principal demands student rewrite graduation essay on bullying. The school and the education board have not considered the bullying against the student as a “serious incident”and neither investigated the case

I understand that image is an important part of the culture. But reading “There must have been at least one thing that was fun. What will people from other schools think when they read this?” from the principal is actually just sickening. Does the cultural importance of image blind a person that much from how cruel and callous that statement is? Does it seriously erode the ability to have a shred of empathy for any one individual? I really don’t understand.