There are no democratic countries in SE Asia (which is in an indication by itself) unfortunately. Vietnam and Laos are communist, Cambodia is a dictatorship, Thailand is a monarchy, Myanmar is rolls dice a military dictatorship this year. Malaysia is an elective Monarchy. You have to get down to Singapore to get to something like a functioning democracy.
I haven't been to Japan yet, so can't speak to that. Fascinating that you see the same attitude there, though.
I guess you know about those things, just thought it's an interesting (and sad) example of what can make people go quiet and pretend they're happy.
You've been to lots of co-working spaces in SE Asia? I was thinking that then you'll meet relatively well-off people who have fewer things to complain about, that might be another source of selection bias? But what do I know.
@majewsky
Japan is a pretty homogenous country? I'd think that can work better and be one reason for a more satisfied-with-the-government mindset? (But maybe there's more)
Compared to e.g. the US with different groups of people sometimes hating each other
No, I actually worked in Cambodia alongside Khmer folks (as well as working in a bunch of co-working spaces elsewhere in the region). And sure, they were probably lying to me about things (but that's part of the difference I found - the truth is less important than in the West [0])
And yes, you could probably get a long jail sentence in Cambodia for publicly criticising Hun Sen. The thing I found interesting is that that's a symptom, not the cause. The cause is that they're a very authoritarian culture who consider it very rude (our best approximation of the emotion) when people criticise leaders. At least that was the conclusion I came to during my time there. As you say, I'm a tourist so what do I know?
I do find it fascinating that we have such a resistance to understanding that different people have different attitudes to the world and different ways of thinking about it.
[0] I moved to Berlin a few years later, and the difference was dramatic: Berliners have a reputation for being rudely abrupt even amongst Germans. They do not sugar-coat anything lol.
I haven't been to Japan yet, so can't speak to that. Fascinating that you see the same attitude there, though.