A 25-year-old tailgated a car, ran the other driver down, dragged him, and told police he only meant to scare him. One hour and 23 minutes after the article went up I counted 94 comments: 95 to 5, with 61 percent of the vote asking for a heavy sentence and a lifetime licence ban. Thirty-four comments, 36 percent of the thread, were about the suspect's face and mask. One comment said the police do not enforce the rules
95 to 5, and the mood was a heavy sentence and a licence ban. But this is the thread at one hour and 23 minutes, 94 comments, the mood of that hour. Thirty-six percent of the comments were about the man's face and mask. One comment said the police do not enforce the rules.
How the votes fell
Ranked by upvotes. Left of the slash is agree, right is disagree. This is where the resentment actually sits.
- 1 348 ∕ 5 whether it is a short temper or just his nature I cannot tell, but he is described as a company employee, so does he never throw a tantrum at work? People of this type should have their licence revoked and be barred from ever getting one again
- 2 323 ∕ 7 the worst, the lowest. Thinking that there are many people like this, I feel the Road Traffic Act must be made far stricter. Driving schools and licence renewals teach that a car is a lethal weapon. Whether the driving was careless or deliberate, all dangerous driving needs to be punished severely
- 3 144 ∕ 1 this is someone who cannot be left loose in society. Attempted murder is punished on a par with murder. There will be no death sentence, but this deserves life imprisonment. The court will probably say seven years is appropriate by precedent, but if judges are just going to cite precedent we do not need them, an AI would do. Judges should think for themselves and hand down their own answer
- 4 130 ∕ 5 tailgating someone, running them down and dragging them is not attempted murder, it is murder with intent. The victim was seriously injured and could just as easily have died. Someone who does not understand the value of a life or other people's feelings deserves a heavy sentence. Surely this is not going to end in a suspended sentence
- 5 128 ∕ 4 the victim stopped his car and went over to remonstrate, but you should never get out of the car. You have no idea who the other person is, so stay inside. Stop somewhere with people around, or better still drive to a police station. There are a lot of dangerous people out there now
I read all 94 top-level comments. This is the thread one hour and 23 minutes after the article went up, at 7:23 on the morning of 9 September 2026. It is less than three hours old, so this is the mood of that hour; by evening the numbers and the order will have changed. The votes: 1,962 "I relate" against 104 "hmm" — 95 to 5. The last three notes ran 85 to 15, 74 to 26 and 92 to 8, so this is the most one-sided of the four. The top 10 comments took 71 percent of the vote and the top 20 took 87 percent; the top comment alone had 348 presses, 18 percent. Of the 94 comments, 26, or 28 percent, had no "I relate" at all, and 37, or 39 percent, had one press or none. "Hmm" beat "I relate" on 4 comments; the most "hmm" in the thread, 12, went to a comment saying the victim should not have remonstrated but simply turned off down a side road. Comments asking for a heavy sentence, saying never let him out, or saying Japan's sentences are too light: 19 comments, 792 presses, 40 percent of the vote, with the second, third and fourth-placed comments among them. Comments saying he must never hold a licence again: 6 comments, 400 presses, 20 percent, including the top comment's 348. Together, 25 comments, 1,192 presses, 61 percent. Comments answering the suspect's line that he only meant to scare — you call that scaring, you mean you meant to kill: 13 comments, 216 presses, 11 percent. Comments about what the victim should have done — never get out of the car, do not engage, drive away: 9 comments, 212 presses, 11 percent, with 19 "hmm", 18 percent of all the "hmm" in the thread. Comments about the man's character — short-tempered, cowardly, the kind who feels powerful behind a wheel: 8 comments, 64 presses, 3.3 percent. And comments about the man's face, his mask and his name: 34 comments, 211 presses, 11 percent of the vote, and 36 percent of the thread by count. They mock an individual's looks, so I do not quote them. One comment, with no presses, leaned towards defending him. Finally, my own reading against the numbers. The word police appeared in 3 comments, 178 presses, 9.1 percent; of those, one comment, 37 presses, 1.9 percent, said the police do not enforce unless something happens. The Road Traffic Act appeared in 2 comments, 323 presses, 16 percent, both asking for it to be made stricter. The causes I named — speeding, ignoring stop signs, turn signals, parked cars — appeared in zero comments, and so did the words stress and salaryman. The words company employee appeared in 5 comments, 358 presses, 18 percent, asking whether he throws tantrums at work and predicting his dismissal. The comment I shared on X, asking whether the excuse would work under Japan's criminal-friendly law, was in 73rd place with zero presses. The thread did not write about why road rage happens. It wrote about what to do with this man.
What happened
FNN Prime Online published this on Yahoo! News Japan at 6:00 on the morning of Tuesday 9 September 2026. One night in August, at about 2 a.m., on a prefectural road in the town of Nagara in Chiba prefecture, the car behind began tailgating, closing the gap and pressing. The 30-year-old driver in front could not take it, stopped, and got out to remonstrate. The car behind accelerated at him, hit his car, reversed, and accelerated again, knocking him down. When the man, on his feet again, approached the driver's window, the driver grabbed his arm and drove backwards with him held, throwing him into a roadside ditch with a broken shoulder blade. Then he drove off. A 25-year-old company employee has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder. He partly denies the charge: he only meant to scare the man, he says. The article gives his name and shows his face. This note does not. I do not print the names of private individuals at the arrest stage.
Here is what I thought when I read the article.
Traffic in Japan. Everyone is rushing about, there are rules, and breaking them is fine. That is the setting, and the problem it produces is road rage, what Japan calls aori unten, "goading driving". The cause of road rage is 100 percent traffic violations. But Japan has a peculiar police practice: an officer has to see the violation with his own eyes, what they call gennin, and if no officer saw it, almost nothing happens. That abnormal state is what brings this about, so it is close to a man-made disaster. Mostly it is speeding and not stopping at stop signs. Then it is turn signals not given, or given at the last second, and swerving around parked cars. Every one of these things is taught as wrong. Drivers with licences do habitually, when no police are around, what they would never do in front of a police officer, and that is what produces road rage. And the cars are driven by salarymen who are chased by the clock and carrying the frustrations of a stressed society, so it happens because it is bound to happen. That is what I think.
My reading is about causes. Road rage grows out of traffic violations, mostly speeding and ignoring stop signs, then turn signals and parked cars. Everyone was taught not to. They do not do it in front of the police. The police do not act on what they did not see. So it is close to a man-made disaster. And it is bound to happen in cars driven by hurried salarymen. I counted how much of that the thread wrote.
95 to 5 — but this is one hour and 23 minutes in, 94 comments
Across 94 top-level comments, 1,962 "I relate" against 104 "hmm" — 95 to 5. The last three notes ran 85 to 15, 74 to 26 and 92 to 8, so this is the most one-sided of the four. But it is the thread at 7:23 in the morning. The article went up at 6:00 and I counted one hour and 23 minutes later. A thread less than three hours old is the mood of that hour, so please read it as that. By evening the count and the order will have moved.
The vote sits at the top, as it always does. The top 10 comments took 71 percent of it, the top 20 took 87 percent, and the top comment alone had 348 presses, 18 percent. Of the 94 comments, 26, or 28 percent, had no "I relate" at all, and 37, or 39 percent, had one press or none. The newer a comment, the fewer its presses; the bottom half of the thread had not yet been read by anyone. "Hmm" beat "I relate" on 4 comments only.
The top comment says never let him drive again — heavy sentence and licence ban, 61 percent
Whether it is a short temper or just his nature I cannot tell, but he is described as a company employee, so does he never throw a tantrum at work? People of this type should have their licence revoked and be barred from ever getting one again.
短気なのか素性なのか良くわかりませんが、会社員との事ですが、仕事中に癇癪を起こす事とか無いのですかね。この様なタイプの人は、免許取消しにして、一生免許取得出来ない様にするべきですね。First place, 348 presses, 18 percent of the vote. Never let him hold a licence again. Six comments said the same, 400 presses, 20 percent of the vote. The 13th-placed one, 39 presses: this is someone who must never be allowed to drive again; let him drive and there will simply be another victim.
The worst, the lowest. When I think that there are many people like this, I feel the Road Traffic Act has to be made far stricter. At driving school and at every licence renewal they teach you that a car is a lethal weapon. Whether the driving was careless or deliberate, all dangerous driving, every case of it, needs to be punished severely.
最悪、最低です。このような人間がたくさんいると思うと、道路交通法を一層厳しくしなければならないと感じる。
自動車学校や免許証更新時には、車は凶器と教えられる。
誤った運転、故意の運転に関わらず、全てを対象に、危険な運転は厳罰にする必要があると思う。Second place, 323 presses, and 8 "I see" presses, the most in the thread. Comments asking for a heavy sentence, saying never let him out, or saying Japan's sentences are too light: 19 comments, 792 presses, 40 percent of the vote, with second, third and fourth place among them. Third, 144 presses: this is someone who cannot be left loose in society; life imprisonment; if judges are just going to cite precedent we do not need them, an AI would do. Fourth, 130 presses: not attempted murder but murder with intent; surely this is not going to end in a suspended sentence. Tenth, 53 presses: do it the American way, add up the sentences for every offence and make it a hundred years. Eleventh, 52 presses: let him out within ten years and he will certainly attempt murder again, or commit it.
Add the six licence comments and the group is 25 comments, 1,192 presses, 61 percent of the vote. Six-tenths of this thread's vote says: put this man in prison, or somewhere without a steering wheel. The Road Traffic Act appeared in 2 comments, 323 presses, almost all of it the second-placed one, and both said make it stricter. Not enforce it. Make the punishment heavier.
You call that scaring — 13 comments, 11 percent
Does he think that claiming he had no intent to kill will get him a lighter sentence? Anyone can see that doing this might kill the other person. A car is like a kitchen knife: use it wrongly and it is a lethal weapon. I am glad the victim was not killed.
殺意がなかったと主張すれば、罪が軽くなるとでも思っているのだろうか？
こんなことをしたら、相手が死ぬかも知れないことは、誰でも分かる。
車は包丁と同じで、間違った使い方をしたら凶器だ。
被害者が殺されなくて良かったです。Eighth place, 64 presses. The line in the headline, that he only meant to scare the man, drew 13 comments answering it, 216 presses, 11 percent of the vote. Seventh, 72 presses: a big build but a small heart, which is why he needs the bluff of scaring people; did he think he was some kind of boss? Fourteenth, 38 presses: you ran a man over and then dragged him, that is attempted murder, decided, no excuses. One comment was a single line, a tick against "meant to kill" and a cross against "meant to scare". The phrase a car is a lethal weapon appeared in 4 comments, 402 presses, 20 percent, including second and eighth place.
I only meant to scare him. I suppose nonsense like that actually works under Japan's law, which is so kind to criminals.
脅すつもりだった。
こんな戯言、やっぱ犯罪者にやさしい日本の法律なら通用してしまうのかなぁ。Seventy-third place, zero presses. This is the comment I shared on X. When I counted, it had been up for 30 minutes and nobody had pressed anything. Comments that looked at the law itself — Japan's sentences are light, abroad this would be life — numbered 2 besides this one, with 1 press between them. Nineteen comments wanted the punishment heavier; three said the current law is too light, and almost nobody voted for those.
Never get out of the car — 9 comments, 11 percent, and the most "hmm" in the thread
The victim stopped his car and went over to remonstrate, but you should absolutely never get out of the car. Fine if you are certain you can overpower the other person, but you have no idea who they are, so in the end it is better to stay inside. Stop somewhere with people around, or better still drive to a police station. There are a lot of dangerous people out there now.
被害にあった人も、車を停めて注意しようと近づいたって事だけど、絶対に車から出ないほうが良いし、確実に相手を制圧できる自信があるなら良いけど、そもそも相手はどんな人かも分からないので、結局、車の中に留まったほうが良い。そしてなるべく人目のあるところに車を停めるとか、出来れば警察署まで走行したほうが良い。もう世の中にはヤバいやつらがたくさんいるからね。Fifth place, 128 presses. Comments about what the victim should have done — never get out, do not engage, drive away — numbered 9, with 212 presses, 11 percent of the vote. Seventeenth, 22 presses: however confident you are, getting out to remonstrate is a mistake in this day and age; martial artist or not, a car coming at you finishes it in a second. Fifteenth, 37 presses: assume there are people like this on the road, call the police and sit tight; give way and they only get angrier and come out at you.
This group drew 19 "hmm", 18 percent of all the "hmm" in the thread. The most disliked comment in the thread is here too.
Instead of remonstrating, just turn off down a side road and they will not follow. A shop car park would do.
注意なんてしないで横道に入っていけばついてこないと思う
店舗の駐車場でもいいOne "I relate", twelve "hmm". The fifth-placed comment, saying never get out, had 128 presses and 4 "hmm", so the advice to get away was not what people disliked. It was the opening, instead of remonstrating, which read as blaming the victim. In this thread, telling the victim that getting out was a mistake earned votes; telling him not to remonstrate earned "hmm". The same idea, put differently, flipped the vote.
The face and the mask — 34 comments, 36 percent
I quote none of them. Thirty-four of the 94 comments were about the arrested man's face, the size of the mask he wore in the article's photograph, or his name. By count that is 36 percent of the thread, more than one comment in three. They took 211 presses, 11 percent of the vote; the highest was sixth place, 75 presses, a one-liner about the size of the mask. The rest had 20 or fewer, and 21 of the 34 had one press or none.
I give the count and nothing else, for two reasons. One, this site does not quote comments mocking an individual's appearance. Two, without the count you would not see what this thread looked like. Under an article about a man run down and dragged along a road in the middle of the night, one comment in three was about his face and his mask. Judging by the votes, readers did not press "I relate" on them, but people wrote them all the same. They drew 17 "hmm", 16 percent of the "hmm" in the thread. Neither disliked nor supported, just present in numbers.
Comments about the man's character — short-tempered, cowardly, the kind who feels powerful behind a wheel — numbered 8, with 64 presses, 3.3 percent. Twelfth place, 45 presses: he was tailgating, the other driver got out, he panicked; it is always the short-tempered cowards who tailgate once they have a wheel in their hands. One comment, with no presses, leaned towards defending him.
Checking my own reading
So the lesson is to drive on the assumption that there are people like this out there. They run on their own private rules, so talking to them achieves nothing. Call the police at once and sit tight. Give way awkwardly and they only get angrier, come out, smash up your car or assault you. And the police do not enforce anything unless something has already happened.
少なからず、こんな輩がいると思って運転した方が良いって事ですね。本人の中のルールで決めているので、話したところで意味がない。すぐに警察に通報して耐える
変に道を譲っても逆上して降りてきて車壊されたり暴行を受けるだけ。警察も何かないと取り締まらないからね。Fifteenth place, 37 presses. Of 94 comments, this is the only one that said the police do not enforce.
The cause of road rage is 100 percent traffic violations: almost nobody wrote about causes. Speeding, stop signs, turn signals, parked cars: zero comments. The Road Traffic Act appeared in 2 comments, 323 presses, 16 percent, both asking for it to be made stricter, neither saying that violations are the cause. The thread did not ask why he tailgated. It asked what to do with the man who did.
The police act only on what an officer sees, so it is close to a man-made disaster: the word police appeared in 3 comments, 178 presses, 9.1 percent. Fifth place, 128 presses, said drive to a police station. Fifteenth, 37 presses, said call the police and sit tight, and then added, and the police do not enforce anything unless something has already happened. That is the only one: 1 comment, 37 presses, 1.9 percent of the vote. The words gennin and man-made disaster appeared in zero comments. This thread wrote about the police as a place to run to. It barely wrote about them as the people who enforce.
Drivers do habitually, when no police are around, what they would never do in front of an officer: one comment, with no presses, wrote in that direction — road rage has been rising for years, and the people doing it keep threatening others even though they know they are being recorded on dashcams. Two more, 59 presses, wrote that people like this are always around and that you should drive on that assumption. They said it is not decreasing. Nobody said why.
Cars driven by stressed, hurried salarymen are bound to produce this: the words stress and salaryman appeared in zero comments. Company employee appeared in 5 comments, 358 presses, 18 percent, including the top comment's 348. But the direction was: a company employee, and he does not throw tantrums at work? Dismissal is a certainty. What kind of company employs him? Not because he is a company employee. Despite being one.
And the line I shared on X, asking whether the excuse would work under Japan's criminal-friendly law: 73rd place, zero presses. Nineteen comments, 40 percent, wanted the punishment heavier, but only three, with 1 press between them, said the current law is too light. This thread did not say the law is soft. It said this man should be dealt with harshly.
This thread is 94 people at seven in the morning on 9 September 2026, one hour and 23 minutes after the article went up, before the commute. Nobody wrote about the system. My reading appeared in one comment. As a check, it fails. But I think the absence of anyone writing about causes is itself an answer. I wrote that in Japan there are rules and breaking them is fine. The thread looked at the man who broke the rules and did not look at the rules. When I counted the thread about roads whose speed limit dropped to 30 km/h on 1 September, the thread sided with the rules. When I counted the thread about cars that will detect drunk drivers, the demand to detect illegal parking came to 7 comments and zero presses. Japanese comment sections write that rules must be kept. They rarely write that they are not being kept.
For readers outside Japan — aori unten, gennin, and "hmm"
Aori unten. Literally "goading driving". Closing right up behind the car in front, pushing it, squeezing it towards the kerb, braking hard in front of it — any driving meant to intimidate another driver. It is Japan's word for tailgating and road rage. It came into wide use after a 2017 case on the Tomei Expressway, when a couple whose car had been forced to stop by a goading driver were killed by a truck that ran into them from behind. An amendment to the Road Traffic Act that took effect in June 2020 created a new offence, obstructive driving, which carries automatic licence revocation. The articles keep coming all the same. The man in this article was arrested not for that offence but on suspicion of attempted murder, because he knocked the man down and dragged him.
Gennin. The word I used in my own reading. It means that a police officer saw the violation with his own eyes. Traffic enforcement in Japan is largely officers on the spot seeing an offence and stopping the driver. If nobody saw it, nothing stops. That, I think, is why people do not do it in front of the police and do it when they are gone. This is my reading, not something I counted. In the thread, one person out of 94 wrote it.
"Hmm". Yahoo! News Japan comments have three buttons: I relate, I see, and hmm. Hmm is the mildest possible way of saying you disagree. This thread had only 104 of them, and 12 went to a single comment telling the victim he should have turned off down a side road instead of remonstrating. The most disliked thing anyone said in this thread was that the victim could have done it differently.
What this thread wrote. 95 to 5. A heavy sentence and a licence ban, 61 percent. You call that scaring, 11 percent. Never get out of the car, 11 percent. His face and his mask, 36 percent by count and 11 percent by vote. The police do not enforce, one comment. Why it happened: nobody. Ninety-four comments, at 7:23 in the morning.
Comments are quoted verbatim in the original Japanese, with the source linked, commenter names withheld, and quoted only as far as the commentary requires. Translations are mine. Source articles may expire (retrieval dates noted). The substance of this piece is the author's commentary.