Originally Posted by
subzeroLV
I must be dumber than I ever thought. I just don't get the debate. If the law in your area says red lights apply to cyclists, then where's the issue? It's the law. Since when do you get to decide which laws you obey? Where do you draw the line on which laws apply to you?
Uh, we all get to decide which laws we wish to obey. The agreement we are bound by as citizens is not that we will obey all laws. The agreement is that we agree to pay the penalty if we are legitimately caught breaking the law. (after all, if we expected everyone to obey every law "or else," then the penalty would be the death penalty: but it isn't because we allow each other the choice of either obeying the law, or paying the penalty.)
As for laws in Tokyo, I wouldn't worry about it much. Not a chance in hell that the local bike/foot police are going to catch you and ticket you. If they do catch up, play the dumb gaijin card and pretend not to speak Japanese and they will likely be too embarrassed about not being able to communicate with you that they'll just repeat something like "stop sign please." and go away.