Why is there the standard thinking about Japanese motorcycles not having "character" or "soul", even though they are demonstrably and empirically better machines? Just the other day I was browsing through a cycle mag and they had a review of a Ducati (M900?) that was a toned down version of the 900 monster with a dumb little plexiglass windshield on it. They started out the article by saying how Italians are ‘just sexy without doing anything." (Yeah, whatever.) Well, they went on and went on and on about this thing, that was marketed as a commuter bike, and how great it was. I doubt they would have attributed such anima to it’s competitor, the Suzuki SV650 , a Japanese make, even though it is superior in all measurable respects, and like with the regular Monsters, several thousands of dollars cheaper.

What I am trying to figure out is why in the US, and sort of in the UK also, do European and American makes get accredited with mystique and soul, while Japanese makes are seen as being soulless machines that are for someone who isn’t yet ready to afford or appreciate something better? I think there are a variety of potential reasons; Japan makes them too well, Japan doesn’t make them expensive enough, Japan is the latecomer into the motor industry, and maybe because of a little bit of racism too.

It is pretty much an established fact that Japanese quality is second to none. In the 1970’s the Japanese took the world by surprise by actually listening to the American quality gurus like Deming. The rest of the world was rightfully scared, and they scrambled to stay financially afloat. Many didn’t make it. It was only with government aide that Harley-Davidson and Chrysler didn’t go under in the 70’s and 80’s, and the British cycle industry was pretty much done in. The German car and cycle industry held its area pretty well, that area being one of high quality yet high prices. The Italians too, have had their niche as being very stylish, fast, but expensive and unreliable products.

It’s because of their fierce competition that we have the quality and pricing that we do today. But perhaps the Japanese have just made their motorcycles too well? Has their reliability, high performance and low cost made all of us desensitized and unappreciative to how good they are?

Another possibility is that we actually like our motorcycles to be unreliable to a degree. There seems to be a human phenomenon where we start to see ‘personality’ in machines that are unreliable. They start to develop malfunctions that only we, the owner, know how to work around, and this in turn makes us feel that we have more in common with the bike. But charming or not, isn’t this just bad engineering and craftsmanship?

The more you spend, the better it looks

It is relatively easy to make something high quality: Just hire very talented and well paid craftsmen to take their time and cut no costs and have them make the product. To make something cheap, you use the cheapest labor, the cheapest materials, and hurry the job. But to make something good and cheap? That’s what Suzuki, Kawasaki, Yamaha, and Honda have done.

Maybe this amazing trick just baffles us and some part of us won’t believe that something so good can be so affordable. It’s also a psychological fact that people often think something is better if they pay more for it. I wonder what would happen if a new make popped up from Japan that was outrageously expensive? How would we receive it? (It is true that the Honda Goldwing seems to be accepted almost as an honorary Harley, and the top-end Japanese sportbikes have been creeping up into the Harley-Davidson and BWM price range.)

Another problem with being affordable, is that is becomes easier to buy a new product instead of fixing an old one. Harley-Davidson once made a poster showing a junkyard of old motorcycles, bragging that there wasn’t one of theirs among them. If one could buy Harleys without having about half of that money going for the brandname alone, I think the junkyard would be full of them, and they wouldn’t seem to be so precious and timeless.

Perhaps it’s a matter of Japan entering the international motor industry late in the game, in about the mid 1960’s in the USA, and they don’t have (to us at least) the historical roots that older makes have, nor have they had the time or chances to attach themselves to our pop culture, like Marlon Brando on his Harley in "The Wild Ones", T.E. Lawrence on his Brough Superior, or the German Blitzkrieg on their BMW boxers with sidecars. We don’t really have anything to think about in the media when someone says "Suzuki"

There has recently, though, been a marked growth in the collectability of the newly vintage Japanese bikes like the Honda Dream. Perhaps they are gaining some nostalgia of their own.

And maybe it’s just a matter of old fashioned evil racism. And it’s not just that we fought them in WWII; I’ve never seem a bumper sticker saying "Friends don’t let friends ride German Crap", but plenty about "Jap crap" It would be interesting to find out how Japan, or the rest of southeast Asia views Japan’s handiwork.

So I think that there are many possible factors for giving the illusion that Japanese motorcycles have "less soul". How could we find out which ones? We could do a little investigation and conduct a few thought experiments.

Do Japanese bikes seem to have ‘soul’ in the eyes of the Japanese, and other Southeast Asians? How will Japanese bikes be viewed decades from now? Or in the future after there are even newer countries in the cycle-making market (Korean cars have been popping up here - are cycles to follow?) How would we view an outrageously overpriced Japanese cycle? Or one that fell apart enough the have ‘charm’?

How about if there were American companies besides the one we have, making good and affordable machines, the way the US auto industry reinvented itself and now competes with Japan with products that are quite similar in all respects ? Or even if just Japanese motorcycles just weren’t so damned good all the damned time.

Regardless of why they may be judged to have less ‘soul’ we know they are outstanding, unparalleled machines. And we ought to appreciate them and give them the full credit they deserve, instead of waiting for history, psychology, or politics to tell us what to think. If Suzuki’s machine that outperforms and underprices and outlasts a Ducati with $3000 and 250cc to spare doesn’t have ‘soul’, could someone please tell me just what in hell does?