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There's nothing racist about the actions of a culture bringing about the repercussions of those actions.

The incredibly racist, it's part of the overall culture. There are people within the race that are not racist, but being racist is a cultural value in the overall national culture. It's not me making this observation. I am speaking of the overall culture, not the race. The race is an Asian person of Japanese person. The culture is the racist copyright grubbing one that I'm referring to.

If i used your logic every white person would be trailer trash, every black person would be a ghetto thug, and every Asian person would work on an assembly line and live in a sweat shop dorm.

There's nothing racist about the actions of a culture bringing about the repercussions of those actions.

The incredibly racist, it's part of the overall culture. There are people within the race that are not racist, but being racist is a cultural value in the overall national culture. It's not me making this observation. I am speaking of the overall culture, not the race. The race is an Asian person of Japanese person. The culture is the racist copyright grubbing one that I'm referring to.

If i used your logic every white person would be trailer trash, every black person would be a ghetto thug, and every Asian person would work on an assembly line and live in a sweat shop dorm.

Read the repont of the "Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission" and you will find that safety measures not being implemented, was *not* a matter of nuclear energy being nuclear energy, but a matter of nuclear energy being in Japan. The conclusion was, that Fukushima was a disaster "Made in Japan". Google it, read it.

Not sure if you're aware, but that report seems destined to become a classic example of Japan telling the west what it wants to hear. Page 86 contains, as part of a disclaimer (alarm bells right there):

"We have attempted to achieve the highest possible accuracy of content and intent in this English translation from the original Japanese"

It so turns out that the Japanese "original" is in fact an entirely different document; for example, there is absolutely nothing like the chairman's message:

"What must be admitted – very painfully – is that this was a disaster “Made in Japan.”
Its fundamental causes are to be found in the ingrained conventions of Japanese culture:
our reflexive obedience; our reluctance to question authority; our devotion to ‘sticking with
the program’; our groupism; and our insularity.
Had other Japanese been in the shoes of those who bear responsibility for this accident,
the result may well have been the same."

in the Japanese "original".

see here for more

Plenty of interesting comments from an American Japanese-naturalized lawyer debito.org .

It's not all bad. At least according to wiki, Japan has one of the lowest incarceration rates of the civilized world. The conviction rate may be high, but the sentencing is extremely lenient and the total number of convictions is low. [...] In the U.S., prosecutors fail to get a conviction about 30-40% of the time in trials, and a vastly higher percentage of the population is prosecuted.

Ever wonder why Japan has such a high conviction rate?

In Japan, confessions don't get overturned. There's really no provision for confessions under duress, and confessions trump material evidence. This leads prosecutors to do whatever they can to get confessions.

In Japan, you can be held by the police for up to 23 days. During those 23 days, life will be hell. You will be subjected to endless hours of interrogations, little sleep, crowded conditions, and no exercise (unless you count 15 minutes a day in a crowded room where everyone is smoking - which international law doesn't). You can get a lawyer after the first 72 hours, but you are only allowed to communicate with them in Japanese and in the presence of a police officer.

Japan is a great country, but hope to god no one suspects you of anything there.

Some links: Twelve days of detention: http://www.debito.org/policeinterrogations.html
Two years from a forced confession: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8290767.stm
Seventeen years from a forced confession: http://www.tokyomango.com/tokyo_mango/2009/06/man-intimidated-into-admitting-to-murder-is-set-free-after-17-years-in-prison.html
What to do if you're arrested in Japan: http://www.debito.org/whattodoif.html#arrested

Stay safe, everyone.

It's not all bad. At least according to wiki, Japan has one of the lowest incarceration rates of the civilized world. The conviction rate may be high, but the sentencing is extremely lenient and the total number of convictions is low. [...] In the U.S., prosecutors fail to get a conviction about 30-40% of the time in trials, and a vastly higher percentage of the population is prosecuted.

Ever wonder why Japan has such a high conviction rate?

In Japan, confessions don't get overturned. There's really no provision for confessions under duress, and confessions trump material evidence. This leads prosecutors to do whatever they can to get confessions.

In Japan, you can be held by the police for up to 23 days. During those 23 days, life will be hell. You will be subjected to endless hours of interrogations, little sleep, crowded conditions, and no exercise (unless you count 15 minutes a day in a crowded room where everyone is smoking - which international law doesn't). You can get a lawyer after the first 72 hours, but you are only allowed to communicate with them in Japanese and in the presence of a police officer.

Japan is a great country, but hope to god no one suspects you of anything there.

Some links: Twelve days of detention: http://www.debito.org/policeinterrogations.html
Two years from a forced confession: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8290767.stm
Seventeen years from a forced confession: http://www.tokyomango.com/tokyo_mango/2009/06/man-intimidated-into-admitting-to-murder-is-set-free-after-17-years-in-prison.html
What to do if you're arrested in Japan: http://www.debito.org/whattodoif.html#arrested

Stay safe, everyone.

The root of the problem is not privacy, it is discrimination, human rights problems and how Japanese unwilling to deal with it. Here we go again: Google Earth maps out discrimination against burakumin caste in Japan.

This is 2005: UN Independent Investigator Raps Japan for Discrimination. Quote: "An independent investigator from the U.N. Commission on Human Rights says he will report that discrimination in Japan is "deep and profound....Mr. Doudou Diene told reporters in Tokyo he found no strong political will to combat racism and discrimination. He also noted what he called a strong xenophobic drive among the Japanese public. This xenophobic drive is expressed by associating minorities, certain minorities, to crime, to violence, to dirt," he said....Mr. Diene said the worst discrimination appears to be the problems a Japanese social outcast group, KNOWN AS "BURAKUMIN" face with finding housing and employment. He called their condition "shocking and terrible," and said their plight would be included in his preliminary report.".

Another example: Racial Discrimination in Japan. Quote "Japan is not usually synonymous with racism in Western media, unlike Mississippi or Soweto, but its society is pretty racist nonetheless....Also, the Japanese landlords do not normally hang out a "For Rent" sign at an apartment building. They go to a "fudosan"- a real estate agency to help them find tenants. However, try and check out some signs near your local "fudosan"- you can usually see those that say: "NO ANIMALS, NO PROSTITUTES, NO FOREIGNERS." Lovely, isn't it?.";

and another: "JAPANESE ONLY" SIGNS IN MISAWA, JAPAN;

and another: U.N. Urges Japan to Stop Discrimination against Korean School Children and Education;

and another: Japanese Discrimination Against Women;

and another: Housing Discrimination in Japan;

and another: Foreigners in Japan say openness all talk. Quote "I went to almost 25 real estate agents trying to get them to show me apartments," she recalled. "Finally, one of them took me aside and said, 'Japanese don't like to rent to foreigners. Many Japanese actually hate foreigners....Without a doubt, Japan is the most discriminatory place I have ever lived in";

Wikipedia: Ethnic issues in Japan

Which makes me wonder, are non-Japanese allowed to buy Japanese products?

The discrimination goes deeper than being just at border control points. One of the most notorious examples in recent years was the case of the law-abiding Canadian academic arrested and held in jail, mostly incommunicado, for 23 days after a mistaken presumed criminal association.

And "What not to do if arrested in Japan".

Hope that helps if you or anybody you know ever visits Japan!

I'd take a Japanese-built house over an American-built one any day.

See, there is a cultural bias! That would prove my point. I mean, American houses are built larger, last longer, have central heat and central air, larger bathrooms, working bathtubs, often have fireplaces, features which Japanese houses tend to lack, and you want the Japanese house, because you are a bigot. Like I said, there is a cultural bias there and that's why we can't have free trade.

But you need to read on:

http://www.debito.org/?p=2111

In Japan houses are built to last 30 years, at most, and have generally no resale value. They are more consumer items, like cars are in the USA.

It was about two weeks after I got back from Japan last time, so Nov 2007.

As a guide to how fscked up Japanese politics is, the law came in because the Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama claimed he had a "friend of a friend" in Al-Qaida who frequently visited Japan on forged passports. You couldn't make it up. Although of course he had made it up it appears because he now refuses to identify the mysterious terrorist friend.

Rich.

You might want to factor in the biased, outdated, unfair Japanese criminal justice system

• Innocent Canadian academic at J university arrested, imprisoned for 20days, stress-questioned in 10-hour long sessions, pushed to "confess", released without charge
• Another J police treatment of disputes between J and NJ
• Japan Bar Association and United Nations Human Rights Commission speak out on probelms with the J criminal justice system
• What not to do if arrested in Japan

You might want to factor in the biased, outdated, unfair Japanese criminal justice system

• Innocent Canadian academic at J university arrested, imprisoned for 20days, stress-questioned in 10-hour long sessions, pushed to "confess", released without charge
• Another J police treatment of disputes between J and NJ
• Japan Bar Association and United Nations Human Rights Commission speak out on probelms with the J criminal justice system
• What not to do if arrested in Japan

"Their government does not wiretap their citizens' phone calls or endorse torture, and their taxes do not go to supporting a massive military industrial complex or a set of oil cartels."

I beg to differ on wiretapping here.

As for torture its more a domestic thing.

Military industrial complex here? I think petrolium cartels are equally obvious.

They scream bloody murder about how implementing a human rights treaty they signed over a decade ago will stiffle free speech, but it's fine if they do it. Bigotry is okay, but we can't have any "illegal and harmful content."

One particular difference is that racial discrimination is, if not completely legal, at least culturally acceptable in Japan.

The Japanese government is even worse. They now fingerprint, photograph, and question visitors and returning residents not only when they first enter the country, but again during all subsequent re-entries . And this is in addition to the mandatory re-entry permits (3000 yen fee!), mandatory registration of non-citizens at their local city hall, and mandatory carrying of Alien Registration Cards on one's person at all times. Don't think you're free to wander about the country after your ordeal with immigration inspectors!

It's not just the US government that does this. Great Britain has its ubiquitous video cameras. Other countries (Belgium?) force even citizens to carry around ID cards. Each country learns of more ways to control people from other countries, and then implements them without regard for the checks those places have on government power. In this way, civil liberties are steadily ratcheted downward. I can't imagine this ever flowing the other way and fear that it will eventually end in violent confrontation.

No, sorry, "Japanese Only" signs are very common in Japan these days, unfortunately. And YES, finger printing is racist, because it will mainly apply to foreigners, i.e., non-Japanese people. I have lost all respect for Japan, and I am ashamed to drive a Japanese car http://k.lenz.name/LB/archives/000973.html http://www.wordpress.tokyotimes.org/?p=1900 http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=6669 http://www.debito.org/misawaexclusions.html Open your eyes.

Ummm...as someone who has lived in Japan for a few years, you might want to rethink that...:-)

Check out:
http://debito.org/

And have you heard of the new law that requires all foreigners (i.e. nonJapanese) to be fingerprinted and photographed upon entering the country? Takes effect Nov. 20, 2007 (You've got about 4 days...)

That's nothing...

If you are not Japanese, and you are going to visit Japan, after November 20, 2007 (when new law takes effect), you will be photographed AND fingerprinted every time you enter the country. Want to know what discrimination/racism feels like?
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20071101a1.html

Read what this long time resident of Japan, (originally American, now fluent in Japanese) has to say about it...;-)
http://www.debito.org/japantimes052405.html

An excellent site for a more sobering look at how Japan is changing, in many ways...
http://www.debito.org/

That's nothing...

If you are not Japanese, and you are going to visit Japan, after November 20, 2007 (when new law takes effect), you will be photographed AND fingerprinted every time you enter the country. Want to know what discrimination/racism feels like?
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20071101a1.html

Read what this long time resident of Japan, (originally American, now fluent in Japanese) has to say about it...;-)
http://www.debito.org/japantimes052405.html

An excellent site for a more sobering look at how Japan is changing, in many ways...
http://www.debito.org/

Public opinion in China and the Philippines, that they were victimized by Japan and not the USA in WWII...

Perhaps I've been unclear. The American atrocities I'm speaking of predate WWII by several decades. Again I refer you to Wikipedia on war crimes during the Philippine-American War.

These atrocities were over long before WWII; however, imperialist rule of the Philippines continued until 1946.

The only physical delivery of aid after Yoyang (Dec. of 2004) was by U.S. Marine helicopter, I was there to document it and took hundreds of photos:

It may be that aid from other nations was delivered by the U.S.; thanks to our obscene military spending, we are the best at putting boots on the ground. As I've documented for you though, the stuff they were delivering was part of a multi-national relief effort, including substantial contributions from the Japanese. And Japanese doctors and other relief personnel were dispatched to aid relief efforts.

American soldiers were not trained that anyone who surrenders is not a human being, and it's OK to kill them)

During the Philippine-American War, prisoners were indeed killed. General Jacob Smith directed "I want no prisoners. I wish you to kill and burn; the more you kill and burn the better it will please me." Smith ordered that anyone over the age of ten who had not proven to be a friendly could be and should be killed.

After all, it's not like they were killing white men. As one contemporary account put it:

Undoubtedly, they do not regard the shooting of Filipinos just as they would the shooting of white troops. This is partly because they are "only niggers," and partly because they despise them for their treacherous servility... The soldiers feel they are fighting with savages, not with soldiers...

Those and other policies don't make it seem like Japan has reformed it's traditional belief in racial superiority (by way of comparison, Americans, not being homogonous, cannot have a collective national belief in racial superiority if they wanted to).

Of course there was an American collective national belief in the racial superiority of whites, up until the late 1960s (and still persisting in some quarters today).

Certainly Japan was strict immigration and naturalization laws, but that is distinct from racism. It's a crowded country. Lack of overtime laws is irrelevant to the question of racism.

Certainly racism does exist in Japan, primarily in the older generations; I got a few dirty looks from old Japanese men when I visited just for being a white guy, and there are businesses that post "Nihonjin-only" signs. On the other hand, white guys are hot property among young Japanese girls. Attitudes change across generations, as they always have.

Legally, Japan is signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.

Yes, you are talking about comics. Such as this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuni_ga_Moeru or this http://www.debito.org/abunaijinkenyougohouan.html Not this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsukuyomi_Moon_Phase or this http://insani.org/haruoto.html

I think you're also oversimplifying and projecting western values onto the Japanese.

The concept of racial equality is a western one, and a western one alone. It is entirely acceptable in Japanese (and most of asia/africa/south america) culture to discriminate based on race. Emmigrating to Japan is hard at the best of times, but if you're brown of any description or russian (for example), you can essentially forget about it. It is not uncommon for establishments (pubs/bath houses/shops) outside of Tokyo to proudly proclaim "Japanese Only". http://www.debito.org/ has some interesting information about this sort of descrimination.

Divirging, but deciding not to offer something because "westerners aren't smart enough " is, in my opinion, entirely in keeping with cultural norms in Japan.

Japan is absolutely correct to view mass immigration with suspicion.

Yeah, after all, just look what it did to America...

check out www.debito.org if you want to hear what it's like to live there with the wrong skin color...

Hah, the US government doesn't want its citizens to renounce their citizenship before moving abroad because then it would lose the ability to doubly tax their foreign earned income. See here for an example (FYI I hate this guys politics, so no flames for that, but his observations on the taxation issue is spot-on).

See this article debunking those commonly published setiments:

http://www.debito.org/christianscimonitor120604.ht ml

Also, see the original statistics (in Japanese):

http://www.mhlw.go.jp/toukei/saikin/hw/jinkou/suii 03/marr2.html

The short version is that Japanese overwhelmingly marry other Japanese (704152 out of 740191 or 95.1% of marriages in 2004). Of those who don't marry Japanese, more are Japanese men marrying non-Japanese women (27881 or 3.7% of men) versus the other way around (8158 or 1.1% of women). Plus, the Japanese men who marry foreigners marry mostly Chinese, Korean, Filipino, or Thai women. Very few (less than 1%) are to British or American women.

Anyway, so it's a bit misleading of you to say that Japanese men prefer caucasian women when 96.3 percent of Japanese men who married last year married Japanese women and 99% of those who didn't married other asian women.

And we're talking isolationism

She isn't a citizen. Bummer. At least she's allowed to stay. Try China.

How about comparing to somewhere a little more free, and developed, somewhere more comparable to Japan...somewhere like...America!

I note that the descendants of African slave labor are allowed to stay AND have citizenship. Hot damn! This is probably true of England as well. But in Japan, descendents of Korean slave labor are allowed to stay but are stripped of their citizenship. Hrm. Isolationist? Probably.

Naturalization procedure: http://www.debito.org/naturalization.html

Proof and pudding: according to the above Washington Post article, the equivalent of the TOTAL NUMBER OF ALL FOREIGNERS IN JAPAN (just over one percent of Japan's population) naturalize into the United States recently EVERY YEAR. Or, according to the US Census Bureau, 1300 would-be immigrants every day enter America (Daily Yomiuri, Nov 25, 1996, p.3). That means that America absorbs all of Japan's annual intake of foreigners in just over a week! AND THAT MATTERS This is not a statistic to ignore. Just about *every single American* here reading this html has or has ancestors who went through a version of this process--my Polish great-grandparents in the 1910's, and my British dad in 1972. On the other hand, practically NO Japanese can claim this background, indicating a great deal about assimilation. If you're not born it, you have to claim it. Not all that many do. But anyway, my point is this: this should all come as no surprise. Obviously, Japan is going to be far behind accepting foreigners legally, given what we know about Japan's history, constant refusal of refugees and active export of illegal immigrants, and social attitudes towards strangers in general. And even more so when compared to the US--the US is the real outlier in the world when it comes to absorbing extranationals. (Anybody else want to give me more information about other countries?)

Granted it's a bit dated (1996), and we are talking about america, but from what I recall, proportionally, Japan's annual intake has always been incredibly low, something like less than 0.01% relative to total population, whereas America has been around less than 0.4% total population? It's interesting to note that, even today in 2005, Japan is still 99% ethnic Japanese according to the CIA world factbook. http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ ja.html

Btw, as far as I know, if those two mixed couples should decide to get a divorce, and already have kids, well, the foreigner of the pair will get the shaft as far as custody rights go. But I admit I'm not sure how that policy compares to other free nations.

Check this link out: http://www.debito.org/

There are several photos there of government backed signs clearly targetting foreigners as "dangerous" or more likely to be criminal. Then there's the exceptionally high propensity for Japan to deny refugee status (compared to other *free* nations), and instead just divert them to other countries.

In some ways - not in others. For example, if you're applying for American citizenship, since when can they randomly show up to your house and rifle through your refrigerator, your clothes, your music, etc, to see if you're living a "American" enough lifestyle? They can do that sort of stuff in Japan when you apply for citizenship... As for immigration in general, difficulty varies depending on what status you want.

And don't pretend that xenophobia isn't common in Japan. If you disagree, you might want to speak with this man.

Trust me, Japanese culture is racist. If you learn the language and live in Japan long enough among Japanese people, not fellow "gaijin." you'll easily see. On TV non-Japanese are mocked for being so; in all sorts of media (manga, TV, magazines, newspapers, radio, etc.) non-Japanese are marginalized, misrepresented and made the butt of jokes.

Television and radio, including the state run stations blatantly portray problems of crime as though much of it is attributable to non-Japanese people to the point where surveys show that "gaijin" crime is a major concern of a large percentage of citizens.

I could go on...for quite a bit, but if you're curious you can check this site for one snowflake in the tip of the iceburg.

By the way, what does socialism have to do with any of this? Japan's got plenty of socialism.

The "No gaijin" signs are a myth too, right?

"No foreigners allowed"? What the hell is up with that?

Oh, there's more of this.

Read Debito's site to find out what happens to a westerner (even a naturalized Japanese citizen westerner) tries to visit a bath in Hokkaido...