Job Discussion Forums

[Lister100]

Sorry for the Yens,

Thanks for the discussion. As interesting as this is it's turning all Canada/US. I have a tendency to fall into the Canada route, something I have to work on.

[homersimpson]

[Lister100]

Just remember Homer this started with your boast of being the most multicultural nation in the world.

Homer "As the only truly multicultural nation on the planet..." How many countries have you spent real time in other than Japan?

"Canada has a sizable Chinese population. How many Candians speak Chinese? Heck, how many Winnipegers speak fluent French for that matter? CNN anchormen/women don't need to speak Spanish; many broadcasts in the U.S. are delivered in both English and Spanish by utilizing one's SAP button on the TV. In addition, many public documents are printed in both English and Spanish. (I'm not talking about basic things like street signs, as the alphabet is basically the same, minus the "k" so the average Spanish-speaker is able to read.) "

There are a little over one million Chinese immigrants in Canada. Say 1 for every 30 Canadians of various backgrounds. Thats a little early to start changing the street signs. How many people of Hispanic descent are there in the US? And before you say they don't all speak Spanish the same could be said for Chinese and even French Canadians in Canada. The relationship is different too. French Canadians and Hispanic communities of the South share more in common than Chinese immigrants. What is worth noting is how many Chinese immigrants preserve their language in Canada. That's why Canadians are learning Chinese as a Second language on the West Coast.

Manitoban's were once more French than English and English Canada put through education laws to assimilate them into English. The fear was that Western Canada would be more French than English. This wasn't a great moment in our history, but as things stand if you're a French Metis from the outskirts of Winnipeg and you move into the city you will have your French television(no dubbing or subtitles necessary) can have your PUBLIC schooling in all French and your court cases in French. Our House of Commons speaks in both languages and I can't remember the last prime minister we had that could not speak both languages with some competency.

While French Canadians were practicing their religion and language the US was on the path of Manifest Destiny. The divine right of the Anglo Saxon race to rule over all others. Ever read your history in the Phillipines? Not too pretty! Our last prime minister was French, when was the last Hispanic or Black president?

The melting pot has its advantages and there is no reason to be ashamed of it. For our purposes, it would be a vast improvement to the condition of foreigners in Japan. People raising kids here that speak Japanese wouldn't have worry about them being accepted.

Another thing, which I admitted to already, is that I have my biases. Having lived in the multicultural hub of Canada (Toronto) where you can ride the subway and hear 5 different languages being spoken at the same time and none of them are English, I have a tainted perspective. I hear a lot of stories from my friend in Raleigh where the whites openly refer to blacks as *beep*(you know what), news about Arab mosques being burned down in the wake of September 11 and vigilanty squads hunting illegal Mexican immigrants. This might be backwater USA but backwater Canada rarely performs the stunts to get that publicity(maybe because its smaller). It makes you forget about the big cosmopolitan centres like New York (I remember some incredible person in that city saying after losing family members in sept. 11 that they didn't want the government to pursue any path that would do the same to Arab families). It doesn't help that backwater is running your country now. But I would like to know what part of the United States your from that is so progressive?

Here's one more old example to defend my point. You ask a 3rd or 4th generation white person in the US what nationality they are and I'll bet they say American. Do the same in Canada and I'll bet you'll get some giberish about quarter Ukrainian, 10%Irish, quarter French with a cherry on top. Mark pointed out that our Canadian culture lacks the filling to make people drop their roots, maybe thats what it comes down to?

[guest of Japan]

[JimDunlop2]

Here's a nice, broad, sweeping stereotype for you...

Why does it seem, that almost EVERY nth generation American/Canadian that I speak to always seems to claim that they are "part Cherokee" or "part Navajo" or part-some Native North American.... And they are ALWAYS proud to point out that "he was a tribal chief?"

/just sayin'

[Mark]

[Mark]

Anyhoo, we've drifted a bit off topic. What were we talking about? Oh yes, whether or not Japan is a racist society.

On that note, look at the recent flare-up between Japan, China and S Korea.

Japanese people (at least in Tokyo) always claim that they're shy, intimidated by foreigners, and embarrassed that they can't speak English. This is used to excuse virtually any behaviour that people might do. Japanese people aren't rude, they're just afraid of foreigners. Being consistently ignored when asking for help or directions, people looking for anyone to sit next to other than the foreigner, J-folks just laugh and say it's because people are afraid. But no-one questions the attitudes that cause people to be so afraid or whether fear justifies actions that would normally be considered rude if done to a Japanese person.

Most people refrain from citisizing Japan, because it's assumed that Japanese people are too insecure to handle the criticism. I had a student say to me that until she saw Lost In Translation she thought that all foreigners loved everything about Japan. However, in my opinion at least, deep down Japanese people don't give a damn what anyone thinks of Japan and are going to do what they're going to do regardless of any criticism.

[Brooks]

xenophobic is what I would say.
Before I worked in Japan I thought Tokyo would be somewhat progressive.
Nah, it isn`t.

I think some Japanese are sensitive to criticism and some could care less.
There have been times when foreign criticism led to changes. Often without the foreign criticism there would be no changes.

[Mark]

[Brooks]

people from all over Japan come to Tokyo to make money.
People in Kyoto are stuck up too. As my Japanese boss says, people in Kyoto think that they still live in Japan`s capital.

People from Osaka are the only people in Japan who will speak their dialect in Tokyo. They are proud of where they are from.

I read a dialect study and people from Osaka to Kagoshima seem to have a positive reaction to their dialects. People in Kanto prefer to hear someone from Niigata speak Japanese than someone from Ehime.

I find Japanese people can`t always get along with each other. Japan is very regional, like England is.

Yup. the furusato has a strong pull in Japan. My wife is a university instructor in Kanagawa, and she seems to get along well with her students from Shikoku and Hyogo since she speaks Osaka ben to them.

[cafebleu]

It was interesting to read about North America but ................. let`s get back to the topic!

Somebody pointed out that we don`t have to keep coddling the Japanese and accepting the very skewed view that:

They are Japanese therefore they are unique and everybody else in the world are `gaijin` therefore the Japanese do not need to engage in any kind of self-criticism about their racism, have to be sheltered from debates that other countries with claims to being industrialised democracies have to engage in etc, etc.

My husband is Chinese and readily admits the racism among Chinese but as he explained to me in a conversation that is too lengthy and complicated to reproduce here, the racism of the Chinese is different from that of the Japanese and according to him less dangerous. And less childish. I agree having heard his arguments.

However, the Japanese are hurting themselves the most. The world has changed but they haven`t changed with it. As Alex Kerr (whose Dogs and Demons has its faults but also some devastating insights and critiques into the dysyfunctional aspects of Japanese society and mores) points out, Japan has a history of opening up to the wider world only to resist changing some essential aspects of its society that need changing.

Japan could get away with being the closed country while superficially opening up or opening up to suck up the best of western technology etc, until relatively recently. However the world of 2005 is a world where industrial societies such as Japan will HAVE to change to survive and support the unproductive, ageing population.

My own country of the UK is unrecognisable in any number of ways from what it was in my parents` time. Yes, there are tensions with multiculturalism and there always will be. However, I love my country with its increasingly racially mixed population and English people generally accept that immigration has more economic benefits than not. Immigrants put the birthrate up - something that racist Japan will never allow.

My advice to everybody here - get out within 5 years` time. Japan will still resist belonging to the world community, will refuse immigrants although they will have the children that Japan needs to counter its stagnating, ageing population, will withdraw more into its racism and start scapegoating the tiny population of foreigners it has, and could very well lurch into a semi fascist society.

Already there is an ominous scapegoating of foreigners
yet Japan`s foreign population are by and large people with respectable jobs such as teaching and technology as well as those South Americans doing the vital `dirty` work in factories. I really dread to think of the mindset of the Japanese if there is a 5 percent foreign population - already the number is too much for many of them. Throw in a passive acceptance of what is fed to them, and the anti democratic nature of institutions here, and you have a recipe for disaster waiting to happen in Japan.

Yet the Japanese only have themselves to blame. Their racism is closing Japan off from the real world again and it runs so deep that they cannot handle the number of foreigners in Japan now, if we are honest. Japanese society will pay the economic price and social price for its racism and it will really start to happen about 5 years from now. Get out while things are not so bad is my advice.

[PAULH]

Dont know if you saw it in this mornings JT but Japan's High Court turned down Debito Arudo's appeal, basically saying that alhough discrimination against foreigners in Japan was unconstitutional there was no need for Japan's local governments to pass special laws making racial discrimination illegal, which means that local bath houses, shop owners, landlords, universities, the local government can discriminate against you and your family and there is squat you can do about it, as there are no laws in Japan making racial discrimination illegal.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20050408a4.htm

[Mike L.]

You're right Paul, but you can sue and often win!

[blue jay]

[homersimpson]