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[king kakipi]

Dipso wrote:-

[osakajojo]

The Family Mart near my office didn't have it, but the AM PM did. The store just reopened after being closed for two weeks due to renovations. The place seems brand spanking new with nice new magazines. I got the Gaijin Files mag and of course the staff rang it up with the same enthusiasm as they do my chocolate milk every morning.

[Dipso]

[king kakipi]

woops!

[Dipso]

The UK's Guardian newspaper has reported on Gaijin Crime File:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/japan/story/0,,2004646,00.html

Magazine plays to Japanese xenophobia

Justin McCurry in Tokyo
Friday February 2, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

Available in mainstream bookstores, magazine targets Iranians, Chinese, Koreans and US servicemen

The recent release of a glossy magazine devoted to the foreign-led crime wave supposedly gripping Japan has raised fears of a backlash against the country's foreign community, just as experts are calling for a relaxation of immigration laws to counter rapid population decline. Secret Files of Foreigners' Crimes, published by Eichi, contains more than 100 pages of photographs, animation and articles that, if taken at face value, would make most people think twice about venturing out into the mean streets of Tokyo.

The magazine, which is available in mainstream bookstores and from Amazon Japan, makes liberal use of racial epithets and provocative headlines directed mainly at favourite targets of Japanese xenophobes: Iranians, Chinese, Koreans and US servicemen. Human rights activists said the magazine was indicative of the climate of fear of foreigners created by conservative newspapers and politicians, notably the governor of Tokyo, Shintaro Ishihara.

"It goes beyond being puerile and into the realm of encouraging hatred of foreigners," Debito Arudou, a naturalised Japanese citizen, told the Guardian. "The fact that this is available in major bookstores is a definite cause of concern. It would be tantamount to hate speech in some societies."

One section is devoted to the alleged tricks foreign-run brothels use to fleece inebriated Japanese salarymen, while another features a comic strip retelling, in graphic detail, the murders of four members of a Japanese family by three Chinese men in 2003.

An "Alien Criminal Worst 10" lists notorious crimes involving foreigners from recent years, including the case of Anita Alvarado, the "Chilean geisha" blamed by some for forcing her bureaucrat husband, Yuji Chida, to embezzle an estimated 800m yen from a local government. Mr Chida, who is Japanese, is serving a 13-year prison sentence.

The magazine's writers are equally disturbed by the apparent success foreign men have with Japanese women: hence a double-page spread of long-lens photographs of multinational couples in mildly compromising, but apparently consensual, positions.

Mr Arudou accused the mainstream press of exploiting the supposed rise in foreign crime by failing to challenge official police figures. Although the actual number of crimes has risen, he said, so has the size of the foreign population.

"The portrayal [of foreign criminals] is not one of a neutral tone," he said. "They don't put any of the statistics into perspective and they don't report drops in certain crimes."

The magazine's publication coincides with warnings more foreigners should be encouraged to live and work in Japan to counter the economic effects of population decline and the greying society.

The current population of 127 million is expected to drop to below 100 million by 2050, when more than a third of Japanese will be aged over 64.

"I think we are entering an age of revolutionary change," Hidenori Sakanaka, director of the Japan Immigration Policy Institute and an advocate of greater immigration, said in a recent interview. Our views on how the nation should be and our views on foreigners need to change in order to maintain our society."

[Hoser]

Yeah the lack of immigration is going to completely kill Japan. Unfortunately for them things probably won't change.

[stillnosheep]

[japanman]

I may be wrong but is the publisher of this magazone a foriegner himself? I was looking through this magazine in my local AM/PM and saw on the back cover a foriegn name, Washington I think. Is this a crazed white Brit or American who hates asians and south americans being in Japan? there are plenty of those around.
I didn't end up buying this magazine though, a flick in the shop was enough. My girlfriend wrote a ltter of complaint to AM/PM staright away too.

[craven]

The Guardian, Reuters, BBC...all have picked it up.
And I think we should take a minute to pat ourselves on the back, because along with Debito Arudo's site and Big Daikon, we managed to kick up a big enough stink to attract major new outlets around the world!!
Also, I'm resonably certain that "Joey H. Washington" is a psuedonym

[Sweetsee]

Still around...barely.
Thanks for thinking of me. I never said that.
Thanks for sticking it in again.

[furiousmilksheikali]

[Jon Taylor]

[callmesim]

[canuck]

[Sweetsee]

Whoa! I admit it, that doesn't make sense. Unless you scroll back to the bit where someone said I said something, than it should.