Gaijin rule!
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.
But, as with everything, it all comes down to S-E-X:
One section is devoted to the alleged tricks foreign-run brothels use to fleece inebriated Japanese salarymen,
…
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.
‘Magazine plays to Japanese xenophobia’ — Guardian
But, we’ve seen it all before.
Anyone fancy petitioning the Tokyo District Court on a human rights violation? No, thought not.
Oh, for God’s sake! Not those stupid signs again.
alex got there first with this topic - this is a pretty poor blog entry in comparison.
February 3rd, 2007 at 5:31 amWhich is why the main thrust of the post is about an article in the press yesterday.
February 3rd, 2007 at 6:52 amThat doesn’t explain the link to the silly making-mountains-out-of-molehills website.
February 3rd, 2007 at 8:41 amBecause I don’t regard it as ’silly’?
Perhaps you’d care to enlighten us what else you expect people to just lie down and roll over for?
February 3rd, 2007 at 9:31 amIt’s interesting how many people feel this is an unimportant thing which isn’t worth protesting. If you turn the tables and put those signs in the windows of a western country and say that Asians aren’t welcome or consider the impact of a similar publication directed toward Asians which perhaps encourages employers not to hire them and take jobs away from caucasians, you can see that it’s not “silly”.
February 3rd, 2007 at 4:32 pmAgreed with Tokyoid and Shari, I do!
I cannot imagin a book about how “asian girls are dumb like monkeys” being sold at a Starbucks for instance anywhere in North America.
I see this is as the same thing.
February 3rd, 2007 at 5:41 pmTokyoid, the thing with the “no Japanese” signs has been discussed at length. As I and others said, I don’t see the correlation between seeing a few places like that and a wider “trend” in Japan. That’s why I express exasperation whenever it is linked to.
There are far better ways to highlight discrimination in Japan. Blithering on about a relative minority of establishments, especially when many can be interpreted in ways contrary to what debito thinks, makes people look silly and above all lazy.
February 3rd, 2007 at 8:28 pmI should also point out that some of his pictures were taken years ago, so we don’t even know if those same places still have “discriminating policies” - hell, they may have gone out of business.
February 3rd, 2007 at 8:34 pmRaj,
Debito began his campaign and subsequent litigation bid after being refused entry to an onsen in Sapporo. I am aware that such places have had problems with Russian servicemen in the past, but even so. Why not just a sign saying “No military personnel”? Others circumvent this insensitivity by banning tattoos, though this has been misapplied by gyms in Tokyo etc.
I would say Debito’s site is the tip of the iceberg if what I’ve seen in the past couple of years is representative. I’ve been refused entry to a bar in Shibuya (which had a European name too, for fuck’s sake!) and seen a row of bars banning foreigners in Shinjuku. Again, I’m aware of previous behaviour by service personnel in such places but why not just “No military personnel” rather than a blanket ban on foreigners? Do gaijin have the monopoly on bad behaviour in bars? No, thought not.
It flies in the face of economic sense for the places concerned and it breaches human rights for a significant portion of the population. I drew together the recent news and the sterling work Debito has done. But yeah, it’s no big deal, clearly.
February 3rd, 2007 at 9:48 pm“Debito began his campaign and subsequent litigation bid after being refused entry to an onsen in Sapporo.”
He can litigate if he likes - nothing wrong with that. But I question his objectivity in the way he presents his “evidence”, especially if he only started this after he was discriminated against.
“I would say Debito’s site is the tip of the iceberg if what I’ve seen in the past couple of years is representative. I’ve been refused entry to a bar in Shibuya (which had a European name too, for fuck’s sake!) and seen a row of bars banning foreigners in Shinjuku.”
If it is the tip, I’d say it’s a fairly small iceberg.
“Again, I’m aware of previous behaviour by service personnel in such places but why not just “No military personnel” rather than a blanket ban on foreigners?”
How can you enforce a ban on military personnel if they’re not in uniform (which is always going to be the case, since they can’t drink on duty)? They’re hardly going to stand up and say “hey, I’m in the US Army - I’d better leave”. You could say the blanket ban is unfair, but saying they can just ban people in the military is completely impractical.
February 3rd, 2007 at 11:06 pmGiven I’ve seen such signs, someone obviously thought they were a good idea and worked. I can see why a bar owner wouldn’t want a gang of burly men in buzzcuts tearing up their bar or aggressively hitting on women but two military buddies out for a quiet drink, there’s no harm in that. Again, a bar owner has the right to preclude gangs with reputations for drinking in there but not on racial grounds. That goes as much for the US Marine Corps as it does for the SDF. Hence the more common ‘No stag parties’ or ‘No bikers’ signs in places that have had trouble in the past. Sure, bikers and husbands to be have their rights too, but using race as an exclusion policy belongs in 1950s Alabama or 1970s South Africa. Debito ought to utilise that as a stick to shame those establishments, rather than just ‘it’s not fair’.
But since shops can openly sell magazines preaching hatred to gaijin, these racist idiots obviously feel no concern about belonging in the dark ages.
February 3rd, 2007 at 11:25 pmThat Guardian article is a peice of crap. Tokyoidさんは日本に住んでるんですよね？ 外国人犯罪について報道すれば、外国人に対する憎しみにつながると考えてるならそれは間違いですよ。もちろん外国人が嫌いな日本人もいるでしょうが、日本人全体がそうだと考えるのは、同じような差別的偏見でしかありません。
February 4th, 2007 at 1:40 amThat Guardian article is a peice of crap.
What did you expect, Fluffy? The Guardian has certain standards to maintain, you know.
February 4th, 2007 at 5:51 pm[...] UPDATE #2: Is Korea trying to match Japan’s current xenophobia over the big, bad foreign criminals as well. Japan’s current xenophobia has some foreigners in Japan calling for a boycott of Family Mart. [...]
February 5th, 2007 at 7:28 am“Given I’ve seen such signs”
I haven’t seen any, yet, so there may not be as many people that think it a good idea as you believe.
“but two military buddies out for a quiet drink, there’s no harm in that”
If you’re going to bar people at the door, how do you tell them apart from two military buddies who might be looking for more than a few drinks?
February 5th, 2007 at 9:47 amFluffy,
I don’t live in Japan now and I do not ascribe xenophobic tendencies to every Japanese person. I just think the trend needs to be exposed and tackled where necessary. As multiple people have said on here, if a bar in London or New York barred ‘orientals’, there would rightly be a fuss.
Raj,
Two of anything is fine (drag queens, s+m fetishists, whatever), it’s just when a gang descends that issues arise. I appreciate that bars and onsen have had problems with gangs of American servicemen and Russian sailors in the past but that doesn’t make banning all foreigners acceptable.
February 5th, 2007 at 9:50 pm“I appreciate that bars and onsen have had problems with gangs of American servicemen and Russian sailors in the past but that doesn’t make banning all foreigners acceptable.”
It doesn’t make it acceptable, but as I said, if you are going to ban people at the door then you can’t tell people apart in that way. Besides there would still be complaints if there were limits on how many could go in.
Japan’s current problem is not that there is a trend of racism, it’s that a lot of people don’t know how to deal with foreigners - there’s a very limited non-Japanese population there, in comparison with cities like London and New York. And I have still to come across a bar, restaurant, etc that refused me access. There are such places I am sure, but I don’t think there are that many of them as an overall percentage. Certainly not nearly enough to talk about “trends”.
February 5th, 2007 at 10:16 pm