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> What I'm saying is that if a caucasian feels like a foreigner just because Japanese because people assume he probably doesn't speak Japanese, then he feels li

> What I'm saying is that if a caucasian feels like a foreigner just because Japanese because people assume he probably doesn't speak Japanese, then he feels like a foreigner for a superficial reason A shorter way to say this is "If a person feels like X because people assume he's X every day, then he feels like a X for a superficial reason", which is almost directly self-contradictory. If people treat you like X every day, that's likely going to make you feel like X. Perhaps you somehow wouldn't feel X despite daily messages that you are X, but most people would.

coldtea 9y ago
>A shorter way to say this is "If a person feels like X because people assume he's X every day, then he feels like a X for a superficial reason", which is almost directly self-contradictory. If people treat you like X every day, that's likely going to make you feel like X. I think where we disagree is that I think that this is not an absolute, but depends on a) what people, and b) under what circumstances and for what reasons they assume you're X. If it's only strangers that assume that, and because it's more or less statistically sound to assume it (that has nothing to do with you specifically) then E.g. if people assume I'm a jerk for wearing some t-shirt message, but only because they don't know me and don't know I wear it ironically, then it wouldn't make me feel like perhaps I'm a jerk -- just that they don't know me and/or they don't get the joke. If on the other hand people I know imply that I'm a jerk, that would actually hurt me. But maybe all this is over-analysing (well, not maybe, it is). In a sense, someone living in Japan who is not Japanese, it is indeed a foreigner. Unlike the US or UK, etc, Japan is an ethnically cohesive society -- most of them are not just born there AND raised there, but also of Japanese ethnicity for millennia. So it makes sense not to consider a caucasian who lives there even 20 or 30 years as Japanese. But the key is probably whether they feel welcome.

coldtea 9y ago

>A shorter way to say this is "If a person feels like X because people assume he's X every day, then he feels like a X for a superficial reason", which is almost directly self-contradictory. If people treat you like X every day, that's likely going to make you feel like X. I think where we disagree is that I think that this is not an absolute, but depends on a) what people, and b) under what circumstances and for what reasons they assume you're X. If it's only strangers that assume that, and because it's more or less statistically sound to assume it (that has nothing to do with you specifically) then E.g. if people assume I'm a jerk for wearing some t-shirt message, but only because they don't know me and don't know I wear it ironically, then it wouldn't make me feel like perhaps I'm a jerk -- just that they don't know me and/or they don't get the joke. If on the other hand people I know imply that I'm a jerk, that would actually hurt me. But maybe all this is over-analysing (well, not maybe, it is). In a sense, someone living in Japan who is not Japanese, it is indeed a foreigner. Unlike the US or UK, etc, Japan is an ethnically cohesive society -- most of them are not just born there AND raised there, but also of Japanese ethnicity for millennia. So it makes sense not to consider a caucasian who lives there even 20 or 30 years as Japanese. But the key is probably whether they feel welcome.