7 ms·

Even with a more open system for legally accepting immigrants, Japan has an extraordinarily closed system for culturally accepting immigrants. An immigrant to J

Even with a more open system for legally accepting immigrants, Japan has an extraordinarily closed system for culturally accepting immigrants. An immigrant to Japan is considered an outsider to much more of an extent than other countries.

ShabbosGoy 8y ago
And it is a lifelong stigmatization as well. You will never be one of them, no matter how hard you try.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- iguy 8y ago
  You can never ever become Chinese either. Nor Indian. Nor Nigerian. Nor Russian. Never mind Kuwaiti. The exception here is the west, both in terminology used for people originating elsewhere, and in actual beliefs. [You, personally, may possibly have one exception on this list, roughly if you come from the edge of one of these, but never more.]
  - ikeyany 8y ago
    How so? The west is well-known for treating ethnic minorities as the "other". I don't think your opinion is very common among them.
    - xkcd-sucks 8y ago
      The state sanctioned Chinese language literally does not have a word for "ethnicnically foreign permanent resident/citizen of China"
      - thaumasiotes 8y ago
        That would sound a little more convincing if you hadn't taken six words to define the concept in English.
        closeparen 8y ago
        “American” suffices over here. You need additional qualifiers to distinguish native-born from naturalized.
        hueving 8y ago
        "American" is the term in the US because it's not tied to ethnicity. "Chinese" is tied to ethnicity.
        yorwba 8y ago
        English speakers may think of "Chinese" as an ethnicity, but it's different in Chinese. The default term is 中国人， which literally means "person from the middle country", which is quite obviously about nationality. If you want to talk about ethnicity, you'd use 汉人 for Han Chinese, 蒙古人 for Mongols and so on for any of the hundreds of Chinese ethnicities.
    - iguy 8y ago
      There's no utopia. That's all that's "well-known". I guess my criteria (for the above) are something like this: an awful lot of British people, and 100% of newspapers, will describe the sprinter Sir Mo Farah as being British, and only get to his place of birth on page two. This pretty much doesn't happen elsewhere. Although a reverse thing does happen, in which (for example) 2nd- and 3rd-generation british indians are not only welcome to almost all the privileges of Indian citizenship, but (if they become famous) are cheered in India. There is a lot of fawning over Priti Patel in the Indian newspapers, but obviously none at all in Ugandan newspapers.
  - khallo 8y ago
    I don't think the issue is about "becoming" any of those nationalities you mentioned. You might not be considered Indian or Nigerian or Kuwaitian in those countries, but you sure as hell won't be ostracized or receive disapproving looks. That is speaking generally since every country has racist/xenophobic people. Blackface is quite common in Japan. Example: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42561815 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42561815 They have more work to do on their attitude towards foreigners than opening up more immigration channels.
    - yorwba 8y ago
      Blackface isn't necessarily racist. Is the blackfaced actor used to make fun of black people? Probably racist. But that would also be the case if it were a black actor doing the same (it might just be more difficult to hire one for that). Is it used to create tension between the obviously fake costume and the effort put into pretending that it is real? Probably not racist. I can imagine a show deriving great hilarity from casting everyone in a role they are not the least bit suited to and then trying to make it work anyway.
      - ShabbosGoy 8y ago
        > Blackface isn't necessarily racist. I remember the controversy of blackface being used in Tropic Thunder. I think you’re right that the intention behind it matters.
  - zeth___ 8y ago
    Plenty of Russians aren't Russian. As long as you speak Russian and don't look obviously non-white you can pass for one pretty easily. As an extreme and over the top example: Stalin wasn't Russian.
    - iguy 8y ago
      Russia I know least about (in my list) so I could be wrong there. Maybe it's more like the West than I imagined. But Georgia is kind-of what I meant by "if you come from the edge of". Are there people from Japan, or Somalia, who many Russians (and the newspapers) would unthinkingly refer to as Russian? (Not a rhetorical question!)
      - pandaman 8y ago
        You are not wrong. There is confusion about the word "Russian". There are Russian nationality and Russian ethnicity. These are different words in Russian language but one in English and often confused (native Russian speakers add to that by misusing word "nationality", which, in Russian, means "ethnicity"). One can become a Russian national through immigration but one cannot become an ethnic Russian, obviously. Newspapers would not refer to anyone as ethnic Russian (русский) and use only nationality (россиянин) even for ethnic Russians. As for Stalin, he wanted to call himself (ethnic) Russian and it so happened nobody could object at the time.
- krapp 8y ago
  More than lifelong, in some cases, if you're Korean.
- onetimemanytime 8y ago
  You will never be one of them, no matter how hard you try. I would not even try, I'm not Japanese. I can like their culture, work there, respect their laws and all, but Japanese I am not and will never be.
hocuspocus 8y ago
The kind of xenophobia you'll be facing is pretty tame compared to most other parts of the world though. Especially if you're a skilled worker from a developed country. Japanese are indifferent and non-confrontational. If you don't care about what people think and don't try to integrate too hard, life isn't bad.
- zeth___ 8y ago
  Compared to where? Most of the world is China, India and Africa. The rest of the developed world is vastly better than Japan when it comes to treating immigrants better.
  - craftyguy 8y ago
    Here in the US, there are quite a few folks who are openly hostile towards immigrants.
    - hueving 8y ago
      In my experience there is a lot of hostility to undocumented immigrants (a.k.a illegal immigrants) but very little to people to immigrate legitimately.
    - tomcam 8y ago
      Where?
    - adventured 8y ago
      US population: ~60% white non-hispanic, 20% hispanic, 14% black, 6% Asian Japan: 98.5% ethnic Japanese Immigrants in the US + their US born children = 27% of the population, roughly 86 million people, or equal to 3/4 the size of Japan's entire population. Such hostility.
      - xref 8y ago
        I'm unclear how these numbers prove there isn't hostility towards immigrants in the US?
jaredklewis 8y ago
Of course you have had your experience and I have had mine, but while we're trading opinions, I have found the Japanese, on the whole, to be among the warmest and most welcoming people I have ever met. Yes, people in Tokyo tend to be a little curt, but no more so than people in other great metropolises like New York, Paris, or London. I have also never experienced the permanent "outsider" stigma. I feel often the complaints boil down to people not liking that they are spoken to in English when being seated at a restaurant. Well, as someone who has quite a few friends working at restaurants, it honestly just an artifact of people trying to do their jobs efficiently, not some elaborate scheme to ostracize white people.

ShabbosGoy 8y ago

And it is a lifelong stigmatization as well. You will never be one of them, no matter how hard you try.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
iguy 8y ago
You can never ever become Chinese either. Nor Indian. Nor Nigerian. Nor Russian. Never mind Kuwaiti. The exception here is the west, both in terminology used for people originating elsewhere, and in actual beliefs. [You, personally, may possibly have one exception on this list, roughly if you come from the edge of one of these, but never more.]
- ikeyany 8y ago
  How so? The west is well-known for treating ethnic minorities as the "other". I don't think your opinion is very common among them.
  - xkcd-sucks 8y ago
    The state sanctioned Chinese language literally does not have a word for "ethnicnically foreign permanent resident/citizen of China"
    - thaumasiotes 8y ago
      That would sound a little more convincing if you hadn't taken six words to define the concept in English.
      - closeparen 8y ago
        “American” suffices over here. You need additional qualifiers to distinguish native-born from naturalized.
      - hueving 8y ago
        "American" is the term in the US because it's not tied to ethnicity. "Chinese" is tied to ethnicity.
        yorwba 8y ago
        English speakers may think of "Chinese" as an ethnicity, but it's different in Chinese. The default term is 中国人， which literally means "person from the middle country", which is quite obviously about nationality. If you want to talk about ethnicity, you'd use 汉人 for Han Chinese, 蒙古人 for Mongols and so on for any of the hundreds of Chinese ethnicities.
  - iguy 8y ago
    There's no utopia. That's all that's "well-known". I guess my criteria (for the above) are something like this: an awful lot of British people, and 100% of newspapers, will describe the sprinter Sir Mo Farah as being British, and only get to his place of birth on page two. This pretty much doesn't happen elsewhere. Although a reverse thing does happen, in which (for example) 2nd- and 3rd-generation british indians are not only welcome to almost all the privileges of Indian citizenship, but (if they become famous) are cheered in India. There is a lot of fawning over Priti Patel in the Indian newspapers, but obviously none at all in Ugandan newspapers.
- khallo 8y ago
  I don't think the issue is about "becoming" any of those nationalities you mentioned. You might not be considered Indian or Nigerian or Kuwaitian in those countries, but you sure as hell won't be ostracized or receive disapproving looks. That is speaking generally since every country has racist/xenophobic people. Blackface is quite common in Japan. Example: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42561815 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42561815 They have more work to do on their attitude towards foreigners than opening up more immigration channels.
  - yorwba 8y ago
    Blackface isn't necessarily racist. Is the blackfaced actor used to make fun of black people? Probably racist. But that would also be the case if it were a black actor doing the same (it might just be more difficult to hire one for that). Is it used to create tension between the obviously fake costume and the effort put into pretending that it is real? Probably not racist. I can imagine a show deriving great hilarity from casting everyone in a role they are not the least bit suited to and then trying to make it work anyway.
    - ShabbosGoy 8y ago
      > Blackface isn't necessarily racist. I remember the controversy of blackface being used in Tropic Thunder. I think you’re right that the intention behind it matters.
- zeth___ 8y ago
  Plenty of Russians aren't Russian. As long as you speak Russian and don't look obviously non-white you can pass for one pretty easily. As an extreme and over the top example: Stalin wasn't Russian.
  - iguy 8y ago
    Russia I know least about (in my list) so I could be wrong there. Maybe it's more like the West than I imagined. But Georgia is kind-of what I meant by "if you come from the edge of". Are there people from Japan, or Somalia, who many Russians (and the newspapers) would unthinkingly refer to as Russian? (Not a rhetorical question!)
    - pandaman 8y ago
      You are not wrong. There is confusion about the word "Russian". There are Russian nationality and Russian ethnicity. These are different words in Russian language but one in English and often confused (native Russian speakers add to that by misusing word "nationality", which, in Russian, means "ethnicity"). One can become a Russian national through immigration but one cannot become an ethnic Russian, obviously. Newspapers would not refer to anyone as ethnic Russian (русский) and use only nationality (россиянин) even for ethnic Russians. As for Stalin, he wanted to call himself (ethnic) Russian and it so happened nobody could object at the time.
krapp 8y ago
More than lifelong, in some cases, if you're Korean.
onetimemanytime 8y ago
You will never be one of them, no matter how hard you try. I would not even try, I'm not Japanese. I can like their culture, work there, respect their laws and all, but Japanese I am not and will never be.

hocuspocus 8y ago

The kind of xenophobia you'll be facing is pretty tame compared to most other parts of the world though. Especially if you're a skilled worker from a developed country. Japanese are indifferent and non-confrontational. If you don't care about what people think and don't try to integrate too hard, life isn't bad.

zeth___ 8y ago
Compared to where? Most of the world is China, India and Africa. The rest of the developed world is vastly better than Japan when it comes to treating immigrants better.
- craftyguy 8y ago
  Here in the US, there are quite a few folks who are openly hostile towards immigrants.
  - hueving 8y ago
    In my experience there is a lot of hostility to undocumented immigrants (a.k.a illegal immigrants) but very little to people to immigrate legitimately.
  - tomcam 8y ago
    Where?
  - adventured 8y ago
    US population: ~60% white non-hispanic, 20% hispanic, 14% black, 6% Asian Japan: 98.5% ethnic Japanese Immigrants in the US + their US born children = 27% of the population, roughly 86 million people, or equal to 3/4 the size of Japan's entire population. Such hostility.
    - xref 8y ago
      I'm unclear how these numbers prove there isn't hostility towards immigrants in the US?

jaredklewis 8y ago

Of course you have had your experience and I have had mine, but while we're trading opinions, I have found the Japanese, on the whole, to be among the warmest and most welcoming people I have ever met. Yes, people in Tokyo tend to be a little curt, but no more so than people in other great metropolises like New York, Paris, or London. I have also never experienced the permanent "outsider" stigma. I feel often the complaints boil down to people not liking that they are spoken to in English when being seated at a restaurant. Well, as someone who has quite a few friends working at restaurants, it honestly just an artifact of people trying to do their jobs efficiently, not some elaborate scheme to ostracize white people.