|
caberham posted:That's really odd about your friend. The Japanese manufacturing partners I work with love systems, orderly procedures and engineering. The 5S is enforced - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5S_(methodology). Everything in a factory has to be neat, tidy, and orderly. And they also implement "Kanban" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanban (billboards to facilitate just in time production). Lots of modern manufacturing techniques came out from the Japanese power houses during the 80's and was a shining model for other factories to follow. I'm surprised that manufacturing is so sluggish in Japan. Look at Canon, they don't even allow chairs and have messages on the ground (if you don't walk faster, the world will burn). Sorry for the Danny Choo link Did anyone else see Gung Ho? That was one of my first introductions to (images of) Japanese manufacturing culture. It slammed both Japanese and Americans pretty hard. Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 10:59 on Mar 7, 2013 |
#
?
Mar 7, 2013 10:57
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 10, 2024 20:32 |
|
|
I watched Gung Ho a few months back, it was quite entertaining now that I've actually spent a good while living in Japan. Also oddly enough I found Office Space to be quite applicable to Japan in a lot of ways. A friend and I were watching it and by the time it ended we were left dumbfounded because so many things rang true for Japanese offices as well: I have nine bosses, my only real incentive is not to have anyone yell at me, the most inept people possible wind up in control of everything, etc. It was kind of eerie honestly, though I'm sure a good deal of it could apply to any office job anywhere in the world. Cliff Racer posted:The mouse has turned marriage into a profitable business, plenty of people get for-real married at the various resorts. Also marriage in Japan is something like a $20 billion USD/year industry so it's no joke. I did the math for the hotel I got married in, and if they're fully booked out every weekend (quite possible) then they're pulling in 20 million/year just on marriages, and that's assuming they all go for low-mid range weddings (~35k). Sheep fucked around with this message at 11:20 on Mar 7, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 7, 2013 11:14
|
|
|
caberham posted:That's really odd about your friend. The Japanese manufacturing partners I work with love systems, orderly procedures and engineering. The 5S is enforced - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5S_(methodology). Everything in a factory has to be neat, tidy, and orderly. And they also implement "Kanban" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanban (billboards to facilitate just in time production). Lots of modern manufacturing techniques came out from the Japanese power houses during the 80's and was a shining model for other factories to follow. I'm surprised that manufacturing is so sluggish in Japan. Look at Canon, they don't even allow chairs and have messages on the ground (if you don't walk faster, the world will burn). Sorry for the Danny Choo link This may very well be true, but they're not actually into efficiency as part of those systems - or at least, they weren't until 2010. I can give the date with that sort of precision as that's when Toyota switched from manual inspection of car parts - doors, etc - to using IR cameras to check. It wasn't even a complex problem - the software was written by one person with no prior experience of steel quality control / IR cameras (me) and ran in realtime on an aging PII desktop. Ending up quitting-by-lawyer from that company later that year as their customers (NEC, Omron, Hitachi amongst others) suddenly started refusing to use a non-Japanese engineer on their projects. Koramei posted:Is knowledge of the specialty products of every prefecture actually incredibly common knowledge in Japan? I've lived in the US for years now and I couldn't say poo poo about what 9/10ths the country produces. Several days old now, but nowadays at least this is a tourism thing I think - because when you stop off while travelling down a toll road the services will always have (a) Some sort of Mr Whippy style icecream made/flavoured with the local famous food product and (b) racks and racks of phone charms with Hello Kitty / other mascot characters holding the local products. Internal tourism in Japan is pretty weird though so much of it happens in areas that foreign tourists never go that I'm not sure how much non ex-pats know about it. ookiimarukochan fucked around with this message at 17:28 on Mar 7, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 7, 2013 17:17
|
|
|
ookiimarukochan posted:Ending up quitting-by-lawyer from that company later that year as their customers (NEC, Omron, Hitachi amongst others) suddenly started refusing to use a non-Japanese engineer on their projects. Wait, like finding your name on a list of project managers and then refusing to let you work on their projects, or just the general knowledge that a foreign engineer worked there was enough to upset them.
|
|
#
?
Mar 7, 2013 22:00
|
|
|
pentyne posted:Wait, like finding your name on a list of project managers and then refusing to let you work on their projects, or just the general knowledge that a foreign engineer worked there was enough to upset them. Probably just the general knowledge. Japan is crazy xenophobic like you wouldn't believe sometimes. This is the same reason why they seemingly only ever use Japanese interpreters, even when translating into foreign languages. The quality will always be better if you have someone translating into their native tongue but for whatever reason you just never see foreigners doing interpreting here. Translation, sure. I imagine it's because interpreting is fundamentally "customer-facing" and you don't want to spook the customers by putting a non-Asian out there; nobody cares what the guy translating your car repair manual looks like. Speaking of foreigners speaking Japanese, some life insurance saleslady was at my in-laws' house last weekend when we showed up, who spoke repeatedly of me (rather than to me) about how it makes her feel uneasy when foreigners speak Japanese well. She even straight up said that foreigners should speak 'katakoto (broken) Japanese'. I was too offended to do much other than stare out the window and fantasize about strangling her. It was unreal, like that interview with Hiroshi Kume all over again. Edit: found an English-language version. I can totally get behind the results of that university study they speak of at the bottom of the page, too. Sheep fucked around with this message at 23:33 on Mar 7, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 7, 2013 23:05
|
|
|
"A Thai working in a hostess bar says she 'hates' the language. On interviewing a Japanese familiar with such establishments, she is told that customers actually prefer women who speak broken Jpaanese: if they become more fluent, they lose their 'cuteness'. Tanaka sees this as a manifestation of unequal power relations, with Japanese as an 'oppressor language' which fixes or positions the foreigner as incomplete or 'disabled.'" This is some fetishy stuff. I knew Japan was bad about accepting Japanese-speaking foreigners, but I didn't they they'd be this much worse than Chinese or Cantonese people. That was a depressing read.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 05:27
|
|
|
A fully fluent foreign Japanese speaking hostess can know how badly she is being screwed (possibly literally) by her employer, no wonder they don't want that.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 05:29
|
|
|
I would be hard pressed to say that life was more difficult or friends harder to come by the better my Japanese got. The ability to actually communicate with people and understand more of what was going on around me was a pretty heavy offset to the insecurities of certain people.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 05:53
|
|
|
Weatherman posted:"Foreigners come to Japan to make money and spoil the women. Then they go EDIT: The girlfriend is currently in Japan doing some kind of factory related training paid for mostly by the Japanese government, so I thought to scan the thread for any current events to share. No matter how bad things seem in Japan, Thailand is probably acting the same way - much less competently or consistently. It's kind of the Japanese to pay for Thai citizens to come learn more efficient and competent ways to implement highly regimented, stultifying bureaucracy. ReindeerF fucked around with this message at 06:02 on Mar 8, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 05:58
|
|
|
Bloodnose posted:"A Thai working in a hostess bar says she 'hates' the language. On interviewing a Japanese familiar with such establishments, she is told that customers actually prefer women who speak broken Jpaanese: if they become more fluent, they lose their 'cuteness'. Tanaka sees this as a manifestation of unequal power relations, with Japanese as an 'oppressor language' which fixes or positions the foreigner as incomplete or 'disabled.'" Cuteness in Japan has been this way for at least a thousand years. Direct from The Tale of Genji, Japan's most celebrated text, from about 1000 AD: quote:つらつき、いとらうたげにて、眉のわたり、うちけぶり、いはけなくかいやりたる額つき、髪ざし、いみじう美し。 My translation, deliberately literal and stunted so as not to blunt the text; you'll notice some words don't mean quite what they do in the modern language. There is a word in there, 'routage' (the kana says 'rautage', yes it's different, it's just one of those things like how we don't use thorns in English anymore). I translate it as 'adorable', but the etymology of the word is 'rou-itashi', with 'rou' as in 労, 'labor'. The 'itashi' means 'pitiful'. Quite literally, the fact that this girl is is piteous and struggling is cute. If it's been with them for a millennium it might take a while to break. 
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 06:05
|
|
|
Bloodnose posted:This is some fetishy stuff. If you want fetishy stuff, go talk to the Thais employed in the hostess/sex trade in Thailand that cater to Japanese clientele. Holy poo poo is all I can really say about that whole scene. Lemmi Caution posted:I would be hard pressed to say that life was more difficult or friends harder to come by the better my Japanese got. The ability to actually communicate with people and understand more of what was going on around me was a pretty heavy offset to the insecurities of certain people. The better my Japanese got, the more I noticed the rude comments and slights that so often occur when Japanese people interact with non-Japanese, and became more aware of a lot of the problems with society here since my access to information no longer had to go through (an often ethnically Japanese) filter. When you're only seeing the gaiken and the tatemae, it's quite hard to even fathom some of the stuff that exists underneath because so much of it will never be spoken of in anything but Japanese. While you could say that of many countries, it really seems to extend to a whole different level in Japan. Sheep fucked around with this message at 06:47 on Mar 8, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 06:40
|
|
|
Sheep posted:If you want fetishy stuff, go talk to the Thais employed in the hostess/sex trade in Thailand that cater to Japanese clientele. Holy poo poo is all I can really say about that whole scene.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 06:42
|
|
|
This commercial always produces a wonderful array of emotions every time it comes on. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wX5A0OYSP7E This things have been running for some time, but this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLmyISKmSec was pulled pretty rapidly as people from the Kansai region were pretty up-in-arms about it.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 06:45
|
|
|
jigokuman posted:This commercial always produces a wonderful array of emotions every time it comes on. What's with the second one? I understand it has something to do with regionalism against Kansai people?
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 07:09
|
|
|
jigokuman posted:
I'm assuming that's like super exaggerated Kansai dialect then? The other one is pretty egregious. I know TVB in Hong Kong has a couple token white guys that go on their soaps from time to time, but I think they're used mostly because they speak extremely good Cantonese. I can't be assed to actually sit through a TVB soap though. Does Japanese entertainment just not feature normal, functioning foreigners? They always have to be exaggerated caricatures?
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 07:09
|
|
|
Man those commercials are so insulting. It'd be like having an Asian guy doing a commercial in America where he talks in the most ching-chong-chang-ish terrible English pronunciation imaginable, makes a bunch of obvious grammar mistakes, and then tops it off a social faux pas (like hugging people in Japan, something you just generally don't do unless you're closely related or dating) just for good measure. Yeah the second one is just making fun of the Kansai dialect. Double standards, ahoy. Back to the thread title though, politics in Japan: back in 2011? the Supreme Court ruled that regional voting disparity in a bunch of places across the country was unconstitutional. The elections were held without redistricting though, and now the verdict has come down - the second one in two days - that the current districts are unconstitutional, but that the election results stand. Article about Sapporo's case here, Tokyo case here. I think there are still ten more to be concluded, then the obligatory appeals, etc. Sheep fucked around with this message at 07:24 on Mar 8, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 07:19
|
|
|
Sheep posted:The better my Japanese got, the more I noticed the rude comments and slights that so often occur when Japanese people interact with non-Japanese, and became more aware of a lot of the problems with society here since my access to information no longer had to go through (an often ethnically Japanese) filter. When you're only seeing the gaiken and the tatemae, it's quite hard to even fathom some of the stuff that exists underneath because so much of it will never be spoken of in anything but Japanese. While you could say that of many countries, it really seems to extend to a whole different level in Japan. To add to this, it's a lot harder to truly offend people with things they might find objectionable if you're unable to articulate those things in the first place. Becoming better at the language means giving Japanese people many more opportunities to dislike you based on disagreements with things you're clearly stating. Westerners also tend to state their opinions a lot more clearly and with a lot more conviction than most Japanese people tend to. This can come off as overbearing. The issue that applies here that's larger than just the language thing is that Japan loves stereotypes, and everyone is expected to play along with their role. If they don't then they're dealt with harshly or admonished for it. It's tightly controlled and extremely granular. It takes into consideration age, gender, social status, yearly income, marital status, and on and on. It is expected that you act a certain way, have certain interests, etc. based on the categories that Japanese society has slotted you into. In the foreigner, young, male category it's expected your speaking is garbage, you can't read more than about 25-30 kanji, you're rich, you can use chopsticks(but only very poorly), and you can't help but try to bang every Japanese girl you lay eyes on. Not conforming to the stereotypes makes Japanese people uncomfortable the same way football players would be uncomfortable if the quarterback tried to call a play that wasn't in the playbook. It can be kind of a clusterfuck. They're not sure how to react, and a lot of times they end up lashing out at you for being different. I don't mean to say that all Japanese people are like this, but even with my best Japanese friends there's been at least one bullshit stereotype I've had to disabuse them of. Also, after meeting a bunch of foreigners that are basically human garbage, I do kind of understand where they're coming from sometimes. There was a really interesting example of this that one of my friends explained to me when I was arguing with her trying to correct my use of chopsticks. I was telling her that the way I used them was fine, and that I'd actually been taught that way by a Japanese friend a long time ago. She ended up saying something like, "The way you're using them isn't truly wrong, but it is kind of a lower-class way to use chopsticks. Japanese people can get away with it because it's understood they do actually know the right way. As a foreigner, people are just going to assume you don't know how to use chopsticks the right way." Before she taught me that I used to get lots of backhanded compliments all the time about being able to use chopsticks. Since I changed how I used them I haven't ever had a single comment on it except maybe from real small children that also ask other crazy questions like, "How come you can speak English?" and "Do you fly back to the US every night?" Going along with that, people also started assuming I'd lived in Japan a lot longer than I actually have. ErIog fucked around with this message at 07:59 on Mar 8, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 07:55
|
|
|
pentyne posted:Wait, like finding your name on a list of project managers and then refusing to let you work on their projects, or just the general knowledge that a foreign engineer worked there was enough to upset them.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 08:56
|
|
|
Bloodnose posted:I'm assuming that's like super exaggerated Kansai dialect then? The other one is pretty egregious. There was a drama a couple years back about the fashion industry that was super hammy (when aren't they) but it had this white guy as the assistant to the evil lady villain. And he was totally fluent and they played it straight. In an actual drama that's the only one I remember, but there's others that stand out, mostly comedians. This one guy called Pakkun is pretty cool. edit: come to think of it, the vast majority of the time you see ridiculous caricatures is in advertisements. Mr. James anyone?
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 09:12
|
|
|
Reverend Cheddar posted:There was a drama a couple years back about the fashion industry that was super hammy (when aren't they) but it had this white guy as the assistant to the evil lady villain. And he was totally fluent and they played it straight. In an actual drama that's the only one I remember, but there's others that stand out, mostly comedians. This one guy called Pakkun is pretty cool. This motherfucker terrifies me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEQhg0qb-2E
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 09:35
|
|
|
jigokuman posted:This commercial always produces a wonderful array of emotions every time it comes on. gently caress everyone involved with that commercial forever with a rusty spiked dildo. That goes for the fuckwit star too, who should have taken one look what she was being asked to perform, thrown it on the ground, tipped over the table and stormed out of the room. See, this is why we need a guaranteed living wage for everyone: so that people can feel free to turn down degrading and harmful work like this and still be able to support themselves.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 09:43
|
|
|
Weatherman posted:gently caress everyone involved with that commercial forever with a rusty spiked dildo. I don't get exactly why that's so offensive. There's an undertone but nothing outright. From the comments understanding the dialogue would make much more clear.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 09:57
|
|
|
To me it's quite simple. It comes down to two points: - This is yet another in the vast, vast number of advertisements/characters/appearances of foreigners who, if they can speak any Japanese at all beyond the word "sushi", can only manage to squeak out a horrible mash of words in an order that no actual person would form and in an accent that suggests the person they learned it from was trolling them. Compared to the rare-as-hen's-teeth examples of people who can and do speak Japanese at a native or near-native level, the sheer amount of these ads serves to remind people that "yes taro, gaijin talk funny." - If the shoe were on the other foot it would immediately be branded anti-Japan racism and unbecoming of modern, educated society. Japanese embassies would lodge protests and newspapers and 2ch would go nuts. But in these cases like Blondie McNumbnuts up there it's just "oh you see we think foreigners (sic) are cute so it's ok!" Edit: sheep even said they pulled the Kaela commercial because Kansaiers got pissed.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 10:09
|
|
|
pentyne posted:I don't get exactly why that's so offensive. There's an undertone but nothing outright. From the comments understanding the dialogue would make much more clear. "Foreigners can't speak Japanese without terrible pronunciation and broken grammar, they also do not understand basic social customs, are loud and overbearing, not to mention white and blonde" all right in one 30 second clip. I totally agree with Weatherman that she should have told them where to stick that gig, but there's so many foreigners trying to become actors in Japan that some dipshit is bound to take it. Mr James was bad too. I had kind of blocked that whole situation out of my memory. Here's an example video. gently caress me I want to punch this guy in the face. Here's a Time article about it. Another hosed thing about the Mr. James situation was that all the quotes of him on in-store advertisements used only katakana, which is traditionally used for foreign loanwords - writing something only in katakana suggests broken (or "foreign") pronunciation, ie that foreigners can't speak Japanese. This happens a lot when foreigners are interviewed on TV here as well, the subtitles for any foreigner speakers will often inexplicably be entirely in katakana, reinforcing that stereotype that only Japanese can speak Japanese. Edit: Imagine subtitles for Asians on TV only using this font:  Someone linked me to this, and now I think I've seen it all. Sheep fucked around with this message at 10:30 on Mar 8, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 10:10
|
|
|
That Time article is loving infuriating, primarily because it's the same ignorant bullshit that gets trotted out when ethnic minorities complain about horrible stereotypes in America. "You're just reading too much into it." "You're just being oversensitive." "You're just looking for an excuse to be offended." Nope, it's an offensive, racist caricature. Might as well call him Ankuru Tomu. EDIT: The author of that piece is, of course, ethnically Japanese, born in Hawaii. Protocol 5 fucked around with this message at 11:18 on Mar 8, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 10:46
|
|
|
I'm curious, when you guys get mad about this stuff are you angry more from a personally offended standpoint or from a public morality & ethics standpoint? Like, does it hurt your feelings personally or are you angry at Japanese society in the broader sense for perpetuating its famous ethnic nationalism? Obviously it could be both or something more, but I'm just trying to figure out what, in particular, actually causes an emotional reaction of hurt feelings or disgust.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 14:25
|
|
|
Sheep posted:Man those commercials are so insulting. It'd be like having an Asian guy doing a commercial in America where he talks in the most ching-chong-chang-ish terrible English pronunciation imaginable, makes a bunch of obvious grammar mistakes, and then tops it off a social faux pas (like hugging people in Japan, something you just generally don't do unless you're closely related or dating) just for good measure. This is driving me crazy because I can't find the commercial now or even the name of the brand, but a couple years back there was a US commercial for microwave Chinese TV dinners that did just that. There was a white lady who is preparing the noodles or whatever and then an old school Confucius looking Asian guy comes out of nowhere and speaks in broken English, dispensing fortune cookie style wisdom. It was creepy as gently caress. Also I don't know about Hong Kong, but in "Love Apartment", a popular Chinese TV show, there is a Japanese guy who is a comic book artist (because all Japanese people are comic book artists), speaks in broken Chinese and half of the jokes are related to him not understanding Chinese: http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNDM0MDg0MzI4.html (Guy in the green shirt... here I guess the joke is that he can't SPEAK Chinese but he can SING) To be honest I found it amazingly progressive that they included a Japanese character (and even showed him dating Chinese girls!) at all... I'm not saying Japan isn't particularly insular, but television and film rely highly on tropes and stock characters to begin with. hitension fucked around with this message at 14:32 on Mar 8, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 14:29
|
|
|
ReindeerF posted:I'm curious, when you guys get mad about this stuff are you angry more from a personally offended standpoint or from a public morality & ethics standpoint? Like, does it hurt your feelings personally or are you angry at Japanese society in the broader sense for perpetuating its famous ethnic nationalism? Obviously it could be both or something more, but I'm just trying to figure out what, in particular, actually causes an emotional reaction of hurt feelings or disgust. I also find that Toshi character from American Dad to be pretty offensive, for example, but it's a bit different to be talking about a character in a comedy television show that takes the piss out of literally everything versus a commercial for laundry detergent, hamburgers, or a tourist ad for Nagasaki. hitension posted:This is driving me crazy because I can't find the commercial now or even the name of the brand, but a couple years back there was a US commercial for microwave Chinese TV dinners that did just that. There was a white lady who is preparing the noodles or whatever and then an old school Confucius looking Asian guy comes out of nowhere and speaks in broken English, dispensing fortune cookie style wisdom. It was creepy as gently caress. That's hosed up but I'd be genuinely surprised if there wasn't a pretty big outcry after something like that.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 14:33
|
|
|
ReindeerF posted:I'm curious, when you guys get mad about this stuff are you angry more from a personally offended standpoint or from a public morality & ethics standpoint? Like, does it hurt your feelings personally or are you angry at Japanese society in the broader sense for perpetuating its famous ethnic nationalism? Obviously it could be both or something more, but I'm just trying to figure out what, in particular, actually causes an emotional reaction of hurt feelings or disgust. I don't think I've ever gotten emotional over this stuff. Frustrated and annoyed at the backwardness is probably the extent. I think the thing that bugs me the most is that I know most of this will change but that the main reason it hasn't is due to the countries massive echo chamber perpetuated by their homogeneity (Remember, non-Japanese barely make up 1% of the population in Japan and half of that 1% is Chinese/Korean). They can get away with this nonsense because there's no identifiable group that can make waves to change this stuff. Then you take all this and consider that Japan is the 3rd largest economic power in the world and yet has the most insular population of the top economic countries*  .(*: Its possible China is just as bad, but I do wonder if China has the same sort of problems that Japan has. China is a hodge-podge of varying ethnic backgrounds which I could see still being strong. Its the presence of large varying ethnic backgrounds that breaks the homogeneity of a country and makes people go "Ya, we're all Chinese, but we also have varying identities." This at the vary least builds a certain degree of tolerance (Ok...maybe not?) in people about "others that are different" instead of turning it into a 3 ring circus and commenting on "Oooh, look how different they are!")
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 15:33
|
|
|
ReindeerF posted:I'm curious, when you guys get mad about this stuff are you angry more from a personally offended standpoint or from a public morality & ethics standpoint? Like, does it hurt your feelings personally or are you angry at Japanese society in the broader sense for perpetuating its famous ethnic nationalism? Obviously it could be both or something more, but I'm just trying to figure out what, in particular, actually causes an emotional reaction of hurt feelings or disgust. If it were just one commercial every once in a blue moon I could laugh it off (like the silly Russian girl and 'le-mon teeeaaa', that one tickles my funny bone for some reason) but when this stuff constantly pops up, then you start to take it personally and from there you wonder about its implications for society. Then you start to wonder if you're turning into another Debito (who makes fair points but is fueled with a rather... unique furvor).  edit: anyway is no secret that Japan loves using foreigners in ads, especially in fashion. There's like this fine balance they strike, making foreigners exotic and attractive, while also dumbing them down to blunt the inferiority complex from the former. Reverend Cheddar fucked around with this message at 16:17 on Mar 8, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 16:11
|
|
|
ReindeerF posted:I'm curious, when you guys get mad about this stuff are you angry more from a personally offended standpoint or from a public morality & ethics standpoint? Like, does it hurt your feelings personally or are you angry at Japanese society in the broader sense for perpetuating its famous ethnic nationalism? Obviously it could be both or something more, but I'm just trying to figure out what, in particular, actually causes an emotional reaction of hurt feelings or disgust. It makes me kind of angry and sad for a short period of time. Unlike some other people in this thread, I don't have any real roots in Japan. There's nothing that explicitly ties me here right now. So when I see something like that it makes me feel like I should just give up, move back to the US, and get some job translating technical documents. I try really hard every single day to do what's expected of me, speak Japanese as best I can, be as tolerant as possible, and improve my Japanese as much as I can. Seeing those kinds of portrayals of foreigners makes me feel like it's all useless because it will always be assumed that I'm just like all those stereotypes. It makes me feel like there's nothing I'll ever be able to do that will validate my existence in Japanese society beyond being the foreigner novelty sideshow. I know that this isn't a problem unique to Japan, and I know I'm not the only person to have ever experienced racism. When I see those things though, feelings like that come up in a very direct way. It's one thing to understand those feelings exist, and it's another to actually feel them. The thing that usually pulls me back from that ledge is that I do have a bunch of Japanese people around me that have gotten to know me well enough that I know they don't see me in that stereotypical way. On a micro level, with the friends and acquaintances I have, it is actually easy to forget in my daily life that Japan can be like that. Those kinds of attitudes that people are talking about being on full display in media is a constant reminder of what the average Japanese person probably thinks when they see me on the train or at the supermarket. It's disheartening. It's not like I lose sleep over it or worry about it a ton, though. The feeling tends to pass pretty quickly. Overall, I really do enjoy my life in Japan. So to answer your question, the thing that bothers me when those sorts of things pop up is that it makes me regret the work I've put toward being fluent in Japanese and living in Japan. It's like, after all I've accomplished, this is the kind of bullshit it comes down to.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 16:30
|
|
|
Kenishi posted:(*: Its possible China is just as bad, but I do wonder if China has the same sort of problems that Japan has. China is a hodge-podge of varying ethnic backgrounds which I could see still being strong. Its the presence of large varying ethnic backgrounds that breaks the homogeneity of a country and makes people go "Ya, we're all Chinese, but we also have varying identities." This at the vary least builds a certain degree of tolerance (Ok...maybe not?) in people about "others that are different" instead of turning it into a 3 ring circus and commenting on "Oooh, look how different they are!") We do have a Chinese politics thread here, you could just ask this there. 
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 17:55
|
|
|
ReindeerF posted:I'm curious, when you guys get mad about this stuff are you angry more from a personally offended standpoint or from a public morality & ethics standpoint? Like, does it hurt your feelings personally or are you angry at Japanese society in the broader sense for perpetuating its famous ethnic nationalism? Obviously it could be both or something more, but I'm just trying to figure out what, in particular, actually causes an emotional reaction of hurt feelings or disgust. For me at least, the idea that's constantly promoted all over Japan, where ALL foreigners speak ONLY broken Japanese in the SAME accent is absolutely infuriating because it is so absolutely not true - and not only that but I've never once heard an actual foreigner who speaks Japanese sound anything like that - I mean, even there's not even an "English speaker's Japanese accent" (apart from the fact we all slur our vowels by Japanese standards) Oh and there's the personal fact that I was abused on 2ch years ago for daring to wear a kilt when I got married as the fact I didn't have blond hair or blue eyes meant I couldn't be British. I suspect that part of the issue is that in other countries, while there may be stereotypes about certain types of foreigner, you can confront that stereotype and get people to change their views, but in Japan this is impossible - and people you work with, who otherwise are totally normal, and - by the standards of Japan at least - socially liberal, will argue with you that they know better about how your native country works, even though they've never left Japan in their lives. Probably the easiest way to fix this would to get more Japanese to actually go on holiday to a foreign country - and not a bus trip like Marty Feldman's Lightning Coach Tours sketch.
|
|
#
?
Mar 8, 2013 18:40
|
|
|
ReindeerF posted:I'm curious, when you guys get mad about this stuff are you angry more from a personally offended standpoint or from a public morality & ethics standpoint? Like, does it hurt your feelings personally or are you angry at Japanese society in the broader sense for perpetuating its famous ethnic nationalism? Obviously it could be both or something more, but I'm just trying to figure out what, in particular, actually causes an emotional reaction of hurt feelings or disgust. I despise all racism equally. Racism in Japan irritates me because it is based on simple lazy stereotyping and ignorance. Pretty much any racist stereotype held by the typical Japanese person would be immediately debunked by spending any time at all learning about or interacting with those cultures, but they just can't be bothered, or are terrified of having their preconceptions shattered. It's lazy and cowardly, and frankly a bizarre aberration considering Japan's eagerness to adapt new ideas and styles from other cultures. I really think they're better than that. Actual personal experiences of racism are unpleasant, but what actually angers me is the fact that the vast majority of people in Japan don't understand, or simply refuse to understand, why racism is a problem.
|
|
#
?
Mar 9, 2013 00:58
|
|
|
ReindeerF posted:I'm curious, when you guys get mad about this stuff are you angry more from a personally offended standpoint or from a public morality & ethics standpoint? Like, does it hurt your feelings personally or are you angry at Japanese society in the broader sense for perpetuating its famous ethnic nationalism? Obviously it could be both or something more, but I'm just trying to figure out what, in particular, actually causes an emotional reaction of hurt feelings or disgust. I don't like those commercials, and I won't buy products advertised that way (except for McDonald's, why can't I quit you.) I guess for me it's not something I take personally, but more that I don't approve of capitalizing on and perpetuating ethinic stereotypes which are often wrong and offensive. To be honest, though, if ever I find myself getting upset about it, I remember that in my country the image of a slave woman is still being used to sell pancake syrup, and people who are the descendents of slaves have to see that poo poo every day, and glorifying slavery is several orders of magnitude worse than making fun of accents, and that helps me keep things in perspective.
|
|
#
?
Mar 9, 2013 01:07
|
|
|
ErIog posted:It makes me kind of angry and sad for a short period of time. Unlike some other people in this thread, I don't have any real roots in Japan. There's nothing that explicitly ties me here right now. So when I see something like that it makes me feel like I should just give up, move back to the US, and get some job translating technical documents. drat dude, why do you put so much stock in being accepted by a country that is slowly strangling itself into non-existence through stubbornly not doing exactly that? It's never going to happen, just accept it and extract pleasure from being an outsider. There's no onus on Japan to accept you, and you would have known this a long time ago. Why do you need your existence validated by some nameless random Japanese dude who most probably hates his own life and couldn't give a tinker's toot about you and doesn't spare you a second more thought than 'hey that man looks different to me and doesn't pay tax!!? It doesn't mean anything.
|
|
#
?
Mar 9, 2013 03:46
|
|
|
I don't put that much stock in it which is why I said the feeling tends to pass pretty quickly, and that it's easy for me to ignore this kind of stuff day to day. Also, your reply there sounds like it could have been written by any random xenophobic Japanese person. "Why did this dumb foreigner ever expect to be treated like a human being in Japan? What a rube!" Please explain more to me about how these minor knee-jerk feelings I have about how foreigners are treated in Japan are my own fault. If you were trying to give me some advice I never asked for then you should know this is pretty low on my list of stressors in Japan. ReindeerF asked how it made people feel. I answered. I wasn't seeking advice about it. ErIog fucked around with this message at 06:11 on Mar 9, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 9, 2013 06:07
|
|
|
On the topic of awful Japanese stereotypes abroad, there was that lovely British TV show "Banzai" that was wildly popular (in Australia at least) a few years ago. It featured the awful accents, nonsensical mystery Oriental language with cool symbols, and wacky inscrutible Japanese salarymen that you'd expect from a show called "Banzai". It was like something out of the 1930s, but managed to win a bunch of awards if I recall correctly.
|
|
#
?
Mar 9, 2013 07:09
|
|
|
Rising Sun by Michael Crichton is pretty much the gold-standard for contemporary hysterical anti-Japanese racism in America. The ironic thing is that it paints Japan as the most racist country on Earth, while simultaneously characterizing protectionist government policies and commercial practices as essential elements of the Japanese devious racial character and a valid justification for hating and fearing them. Not only that, but it was published right on the heels of the recession in 1991 that was caused by the savings and loan crisis.
|
|
#
?
Mar 9, 2013 08:46
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 10, 2024 20:32 |
|
|
ozza posted:On the topic of awful Japanese stereotypes abroad, there was that lovely British TV show "Banzai" that was wildly popular (in Australia at least) a few years ago. There's also the fact that it was largely a spoof of weird gameshows like Takeshi's castle rather than purely "lets be racist about the Japanese" (I did think it was a vile show when it aired though) ookiimarukochan fucked around with this message at 10:33 on Mar 9, 2013 |
|
#
?
Mar 9, 2013 10:29
|
|