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JAPANESE_RACISM

                                               September 20, 2012
                                               October    6, 2016
I've often heard reports of
racism in Japan: it seems that     (Which is not to claim that
there's plenty going around.       the United States is
                                   blissfully post-racial...)



            A friend of mine, a Stanford student who is
            typically regarded as a "black" woman (her
            ancestry is more like "African
            American-Chinese") was staying in Japan in
            the mid-1980s (working as an English
            teacher, as a number of my friends did).
            She remarks that she was told that
            obviously she had gotten into Stanford
            because of her Chinese half.



                                      Japanese-Korean's tend to be
                                      regarded as inferior in Japan:

                                                KOREAN_JAPANESE


  James Fallows, "More Like Us" (1989):

  "America's problems derive, in the Japanese
  view, from too many vacations, too much
  greed, too little discipline-- and, as only
  a few actually say but many seem to believe,
  too few Asians and too many blacks." (p.6)

I think there are some signs
that Japan's racial attitudes
are changing, though from what
I can see at a distance, I
think what's going on is the
more sophisticated Japanese
embracing other ethnicities as
a source of exotic beauty.
                                           HETEROPHILLIA
   That's not identical with racial
   acceptance... it strikes me as
   a good first step, though.


Now there's a sub-culture of
Japanese young women who feel
like black people have a really
cool look.                           A 2011 news item about this: [ref]

                                     Narrator:
                [ref]
                                     "Pale skin is a symbol of beauty in Japan.
Yuta once again gets out             That is why Japanese girls hate the sun.
and asks some people:                But nowadays not all girls hate it.
                                     They want dark skin, so they look like
  He finds people commenting         American hip-hoppers"
  that they really like the
  idea of the United States               It goes on to talk about
  and they'd really like to               girls who are into "B-Style",
  live there "because people              and black culture.
  are less reserved".
                                     In the comments you see people make
  When asked what they think         the obvious point that this is a
  the percentage of black            very shallow understanding of black
  people in the US is, they          culture: that's certainly true,
  guess "50%", and are               but it remains a positive take
  surprised to hear "13%".           on "black", an improvement over
                                     earlier eras.
  Some people he talks to are
  clearly better informed then
  others, but a typical comment
  is that they think black people
  are "cool people", and they
  must have a positive reputation    This is interesting in a lot of
  because of all the popular         ways: black people *and* America
  singers and sports stars that      are nearly synonymous in their
  are black.                         minds, and both symbolize being
                                     natural and spontaneous.

                                         This is both (1)
                                         something that would
                                         make you wince, coming
                                         from a well-meaning
                                         American & (2) a huge
                                         improvement over
                                         "lazy/stupid".
    The 2015 Miss Universe
    representative for
    Japan was a mixed-race      She reports she got a lot of static
    woman: Nagasaki Ariana      about this though-- they've got their
    Miyamoto                    own version of teapers, birthers and
                                trumpsters over there, I gather.
    Ah, and 2016 had another
    mixed-race candidate win:
    Priyanka Yoshikawa.



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