Xenophobic rantings of the Far-Right still continue despite NJ Suffrage Bill’s suspension; scanned flyers enclosed

Posted on April 19, 2010April 19, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. For some people, anything is an excuse for a party. Especially if it’s a Political Party. For the Far-Right xenophobes in Japan, it’s their party and they’ll decry if they want to — as they continue their anti-NJ rantings, even when they’ve effectively shouted down the NJ Suffrage Bill the DPJ proposed after they came to power last August. Everyone has to have a hobby, it seems. Pity theirs is based upon hatred of NJ, particularly our geopolitical neighbors. Two submissions of primary source materials and posters enclosed below, one from Debito.org Reader AS, one from me that I picked up when I was in Tokyo last March, which led to a rally reported on in the Japan Times and Kyodo the other day. Drink in the invective and see how naked and bold Japan’s xenophobia is getting.

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From: AS
Subject: More anti-NJ suffrage propaganda
Date: April 14, 2010

Hi Debito, There was a person handing out anti-NJ suffrage materials at Tokorozawa station yesterday morning, and, as I promised myself I would, I got a photo and the stuff he was handing out.

I think I caught him off guard when I approached him from the flank and stuck my hand out for the pamphlets – he just handed them over without realizing until it was too late.

Ok, the pamphlets themselves. The first one is not particularly nasty, it’s just another “Release the North Korean kidnap victims” flyer. It appears to be produced by another group.

Funny how this stuff talks about the international community, while the group distributing it want nothing to do with the international community.

The second one is quite vindictive and lacking in logic. The first side is largely devoted to portraying China as a murderous country with no justice or morals (“a culture of evil”) and then jumping to the conclusion that foreign suffrage, dual nationality, recognized residency for NJs and spouses with different surnames will mean the same fate for the Japanese as is has for ethnic minorities in China!! (The same kind of logic as “Don’t buy a Toyota because Tojo was a murderer!”)

“China is evil, so we can’t have…”

Page 2 resorts to character assassination of DPJ members, linking them with China, South Korea and communism, then goes on to the same arguments that NJs will abuse child support allowance and that Japanese won’t be able to receive it.

Next is the big stinking lie that anyone (including illegal residents and criminals) can get PR just by living here for 5 years and that they will have the same voting rights as Japanese.

It then goes on to suggest that human rights laws will turn Japan into a communist nation with no freedom (Gosh – I was under the impression that page one was slagging off China for not protecting human rights)

Finally, we get the guff that allowing different surnames for spouses will be the end of the family unit. (Let’s just make everyone change their name to Suzuki, then). DS

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ADDENDUM FROM DEBITO: I too saw these protesters and felt their invective outside the Diet Building on March 23, 2010, just after I gave my presentation to UN Special Rep Bustamante. (I wonder if he caught wind of these people; they certainly were making enough of a stink.)

I too managed to get some flyers (off a kind reporter), and here are some of them. Hang on to your logical hats, everyone:

In addition to the flyers AS referred to above (these are the same people distributing, after all):

We have former ASDF general Tamogami wallowing in all the luscious pink trappings of Japanese patriotism, calling for people to come pay money to hear him speak in Kamakura. What you would be in store for: According to the Japan Times January 24, 2010 (http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20100124x4.html), “20 percent of shares in the Japanese mass media are held by foreigners. This means that the Japanese mass media are controlled by foreign investments. Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was brought down by these foreign powers.” Good thing he’s no longer imbedded in our military.

Here’s our laundry list of national heroes (with Tamogami and racist Dietmember Hiranuma enjoying big pictures) for us lesser mortals:

The greater national hero I’d like to see honored more often would be journalist Kotoku Shusui, but some of these faces above are the type of people who would have him and his ideology killed. (They managed it, and look where it got Japan — destroyed in WWII.)

Underpinning all of the counterarguments proffered above is more hatred. NJ hate us. So we shouldn’t allow any of them to vote. QED.

Next up:

And here comes the kitchen sinking — where we lump in all sorts of other issues (including Nikkyouso, even Japan’s sex education) with the NJ suffrage stuff. And of course Ozawa’s qualification as a real Japanese are called into question due to his beliefs. Didn’t realize “Japaneseness” also meant ideological conformity and uniform arguments. Oh wait, yes it did, back in the bad old days when it led the nation to destruction in a world war. Never mind. Reenforced patriotism will surely fix everything!

And finally:

An advertisement for a big free public rally against NJ suffrage in the Budoukan (the place the Far-Rightists also protested when the Beatles played back in 1966, as they were too decadent for Japanese morals; they paved the way for Cheap Trick, however, phew). Wish I could have gone. The Japan Times and Kyodo attended, however. Here’s what they say (excerpt):

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The Japan Times Sunday, April 18, 2010

Foreigner suffrage opponents rally
Conservative politicians express outrage at DPJ plan
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20100418a1.html
By ALEX MARTIN Staff writer

Conservative intellectuals and key executives from five political parties were among the thousands who gathered in Tokyo on Saturday to rally against granting foreign residents voting rights for local elections.

On hand were financial services minister Shizuka Kamei, who heads Kokumin Shinto (People’s New Party), Liberal Democratic Party Secretary General Tadamori Oshima, former trade minister Takeo Hiranuma, who recently launched his own political party, Tachiagare Nippon (Sunrise Party of Japan), and Your Party leader Yoshimi Watanabe.

According to the organizer, a total of 10,257 people attended the convention at the Nippon Budokan arena in Chiyoda Ward, including representatives of prefectural assemblies and citizens from across the nation…

In an opening speech preceded by the singing of the “Kimigayo” national anthem, Atsuyuki Sassa, former head of the Cabinet Security Affairs Office and chief organizer of the event, expressed his concern about granting foreigners suffrage.

“I was infuriated when I heard of plans to submit to the Diet a government-sponsored bill giving foreign residents voting rights,” he said.

“Our Constitution grants those with Japanese nationality voting rights in return for their obligation to pay taxes,” he said. “Granting suffrage to those without Japanese nationality is clearly a mistake in national policy.”

[NB: As any taxpaying NJ knows, this is untrue. I guess that means they don’t need NJ tax monies.]

Taking the podium to a round of applause, Kamei emphasized his party’s role in preventing the government from submitting the bill to the Diet, and said that “it was obvious that granting suffrage will destroy Japan.”

Kamei, who has in the past argued that giving foreigners voting rights could incite nationalism during polling, went so far as to declare that his party would leave the ruling coalition if the government submitted the bill to the Diet…

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Rest of the article at http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20100418a1.html

Kyodo News adds:

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Lawmakers oppose giving foreign residents right to vote

Japan Today/Kyodo Sunday 18th April, 2010

http://www.japantoday.com/category/politics/view/lawmakers-voice-opposition-to-giving-foreign-residents-right-to-vote

TOKYO — A group of conservative lawmakers from both ruling and opposition parties on Saturday voiced their opposition to proposed legislation to enfranchise permanent foreign residents for local elections. Shizuka Kamei, who leads the People’s New Party, addressed a gathering of people against the proposed legislation in Tokyo, saying, ‘‘The right to vote for foreigners will ruin Japan.’‘

‘‘It will not be enacted during the current parliamentary session because the People’s New Party has invoked a veto (within the government of Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama),’’ said Kamei, who is a cabinet member within the tripartite coalition government.

While Hatoyama’s Democratic Party of Japan is aiming to pass the legislation, at least one member is apparently opposed.

Jin Matsubara, a House of Representative member of the DPJ, told the meeting, ‘‘There is an argument that Europe is positive about enfranchising foreigners, but that does not hold water in Japan. I am unequivocally opposed. It’s my belief that it is necessary to faithfully speak up (about the issue) within the party.’‘

Meanwhile, Mizuho Fukushima, a cabinet member and leader of the Social Democratic Party of Japan that partners the DPJ and PNP in the government, reiterated her endorsement of the proposed legislation.

‘‘It’s not about all foreigners and it’s also limited to local elections,’’ she told reporters in Odate, Akita Prefecture. ‘‘Participation in the local community is necessary, as some countries have approved it.’‘

Objections to the bill were also expressed by opposition lawmakers at the Tokyo meeting. Tadamori Oshima, secretary general of the Liberal Democratic Party, ‘‘We must protect Japan’s sovereignty. I am absolutely opposed.’‘

Yoshimi Watanabe, leader of Your Party, suggested that enfranchising foreign residents is a vote-buying tactic. ‘‘The Democratic Party says livelihood is the No. 1 issue, but in fact aren’t elections their No. 1 business?’’ he said.

Takeo Hiranuma, who leads the just launched Sunrise Party of Japan, said he ‘‘will stake his life in fighting’’ against the legislation.

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CONCLUSION: These are some awfully flash and well produced pamphlets, and renting sound trucks and the whole Budoukan for all these sound bites cost a helluva lot of money. Who’s funding this? Arudou Debito in Sapporo

MHLW clamps down on NJ spongers of system claiming overseas kids. What spongers?

Posted on April 9, 2010April 9, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. In mid-March we had a storm in a teacup about DPJ policy re child allowances: If NJ also qualified for child support, politicians argued, some hypothetical Arab prince in Japan would claim all 50 of his kids back in Saudi Arabia. Well, thanks to that storm, we have the Health Ministry creating policy within weeks to prevent NJ from potentially sponging off the system. As submitter JK notes, “What follows is article on why 厚生労働省 feels the need to clamp down on those untrustworthy foreigners; never mind about the lack of data.”

Gov’t gets tough on allowances for foreigners who claim to have children in home countries
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20100407p2a00m0na008000c.html

子ども手当：外国人支給、厳格に　子との年２回面会要件
http://mainichi.jp/life/edu/child/archive/news/2010/04/20100407ddm002010042000c.html

Well, that’s proactive policymaking in Japan. In the same way that anti-terrorism policy that targets foreigners only was proactive (although it took a few years to draft and enact). Here, the bureaucrats could just do it with a few penstrokes and call it a “clarification”, without having to go through the pesky political process.

But the assumption is, once again, that a) foreigners are untrustworthy and need extra background checks, and b) any policy that might do something nice for the Japanese public needs to be carefully considered by viewing it through the “foreigner prism”, for who knows what those people might do to take advantage of our rich system? “What-if” panicky hypotheticals without any data win the debate and govern policymaking towards NJ again.

Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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Gov’t gets tough on allowances for foreigners who claim to have children in home countries
(Mainichi Japan) April 7, 2010

The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry has tightened conditions for paying child-care allowances to foreigners who reside in Japan and claim to have children in their home countries, ministry officials said.

The move is aimed at preventing foreign residents from illicitly receiving expensive allowances by falsely adopting children in their home countries or using other tricks to deceive Japanese authorities. The ministry has notified local governments across the country of its decision.

Before providing child-care allowances, local governments are required by the ministry to confirm that such recipients meet their children in their home countries at least twice a year by checking their passports, and make sure that they send money to their children at least once every four months.

The ministry took the measure out of fear that a large number of foreigners would falsely adopt children in their home countries for the sole purpose of illegally receiving child-care allowances in Japan.

The number of foreign residents’ children who receive child allowances while living in their home countries remains unclear, according to the ministry.

Some local governments have expressed concern that the measure would increase their workload.

Original Japanese story

子ども手当：外国人支給、厳格に　子との年２回面会要件
毎日新聞　2010年4月7日　東京朝刊

厚生労働省は、国内に住み母国に子供がいる外国人に対する子ども手当の支給要件を厳格化する通知を各自治体に出した。年２回以上面会していることをパスポートで確認することなどが柱。児童手当は比較的緩やかな条件下で支給されてきたが、高額の子ども手当で不正受給を防ぐことを狙った。

児童手当は、子を養育する権限があり、生計を維持する保護者に支給。母国に子がいる外国人については、出生証明書と送金証明書があり、面会などしていれば支給してきた。だが面会の立証は困難で、手紙の提示だけでよかったり、証明を求めない自治体もあった。証明書の偽造も可能と指摘されており、不正受給目的の養子縁組の横行などが危惧（きぐ）されていた。

このため厚労省は、少なくとも年２回以上の面会をパスポートで確認▽約４カ月に１回以上の送金を銀行の送金通知などで確認－－などを支給要件と定め通知した。

厚労省によると、母国で児童手当を受給する子どもの数は把握されていない。年度末に子ども手当の駆け込み申請があった自治体もあり、今回の通知に対し、自治体側からは「事務負担がどのくらい増えるか未知数」と懸念する声も上がっている。【野倉恵】
ENDS

Asahi: Prof pundit on Toyota uses “culture” benkai to explain recall issues

Posted on March 14, 2010March 14, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. As a weekend tangent, here’s more on Toyota and how we try to steer attention away from matters of engineering — by blaming it once again on culture, and getting some university prof to mouth it for legitimacy’s sake. Comments from submitter BT included. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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On Feb 26, 2010, at 11:45 AM, BT wrote:

Greetings and salutations! Just came across this little gem while reading the Asahi Shinbun earlier today. I thought you might be interested (if someone else hasn’t already sent this in): http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201002250455.html

It’s an interview about Toyota recalls in the US, with “Hideo Kobayashi, a visiting professor at Yokohama National University’s Center for Risk Management and Safety Sciences”. I’m talking specifically about these two quotes:

“Q: Wasn’t Toyota’s confidence in product quality one of the factors that led to its sloppy handling of the situation?

A: Can what people in Japan consider “good quality” be also considered good in the United States, which has a more diversified population?

Japanese people generally have high driving skills and similar physical features. But the United States, whose society was more or less built by immigrants, has people with various physical features and behavioral patterns. To get a driver’s license, you don’t need the sort of skills that are required in Japan..”

(The “we’re superior” routine)

And,

“Q: Some say the reaction to Toyota’s problems has an aspect of “Japan bashing” about it. What is your view?

A: With American companies such as General Motors Corp. going under and Toyota doing well in sales, there naturally is an aspect of Japan bashing. But this is something that has to be overcome.”

(The “poor, poor Japan” routine)

Cheers from Tokyo! BT

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‘Toyota relied too much on Japanese way’
BY TETSUO KOGURE, THE ASAHI SHIMBUN

2010/02/26, Interview with Hideo Kobayashi (THE ASAHI SHIMBUN)

What can companies do to avoid the pitfalls that have plagued Toyota Motor Corp. over its vehicle recalls?

Hideo Kobayashi, a visiting professor at Yokohama National University’s Center for Risk Management and Safety Sciences, says Toyota failed to recognize differences in the way Japanese and Americans perceive recalls.

Kobayashi is an expert on crisis management concerning safety measures and is well-versed in recall matters. Because product problems are bound to crop up, he says companies should deal with them while paying attention to detail.

Following are excerpts of an Asahi Shimbun interview with Kobayashi:

* * *

Question: In the United States, Toyota has come under fire for being tardy in issuing recalls. What is your sense of the whole Toyota issue?

Answer: Trouble always occurs when a carmaker develops, produces and introduces a new vehicle. When problems occur, modifying the vehicle is what every automaker (in the world) does as a matter of course. While the modification is usually carried out on cars to be produced in the future, the system of recalls specifically targets vehicles that have already been manufactured so that they are fixed, too.

I think the biggest problem with Toyota was its failure to recognize the difference in thinking in Japan and the United States over the issues of recalls and safety. It apparently made a typically Japanese judgment.

Japanese companies have a strong tradition of being bound by legal regulations, with a deep-rooted perception that issuing a “recall is evil.”

In the United States and Europe, companies believe that from a crisis management viewpoint, “the sooner a recall is done, the easier it is to contain the damage.” As a result people think: “Because there is a recall (system), we can travel in a car without having any worries.”

Overseas subsidiaries (of car manufacturers) that are aware of these things had better take the lead in coping with recalls. However, faced with rapid market expansion and increased sales, Toyota probably decided that it would be easier for the headquarters (in Japan) to make a judgment.

Q: Some say the reaction to Toyota’s problems has an aspect of “Japan bashing” about it. What is your view?

A: With American companies such as General Motors Corp. going under and Toyota doing well in sales, there naturally is an aspect of Japan bashing. But this is something that has to be overcome.

To survive, many Japanese companies need to go overseas for sales and manufacturing, but they won’t succeed if they force their Japanese style (of doing business). Overseas subsidiaries must hire locally and assimilate.

Q: Wasn’t Toyota’s confidence in product quality one of the factors that led to its sloppy handling of the situation?

A: Can what people in Japan consider “good quality” be also considered good in the United States, which has a more diversified population?

Japanese people generally have high driving skills and similar physical features. But the United States, whose society was more or less built by immigrants, has people with various physical features and behavioral patterns. To get a driver’s license, you don’t need the sort of skills that are required in Japan.

Naturally, there can be various troubles even with cars developed in Japan that are regarded as good in the country. Problems need to be handled with attention to detail.

Q: Toyota has decided to introduce a brake override system that enables a driver to stop the car even if the gas pedal is depressed. Was it a problem that there was no such system previously?

A: It was rather whether (Toyota) had explained to customers the lack of the system and what could happen as a consequence.
ENDS

Weekend Tangent: China Daily publishes snotty anti-laowai article

Posted on March 7, 2010March 7, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Turning over the keyboard to Debito.org Reader R for commentary about some pretty nasty (and repetitive: how many ways can we say “you don’t get it”, and “you don’t belong here” in a single essay?) anti-foreigner media published in a major English-language daily in China for a comparison. And I thought 2-Channel was bad. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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Subject: “gaijin” discrimination in China
Date: January 18, 2010

Dear Debito, I am a regular reader of your blog, even though I do not usually participate or leave comments.

I am quite interested in your work about discrimination in Japan (where I currently live) ; I also keep an eye on what happens in China (I was living there before).

I found this article in China Daily online the other day (http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/life/2010-01/12/content_9304769.htm).

When I was reading it I was thinking 2 things :

– there is discrimination in Japan, but hopefully it won’t get as obvious as the tone of this article. Can you imagine this kind of article about “Gaijin” in Japan (FYI, Laowai means Gaijin in China) published in a serious english newspaper, like Japan Times for example ?

[Ed: Yes I can. I’m thinking something like Amy Chavez and Japan Lite. Although in the case I will cite I think if it more as failed sarcasm than borderline hatred. Both are snotty and asinine, however.]

– this article reminded me of your work. unfortunately we have nobody like you in China to prevent that kind of article from being published 🙁 Because the truth is I was very shocked by the tone if this article and how it pictures white people living in China.

Well, I know it doesn’t talk about Japan at all, but I thought you could be interested by what happens in our neighbour country… Best regards, R

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Dear laowai, don’t mess with our Chinese-ness
By Huang Hung (China Daily) 2010-01-12
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/life/2010-01/12/content_9304769.htm

Now, listen up, you foreigner boys and girls, Chinese New Year is around the corner and I want to talk to you seriously about fireworks.

I saw this picture in a newspaper, where a smiling, cordial Chinese girl (rather pretty as well) was explaining the tradition of lighting fireworks to a group of foreign guys. They all looked very happy.

I will let you know that is false information. Fireworks are no small matter, and no laughing matter either. So wipe that smirk off your face and listen up.

As a Chinese, I want to be honest with you. For the past 30 years, we have opened up to the West, and welcomed foreigners like yourselves to come here to do business, to make money, even gave you some easy credit to let you buy real estate, marry our women, whatever. But this does not make you Chinese. There are things we reserve for ourselves, and it really doesn’t matter how long you have been here, just don’t assume you can be one of us, and don’t touch the following three things:

CHICKEN FEET,

SEA CUCUMBERS

AND FIRECRACKERS!

Most of you are well trained enough to withhold your chopsticks, whichever way you are holding them, and stay away from the chicken feet at Chinese dim sum restaurants. But some of you are show-offs. Most of the time, you are trying to prove to your Chinese girlfriend’s parents that you are so Chinese. “Look, I am eating chicken feet. Mmm … Good!”

Don’t do that. We really get annoyed when foreigners try to chomp on chicken feet. Sometimes, you are so polite, you don’t spit out the bones, you chew them and try to swallow them. That’s totally unacceptable. Because, when you do that, most Chinese start getting anxious about you choking to death on the damn chicken bones. And it is very difficult to enjoy dim sum when you are anxious.

Sea cucumbers are not for you either. Most of you are rather intimidated by slimy sea things – jelly fish, sea cucumbers. But, there are those of you who are so brave that you insist on trying it, and pretend to enjoy it. Most of the time, you are a foreign businessman, you don’t want to offend your Chinese host by not eating the most expensive dish ordered.

I’ve got some news for you. Guess what? He didn’t order it for you! He ordered it for the Chinese at the table! Do you know how difficult it is to soak the sea cucumber so it acquires the right slimy texture? No one can master it in his own kitchen. Only the restaurants can. So stop trying to pick up the sea cucumber with your chopsticks, it will probably end up in your lap anyway. Just politely put the untouched dish back on the lazy susan. We are not impressed by sea cucumber chivalry.

Now fireworks. It is strictly, strictly for us Chinese. We really don’t want you anywhere near fireworks. First of all, it is dangerous. You don’t understand why 1.4 billion people have to turn into pyromaniacs for one night. It’s totally beyond your comprehension. But we love it; we have been setting off these things since we were three and for 5,000 years. So let me just say that fireworks are not for barbarians like you. You don’t get it. On the other hand, we Chinese have great tolerance for fireworks; it’s one night when you can do some damage and get away with it. For example, you can burn a building down, a brand new building, with stuff in it. How can you comprehend that level of generosity?

And, don’t you dare try to do the same, we simply have no tolerance for it. You try to burn a building down, we will kill you, because, you were probably high, and we really don’t give a hoot whether you are mentally disturbed or whether your prime minister is going to make endless harassing phone calls.

So, you better be good, you better be nice, because firecrackers are coming to town!

(Huang Hung is an opinionator on arts, lifestyle and showbiz.)

[Ed: And [comes off as] a nationalistic asshole.]

ENDS

Kyodo: GOJ criticized by UN CERD (once again) for inaction towards racial discrim; GOJ stresses “discrim not rampant”

Posted on March 1, 2010March 2, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. Here we have some preliminary reports coming out of Geneva regarding the UN CERD Committee’s review of Japan’s human rights record vis-a-vis racial discrimination. We have the GOJ claiming no “rampant discrimination”, and stressing that we still need no law against RD for the same old reasons. This despite the rampant discrimination that NGOs are pointing out in independent reports. Read on. And if people find other articles with interesting tacks (the second Kyodo version in the JT below feels decidedly muted), please include whole text with link in the Comments Section below. Thanks. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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Japan disputes racism allegations at U.N. panel
Feb 25 2010 The Associated Press
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9E38OV00&show_article=1

GENEVA, Feb. 25 (AP) – (Kyodo)—Japan does not need laws to combat racial discrimination, a Japanese official said Thursday as Japan’s racism record was examined by the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.

“Punitive legislation on racial discrimination may hamper legitimate discourse,” Mitsuko Shino of the Japanese Foreign Ministry told a session in Geneva. “And I don’t think the situation in Japan is one of rampant discrimination, so we will not be examining this now.”

The review, the first since 2001, is a required procedure for countries signatory to the 1965 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, which Japan ratified in December 1995.

It is conducted by a committee composed of 18 legal experts who act in their professional capacity.

Fourteen Japanese government officials from five ministries, headed by Ambassador in charge of Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs Hideaki Ueda, spent the morning answering questions about Japanese legislation and practices to fight racism and protect minority rights.

The committee was critical of the lack of antidiscrimination legislation in Japan, and the treatment of Japanese minorities and its large Korean and Chinese communities.

Prior to the start of the review on Wednesday, Japanese nongovernmental organizations presented to the committee issues they wanted raised.

They showed a video of a group of Japanese nationalist protesters waving flags and protesting in front of a North Korean school in Kyoto Prefecture, shouting phrases such as “This is a North Korean spy training center!”

An official of Japan’s Justice Ministry said such behavior could be explained as a reaction to “intermittent nuclear and missile tests” by North Korea, although any consequent human right violations were investigated.

Many committee members asked questions about the Okinawan population, some groups of which are fighting to obtain recognition as an indigenous population.

“There is no clear definition of an indigenous people, even in the U.N. declaration,” Ueda said. “But Okinawan people are Japanese, and their language is the Japanese language,” he said.

Concerns were also expressed by committee members about the treatment of descendants of people in discriminated communities called “buraku.”

Committee members admitted they had difficulty understanding whether they were a caste, or a separate ethnic group.

“What makes them different from the average Japanese?” committee member Jose Augusto Lindgren Alves asked.

“There are no differences at all, they are like us, we are the same,” Ueda answered.

Other questions raised included educational opportunities for students of non-Japanese schools, and reports that some individuals had to change their last name to a pre-approved Kanji when obtaining Japanese citizenship.

Foreign schools in Japan get tax credits and subsidies, a delegate from the Education Ministry said, and students from many, especially Korean, schools had access to Japanese universities.

Counselors are available for foreign students joining Japanese schools, the delegate added.

On the name-change allegation, “in order not to create inconvenience in their social life, it would be better to pick an easier to use character,” a member of the Justice Ministry said. “But you can also use hiragana and katakana.”

After the review, Ralph Hosoki of the Solidarity Network with Migrants Japan, one of the NGOs, told Kyodo News, “The government only regurgitates what’s already in place…There is no imaginative dialogue to work towards concrete changes.”

In concluding remarks, committee member Patrick Thornberry said, “A lot of the responses are that you do not need legislation…My concern is that your information…may not be proper to make such a conclusion.”
ENDS

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The Japan Times, Friday, Feb. 26, 2010
Japan faces U.N. racism criticism
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20100226a4.html

GENEVA (Kyodo) Japan’s record on racism has improved, but there is still room for progress, according to the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.

“We heard today much that is good and positive, but I think a deepened engagement would be welcomed and necessary,” Patrick Thornberry, the member of the committee responsible for Japan’s review, said Wednesday.

The review, the first for Japan since 2001, is required of signatory countries to the 1965 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, which Japan ratified in December 1995.

Fourteen Japanese officials from five ministries, headed by Ambassador in Charge of Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs Hideaki Ueda, flew from Japan to field questions and comments from the committee of 18 legal experts.

Thornberry particularly criticized Japan’s lack of laws to combat hate speech, saying “in international law, freedom of expression is not unlimited.”

The convention commits states to fight racial discrimination by taking such steps as restricting racist speech and criminalizing membership in racist organizations. Japan has expressed reservations about some of the provisions, which it says go against its commitment to freedom of expression and assembly.

Prior to the review, Japanese nongovernmental organizations presented various examples they say highlight the need for legislative action to fight racism in their country.

“There seems to have been little progress since 2001,” when the last review was held, committee member Regis de Gouttes said. “There is no new legislation, even though in 2001 the committee said prohibiting hate speech is compatible with freedom of expression.”

Committee members also criticized the treatment of certain segments of society, such as the “burakumin” (descendants of Japan’s former outcast class), and the people of Okinawa.

“The ‘buraku’ situation is a form of racial discrimination,” committee member Fatimata-Binta Victoire Dah said. “It is frighteningly similar to the caste system in Africa.”

Many members of the committee, however, praised the government’s recent recognition of the Ainu as an indigenous people.

But there was also criticism of the treatment of Chinese and Korean nationals, in matters ranging from the lack of accreditation of their schools, to the necessity, at times, for them to change their names when they obtain Japanese citizenship.

The NGOs, before the review, showed the committee members a video of a group of nationalists waving flags and protesting aggressively in front of a North Korean school in Kyoto Prefecture, shouting phrases such as “This is a North Korean spy training center!”

“Why are these children guilty of what North Korea is doing?” committee member Ion Diaconu asked.

Some members of the committee also expressed concern that such schools did not receive any government funding at a time when the government is considering removing tuition fees for public high schools.
ENDS

======================================

Feedback from a Debito.org Reader, who cced me in this letter yesterday to a UN official, disputing the lack of “rampant discrimination”. Forwarding:

Dear Gabriella,

I am writing this email in the hope that it will find Mr. Patrick
Thornberry as he is conducting a review on Japan’s Elimination of Racial
Discrimination. I read briefly of the review on the Japan Times website
(URL below).

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20100226a4.html

I am concerned that a very important human right is not being protected
in Japan. I am referring to the child’s right to an education. In Japan,
the child’s right to an education is ensured by law. Students must
attend school as compulsory education until they graduate from junior
high school. However, this legislation is only applicable to Japanese
citizens. Non-Japanese do not have the same rights/obligations regarding
education and this violates the right of the non-Japanese to an
education.

I direct your attention to the Convention on the Rights of the Child of 1989.

CHAPTER IV
HUMAN RIGHTS
11 . Convention on the Rights of the Child
New York, 20 November 1989

Apparently, Japan became a signatory on 21 Sep 1990 and ratified it on
22 Apr 1994. However, practice in Japan does not appear to be in line
with the articles of the convention. Specifically article 3 and article 28.
——-
Article 28
1. States Parties recognize the right of the child to education, and
with a view to achieving this right progressively and on the basis of
equal opportunity, they shall, in particular:

(a) Make primary education compulsory and available free to all»

(b) Encourage the development of different forms of secondary
education, including general and vocational education, make them
available and accessible to every child, and take appropriate measures
such as the introduction of free education and offering financial
assistance in case of need;
——-

In Japan, education until Junior high school is compulsory for Japanese
students only. For non-Japanese it would appear that the legislation
provides compulsory primary education only. In reality, this is not
ensured. There are many families whose children are not enrolled in any
part of the Japanese education system. Some cite the language barrier as
problem with sending their children to a Japanese school. Education is
not “available to all”. This leads to some students being enrolled in
“schools” that are not required to comply with any standards. This leads
to a conflict in Article 3.

——-
Article 3 Paragraph 3
3. States Parties shall ensure that the institutions, services and
facilities responsible for the care or protection of children shall
conform with the standards established by competent authorities,
particularly in the areas of safety, health, in the number and
suitability of their staff, as well as competent supervision.
——-

There are thousands of Brazilian families living and working in Shizuoka
Prefecture. Many of these families send their children to “Brazilian
schools” that do NOT conform with the standards of Japanese schools. In
fact, many of these so-called schools have no standards with which they
have to comply.

On the other hand, Japanese students have access to compulsory,
standards-compliant education until the end of junior high school.
Non-Japanese children are being discriminated against to the point that
their universal and inalienable right to a quality education is not
being protected.

Enforcing compulsory education in Japan is necessary. Japan may not have
the multilingual schools that would be ideal but a standards compliant
education is better than what these children get now which is either a
non-standards compliant education or no education at all. Enforcing
compulsory education would surely see the current situation improve.

In the news article I cited at the beginning of this email there was no
mention to this issue. That leaves me with my sole question, is
eliminating hate speech really more important to the UN than children’s
education?

AUTHOR’S NAME WITHHELD UPON REQUEST
ends

///////////////////////////////////////////

UPDATE. RESPONSE FROM UNITED NATIONS

——- Forwarded Message ——–
From: Harumi Fuentes
Cc: Gabriella Habtom , sthodiyil@ohchr.org,
p.thornberry@keele.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Fw: JAPAN – U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial
Discrimination
Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2010 11:10:06 +0100

Dear Mr. (anonymized),

In response to your email, the Committee is in charge of monitoring
the implementation of the Convention for all the persons under the
jurisdiction of the State party and the right to education is covered.
Please rest assured that despite what reports or news articles may
write or omit, the issue of education was addressed extensively by the
Committee. In fact, going over the summary record, I’d like to inform
you that education, including Peruvian and Brazilian schools and
miscellaneous schools, was taken up by almost all the members of the
Committee and discussed in length with the State party.

We appreciate the useful information you provided on legislation on
compulsory education for Japanese and non-nationals and thank you for
your interest in the work of the Committee.

Best regards,
Harumi Fuentes

Harumi Fuentes Furuya (Ms.)
Associate Human Rights Officer

Human Rights Council and Treaties Division
OHCHR-Palais Wilson 1-075
tel. +41-22-917 9699
hfuentes@ohchr.org
wwww.ohchr.org
END

Kyodo et al. falls for NPA spins once again, headlines NJ “white collar crime” rise despite NJ crime fall overall

Posted on February 27, 2010May 10, 2021 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. It’s that time of year again. Time for the National Police Agency (NPA) Spring Offensive and Media Blitz against foreign crime. Article, then comment, then some original Japanese articles, to observe yet again how NJ are being criminalized by Japanese law enforcement and our domestic media:

/////////////////////////////////////////////

No. of white-collar crimes by foreigners up by 31.2% in 2009

Thursday 25th February, 2010 Kyodo News, Courtesy of KG
http://www.japantoday.com/category/crime/view/no-of-white-collar-crimes-by-foreigners-up-by-312

TOKYO — The National Police Agency detected 964 white-collar crimes by visiting foreigners in Japan last year, up 31.2% from the previous year, it said Thursday. The number of visiting foreigners charged with such crimes came to 546, up 7.9%, according to the NPA. It said notable among the crimes was teams using faked credit cards.

The overall number of crimes committed by all foreigners in the reporting year fell 11.1% to 27,790, with 13,282 people, down 4.3%, charged, the NPA said.

ENDS

/////////////////////////////////////////////

COMMENT: Yep. Same old same old. Parrot the NPA: Highlight the NJ crime rises, and play down the fact that NJ crime overall has gone down. And of course no depiction of J “white collar” (whatever that means) crime numbers, nor their ups or downs to give a sense of scale.

NB: I can’t find the Japanese original for the Kyodo English article, only something in Kyodo’s Chinese-language news service (which avails us with the original terminology for “white-collar crime”, as “gaikokujin chinou hanzai” (lit. foreign intellectual crime); again, whatever that means). The structure is the same:

◆09年在日外国人智能犯罪案件骤增
02.25.10 17:36
http://china.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fsStory/index.php?sel_lang=schinese&storyid=78662
【共同社2月25日电】据日本警察厅统计，除永久居住者外，去年赴日外国人犯罪案件中诈骗等“智能犯罪”急剧增加。案件数量较上年增加了31.2%，共964起；涉案人数为546人，增加了7.9%。

其中使用伪造信用卡的多人诈骗团伙发案率明显居高。

警察厅表示，不同国籍的团伙成员在世界各地重复犯罪的“犯罪国际化”对日本的治安也构成了巨大威胁，将重新构筑针对外国人有组织犯罪的调查机制。

从外国人犯罪的整体情况来看，触犯《刑法》及特别法的案件共27,790起，减少了11.1%；涉案人数为13,282人，减少4.3%。（完）
ENDS
======================

The Sankei doesn’t defy its typical anti-NJ bent as it also parrots the NPA:

外国人の知能犯罪が増加　前年比３１・２％増の９６４件　５６４人摘発詐欺グループ目立つ
産經新聞　2010.2.25 10:53
http://sankei.jp.msn.com/affairs/crime/100225/crm1002251055012-n1.htm
昨年警察が摘発した永住者らを除く来日外国人による犯罪のうち、詐欺などの「知能犯」が急増し、件数で対前年比３１・２％増の９６４件、人数で７・９％増の５４６人となったことが２５日、警察庁集計で分かった。
偽造クレジットカードを使った多人数の詐欺グループ摘発が目立つ。
警察庁は、多国籍のメンバーが世界各地で犯行を繰り返す「犯罪のグローバル化」が日本の治安にも大きな脅威になっているとして、外国人組織犯罪への捜査態勢の再構築を打ち出している。
外国人犯罪全体では、刑法犯と特別法犯を合わせ件数が１１・１％減の２万７７９０件、人数が４・３％減の１万３２８２人だった。
ENDS
=======================

Jiji Press takes a different angle, headlining the drop in NJ crime and assigning possible societal causes, but still resorts to pointing out a rise where possible (in types of crime, such as theft and graft):

外国人犯罪、５年連続減少＝「生活苦」で窃盗、強盗増加−警察庁
http://www.jiji.com/jc/c?g=soc_30&k=2010022500269
２００９年に全国の警察が摘発した来日外国人は、前年比６０３人減の１万３２８２人だったことが２５日、警察庁のまとめで分かった。０４年に過去最多の２万１８４２人となった後は５年連続で減少しているが、罪種別で見ると窃盗や強盗、詐欺などが増加。同庁は「生活苦による犯罪が目立つ」としている。
国籍別の割合は、中国が３６％を占めて過去１０年間続けて最多。フィリピンやベトナムが１０年前と比べ激増した。（2010/02/25-10:23）
ENDS

=======================

And in a related note, the NPA is going “global” in its unified crime-fighting efforts:

警察庁：国際犯罪、対応を一元化　部門横断的に「対策室」
毎日新聞 – ‎Feb 22, 2010‎
http://mainichi.jp/select/wadai/news/20100223dde041010004000c.html
国際的な犯罪グループによる事件の続発を受け、警察庁は２３日、犯罪のグローバル化戦略プランをまとめた。警察庁の各部局や各都道府県警察本部間の垣根を低くして情報の一元化と共有を図るため「グローバル対策室」を設置。韓国や中国の捜査当局との連携強化も視野に置きグローバル化する犯罪の解決や解明に乗り出す。【千代崎聖史】

戦略プランの主な柱は（１）ＩＣＰＯ（国際刑事警察機構）の積極活用や、各捜査部門間の壁を取り払い組織横断的な情報収集を強化して、警察庁の情報管理システムに集約（２）海外勤務経験者を活用するなどして通訳・翻訳体制を充実（３）東アジアでの国際協力枠組みを構築し、共同オペレーションの推進。グローバル対策室は警察庁のほか各警察本部にも設置され、まず警察庁で約２０人体制で発足する。

従来の外国人犯罪は、短期間のうちに実行し出国する「ヒット・アンド・アウエー型」が主流だった。しかし、この数年は拠点など犯罪インフラの準備を入念に行うケースも増え、「ピンクパンサー」と呼ばれる国際的強盗団による宝石店強盗▽ナイジェリア人らによる身代金目的邦人誘拐▽多国籍グループによる広域自動車盗事件－－など複数の国にまたがる事件が頻発。日本人が犯行拠点の確保などを支援し、組織の実態解明が困難なケースも多いため、警察庁はこうした犯罪への対策を最重要課題と位置づける。

安藤隆春警察庁長官は同日の担当課長会議で、「全国警察一体で取り組まなければならない治安上の喫緊の課題だ」と訓示した。

◇初動早め情報共有
日本と海外の捜査当局が連携して事件を解決したケースに共通するのは、初動の素早さと情報の共有だ。

「助けて。マレーシアにいるの」。昨年１２月１３日、千葉県に住むフィリピン人女性（３８）の携帯電話に、山梨県で食品工場の工員をしているはずの姉（４４）から電話が入った。入管関係者を名乗る男が電話口に出てきて「薬物の容疑で連行した。釈放してほしければ１万ドルを口座に振り込め」と要求した。１４日、女性は東京のフィリピン大使館に駆け込んで通報した。

警視庁は通訳を派遣し身代金目的誘拐とみて捜査を開始。「金を早く用意しないと殺す」。脅迫の電話や電子メールは計１６回。警察庁はＩＣＰＯを、フィリピン大使館はマレーシアの同大使館をそれぞれ通じてマレーシア国家警察に情報提供を続けた。

これを受けて、日本のフィリピン大使館とマレーシア・セランゴール州警察に対策本部が発足。州警察が携帯電話の発信電波からアジトの団地を割り出して包囲した。１７日に犯人グループが被害女性を解放、ナイジェリア人５人とマレーシア人３人の２１～３５歳の計８人が逮捕された。女性は衰弱していたが無事だった。

捜査関係者によると、犯人グループの男らは英語のチャット上に、欧州のビジネスマンを名乗り「結婚相手を探しています。４０歳以上希望」と書き込み、返信した女性にはハンサムな白人男性の顔写真を添付して送信。誘い出したクアラルンプール国際空港で拉致した。アジトでは別のカザフスタン人の女性（４３）を拉致していたことも判明した。警察幹部は「警察が国境を超えてリアルタイムで情報を共有し、解決できた意義は大きい」と話す。【千代崎聖史】
ENDS

Arudou Debito in Sapporo

Tokyo Edogawa-ku LDP flyer, likens granting NJ PR suffrage to UFO alien invasion. Seriously.

Posted on February 24, 2010March 15, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Here’s something I received the other day from Debito.org Reader XY. It’s a flyer he found in his mailbox from the Tokyo Edogawa-ku LDP, advising people to “protect Japan and vote their conscience” (although they can’t legally use the word “vote” since it’s not an official election period). It talks about how “dangerous” it would be to grant NJ PR local suffrage.

I’ve given some of the con arguments here before (from radical rightists loons like Dietmember Hiranuma and co.), but this time it’s seventeen more-mainstream LDPers (a party which would otherwise be in power but for people voting their conscience last August) offering a number of questionable claims. First, have a look at the flyer (received February 19, 2010):

The arguments in summary are these:

1) PR NJ suffrage might be unconstitutional (hedging from the rabid right’s clear assertion that it is). In fact, I’m not sure anyone’s absolutely sure about that.

2) PR NJ suffrage will give foreigners say over how our children are taught and how our political decisions are made. (Well, yeah, if there are enough NJ in any particular district; and even if there were, given how nasty Japan’s public policy can be towards NJ, I’m not so sure that’s such a bad thing.)

3) Granting PR NJ suffrage is not the world trend. (Oh, now we cite how other countries do things? If other countries were creating a world trend, such as signing the Hague Convention on Child Abductions, you’d no doubt be begging off stressing how unique Japan is instead. Besides, at least three dozen other countries, many of them fellow developed countries, grant local suffrage to non-citizens, and they deal with it just fine.)

4) One shouldn’t equate taxpayer with voting rights, asserting that Japanese wouldn’t get suffrage if they lived overseas. (Actually, yes they would, if they lived in one of those abovementioned three dozen plus countries which grant it.)

5) We haven’t studied the issue enough. (This is a typical political stalling tactic. How much debate is enough? How long is a piece of string?)

6) We’ve got prefectural governors coming out against PR suffrage. (And we have prefectural governors coming out FOR suffrage too. Anyway, when has the national government listened to local governments until now? It hasn’t been for the past decade since the Hamamatsu Sengen, for example.)

My favorite bit is the illustration at the bottom. “JAPAN, LET’S PROTECT OURSELVES!!” Love how it’s an angry-looking alien ship with its spotlight on our archipelago. NJ as invading alien!! And I remember back in the day when we had a UFO Party (yes, the UFO党) waiting to cart us all away!! How times change when there’s a real policy up for debate.

But seriously folks, this isn’t some podunk backwater like Dejima Award Winner Setaka Town in Fukuoka, which decided that its local university should be officially “foreigner-free”. This is Edogawa-ku, the easternmost ku of Tokyo proper, right across the river from Chiba, with more than half a million registered residents. It’s not the type of place for xenophobic alarmist politicians to immaturely paint the spectre of an alien invasion in a serious debate.

Vote your conscience. Now that we know who these LDP idiots are, don’t vote them back into power. Arudou Debito in Calgary

Colin Jones and Daily Yomiuri on J judiciary’s usurpingly paternal attitudes re families post-divorce

Posted on February 23, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. One more piece in the puzzle about why divorces with children in tow in Japan are so problematic. As we’ve discussed here before umpteen times, Japan does not allow joint custody (thanks to the Koseki Family Registry system etc.), nor does it guarantee visitation rights. Following below is another excellent article by Colin Jones on why that is — because Japan’s paternalistic courts and bureaucrats believe they know more than the parents about what’s best for the child — and another full article from the Yomiuri illustrating how this dynamic works in practice. It’s one more reason why I believe that without substantial reforms, nobody should marry (Japanese or NJ) and have children under the Japanese system as it stands right now. Arudou Debito in Calgary

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

The Japan Times Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2010
THE ZEIT GIST
Children’s rights, judicial wrongs
By COLIN P. A. JONES Last in a two-part series (excerpt)
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20100202zg.html

Parents, lawyers and activists alike understandably frame the problems of parental child abduction and parental alienation in Japan in terms of children’s rights. While it would be easy to conclude from what I wrote in last week’s column that Japanese courts simply do not care about them, this would probably be a mistake.

On the contrary, family courts and their specially trained investigative personnel are held out as the “experts” on children, their welfare and rights…

Thus, in my view, the fact that courts might be inclined to ignore Civil Code provisions that describe parental authority as including parental rights is understandable for the same reason that they might not be keen on referring to the Children’s Rights Convention: It is probably personally and professionally more satisfying to tell other people what they should be doing than the other way around.

With rights being the principle way in which parents and other citizens could tell the courts and other government institutions what to do, their conversion into duties is also understandable. While in other countries courts provide a mechanism by which people assert their rights against bureaucracies, in Japan the courts tend to be more like bureaucracies themselves. The same logic may also explain why the Japanese government is able to advance plans to make it easier to terminate the rights of abusive parents at a time when growing calls for the adoption of joint custody, enforceable visitation and joining the Hague Convention on international child abduction remain unaddressed.

Consequently, parents and activists trying to address the problems of child abduction and parental alienation in Japan using arguments framed in terms of children’s rights may not get very far with family courts or other bureaucracies. After all, they are the experts in the subject, and if you are in court they may presume you are a bad parent anyways. That being the case, they will tell you what is best for your child, not the other way around.

Full article at: http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20100202zg.html

////////////////////////////////////////////

WHEN FAMILIES BREAK UP / Divorced parents fighting for right to see own children
The Yomiuri Shimbun Feb 3, 2010, courtesy of TC
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20100203TDY01303.htm

We live in a time when divorce has become commonplace. In Japan, a couple gets divorced every two minutes. Consequently, the number of divorced parents filing requests with the courts for visitation rights is increasing.

There is also a growing number of conflicts resulting from breakups of couples from different countries. Due to differences in interpretation regarding child custody, parents have been accused of abducting their own children and taking them to another country.

As families and people’s values diversify, certain problems have become difficult to resolve under the existing system.

Starting today, we will look at some of the problems divorced parents face as they struggle to win the right to see their children.

After separating from her husband five years ago, a 51-year-old woman in Tokyo began a long struggle to see her 15-year-old son.

The woman, a temporary worker, has only been able to see her son twice in the five years that have passed. The meetings, held in a court and in the presence of a court personnel, totaled just 95 minutes.

On both occasions when the woman saw her son, she was unable to stop tears welling up.

“My son, who is taking piano lessons, put his hand on mine to compare the size,” she said. “As I saw him staring at me while talking, I felt we were deeply bound inside.”

Desperately wishing to see her son more often, in July 2007 she applied to the family court for mediation on the issue of visitation rights.

However, the woman’s former husband initially resisted all requests to allow her to visit her son, citing the boy’s need to focus on his schooling, including preparing to move up to the next grade.

As part of the mediation process, in which a voluntary settlement is sought with the help of commissioners, the court initially set up two short meetings between the woman and her son as a way of determining the format future meetings should take.

The two met for 50 minutes in March 2008 and 45 minutes in April 2009.

“My son remembered the meeting we had a year earlier,” the woman said.

While the court advised that the woman be allowed to visit her son every two months, the couple failed to reach an agreement. As a result, the mediation process moved to the next stage, which will see a final decision issued by a judge.

“I’m so worried that I might never be allowed to see my son again,” she said.

===

Children caught up in disputes

The number of divorces nationwide reached 250,000 in 2008, according to a Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry survey. Of those divorced couples, 140,000 had children aged under 20, which numbered more than 240,000.

The rising number of divorced couples is accompanied by an increasing number of conflicts involving children.

According to an annual survey compiled by the Supreme Court, family courts across the country mediated in 6,261 cases concerning disputes over meetings between divorced parents and their children and judges were forced to deliver a final decision in 1,020 of those cases. Both figures were triple the numbers a decade ago.

Even through such court-mediated procedures, only half of the parents involved in the cases won permission to see their children.

In addition, regardless of an agreement or court order reached on visitation, if the parent who lives with the child strongly resists allowing meetings, it remains difficult for the other parent to see the child.

===

Maintaining contact important

Several years ago, a 40-year-old man from Kanagawa Prefecture seeking the right to see his then 1-year-old son applied for court mediation.

He had helped his wife take care of the baby, feeding him milk and changing his diapers at night. On his days off, he took the boy to a park to play. “I had no inkling I’d be prevented from meeting my son after the divorce,” he said. “But I was completely wrong.”

He said that even after the official mediation procedure started, his former wife maintained she would never allow him to see their son. She even pushed back the scheduled date for the mediation. Time passed and no decisions were made.

Desperate to see his son, the man even visited the neighborhood where the boy lived with his mother.

The former couple failed to reach a compromise through the court-led mediation process and began proceedings that would lead to a decision by a judge. Two years later, the court concluded that the man should be allowed to see his son once a month, for half a day. Nevertheless, the former wife broke the appointment set for the first meeting, leaving the man unable to see the boy.

After repeated negotiations with the woman through lawyers, he finally managed to ensure he could regularly see his son. “I believe it’s important for children’s growth to maintain a relationship with both parents,” the father said. “I think adults shouldn’t deprive their children of this right due to selfishness.”

Waseda University Prof. Masayuki Tanamura argues the existing system no longer meets society’s changing needs. “It was previously believed that divorced parents had to accept they couldn’t see children they’d been separated from,” Tanamura said. “In recent years, however, men have become more involved in child rearing and the number of children born to couples has declined. Because of this, many divorced parents have an increased desire to maintain their relationship with their children even after a divorce.”

What needs to be done to ensure that parents can see their children after a divorce? There is a growing need for this nation to find an answer to this question.

===

Sole custody causing headaches

A key factor behind disputes involving divorced couples over their children’s custody is a Civil Code stipulation that parental prerogatives are granted to either the mother or father–not both.

The parent who obtains custody assumes rights and duties for his or her child, such as the duty to educate the child and the right to control any assets they might have. However, the parent without parental authority can claim almost no rights concerning their children.

In fact, mothers win in 90 percent of court decisions concerning the custody of a child–known as mediation and determination proceedings.

There is no provision in the Civil Code referring to the visitation rights of a parent living separately from his or her child, so whether the absent parent can meet the child depends on the wishes of the former partner who has been granted custody.

If the parent who has custody refuses to let his or her child meet with the former spouse in a court mediation, it is difficult to arrange visits.

Even if the parent living separately from his or her child or children is allowed to visit, the chances are limited–for example, to once a month. Moreover, if the parents who have custody ignore the court’s decision to grant their spouses visiting rights, there is almost no legal recourse to implement such visits.

Waseda University Prof. Masayuki Tanamura said: “The current system strongly reflects the Japanese family system established in the Meiji era [1868-1912]. Since that time, parental authority has been regarded as the right of the parents to control their children, so couples fight over it.”

Meanwhile, as the number of divorces increased from the 1970s to the ’90s in Europe and the United States, such countries began allowing joint custody, in which former couples cooperate in bringing up their children even after breaking up.

Lawyer Takao Tanase, who also serves as a professor at Chuo University, said: “[In such countries,] the rights of parents who live separately from their children after divorce to visit and communicate with their children are recognized, and such visits occur regularly. For example, there are cases in which such parents meet with their children once a fortnight and spend the weekend together.”

The number of international marriages is increasing yearly–reaching a record high of 18,774 cases in 2008–and the difference in the custody system between Japan and foreign countries causes serious problems when a Japanese splits from his or her foreign spouse.

Cases in which Japanese living in foreign countries take their children back to Japan after divorcing a foreign spouse have become an international problem. The Foreign Ministry confirmed 73 such incidents in the United States, 36 in Canada, 35 in France and 33 in Britain.

There is an international law to deal with such disputes. The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction stipulates that if a former husband or wife takes his or her child or children to another country without the consent of the former spouse, the spouse can apply to bring the child back to the country where they were living. Member countries assume an obligation to cooperate in bringing the child back to the home country.

Many European countries and the United States have joined the convention, but Japan has yet to ratify it. International pressure on Japan to adopt the convention is growing.

“We need to separate the problems of parent-child relationships from the problems between couples. We need to establish laws enabling children to meet with the parent who is living separately after divorce, with the exception of cases in which the child is exposed to potential physical danger by meeting the parent,” Tanase said.

“In Japan, divorce is becoming increasingly common, and it’s important to accept the idea that divorced couples will share child-rearing duties even after divorce,” he added.

(Feb. 3, 2010)

Day Care Center in Tokorozawa, Saitama teaches toddlers “Little Black Sambo”, complete with the epithets

Posted on February 21, 2010February 21, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. Forwarding. Disgraceful. Suggest those concerned send the day-care center my Japanese-language parody of the book where the shoe is on the other foot. Arudou Debito in Calgary

=============================

From: Mark Thompson
Date: 2010/2/18
Subject: Teaching Children the Words of Hate in Tokorozawa, Japan

Dear Debito, I would like to bring the following matter to your attention.

A daycare center named Midori Hoikuen (みどり保育園), or Green Daycare Center, in Tokorozawa City in Saitama Prefecture, located just 30 minutes by train from Ikebukuro station in Tokyo, has been teaching hate speech to three-year old children daily, despite the protests of the parents of at least one biracial child in the class.

http://tinyurl.com/yz8ht6m

Although technically a private institution, the parents were originally instructed by the city of Tokorozawa that their child would have attend daycare there.

During the two years that the child has attended the daycare center, the parents had never once voiced a single concern about the operation of the daycare center until much to the their shock, the daycare center based a play / musical to be performed on Saturday, February 27th, 2010, on the book Little Black Sambo:

http://tinyurl.com/2xgvg8

This is the very same book that several Japanese publishing companies had stopped printing due to public outrage in 1988. When the book was reprinted by one rogue publisher in 2005, many residents of Japan–foreign and Japanese–signed a petition encouraging the publishing company to use a different title and illustrations for the book due to their offensive nature:

https://www.debito.org/chibikurosanbo.html

Unfortunately, now that the book Little Black Sambo has been republished and widely distributed in Japan, it is apparent that the book is now being taught at Japanese daycare centers and quite possibly preschools and elementary schools across the country as well. At least two additional volumes of the book have also been printed by the same rogue Japanese publishing company:

http://tinyurl.com/yd7krej

http://tinyurl.com/ybn33sx

In addition, another publishing company has also decided to get in on the action and has also decided to republish another version of Little Black Sambo:

http://tinyurl.com/ykqx3c7

It is important to note that the book Little Black Sambo was written by a white English woman during India’s colonial period, and at a time when slavery was still quite common. Although the use of the word “slavery” was in decline at the time in India, the population was routinely subjected to debt bondage by the British instead.

Here is a quick translation of some of the frightening lyrics from the song the children are being taught to enjoy singing daily at the daycare center in Tokorozawa:

“Little Black Sambo, sambo, sambo
His face and hands are completely black
Even his butt is completely black”

In the original Japanese:

“ちびくろ・さんぼがサンボサンボ
顔もお手ても真っ黒け
ついでにおしりも真っ黒け”

Obviously, that kind of speech should never be taught to children by teachers at a daycare center. Those words are more akin to what might be taught by a white supremacist group.

Apparently, the book they daycare center is using even comes complete with demeaning picaninny images:

http://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/picaninny/

Now every time the 3-year old biracial child sees a black person he starts using the racial slur and mentions their black skin. The parents now fear taking their own child out in public or overseas. As the child is of such a young age, it also is not effective for the parents to tell the child not to use those derogatory words outside of daycare, as the child will only use them more.

In an attempt to be as understanding of cultural differences, as it was possible that perhaps the daycare center teachers were just not aware of the problems with the book, the parents of the biracial child both wrote letters in Japanese explaining the history of the book, why the title was discriminatory, and mentioning that they thought that illustrations showing demeaning racial stereotypes were not appropriate for young children.

The parents even showed the teachers that the term “sambo” was offensive and derogatory, both in English and in Japanese:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/sambo

http://eow.alc.co.jp/sambo/UTF-8/?ref=sa

Beside being used as a disparaging reference to black people, the English dictionary above makes it clear that the word is also used to refer to people of “mulatto ancestry,” in other words, the offspring of parents of different racial origin.

After doing a little research, the parents soon found that the term had been in use and deemed derogatory as far back as 1748, 150 years before the book Little Black Sambo was even written. In addition, the derogatory word “sambo” has been prohibited from being broadcasted on TV or radio in Japan (放送禁止用語), which was also explained to the daycare center.

This fact that the book contains offensive slurs shouldn’t even be considered news to anyone in Japan, when when Little Black Sambo was republished in Japan in 2005, the website of the Asahi News reported that the book was said to “discriminate against black people” and the article can still be found online:

http://book.asahi.com/news/TKY200504190160.html

In an attempt to help the daycare center out of a sticky situation, the parents of the biracial child even had the two following books sent by express mail and took them to the daycare center:

The Japanese translation of “Sam and the Tigers”:

http://tinyurl.com/yb4yfav

The Japanese translation of “The Story of Little Babaji”:

http://tinyurl.com/ylybsbw

Both books above are modern, politically-correct retellings of Little Black Sambo that would not cause offense.

However, the daycare center said that they were not only already aware of the politically correct versions of the book, but has also refused to use them.

The daycare center’s excuse is that since all of the children have already learned the title Little Black Sambo, there will be no change in the title whatsoever. The staff have continued to teach the use of the discriminatory word “sambo” and encourage the children to enjoy using it.

In addition, at a meeting with one of the parents of the biracial child, the daycare center said that although they could not make any promises, they would “try” to change the lyrics of the song. However, it seems that additional lyrics were never actually taught and the biracial child and others in the school continue to use the hate speech filled one.

It appears that nothing has been done at all and that the daycare center is just trying to avoid the problem. Despite the parents’ protests, the daycare center still continues to use the racial slur in the presence of their biracial child and encourages the child’s classmates to enjoy singing the song which clearly contains hate speech.

Despite the daycare center’s claims, the fact is that there is no good excuse for racial discrimination.

It is shocking that a daycare center of all places, located just 30 minutes by train from downtown Tokyo, where the population includes a fair number of black people and numerous African Embassies, is teaching hate speech to small children. Tokorozawa’s sister cities include Decatur, Illinois in the United States (which has a 20% African American population), Changzhou in the People’s Republic of China and Anyang, Gyeonggi in South Korea. In addition, Tokorozawa is also the home of Columbia International School (コロンビアインターナショナルスクール) and several international dormitories for the international students of Waseda University:

http://www.columbia-ca.co.jp/

http://tinyurl.com/yfque4b

As can be imagined, this has caused quite a lot of stress for the family with the biracial child. While understanding that this matter needs to be brought to the attention of the public, one of the parents of the biracial child has expressed concern for their family’s safety, and so wishes that the family not be further identified publicly.

Japanese society is based on shame and often slow to change. As a culture is appears that may Japanese people prefer to try to ignore problems and just hope they go away. Only by shaming organizations that discriminate and drawing the public’s attention to the problem of racial discrimination in Japan, will real change eventually come about.

Please take the time to contact the daycare center yourself, either in English or Japanese, and raise your concerns about the daycare center’s teaching of hate speech to young children. It will only take a minute of your time and contact information is provided below.

Midori Hoikuen (みどり保育園)

Tel: 04-2948-2613 (Monday to Saturday, 9 AM – 5 PM)
Fax: 04-2947-3924
E-mail: qqew85hd@world.ocn.ne.jp

Address:

Sayamagaoka 1-3003-52
Tokorozawa, Saitama 359-1161

〒359-1161埼玉県所沢市狭山ヶ丘1丁目3003-52

Please also make your voice heard, by sending a carbon copy to Tokorozawa City Hall, Department of Daycare Services, which has been informed of this issue:

EMAIL: a9126@city.tokorozawa.saitama.jp

Thank you very much for your time. Your assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,

Mark Thompson (MarkThompson1970@gmail.com)

This message can be freely copied, distributed or published online. Please help raise awareness of racial discrimination.
ENDS

Odd treatment of “naturalized” people (guess who) by Air Canada/Canadian Government at Narita Airport

Posted on February 7, 2010February 7, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. Writing to you from Calgary, Canada. As a tangent that might not be all that tangental, let me tell you about an odd experience I had at Narita Airport yesterday.

It was a breeze for a change getting out of Hokkaido and going overseas (which generally means, if you don’t go through Seoul, that you go through KIX or Narita), as my bags were checked all the way through to Vancouver (meaning I didn’t have to get my bags and go through long-lined Immigration procedures again at Narita). And no, there were no double-takes at my Japanese passport at any stage of the game.

That is, until boarding. I had a ten-hour layover in Narita (!! — it was longer than my actual flight to Canada), so I holed up in the United Airlines lounge (the ANA lounge idiotically won’t take non-members willing to pay 50 bucks at United or Delta) for the duration and got stuff done (free beer and internet, not bad at all). Then when I was heading back for the gate about fifteen minutes before boarding, I was paged along with about four other people to come to the Air Canada desk at the gate.

They asked to see my passport. I obliged. Then they asked (whole exchange in Japanese):

“You’re naturalized, right?” Yes.

“What was your nationality before?”

I double-took and told them that was unessential information.

“So you are unwilling to say?”

I asked what this information was necessary for.

“We’re just asking.”

“No you’re not. Who needs this information? You as the airline?”

“No, the Canadian Government wants it. They’re an immigration country. They’re trying to avoid faked passports.”

Me: “Erm, I don’t get it. I’m not on a faked passport, obviously. And it’s not a Canadian passport anyway. Why are naturalized people more suspicious?”

“I don’t know.”

“Were any of the other four people you paged called up for a passport check?”

“No, different business.”

“So you’re only singling out the naturalized people for extra identity checks?”

“Yes.”

“This is, frankly, annoying and insulting. And unCanadian. I went over there in 2006 and was not subjected to this. When did this start?”

“I don’t know. I’ve only been working here about a year.”

“Well, I’m not telling you my birth nationality. It’s unnecessary. And I don’t see how knowing that helps you smoke out any faked passports. Okay?”

That was fine. They pursued it no further.

I got through YVR and other checkpoints just fine, again, with no double takes.

Any thoughts from people out there? Anyone with connections to the Canadian government willing to ask around and see if this is actual policy?

Arudou Debito in Calgary

My Japan Times JUST BE CAUSE Column Feb 2, 2010: “NJ suffrage and the racist element”

Posted on February 3, 2010March 15, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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The Japan Times February 2, 2010
JUST BE CAUSE, Column 25, Version with links to sources.
Non-Japanese suffrage and the racist element
By ARUDOU DEBITO
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20100202ad.html

On Jan. 17, Takeo Hiranuma made this statement about fellow Diet member Renho:

“I hate to say this, but she’s not originally/at heart (motomoto) a Japanese.”

https://www.debito.org/?p=5770

What could have provoked such a harsh criticism of one’s identity?

A simple question Renho, of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan, asked mandarins (as is her job) who were requesting more cash: “Why must we aim to develop the world’s No. 1 supercomputer? What’s wrong with being No. 2?” Hiranuma claimed, “This is most imprudent (fukinshin) for a politician to say.”

Is it? I’ve heard far more stupid questions from politicians. Moreover, in this era of deflationary belt-tightening, it seems reasonable to ask the bureaucrats to justify our love.

Being pilloried for asking inappropriate questions is one thing (as “appropriate” is a matter of opinion). But having your interests in the country, and people you represent, called into question because you have non-Japanese (NJ) roots (Renho’s father is Taiwanese, her mother Japanese, and she chose Japanese citizenship) is nothing less than racism, and from a Diet member at that.

Hiranuma predictably backpedaled: First he accused the media of sensationalizing his comments. Then he claimed this was not racial discrimination because Renho has Japanese citizenship.

http://mainichi.jp/select/seiji/news/20100118k0000m010058000c.html

Somebody should explain to Hiranuma the official definition of “racial discrimination,” according to a United Nations treaty the Liberal Democratic Party government ratified in 1996, when he was a Cabinet minister:

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/平沼赳夫#.E5.A4.96.E9.83.A8.E3.83.AA.E3.83.B3.E3.82.AF

“Racial discrimination shall mean any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, color, descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.” (U.N. Convention on Racial Discrimination, Article 1.1)

So, by raising Renho’s descent/ethnicity/national origin in questioning her credentials, Hiranuma is guilty as charged.

But there is a larger issue here. Hiranuma’s outburst is symptomatic of the curious degree of power the ultrarightists have in Japan.

Remember, this is the same Hiranuma who helped scuttle a human rights bill in 2006, headlining a book titled, “Danger! The Imminent Threat of the Totalitarianism of the Developed Countries.” Within it he claimed, “This human rights bill will exterminate (horobosu) Japan.”

http://debito.org/abunaijinkenyougohouan.html

This is also the same politician who declared in 2006 that Japan should not have a female Empress, for she might “marry a blue-eyed foreigner” and spawn the next Emperor — managing to double-dip racism into sexism and misogyny. (Why assume women are more susceptible to rapacious NJ than male heirs to the throne?)

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20060202a2.html

Hiranuma wasn’t so lucky in 2008 when trying to stop a bill revising the Nationality Law, fixing paternity recognition loopholes our Supreme Court had ruled unconstitutional mere months earlier. He argued that granting bastard children Japanese citizenship would dilute “Japan’s identity.”

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20081127a1.html

But he’s still at it: The Hiranuma hobbyhorse is currently rocking against the proposal of granting suffrage in local elections to NJ with Permanent Residency (PR), which may pass the Diet this year.

It is probably no surprise that this columnist supports PR suffrage. There are close to half a million Special Permanent Residents (the zainichi ethnic Koreans, Chinese, etc.), born and raised here, who have been paying Japanese taxes their entire lives. Moreover, their relatives were former citizens of the Japanese empire (brought here both by force and by the war economy), contributing to and even dying for our country. In just about any other developed nation, they would be citizens already; they once were.

Then there are close to a half-million more Regular Permanent Residents (the “newcomer” immigrants) who have taken the long and winding road (for some, two decades) to qualify for PR. They got it despite the discretionary and often obstructionist efforts of Japan’s mandarins (Zeit Gist May 28, 2008).

https://www.debito.org/?p=1681

Anyone who puts in the years and effort to meet PR assimilation requirements has earned the right to participate in their local community — including voting in their elections. At least three dozen other countries allow foreigners to vote in theirs, and the sky hasn’t fallen on them.

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20091201i1.html
http://magnesiumagency.com/2010/01/24/no-local-suffrage-for-foreigners-in-japan-shibuya-protest/

But that’s not what antisuffrage demonstrators, with Hiranuma their poster boy, would have you believe. Although public policy debate in Japan is generally pretty milquetoast, nothing brings out apocalyptic visions quite like the right wing’s dry-throated appeals to Japanese-style xenophobia.

Granting foreigners suffrage, they say, will carve up Japan like a tuna. Okinawa will become another Chinese province. Beijing will control our government. Even Hiranuma claims South Korea will annex the Tsushima Islands. The outside world is a perpetual threat to Japan.

https://www.debito.org/?p=5353
http://www.tokyo-shinsei.jp/2201.html

This camp says that if NJ want the right to vote, they should naturalize. Sounds reasonable, but I know from personal experience it’s not that simple (the application procedure can be arbitrary enough to disqualify many Japanese). This neutralizes the Alien Threat, somehow.

But by criticizing Renho for her NJ roots, Hiranuma exposed the naturalization demand as a lie.

Renho has taken Japanese citizenship, moreover graduated from one of Japan’s top universities, became a member of Japanese society as a famous newscaster and journalist, and even gotten elected by fellow Japanese to Parliament.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren_Hou
https://www.debito.org/residentspage.html#naturalization

But to Hiranuma, that doesn’t matter. Renho is still a foreigner — in origin if not at heart — and always will be.

This is where Hiranuma and company’s doctrinaire bigotry lies. You can’t trust The Alien no matter what they do, especially if they don’t do what Real Japanese tell them to do.

Why is this expression of racism so blatant in Japan? Because minorities are so disenfranchised in our political marketplace of ideas. In any marketplace (be it of products or ideas), if you have any barriers to entry, you get extremes and aberrations (be it in prices or views). Open the market, and things tend to correct themselves.

That is what these zealots are most afraid of: not merely The Alien, more the loss of the ability to attract votes by whipping up public fear. Let The Alien in, and those on the cosseted ideological extremes would have to be more tolerant of, if not appeal to, a newly enfranchised section of Japan’s electorate with more diverse interests.

That’s the best argument yet for giving NJ with PR the vote: to reduce the power of Japan’s xenophobic fringe, and rid our polity of these racists and bigots. Make it so that next time a Hiranuma makes racist statements, those affected will have the chance to vote him out of office.

—————————

Debito Arudou coauthored the “Handbook for Newcomers, Migrants and Immigrants.” Twitter arudoudebito. Just Be Cause appears on the first Community Page of the month

ENDS

Momoyama Gakuin Daigaku blocks online campus access to Debito.org. Just like Misawa Air Force Base.

Posted on January 31, 2010January 31, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. As a Sunday article, let me forward two collated emails that I received from a student at Momoyama Gakuin Daigaku. He sent proof that his university blocks campus access to Debito.org.

Can’t imagine why. Maybe they’re confusing my name with Adult Videos? 🙂

Anyway, it’s not the first time I’ve heard of Debito.org being too truthy for some places with internal attitudes to maintain. Such as the American Air Force Base in Misawa, Aomori Prefecture. (I know for a fact they didn’t like me exposing both the “Japanese Only” signs right outside their base and the organized blind-eying both they and the City of Misawa gave it.) So instead of dealing with the problem, they dealt with the messenger, by making sure that anyone on base cannot see what you’re seeing now. It’s to them Non-Operational Information, I guess. Or, as Momoyama seems to indicate, it might give students in Japan too much of an education.

Report from Momoyama student follows, along with his unsuccessful efforts to get it “unblocked”. Arudou Debito, webmaster of the site just too hot for some institutions to handle.

////////////////////////////////////////////////////

January 20 and 28, 2010
Dear Debito San,

I was pretty surprised when I realized that my university blocks www.debito.org. (Screen Capture dated January 27, 2010):

I tried to inquire upon that and got told that “gambling”, “adult” and “blogs” are blocked… they wanted to check if they can whitelist yours. all that happend is that they reported to the kokusai-center who told me that I can apply for temporary access.

a) why filter communication? “Fostering Students of the World” is written at this university’s entrance.

b) shouldn’t I not feel discriminated and humiliated when I ask a question at a certain department and the answer gets wired through other channels?

(break)

As promised some further information about the blocking of debito.org and a clean and hopefully more representative screenshot.

As I were able to find out, it is rather “collateral damage” caused by ignorance and incompetency… I do not want to explicitly extend the applicability of these impression for the rest of the administration and teaching at this university, but it would be surely wrong to avoid such implication. (please excuse the use of sarcasm)

I don’t know what would happen if a professor would request to put debito.org on the white-list… maybe I will try that, though my time here is almost over…

After three members of the computer-center “studied” your site for quite a while, while I was waiting, they told me that BBS are blocked because online crime is originating from them. They seem to combine all kinds of Web2.0-activity and other dynamic content like foren, blogs, etc. as BBS (which is a term derived from the old pre-internet mailbox-systems and seems to be out of use for ages anywhere else in the world…)

Upon my objection that debito.org is not really anything they call BBS they only came up the possibility to ask a professor to suggest this for the white-list…

I asked them if it ever happened that students committed crimes from withing this network, but those cases had never happened…

But, how another exchange-student got lectured the other day, “trust is important”. And I don’t want to enumerate all the cases they betrayed the exchange-students’ trust…

Thank you again!

—————————————————————–

Blocked Websites within the campus of 桃山学院大学

To evaluate the significance of the filter I conducted some experiments: I googled for a ranking of blogs, which took me to technorati.com/blogs/top100, and from those I tried to access the top 50. 7 out of 50, 14% obviously, are blocked. Looking at the top-10 the number of blocked sites is even 5 out of 10, even more obviously 50%. (list at the end of this mail)

I went to the computer center of that university and asked them about the background and criteria… the explanations were as follows: – a “smart filter” is in used. As a source they referred to a company they call “vertex link”. This company, as they say is an American company. A quick search reveals:

www.vertexlink.co.jp is in deed a Japanese company which promotes via their website www.j-smartfilter.com a filter-technology from www.securecomputing.com which belongs to McAfee since 2008 and is famous for its involvement for the NSA.

– The only customization done by the university is the selection of categories (www.j-smartfilter.com/catList.html) and sub-categories to be blocked. Under the category called “communication” are 5 sub-categories listed. The University decided to block three of them, one unblocked sub-category is “email”. Blogs and BBS are blocked. I asked for a copy of that list, a favor that was not granted.

– A white-list for websites is in use. The items of that list are not disclosed. But, as I were told, Professors are allowed to suggest sites to be put on that white-list, which might be put there after evaluation from the board of the computer-department…

– In the end they explained to me, that REAL PEOPLE check all filtered websites and assign the categories. Though had to admit, that they could not tell if those were part-time, students or regular employees.

First impression: They have only little or partial knowledge which is not even enough to understand the concepts they are dealing with. They cannot understand the difference between dynamic-filtering and static-lists… According to my experience, it is highly unlikely, to be quite kind, to rate and categorize the whole internet! At least when telling me that I would have expected a little more understanding or awareness for possible nonsense.

I went on and, out of curiosity, I tried other web-sites… Some were blocked to my surprise and other surprisingly not:

In brief:

Warez/Cracking/Hacking/Passwords…

Some blocked, some not…

E.g. the infamous thepiratebay.org is NOT blocked… furthermore Chinese warez-sites are not blocked but some middle-sized torrent-sites from western countries… Same situation applies for password/cracking-sites.

Adult/Porn…

Mostly blocked… at least the more well known like youporn.com…

Accidentally I stumbled upon a pop-up from a not blocked blog-site with adult-advertisement (pornoloadz.com) which was not blocked either…

This seems to rule out a URL-based filter since “porn” should be most likely filtered but does not trigger the filter in the second URL.

Gambling…

At least official sites from casinos were not blocked but I would assume that this is rather about online-brokering/gambling… but I had no idea what to look for…

When I asked about the filter for the first time, the only mentioned categories were gambling, adult and blogs… that’s why I had that focus on my own brief research… plus the most obvious one, imho, warez… but since everything is different in Japan, I did not check winnie ( was it spelled this way?) 😉

A tendency of the university’s endeavor is obvious, though rather questionable…

While it is understandable that a university does not want to support illegal activities such as gambling or illegal porn, I cannot find any reasonable explanation to go against blogs and communication in general.

The explanation that I got from the computer center that BBS, a term I haven’t heard since the early 1990, are usually the source of online-crimes appears a little odd and short-sighted.

The tolerated collateral damage seems enormous to me. While I am one of the few inhabitants of this planet who would not suffer from inaccessibility of facebook, I certainly disapprove the blocking of a source like debito.org.

According to my observation I want to state that in this case people got their hands on a tool which they do not understand sufficiently enough to justify the outcome of their actions.

—————————————————————–
List of Blog-Ranking
According to:
http://technorati.com/blogs/top100
(here in ascending order from 1 to 50)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com
(blocked) http://www.gizmodo.com
(blocked) http://www.engadget.com
http://mashable.com
(blocked) http://www.techcrunch.com
(blocked) http://www.boingboing.net
http://www.tmz.com
http://corner.nationalreview.com
(blocked) http://www.gawker.com
http://www.thedailybeast.com

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com
http://hotair.com
http://politico.com/blogs/bensmith
http://www.readwriteweb.com
http://thinkprogress.org
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com
http://nymag.com/daily/intel
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com
http://hotlineoncall.nationaljournal.com/

http://www.lifehacker.com
http://newsbusters.org/
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog
http://www.breitbart.tv
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch
(blocked) http://www.kotaku.com
http://michellemalkin.com
http://biggovernment.com
http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org
http://www.politicsdaily.com

http://gigaom.com
http://consumerist.com
(blocked) http://jezebel.com
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/
http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com
http://www.popeater.com
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com
http://www.thrfeed.com

http://www.redstate.com
http://www.gothamist.com
http://thisisnthappiness.com/
http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment
http://www.mediaite.com
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com
http://www.dailykos.com
http://www.physorg.com
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com
http://www.businessinsider.com

—————————————————————–
several random tests (some of these not indicative of my personality or places I want to see; rather these are the sites that universities might have reason to block; I do not understand why, in light of these paradigms, Debito.org is blocked):

not blocked:
http://www.rlslog.net/
http://blog.iphone-dev.org/
http://ccc.de/
http://www.hoerbuch.in/blog.php
http://verycd.com/
http://uu.canna.to
https://www.blogger.com/start
http://wordpress.org/
http://www.heise.de/
http://www.heise.de/security/foren/
http://thepiratebay.org/
http://wikileaks.org/
http://nihongo-dekimasu.blogspot.com/
http://fosi.alphasys.nl/
http://www.elcomsoft.com/
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/default.aspx
http://www.pornoloadz.com/
http://blog.fefe.de/
http://www.torrentreactor.net/
http://www.ninjavideo.net/
http://www.sidereel.com/
http://www.youtube.com/
http://www.thegunsource.com/
http://www.weaponmasters.com/shopping/home.html
http://www.latex-weaponry.com/

Loan Forgiveness Program | How to, When & How Much Each Month

http://www.spielbank-hamburg.de/sbhh-main/

blocked:
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/
http://blog.twitter.com/
http://astalavista.box.sk/
http://torrents.sumotorrent.com/
http://isohunt.com/
http://www.torrentz.com/
http://www.serials.ws/index.php
http://fun.sdinet.de/
Tweets by timpritlove
http://twitter.com/
http://forum.torrentreactor.net/
http://youporn.com/
http://www.xnxx.com/
http://freebigmovies.com/
http://xnews.blog2.fc2.com/blog-entry-1765.html

ENDS

Sunday Tangent: Economist (London) passim on “Global Creativity Index”, which ranks Japan over USA in terms of creativity

Posted on January 24, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. In their bumper Xmas Issue last year, The Economist had a number of (as usual) interesting articles. Here’s another, about what makes America attractive as a destination for immigration.

The part that I’ll excerpt from concerns how countries attract talent and creativity, citing an odd survey called the “Global Creativity Index” created by a Richard Florida. The Economist notes, “The index combines measures of talent, technology and tolerance. America comes fourth, behind Sweden, Japan and Finland,”, then picks apart the methodology that would put Japan as more tolerant to people from elsewhere than the US (and Finland, which also has a very low percentage of foreigners). Given the revolving-door labor market (here and here) and the trouble NJ in Japanese universities have getting favorable study conditions and domestic employment afterwards (here and here), one wonders if this celebrity researcher has ever lived or worked overseas much. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

///////////////////////////////////////////////

Going to America

A Ponzi scheme that works

Dec 17th 2009 | ANNANDALE, VIRGINIA AND DALLAS, TEXAS
From The Economist print edition

The greatest strength of America is that people want to live there

http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstates/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15108634
(pertinent excerpt)

Mr Florida and Irene Tinagli of Carnegie Mellon University compiled a “Global Creativity Index”, which tries to capture countries’ ability to harness talent for “innovation…and long-run prosperity”. The index combines measures of talent, technology and tolerance. America comes fourth, behind Sweden, Japan and Finland. You could quarrel with the methodology. America comes top on certain measures, such as patents per head and college degrees, but it is deemed less tolerant than other countries in the top ten. This is because the index rewards “modern, secular” values and penalises Americans for being religious and nationalistic.

This is a mistake. Some religious countries are indeed intolerant, but America is not one of them, as Ms Hirsi Ali attests. And for many talented people, such as Mr Lee, America’s vibrant and varied religious scene makes the country more attractive, not less.

Michael Fix of the Migration Policy Institute, a think-tank, observes that religion has a strong effect on who comes to America. For example, although Muslims slightly outnumber Christians in Nigeria, Nigerian immigrants to America are 92% Christian and only 5% Muslim. Christians are about a quarter of the South Korean population, but four-fifths of Korean immigrants in America are Christian. Migrants from the Middle East and North Africa are mostly Muslim, but a hefty 28% are Christian and 10% are Jewish.

Christians and Jews are drawn to America in part because they know it is an easy place to be Christian or Jewish. They don’t face persecution, as they might in the Middle East. Nor do they face derision, as they might in more aggressively secular parts of Europe. Also, churches create networks. Migrants typically go where they already know people, and often make contact through a church.

It is also a mistake to rate Americans as less tolerant because they are nationalistic. Americans may have an annoyingly high opinion of their country, but theirs is an inclusive nationalism. Most believe that anyone can become American. Almost nobody in Japan thinks that anyone can become Japanese, yet Japan is rated more “tolerant” than America. This is absurd.

Rest of the Economist article at
http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstates/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15108634

ENDS

Japan Times Amy Chavez comes unglued with weird “Japan Lite” column: “How about a gaijin circus in gazelle land?”

Posted on January 20, 2010January 21, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. One column I’ve always skipped in the Japan Times has been Amy Chavez’s “Japan Lite”. I have never found it interesting, and its attempts at humor are at best cloying if not corn-pone ignorant. Kinda reminds me of the old “Beetle Bailey” or “Hagar the Horrible” cartoons published in my local newspaper that hadn’t been funny for years; I always wondered why they kept printing them. Force of habit, I guess.

But last week’s Chavez column, submitted by alert Debito.org Reader LW, had both LW and me scratching our heads as to what Chavez was smoking when she wrote it. As LW wrote, “I know it’s meant to be taken with a grain of salt, but there are a few underlying preconceptions there that just made me feel uncomfortable.”

I too know it’s supposed to be a “Lite” column (more filler, and no taste!), but even leaving aside its repeated use of a racial epithet in the name of childish play, I’m not sure I understand the premise of this meandering column just in terms of logic. Where gaijin (yes, anyone not Japanese) are descendants of “cavemen” while Japanese come from, er, “gazelles”?? And then we somehow develop that into a metaphor of a “gaijin circus”? Not kidding. Read on.

Seems like living in Japan has somehow broken Chavez’s brain. Then again, I’ve seen it happen before, many times. Doesn’t mean the Japan Times has to print it, however. Force of habit, I guess. But I reckon they could trim this fat from the paper and it would hardly be missed. What do others think? Arudou Debito in Sapporo

////////////////////////////////////////
JAPAN LITE
How about a gaijin circus in gazelle land? (excerpt)
By AMY CHAVEZ
The Japan Times: Saturday, Jan. 16, 2010, Courtesy of LW
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20100116cz.html

The other day, my husband bought a shirt at Uniqlo. “Wow, the sleeves are long enough!” he marveled. Clothes in Japan are getting bigger and even now foreigners can almost wear them. But there was still a problem. The arms of the shirt were too tight. This confirms a suspicion I have long had about the Japanese people — they are descendants of gazelles.

Now, this may be contrary to what you have heard, that the original Japanese people were descended from heaven. Hell no.

Consider that gazelles and the Japanese share some striking similarities: They are both fine boned and graceful and the females have pretty little feet with high heels, making them look like they are tip-toeing along. Now, put a cow next to the gazelle and you have us gaijin.

A crowd of Japanese people looks tidy but a crowd of beefy foreigners looks like a stampede. The Japanese, with their long, elegant limbs and quiet demeanor cannot possibly be descendants of the caveman.

Upon some careful research on the habits of gazelles, I found that mountain gazelles eat easily digestible plants and leaves. It’s no wonder that these are the same things you’ll find at a traditional Japanese restaurant: kuwai (arrowhead buds), ginko nuts, mitsuba leaves, shiso leaves, and even chrysanthemum leaves.

But wait, you protest, gazelles are from Africa! Well, why do you think it’s called the Japanese “race”? Because they raced here from Africa during the Jomon Period to escape the hot, dry conditions of the African continent. Once here, they adapted and became mountain dwellers.

Sometimes it seems that we foreigners, descendants of the caveman, are a species unto ourselves. Living in Japan for us can sometimes feel like a circus, with all the attention and curiosity given to our movements…

Rest at

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20100116cz.html

Racist statements from Xenophobe Dietmember Hiranuma re naturalized J Dietmember

Posted on January 19, 2010March 15, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Here we go again. Pet Xenophobe Dietmember Hiranuma Takeo (who is so far out there he won’t, or can’t, run under the LDP banner) has once again said something nasty about foreigners. Or at least people he still considers to be “foreigners”. Read on, comment from me follows the Japanese Sankei article:

////////////////////////////////////

◆Ex-minister Hiranuma says lawmaker Renho is ‘not originally Japanese’
OKAYAMA, Japan, Jan. 18 2010 KYODO NEWS
http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=480954
and http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2010/01/18/4576412.htm

OKAYAMA, Japan, Jan. 18_(Kyodo) _ Former trade minister Takeo Hiranuma on Sunday criticized remarks made by House of Councillors member Renho in November in trying to slash budget allocations for the supercomputer development by pointing to the fact that the politician, who goes by a single name, is a naturalized Japanese.

“I don’t want to say this, but she is not originally Japanese,” said the former Liberal Democratic Party member during a speech before his supporters in Okayama City. “She was naturalized, became a Diet member, and said something like that,” the independent House of Representatives member continued.

Hiranuma was referring to the high-profile remarks made by the ruling Democratic Party of Japan member, who asked during a debate with bureaucrats, “Why must (Japan) aim to (develop) the world’s No. 1 (supercomputer)? What’s wrong with being the world’s No. 2?” The remarks have been broadcast repeatedly on TV as a symbolic image of the DPJ-led government’s efforts to cut wasteful spending.

The remarks were “not appropriate for a politician,” Hiranuma said, adding that Japan, as a country aiming to be a science technology power, “must have the budget for (developing) the world’s No. 1 (supercomputer).” He later told reporters he did not intend to say anything discriminatory and what he meant was that politicians should not engage in “sensational politics that ring the bell with TV broadcasters.” According to Renho’s website, she was born in 1967 as the child of a Taiwanese father and a Japanese mother, and switched her citizenship from Taiwanese to Japanese in 1985.

Renho’s office told Kyodo News on Monday that the lawmaker would not make any comment on Hiranuma’s remarks because she did not hear them directly.

////////////////////////////////////

「もともと日本人じゃない」　平沼氏が蓮舫氏を批判
2010.1.18 　産經新聞 Courtesy of AS
http://sankei.jp.msn.com/politics/situation/100118/stt1001181234002-n1.htm
平沼赳夫元経済産業相（衆院岡山３区）が岡山市で１７日に開かれた後援会パーティーのあいさつで、政府の事業仕分けで注目された民主党の蓮舫参院議員について「言いたくないけれども、もともと日本人じゃない。帰化して国会議員になって事業仕分けでそんなことを言っている」などと発言した。
蓮舫議員の事務所は１８日、取材に「内容を確認してから判断したい」としている。ホームページによると、蓮舫議員は昭和６０年に日本国籍を取得している。
平沼氏は次世代スーパーコンピューター開発事業の仕分けで、蓮舫議員が「世界１位でなければ駄目なのか」と発言したことを「政治家として不謹慎だ」と指摘。「科学技術立国の予算は世界１位じゃなきゃいけない。つけを払わされるのは有権者だ」と強調した。
パーティー終了後、平沼氏は記者団に「差別と取ってもらっては困る。テレビ受けするセンセーショナルな政治は駄目だ」と説明した。

=========================

平沼赳夫氏：蓮舫議員の仕分け批判「元々日本人じゃない」

毎日新聞　2010年1月17日

http://mainichi.jp/select/seiji/news/20100118k0000m010058000c.html

平沼赳夫元経済産業相（岡山３区）は１７日、岡山市内で開いた政治資金パーティーのあいさつで政府の事業仕分けを批判し、仕分け人を務めた民主党の蓮舫参院議員について「元々日本人じゃない」と発言した。

平沼氏はあいさつの中で、次世代スーパーコンピューター開発費の仕分けで蓮舫議員が「世界一になる理由があるのか。２位では駄目なのか」と質問したことは「政治家として不謹慎だ」とし、「言いたくないが、言った本人は元々日本人じゃない」と発言。「キャンペーンガールだった女性が帰化して日本の国会議員になって、事業仕分けでそんなことを言っている。そんな政治でいいのか」と続けた。

平沼氏はパーティー終了後の取材に対し、「差別と取ってもらうと困る。日本の科学技術立国に対し、テレビ受けするセンセーショナルな政治は駄目だということ。彼女は日本国籍を取っており人種差別ではない」と説明した。

蓮舫議員のウェブサイトによると、蓮舫議員は６７年、台湾人の父と日本人の母の間に生まれた。当時は父親が日本人の場合にしか日本国籍を取得できなかったが、改正国籍法施行後の８５年に日本国籍を取得した。【石川勝義】

/////////////////////////////////////////

COMMENT: Well, people will stoop to anything to delegitimize a person’s opinion, won’t they? Even question their ability to put their country’s needs first if they have NJ roots? Well, as a fellow naturalized Japanese, I say: Fuck you very much, Takeo. Given your family history as an adopted son of the family name, I question your ability to represent Japan’s Blue-Blooded Elites as you claim to do.

There’s a reason for my intemperance. This is not the first time Hiranuma has resorted to bigotry and ignorance to take cheap shots at an internationalizing Japan.

Consider Hiranuma’s rallying with the alarmists to try and deny Permanent Residents from getting local suffrage in 2009. (Bonus points for irony: It’s his camp which usually says that PRs should naturalize if they want suffrage. Then he says the above; clearly naturalization is irrelevant to him.)

Consider Hiranuma’s opposition in 2008 to a bill plugging paternity loopholes in Japan’s Nationality Laws (which he fortunately could not stop) because it would dilute “Japan’s identity”.

Consider Hiranuma’s alarmism rallying against passing a Human Rights Bill in 2006 since it would lead to “totalitarianism of the developed countries” (which his camp unfortunately probably did manage to stop).

And consider Hiranuma’s belief that a female Empress might let a NJ in to sully The Royal Womb:

//////////////////////////////////////////

The Japan Times Thursday, Feb. 2, 2006
Female on throne could marry foreigner, Hiranuma warns
The Associated Press
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20060202a2.html
Dozens of conservative lawmakers and their supporters Wednesday attacked a proposal to let females and their descendents ascend to the Chrysanthemum Throne, warning the move threatens a centuries-old tradition — and could even allow foreign blood into the Imperial line.

The lawmakers, led by former trade minister Takeo Hiranuma, are fighting a bill being drafted by the government to avert a succession crisis in the Imperial family by allowing reigning empresses and their descendents.

Females have been barred from the throne since the Meiji Era (1868-1912) and a 1947 law further restricted ascension to males from the male line. No woman has reigned in more than 200 years.

The Imperial family has not produced a male heir since the 1960s and public support has been growing for a change in the law to allow Princess Aiko, the only child Crown Prince Naruhito and Crown Princess Masako, to ascend to the throne.

Hiranuma, however, warned the reform could corrupt the Imperial line, which he said has been the supreme symbol of Japanese national and ethnic identity for centuries.

“If Aiko becomes the reigning empress and gets involved with a blue-eyed foreigner while studying abroad and marries him, their child may be the emperor,” Hiranuma told about 40 lawmakers, academics and supporters at a Tokyo hall. “We should never let that happen.”

Despite the overwhelming public support for the reform, traditionalists have stepped up a campaign to quash the move — going so far as to propose bringing back concubines to breed male descendants as was done until the Taisho Era (1912-1926). Others have argued the aristocracy, banned after World War II, should be reinstated as a way of broadening the pool of candidates for the throne.

///////////////////////////////////////

COMMENT CONTINUES: This video-nasty of a person is in my view unfit for national office. Unfortunately, his constituency did not agree. He got comfortably reelected in Okayama as an independent last August. I’d say that’s Okayama’s shame, but Hokkaido reelects shameful politicians too (think Suzuki Muneo).

Let’s hope the media takes Hiranuma to task like the media did somewhat for a similar-style othering of TV personality Takigawa Christel (unrelated to Hiranuma, but same genre). Japan’s future has no use for people like him. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

Saturday Tangent: DNA checks of “hakujin” at my university (?!?)

Posted on January 16, 2010September 19, 2012 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. As a Saturday Tangent, let me relate something rather funny that happened to me two days ago at my workplace, a university (i.e., Hokkaido Information University, Ebetsu, Hokkaido):

It’s currently exam time (I did more than 110 individual 20-minute oral interviews over the past two weeks, which may explain my recent short-temperedness over things like overseas racist publishers). And right in the middle of them we have this singular event.

One of my co-workers is this medical researcher who fancies himself internationalized, cos he says “hello” to me as we pass in the corridors (I answer back こんにちは, of course). Well, yesterday, right in between two interviews, he pops in my office with a student saying he has a favor to ask (and sidles up to me as if it’s a given that I will oblige — his students had several vials in his hand all ready for my obliging).

Sez he (in Japanese): “We need a strand of your hair please. We’re conducting experiments.”

When I backed off a bit with amusement and asked what for, he said, “We will keep the results private, but we need to do some DNA tests.”

When I asked whatever for, and why me, he said, “We’re testing for a special “wild gene” (yes, he said that, in English) that white people (hakujin) have.”

I said, sorry, find yourself another hakujin. They slunk out.

You’d think they’d know by now not to bother a person like me with stuff like that. But no. (And I just checked with one other “hakujin” in my school — he didn’t get asked. So double points for effrontery.)

Anyway, the use of the “hakujin” here is what set me off. But then again, so would “gaikokujin” (especially since it would have been incorrect; they knew that much). In fact, any word would have set me off. The request to be guinea-pigged thusly for whatever reason was something I found quite offensive.

What a funny situation! No doubt my friend Olaf will say (as he should), “Why does this stuff keep happening to Debito?!” Guess it’s my fate here in Japan.

Arudou Debito in Sapporo

NZ publisher perpetuates “Tales of Gaijin”; I have to withdraw submission due to rubric I cannot accept

Posted on January 14, 2010January 14, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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[NB: Original title of this post has been amended]

Hi Blog. I was invited a little over a year ago to submit two stories to a NZ publisher, a new place called Fine Line Press, run by a jolly decent fellow I know (former head of the Tokyo Chapter of JALT) named Graham Bathgate. One story was on the Otaru Onsens Case, the other on the Top Five Things I Like About Japan. I knew the person, was happy to oblige, and we exchanged some story drafts until satisfaction about the submissions were reached on both sides.

However, in August I heard that the book would be published under the rubric of “Foreign Tales from Japan” (actually, they were originally punning on the “Tales of Genji” to make “Tales of Gaijin”. Ick). Alas, I am not a foreigner in Japan, and I said I did not want my stories to be included either under this rubric or within this concept. I have, naturally, very strong feelings about being treated as a foreigner in Japan, and I do not like publishers (and former long-termers in Japan, such as Graham) exporting the binary “Japanese vs. Gaijin” mindset to media overseas. We have enough trouble dealing with it over here without it being propagated in more liberal societies (such as NZ). Graham, IMHO, should know better, and should publish better.

So I protested and asked the rubric to be changed or my writing withdrawn. After several months of silence, I got the final word: The rubric would stand. Okay. Sad to see.

But I’m not one to let things like this go. I feel the publisher led me down a garden path, and then wound up pigeonholing me through imported racist paradigms. Should be known about. Here’s the main correspondence we had, for the record. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

///////////////////////////////////////////

From: graham bathgate
Date: December 26, 2008 11:54:02 AM JST
To: debito@debito.org
Subject: Graham Bathgate here

Dear Debito, A long time ago we connect re JALT stuff, etc. Actually,
I interviewed you in a room at Sophia University (Jan. 28 ’01) and produced
a piece which unfortunately I had no outlet for. That was entitled
“Onsen in hot water won’t come clean”.

Now I wonder if you would be interested and have the time
to craft a story for a book I would like to publish in 2009. It will
be my second book, the first being a slim volume of memoirs
by an old student of mine, now 85 – called “Glimpses of Old Tokyo”.
The second book has the working title of “Tales of Gaijin” and
will be stories derived from the personal experiences of people
who have lived or still live in Japan.
I have taken the liberty of including the brief guidelines straight off
to you, knowing that you are already a very productive writer – I greatly
admired your home page and writings. Must be hugely helpful to
all people, newcomers and old-hands in Japan.
You’ll see below that there’s a limit of 2000 words on a story, but no-one’s
going to quibble about 2,500 or a bit more. The deadline for an idea for
a story is end of January, and for writing something, the end of March ’09…

Hope to hear from you soon. All the best for 2009. Graham
¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶
Guidelines in acronym form (PILLOTS) for your story about Tokyo/Japan:
PILLOTS

P – Personal experience / feelings
I – Images – clear and concrete – of Tokyo and/or Japan
L – Lyrical (The prose should have beauty if not poetic quality)
L – Light (Story ideally shows a light side of life in Japan with serious comment on this …… or vice versa
O – Observation (A clear event described or some thoughts about Tokyo/Japan – contrast/comparison with other places OK)
T – Tokyo-based atmosphere preferred / Japan fine, too
S – Short (Not more than 2,000 words, or two or three very short “stories” adding up to that). There can be exceptions but 5,000 words would be a take-over!
¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶¶

////////////////////////////////////

We had a few months of drafts bouncing back and forth, arrived at finished product, then I got this update:

////////////////////////////////////

From: graham bathgate
Subject: Invitation to book launch Tokyo
Date: August 8, 2009 7:41:28 AM JST

Dear All, Please have a look at the invitation on the site ….. and tell a friend:

www.finelinepress.co.nz

Iit will be “Foreign Tales from Japan” next year.

My apologies to those of you already received something like this. Cheers, Graham

////////////////////////////////////

I immediately checked things out and sent this reply:

////////////////////////////////////

From: debito@debito.org
Subject: Re: Invitation to book launch Tokyo — I am deeply disappointed by the publisher’s taglines.
Date: August 8, 2009 10:04:27 AM JST
To: Graham Bathgate

Hi Graham. I’ve had a look. I am gravely disappointed by the publisher’s prospectus:

http://www.finelinepress.co.nz/foreign_tales_from_japan.html

=========================================
A colleague at the school we taught at in Tokyo said that everyone has a good story to tell, possibly very true for travellers to the Far East. Recalling this we decided to ask friends there if they would like to write about an experience in Japan. The contributions were sufficient to start work on the next book. It will be published by the end of 2009, a compilation of forty stories by foreigners who live or have lived in Japan.

The basic idea in producing this kind of book was to give a chance to people to tell their Japan experience in well-crafted story form, a tale that deserves to be recounted but perhaps wouldn’t otherwise find its way into print. The working title of the book isTales of Gaijin (after “Tale of Genji”).

It will fascinate anyone interested in how foreigners view Japan and what their unique experiences were. It is hoped that Japanese people will read these stories and reflect on the images and opinions of people who love Japan.

=========================================

Debito continues:

“a compilation of forty stories by foreigners who live or have lived in Japan”, “how foreigners view Japan” etc

I’m not a foreigner.

“Tales of Gaijin (after “Tale of Genji”).”

This had better not be the title of the book.

If this is how the book is shaping up, I want no part of it. I never knew that this would be sold as a book by “foreigners”, worse yet “gaijin” (a racist term in the very title). Either have your publisher make the proper accommodations for long-term residents and citizens or withdraw my story. I will have no part in perpetuating racist stereotypes overseas.

Arudou Debito in Sapporo

(cc publisher, which worse yet looks like it’s you. You wrote this??)

////////////////////////////////////

From: Graham Bathgate
Subject: Re: Invitation to book launch Tokyo — I am deeply disappointed by the publisher’s taglines.
Date: August 8, 2009 11:12:34 AM JST
To: debito@debito.org

Dear Debito,
Sorry you feel the book will not shape up and be fair to all, especially to the
Japanese. All the stories have wonderful unique experiences
to tell. There are haiku and tanka, too. It is a fine collection. I would be
sad to lose your story because it gives an edge to the book which is lacking
somewhat, I feel. However, good experiences in an adopted country have
a readership, I am sure, not only among non-Japanese but also I hope
among Japanese.
The working title was the play on title “Tales of Genji”. Not the final title
at all.
What title would you suggest? I am open.
What else would you like changed? Again open.
I hope I can keep your story. It’s one of the best.
Cheers,
Graham

////////////////////////////////////

From: debito@debito.org
Subject: Re: Invitation to book launch Tokyo — I am deeply disappointed by the publisher’s taglines.
Date: August 8, 2009 10:28:32 PM JST
To: Graham Bathgate

Graham, I think you missed my point. You are selling this as a book with the perspectives of foreigners. What about me, then? I am not a foreigner. Can you not see the disconnect?

Titling: “Foreign Tales from Japan”, okay, but again, what about me? Not foreign. If you say it’s foreign perspectives, I’m out.

Moreover, if you use the word “gaijin” in the title, my essay is off limits. I am not a gaijin, or a gaikokujin, and I will not be associated with any work which imports and uses that binary rubric to view the world. I am a Japanese. Full stop.

Do you at least see the problem I’m talking about? I’m not talking about “fairness to all, especially to the Japanese”. I’m talking about accuracy. Calling me a foreigner is inaccurate. With me so far? If so, email back and we’ll continue this discussion.

PS: Again, did you write the book blurb below?

////////////////////////////////////

I received no answer until January 12, as in two days ago.

////////////////////////////////////

From: Graham Bathgate
Subject: Re: Launch ……. I am deeply disappointed…..
Date: January 12, 2010 6:47:17 PM JST
To: debito@debito.org

Omedetoh,
Sorry such a late reply, but Xmas or something.
Many other writers were happy as “gaijin”, so I would like to
save your “Onsen”, if I may, for another publication.

I’ll be sure to let you know about the launch of “Forty Stories of Japan”, probably
beginning of November in Tokyo, but should be out here in March.
All the best for Tiger,

Graham
============================

On 14/12/2009, at 7:32 PM, Arudou Debito wrote:

Hellooooo Graham? What’s happening with my writing, please? Debito

============================

Begin forwarded message:

From: Arudou Debito
Date: August 13, 2009 9:55:43 PM JST
To: Graham Bathgate
Subject: RESEND: Invitation to book launch Tokyo — I am deeply disappointed by the publisher’s taglines.

Graham, did you get this? Debito

============================

Begin forwarded message:

From: Arudou Debito
Date: August 8, 2009 10:28:32 PM JST
To: graham bathgate
Subject: Re: Invitation to book launch Tokyo — I am deeply disappointed by the publisher’s taglines.

Graham, I think you missed my point. You are selling this as a book with the perspectives of foreigners. What about me, then? I am not a foreigner. Can you not see the disconnect? … [rest of forwarded message deleted]

ENDS

GAIJIN HANZAI Magazine becomes a “Taboo” topic in a 2007 magazine, victimizing J publisher

Posted on January 8, 2010January 8, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. Here’s something that’s been sitting on my server since September 2007 (!!) and I’ve finally decided to put up now. (Didn’t want to encourage sales of something like this by attracting attention to it until long after the fact.)

A magazine on “Taboos”, sent to me more than two years ago by MS, tells the story of the reactionary gaijin who took the “Gaijin Hanzai Ura File” mook to task for the lies and hate speech it was spreading on convenience store newsstands nationwide (substantiation of that all here). And portrays that pitifully misunderstod publisher, Eichi Shuppan Inc., which went bankrupt within two months of releasing that mook, as victim.

It has quotes from me (even of me laughing) that it never garnered through any interviews (they apparently talked to Eichi, but I received no communication from this publication), and shows me as some sort of fearsome activist (thanks, I guess). It of course offers no counterarguments to Eichi’s spurious published assertions, for example about the rise of NJ crime (I would have given those counterarguments if they’d only asked), accepting their assertions at face value. And of course we have no real debate on whether or not the book was actually telling the truth or not (obviously, as I argued in many venues, it wasn’t). For all the research they did pulling my written quotes out of context, they didn’t cite my questions of the veracity of the portrayals that assiduously at all.

In other words, it’s a debate that once again favors and victimizes Team Japan. Those poor victimized convenience stores responding to public pressure (yeah, like that worked for “Mr James”; McDonald’s basically ignored us). It couldn’t just be that the stores carrying the mook were convinced by our arguments about its exaggerated and errant claims and hateful tone now, could it? Naw, Japanese lost to the foreigners, therefore the foreigners didn’t fight fair. And now because of that, we have yet another “taboo” that hurts We Japaneses’ Freedom of Speech.

Hardly a “taboo” here. You overdid it, and lost the debate. That’s all. And if you spread lies and hate speech in public again like this, you should be called on it again and debated against. And if you lose the debate (moreover your company after your risky business decisions), don’t put it down to sour grapes and blame the other side for your losing. Take responsibility for your actions like an adult, and put it down to publishing stupid things that were trying to defame and hurt people, particularly Japan’s NJ residents. You lost. Live with it. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

(Click on any image to expand in your browser)

ENDS

Book review of “Japan Took the J.A.P. Out of Me” (Pubs Simon and Schuster). Yes, that is the title.

Posted on December 28, 2009December 28, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. Another holiday tangent. Enjoy. Debito in Monbetsu

=====================================

REVIEW OF BOOK “JAPAN TOOK THE J.A.P. OUT OF ME”

By Lisa Fineberg Cook. Published by Simon and Schuster Inc 2009

Reviewed by Arudou Debito

Simon and Schuster sent me this book this month for review, and I know not why. I am probably the last person to whom you’d send a “Chick Lit” book (defined by some as a genre where the protagonist is a young female trying to make it in the modern world, dealing with issues that women face, whether it be learning how to stand on their own two feet, or just about them being passionate about career, style, personal appearance, shopping…). But I did sit down and get through it. I agree with the reviews on Amazon.com — it’s “an easy read”. That’s not much of a compliment, however: If the most positive thing you can say about a literary work is that you got through it quickly, that’s damning with faint praise indeed.

So let’s get through this review and make it a quick read too. Start with the obvious: J.A.P. Having a racial epithet cloaked as an ethnic slur (I hail from Cornell University, so am plenty aware of “Jewish American Princesses”) in the very title already puts me off — as very culturally insensitive. What were you thinking, S&S?

In fact, insensitivity is the recurring theme in this tome: The first-person narrator is so self-absorbed that there is no space for anyone else. There are a few friends here and there (or one stellar Japanese student enlightened by the protagonist’s poetic guidance) that slot in at whim, but no particular impression is made on the reader. In fact, aside of course from our narrator, we know more about her best friend overseas than anyone else who glides in and out of the work. Even her newlywed husband is an undeveloped glyph who drops in occasionally, offering improbably perfect and concise bon mots designed to confirm or destroy her preconceptions. But never mind. The book is all about our J.A.P. girl empowering herself, moreover in a land where women apparently have no power of their own, and it’s her task to enlighten them. You go girl, for all of us! Feh.

Reviews are supposed to give a plot synopsis, so let’s get through that quickly too: California Jewish girl follows her American husband to Nagoya (she even makes a “goy” joke about that) where they both teach English for one year. She gets her comeuppance in quirky ways, as there is apparently no Starbucks in Nagoya (in 1999? There is no date given but I place it then, since she mentions the US debut of TV show The Sopranos.), little English spoken, and few of the material or cultural creature comforts that satisfy her spoiled-girl whims. She starts off, by design, as an unsympathetic character (hence the titled comeuppance). However, like any newcomer in a predictable Hollywood flick, she not only learns to cope well enough (despite the natives) to stay in Japan and grow, but also to recommend to everyone (in a self-important interview in the back of the book) they try living overseas (I agree, of course, but one year abroad hardly makes one an authority on world travel).

After solipsistic battles with things like a washing machine and public transport, she finally takes us outside for some sightseeing in Japan (Hiroshima and shopping trips in Nagoya are highlights, of a kind). But in the end the reader gets little impression of Japan beyond the stares, the crowds, some undeveloped allegations of anti-Semitism, and sundry interactions between her and some Westerners that could have taken place anywhere in the world. Again, this character is so insensitive to anything beyond her sphere (she doesn’t even try to learn the language) that there’s no room left for Japan. She and hubby leave after one year and return to the US to raise a family. End of slide show.

In sum, the best I can say about the book is that the one character who counts in this book (guess who) is very well developed (if not overly so), and she has a very clear writing voice. Hooray. So why is she writing about Japan? Because she has to get published by writing about something? Hokay. But this book is hardly something that can be advertised as a “memoir”. Memoirs are generally an autobiography — something that give us some idea of the world people live in. This barely gives us the world that one this one person briefly dwelled. Japan is a difficult and time-consuming place to get to know, even when you have an interest in what’s going on around you. Moreover even when you understand the language. Neither happens in this book. One year abroad — and as a functional illiterate at that — does not justify a “memoir” about a country published by one of the world’s largest publishing houses.

Good for Ms. Cook for putting one over on them. You go, girl! Now let’s hope S&S give some space to some more serious and knowledgeable writers about Japan. There are plenty of them over here, trust me. Ferret us out, Simon and Schuster. We’ll give you something much more empowering.

— Arudou Debito, author, “JAPANESE ONLY, The Otaru Onsens Case and Racial Discrimination in Japan”, and “Handbook for Newcomers, Migrants, and Immigrants” (Akashi Shoten Inc., editions 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, and 2009 respectively); columnist, The Japan Times, and Sapporo Source.

ENDS

Proof positive that some people really do suck: JT responses to proposals for a Japanese immigration policy

Posted on December 24, 2009December 24, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. It’s times like these when I think human society really has a bottomless capacity for oozing disdain for and wishing ill-will upon others. Get a load of these letters to the editor (including authors who won’t reveal their names, or don’t live in Japan anyway) responding acidulously to my Japan Times column earlier this month, where I made constructive proposals for making Japan a place more attractive for immigration. (Many of these proposals were made not just by me, but also by former Immigration bureaucrat Sakanaka Hidenori; so much for their pat claim below of imposing my moral values).

None of these respondents appear to be immigrants, or have any expressed interest in investing in this society, yet they heap scorn upon those who might plan to. I know paper will never refuse ink, but surely these people have more productive uses of their time then just scribbling poorly-researched and nasty screeds that help no-one. The self-injuring, snake-eating-its-tail mentality seen in NJ vets of Japan is something worthy of study by psychologists, methinks. Any takers? Arudou Debito in Sapporo

///////////////////////////////////////////

The Japan Times, Letters to the Editor Tuesday, Dec. 22, 2009

HAVE YOUR SAY
Level playing field for immigrants: responses
A selection of readers’ responses to Debito Arudou’s Dec. 1 Just Be Cause article, which proposed policy changes to “make life easier for Japan’s residents, regardless of nationality”:

Get your fill and head off
I’m getting tired of listening to foreigners moaning on Japan. The answer is very simple: You don’t like it, leave it. Why do these people want to live in Japan at all costs if they don’t like the system? The world is big; go somewhere else. I’ve been in Japan for 4 years with my Japanese wife and now we have understood it’s time to move on for our future, and therefore go back to Europe. We all know Japan is a homogeneous country. It will never become a cosmopolitan society like the West. Who are we to change a deep-rooted, xenophobic culture where Japanese have been living for centuries? It’s much easier for Japanese to live in the West than for us to live in Japan. There are big Japanese communities in every Western country. Japan is not an expats’ resort by tradition. Foreigners come here either for marriage or overseas contracts, meaning it can be a beautiful place to live for a few years but not to settle permanently. My suggestion to all those disillusioned gaijin is to make the most of your stay in Japan and return home when you think you’ve had enough.

JOHN TESTORE

Takasaki, Gunma Pref.

================================

Unwelcome, no matter what
This article implied that Japan is seeking to welcome foreigners, which is far from the case. I came here (unwillingly) under a Japanese scholarship, graduated here top of my class, work here, did volunteering to help in disaster relief . . . But everyday I wake up, I find myself in the same position: potential thief when I walk in a store; a potential terrorist when I enter a government building, even when I spend my time there volunteering; my neighbor keeping watch on me every day; unable to obtain a bank recommendation when I need it . . . In my case, I gave up on Japan and will (leave) with a bitter taste.

NAME WITHHELD

================================

Homogeneity works well
Japan has been often criticized for its immigration policy, which does make it somewhat difficult for a non-Japanese (NJ) to obtain permanent residency or citizenship. I disagree that this policy has worked to Japan’s disadvantage in the global labor market. . . . (Arudou) says Japan needs a new immigration ministry that would decide clear public standards that would give immigrants what they want. It is not an obligation of the government to give immigrants what they want. The (role of the) ministry is to be sure that the immigrants who are allowed into Japan will obey the laws of Japan and not become wards of the state.

Also, I disagree with Arudou’s desire to have citizenship based on birth in Japan. Look at the U.S.: Illegal aliens come into the U.S. and have what is called an “anchor baby.” The baby is automatically a U.S. citizen, and his/her parents then become eligible for permanent residency and then citizenship. And the American taxpayer pays for their health care, housing, food stamps, education and more. They create their enclaves, demand bilingual classes, etcetera, and never learn English.

Japan has been very fortunate to have about 98 percent of its population (form) a homogeneous society, in which the people share a common language and culture. Of course there are local variances, but by and large the people speak one language, which helps to maintain a high level of literacy and an appreciation of a common culture, language and history. . . . Debito Arudou should abide by the laws of immigration of Japan, stop whining or simply find another place to live.

KARL E. WAHL

Bellevue, Wa.

================================

Let Japan run its own shop
I am an American who lived in Japan for 4 years and find it pathetic how many people want to force Western ideologies onto Japan. Japan is its own country. Let them do as they please. At least they can control their immigration issues, unlike most European countries and the United States. I bemoan how my country, the United States, can’t tackle or has an unwillingness to tackle the issue. Japan has a right to keep the country as Japan sees fit. Forcing non-Japanese moral values on it to satisfy the short-term aging population issue is not in best interests of Japan.

MIKE TULL

Address withheld

ENDS

Kyodo: GOJ responsible for hardship facing Ainu, incl racial profiling by J police on the street!

Posted on December 18, 2009December 18, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. Here’s a little article about how other minorities have it in Japan — the Ainu indigenous peoples, for one. According to this, people of Ainu descent are even being racially profiled by police on the street just like NJ! Anyone still want to argue that the NPA is not training the police to target foreigners (defined as “foreign looking”, hence the Ainu getting snagged)? Even the police themselves below justify their actions as ferreting out NJ overstayers. Read on. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

//////////////////////////////////

Former panel member says state responsible for hardship facing Ainu
Kyodo News/Japan Today Sunday 06th December 2009, Courtesy SC
http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/former-panel-member-says-state-responsible-for-hardship-facing-ainu
TOKYO —
A member of a disbanded government panel on policies related to the Ainu said Saturday that the panel wanted to send a message to the government and the public that state policy has imposed hardships on the indigenous people and caused discrimination against them. ‘

‘We wanted to make it clear and tell the people in our report that the state was responsible for the suffering imposed on the Ainu and the disparities (between them and the majority group),’’ Teruki Tsunemoto, head of the Hokkaido University Center for Ainu & Indigenous Studies, told a symposium on Ainu policy in Tokyo.

Tsunemoto was one of the eight members of the panel, which was set up after Japan recognized the Ainu as an indigenous people last year and issued the report in July this year. The panel urged the government in the report to take concrete steps to improve the lives of Ainu people and promote public understanding of them through education.

Stressing the need to take specific measures for the Ainu, Tsunemoto, also a professor in constitutional law, said, ‘‘The Ainu have existed uniquely as an indigenous people and they have become a minority group not because they wanted to be but because the majority group of the Japanese advanced into their native land.’‘

‘‘The Ainu did not agree to become minority, so the state must take responsibility for driving them into their current status,’’ he said. ‘‘The panel did not propose providing ‘benefits’ to the Ainu but enhancing Ainu policies, based on the state’s political responsibility.’‘

A survey has shown that Ainu people still lead underprivileged lives, with their income levels and university advancement rate remaining low, compared with the national averages.

At the symposium, some Ainu people living in Tokyo and its vicinity shared their experiences of discrimination and expressed hope for future policy.

Akemi Shimada said, ‘‘People do not know much about the Ainu. Some people in Tokyo said to me when they saw me wearing traditional Ainu clothes, ‘Do the Ainu still exist?’ and ‘Are you from the Ainu country?’ I responded, ‘Where is the Ainu country?’‘’

Tomoko Yahata said she was stopped and searched in Tokyo nine times over the six months through October. ‘‘Responding to my question as to why they had stopped me, the police officers said it is because there are many overstaying foreigners,’’ she said.

Many Ainu must be facing similar difficulties as they now live nationwide, she suggested.

The Ainu at the meeting said they want sufficient support to improve their livelihoods while seeking their own space where they can pursue cultural activities such as traditional dancing, embroidery and cooking.

ENDS

GS on Michael Moore’s rights to complain about being fingerprinted at Japanese border

Posted on December 16, 2009December 16, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. I received this very thoughtful email from GS after Michael Moore’s visit to Japan, where he was perturbed by the border fingerprinting. According to GS, he has every right to be. Read on. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

//////////////////////////////////////////////////

December 14, 2009
Dear Debito-san,

Thank you for the heads-up I got on Mr. Michael Moore’s comments regarding fingerprinting.

As you know from our previous e-mail conversations, I am concerned about some aspects regarding the safety of fingerprint verification in general and J-VIS in particular.

Following-up on your article, I have taken the liberty of writing a long message to the website feedback form on Mr. Moore’s website, summarizing my concerns. Please find below a copy of my writing. I hope you find it useful.

===============================

“Dear Sir, Madam,

Through the blog of Mr. Arudou Debito (www.debito.org), I’ve read part of Mr. Moore’s interview in Japan, in which he reported his fingerprinting experiences at the border (see https://www.debito.org/?p=5347). Though through this web form my message probably gets to the inbox of a webmaster, I hope you may find my response interesting enough to patch through to him. I would like to provide him with some hopefully interesting food for thought about fingerprinting in general, and the J-VIS (Japanese border check) system in particular.

Mr. Moore apparently got the hostile response that if he refused, he would be deported back to the United States on his question why he would have to be fingerprinted. I guess a good introduction to my story would be to point his attention to Article 4 of the Japanese “Act on the Protection of Personal Information Held by Administrative Organs” (see http://www.japaneselawtranslation.go.jp/law/detail/?ft=1&re=02&dn=1&x=0&y=0&co=01&ky=personal+data+administrative+organs&page=15, elements in Japanese writing have been deleted but can be seen in the original):

“Article 4 When an Administrative Organ directly acquires Personal Information on an Individual Concerned that is recorded in a document (including a record made by an electronic method, a magnetic method, or any other method not recognizable to human senses [referred to as an “Electromagnetic Record” in Articles 24 and 55]) from the said Individual Concerned, the Administrative Organ shall clearly indicate the Purpose of Use to the Individual Concerned in advance, except in the following cases:
….
(i)　Where the acquisition of Personal Information is urgently required for the protection of the life, body, or property of an individual
….
(ii)　Where clear indication of the Purpose of Use to the Individual Concerned is likely to cause harm to the life, body, property, or other rights or interests of the Individual Concerned or a third party
….
(iii)　Where clear indication of the Purpose of Use to the Individual Concerned is likely to cause impediments to the proper execution of the affairs or business of state organs, Incorporated Administrative Agencies, etc. (which means incorporated administrative agencies prescribed in Article 2, paragraph 1 of the Act on the Protection of Personal Information Held by Incorporated Administrative Agencies, etc. [Act No. 59 of 2003; hereinafter referred to as the “IAA Personal Information Protection Act” ]; the same shall apply hereinafter), local public entities, or Local Incorporated Administrative Agencies (which means local incorporated administrative agencies prescribed in Article 2, paragraph 1 of the Local Incorporated Administrative Agencies Act [Act No. 118 of 2003]; the same shall apply hereinafter)
….
(iv)　Where the Purpose of Use is found to be clear in light of the circumstances of the acquisition”

I am not a lawyer (disclaimer), but it would seem to me that when Mr. Moore asked “why?”, he made a lawful request under article 4, while the answer that if he wouldn’t, he would be deported, doesn’t appear to me to be in the spirit of this article. Not to mention that the Immigration Bureau, the responsible party in this scheme, states in their FAQ: “we will properly store and protect your data, according to the basic law for the protection of personal data, the Act for the Protection of Personal Information Retained by Administrative Institutions.” (http://www.moj.go.jp/NYUKAN/nyukan64-2-1.pdf, note by the way the spelling differences in the title…). Right……

Privacy laws generally have a common ancestor and a common purpose. In 1980, a workgroup within the OECD (http://www.oecd.org/home/0,2987,en_2649_201185_1_1_1_1_1,00.html) published the “OECD Guidelines on the Protection of Privacy and Transborder Flows of Personal Data” (http://www.oecd.org/document/18/0,3343,en_2649_34255_1815186_1_1_1_1,00.html), with eight key principles that form the basis of privacy laws worldwide. Contrary to both the statements: “If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear” and “Big Brother is watching you”, these guidelines (roughly said) recognize the general legitimacy of using personal information, provided that such use is safe, sane and sensible.

Safe, sane and sensible… One is left to wonder about this when it comes to fingerprinting schemes worldwide… From what I understand, the key reason for implementing such schemes is the assumption that fingerprints provide a ‘silver bullet’ solution to identifying people, being unique, impossible to forge, and impossible to misidentify. However, by now it’s safe to say that fingerprinting schemes are not the ‘silver bullet’ hoped for, and that they are creating problems which might easily lead to grossly unfair treatment to individuals being unfortunate enough to become victims of such a problem.

Leaving all kinds of other problems aside, I would like to react to the assumption that fingerprints are impossible to forge first. One can find plenty of proof that fingerprints can be copied. The University of Yokohama (http://www.lfca.net/Fingerprint-System-Security-Issues.pdf) has published it’s groundbreaking article on this now almost 8 years ago, the Chaos Computer Club in Germany (http://dasalte.ccc.de/biometrie/fingerabdruck_kopieren), and the Mythbusters (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAfAVGES-Yc) have spectacularly shown that it is possible. But the proof of the pudding is that in fact at least one person has been caught in Japan after defeating the J-VIS system (among others: http://archives.chicagotribune.com/2009/jan/02/nation/chi-090102-faked-fingerprint-japanese-airport). Some food for thought, the woman bought her fingerprints, so not only is it possible, but there are people out there making money on it. More food for thought in a few questions: Were the original prints from which the copies were made stolen? Were the copies registered as unreliable? And will the rightful owner get into trouble because someone else stole her/his fingerprints and did something unlawful? The answer is a triplicate: “We don’t know”. What we do know is that someone who is the victim of such identity theft is in for some serious trouble in those places where the assumption is still that it can’t be done…

The assumption that it’s impossible to misidentify people based on fingerprints is also incorrect. In this respect it may be the most interesting to follow the trail of the J-VIS devices.

On at least one of the airports, the devices used are from the company NEC. NEC is not very secretive about the tests proving the quality of it’s devices, they post links to the test results on their own website, with the headline NIST(= (US) National Institute for Standards and Technology)-Proven Accuracy (http://www.nec.com/global/solutions/biometrics/technologies/nist.html). But what is this accuracy?

Only the FpVTE2003 appears to test the kind of verification that is in use for J-VIS. On this, NEC says: “The FpVTE2003 was an international benchmark test of fingerprint matching, identification, and verification systems, conducted in the United States in 2003 under the control of one of the US’s most respected government authorities, the NIST.” So what does this test say? The Summary of Results (http://fpvte.nist.gov/report/ir_7123_summary.pdf) says:

“The most accurate fingerprint system tested (NEC MST) using operational quality single fingerprints:
• 99.4% true accept rate @ 0.01% false accept rate
• 99.9% true accept rate @ 1.0% false accept rate”

It is good here to explain the technical language. In the context of US-VISIT or J-VIS, fingerprints are checked against a list of unwelcome people, while NIST uses the standard terms for checking against a list of authorized (= welcome) people. This creates confusing language, but it can be explained fairly easily. A True Accept in the spirit of the US-VISIT or J-VIS system means that an unwelcome person (say, Mr. X) shows up and is recognised because of a fingerprint match. A False Accept means that a welcome person (say, Mr. Michael Moore) shows up, but is incorrectly recognized as Mr. X because of a false fingerprint match.

At this point, I would like to entertain Mr. Moore with a little side step, to which I get back later. What would a False Accept Rate of 0.01% mean? That’s infinitely small, right? Well, the J-VIS system went into operation on November 20th, 2007. I don’t have day-by-day figures on the number of visitors, but I can tell that in the year from December 1st, 2007 to November 30th, 2008, 8,513,909 visitors were registered in Japan (http://www.tourism.jp/statistics/xls/JTM_inbound20091027eng.xls). I would therefore expect 851 false alarms based on a False Accept Rate of 0.01%. It is not infinitely small.

So the question comes up: “Is fingerprint verification a form of Russian Roulette?” The answer is: “Not necessarily”. No system is perfect against theft or mistakes. But if the people running the system are well-trained and thorough, it is likely that they can spot and correct the problem before serious damage is done to the victim of either problem above. But for that to work and the people subjected to such a system to be safe, one principle is vital: Every person in the organization must have the capabilities of being able to take criticism, and also a healthy dose of self-criticism. That is never easy, and the more damage already done, the more difficult it becomes.

…And right at that point is where the comparison the officials from Japan’s Immigration Bureau made to Mr. Moore ends. One of the officials apparently told him: “But you do this in the United States, when we visit the United States.” True, they do undeniably verify fingerprints. They also undeniably verify and correct false alarms. In the words of Mr. Neil Latta, US-VISIT IDENT Program Manager at the time of writing of the following document (http://fingerprint.nist.gov/standard/archived_workshops/workshop1/presentations/Latta-LessThan10.pdf): “1:many Accuracy For a 2-finger Search Against a 6M Subject Database is 95% With a False Hit Rate of 0.08% (Exceeding US-Visit Requirements)”. And: “0.4% FAR Results in (0.4% x 100K Trxs/Day) = 400 Examiner Verifications”. Again in less technical terms, they verify false alarms, they know how many false alarms there are, and so on. Granted, given the reputation of ‘outstanding customer friendliness’ that Homeland Security has carved out for themselves, this is still likely to be a rather unpleasant experience, and there is almost certainly room for considerable improvement. But at the end of the day, here is the written proof that the Department of Homeland Security is capable of admitting mistakes.

Is this also the case on the Japanese borders? The answer is again: “We don’t know”. But in itself, this is an answer too. Just some food for thought, there’s nothing in the quoted FAQ, and the incident Mr. Moore had is not exactly the first one where the organization reacts with hostility to something that sounds remotely like criticism. It’s not exactly reassuring to have to depend for your own safety on the ability of an organisation to take (self-) criticism, while on less important details the same organisation shows a distinctive lack of that same ability.

And one detail gives more food for thought that is not very reassuring. Remember the 851 false alarms I would expect if there was a false accept rate of 0.01%? On November 29th, 2008, the Japanese Ministry of Justice (of which the Immigration Bureau is a part) made a press release stating that they had deported a total of 846 people based on fingerprint matches in the first year of operation (http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D94NKV182&show_article=1). That is only five off that number… Or differently put, 846 people is 0.00994% of 8,513,909 visitors. The difference with a false accept rate of 0.01% is only 0.00006%… Is this proof that there is a Russian Roulette situation? Certainly not. From the same sources we also have the numbers for South Koreans (297 people deported, total visitors – from both Koreas, admittedly leaving a margin for doubt: 2,483,288, percentage = 0.01196%), Chinese (90 people deported, total visitors 1,000,228, percentage = 0.008998), and Filipino’s (155 people deported, total visitors 82,473, percentage = 0.18%, way off the mark). But some food for thought: Out of four groups of visitors, only the smallest group is way off the mark. The other ones are groups of more than one million visitors. And the larger the group of visitors, the closer we get to the mark of 0.01%. That is a curious set of coincidences…

And yet more food for thought. With almost every other identifier and keys, from physical keys to credit cards to drivers’ licenses to passports, the reason we have them is that we can replace them when the legitimate user gets into trouble because something goes wrong. We would find it unacceptable to hear: “Sorry, we found out your car key / credit card / passport has been copied / isn’t accepted as well as it should be / doesn’t fit / …, but you can’t replace it, so you just have to live with the problem.” Why then do we accept that with fingerprints…?

I’m sorry for this long message. I hope it has been worthwhile reading though.

Kind Regards, GS”

===============================

And of course the kind regards are for you as well.

ENDS

Sunday Tangent: Headachingly bad Japan travelogue by Daily Beast’s “new travel columnist” Jolie Hunt. Go to town on it.

Posted on December 13, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. Sunday Tangent time: I saw one of the worst Star Trek (TOS) shows ever (one that makes you say, “Give me my 50 minutes back!”, and no, it wasn’t “Spock’s Brain” — it was “Catspaw”; enough said). In the same genre of howlingly bad copy and information, let me send along this little ditty of Japan travelogue by a Ms Jolie Hunt, whose qualifications are, quote:

“Jolie Hunt travels on her own dime for more than 50 percent of the year. She is the global head of public relations for Thomson Reuters, appointed April 2008. Prior to that, she served as global director of corporate and business affairs for IBM Corporation She was the director of PR for the Financial Times. She lives between New York and London.”

Her “Catspaw Article” follows. Go to town on it. And better yet, follow the link back to The Daily Beast and see how fellow commenters go to town on it as well.

Why don’t we Japan-residents ever get any of these sweet gigs? At least they wouldn’t have to pay us intercontinental airfare. And we’d know what we’re talking about. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

=============================

Gal With a Suitcase

by Jolie Hunt

The Daily Beast, undated, spotted by AG November 30, 2009 http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-11-27/gal-with-a-suitcase-2/full/

Our new travel columnist visits Tokyo, a place at once colorfully chaotic and contemplatively serene—and more accessible to Westerners than ever before.

Welcome to Tokyo, home of Harajuku, supersonic toilets, and food that can make even the sturdiest stomach reconsider career options. Every traveler wants to visit Tokyo, but making the schlep (and it is a schlep, from virtually anywhere) is an entirely different matter. But believe me, it’s worth it.

I hadn’t been to Tokyo in three years and what struck me on a recent three-day visit was how the city seems vaster, yet more accessible for Westerners, than it did when I was last here. Now nearly everyone, from your cabbie to your masseur, can manage a few words in English. And speaking of cabbies, Tokyo’s are glorious. All wear white gloves, have doily-adorned seats, and accept American Express. And no more renting one of those weird cellphones when you visit; 3G now works here. All these comforts and conveniences have a way of making Japan feel less foreign—almost, I dare say, like any other major city.

This can be a chaotic, rebellious place, where fashionistas in Hello Kitty haute couture strut the streets of Shibuya, and young punks with 10-inch Mohawks screech from makeshift stages in grimy underground clubs.

Thankfully, what remains unchanged are the enchanting Japanese. Many of the clichés remain true: flawless etiquette in every encounter (even if I was occasionally called “mister”), exquisitely prepared food, perfect-in-every-way service, and masterful in the art of the business deal. I like that life here retains a tinge of formality, too. Take, for example, press releases, hand-delivered to all journalists in the Nikkei by a bike-messenger every day—no blast email, no fax.

But just when you think you’ve got Japan figured out, it surprises you. This can be a chaotic, rebellious place, where fashionistas in Hello Kitty haute couture strut the streets of Shibuya, and young punks with 10-inch Mohawks screech from makeshift stages in grimy underground clubs.

Before we get to the tips, one little bento box of warning: Tokyo isexpensive. If Sofia Coppola were making her movie in 2009, I’d propose the title Cost in Translation. The only place I’ve been that’s more outrageously pricey is Moscow, and you typically get caviar as part of that experience. If you’re on a budget, don’t come—you haven’t a chance in the world. Instead, arm yourself with the phrase takai neh (“How much?!”) and be prepared to shell out. GWS learned this lesson the hard way when trying to buy a basic hair band that would cost no more than $12 anywhere else, but here was quoted at $79. Suffice to say, I did not leave Japan with a new head accessory.

Hotels

Park Hyatt remains a fave. It boasts jaw-dropping views of Mt. Fuji on a clear day, and the infamous New York Grill on the 52nd floor, which I tend to give a miss due to the oppressively loud jazz music. There’s a delicious breakfast at Girandole on the 41st floor, and big, heavenly beds in every one of the 178 rooms, including 23 suites. Skip the gauche, ‘70s-styled spa called “Club on the Park,” but do everything else. Service is mwah—superb concierge. Its location in the Shibuya area is a bit of a haul, but nowhere is perfect. Starting at 35,700 yen (about $400.)

3-7-1-2 Nishi Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo
03-5322-1234
www.tokyo.park.hyatt.com

Few do it better than The Peninsula, a three-minute walk from uber-posh Ginza, across from the Imperial Palace. The neighborhood is gorgeous, and the 24th floor’s restaurant, Peter, is a destination in and of itself. Also a big fat winner is their spa, Espa. 314 rooms and 47 suites, from 60,000 yen (around $685. Ouch.)

1-8-1 Yurakucho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo
03-6270-2888
www.tokyo.peninsula.com

Claska is, strangely, one of the only designer-boutique options in the city. 12 rooms (nine Western, three traditional tatami style) and a hopping lobby scene, but you must book early. It’s out of the way, but it’s reasonable: rooms from 12,600 yen, or approx $120 for a single.

1-3-18 Chuo-Cho, Meguro-ku, Tokyo
03-3719-8121
www.claska.com

Eat

Robataya. You just have to. This Roppongi institution is the ultimate in kitsch dining experiences. Western faces line the small, den-like robatayaki restaurant, where two large Japanese men kneeling over a grill will cook up whatever fresh food you’re in the mood for. It’s utterly delicious. I recommend the Kobe beef skewers, fresh shrimp, and any type of veg. Be prepared for a loud welcome and a wacky host called Suzuki. It’s expensive, naturally, but it’s the best meal I’ve had in Tokyo.

1F, 7-8-4, Roppongi, Minatuo-ku, Tokyo
03-3408-9674
www.roppongi-robataya.com

Make your reservation now at Aronia De Takazawa. This stunning restaurant is impossibly delicious and is fully booked far in advance. With only 10 seats, it has some of the most palate-pleasing fare Tokyo has to offer. Set menu, so your only job is getting in.

2/F Sanyo Building, 3-5-2 Arasaka, Minato-Ku, Tokyo
03-3505-5052
www.aroniadetakazawa.com

Their mantra is simplicity and their food lives up to it. Promising an “alluringly comfortable time,” Higashi-Yama’s 10-course tasting menu is a veritable sashimi-gasm. No English menu, so just nod and smile. Closed Sundays.

1-21-23 Higashiyama, Meguro-Ku
03-5720-1300
www.simplicity.co.jp

Set your alarm for a visit to Tokyo’s infamous Tsukiji Market. It’s worth rising in darkness to spend an hour or two slinking amongst the frenetic commercial activity of this working fish market. The tuna auction takes place from 5 to 6:15 a.m. and must be seen to be believed. Be mindful of mad fishermen on moving vehicles; they do not stop for tourists. And dress accordingly—this place is covered in slime. Wear with old sneakers or boots and be sure your trousers don’t drag. I couldn’t bring myself to eat sushi this early, but if you’re game this is the freshest catch on earth. Closed Wednesdays and Sundays.

5-2-1 Tsukiji, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104-0045
03-3542-1111
www.shijou.metro.tokyo.jp/

Meiji Shrine and Harajuku. A trip to the Harajuku area is daunting, but if Gwen Stefani can do it, so can you. Elaborately costumed Japanese teenagers converge here every weekend in a bizarre Japanese youth-culture ritual that has no parallel anyplace else on earth. Tucked away on the opposite side of the Harajuku train station is one of the city’s hidden gems, the Meiji Shrine. Set in a serene park oasis in the middle of Tokyo, a visit here gives visitors a real sense of history and traditional Japanese culture. On a weekend you may witness a wedding, or families paying their respects at the temple, or—my favorite—beautifully attired children in kimonos and slippers.

Once you’ve found Zen, venture into the chaotic experience of Takeshita Street. A guidebook I read aptly called it “a conveyer belt of black hair.” If you’re brave enough to shove your way through the crepes-eating teenagers (yes, crepes) you’ll be rewarded with sensory overload in its purest form. Push through to the end and you’ll come out to Omotesando Hills, where top-brand shops abound. If seeking a late lunch, one of the few options past 2 p.m. is Sin.

Avoid

Not leaving yourself enough time to get to and from the airport. It’s two hours from Narita International into central Tokyo. Cabs cost $300, or there’s the limo bus that stops at the big hotels.

Beware of eating at places without prior recommendation. Oftentimes you’ll be given a set menu, which offers little choice for diversion. GWS spent many nights staring in horror at plates of indistinguishable fried creations, or worse, raw ones. (Is that uncooked chicken?) Your Japanese hosts may be confused by your reticence. My advice? Be gracious, and carry a granola bar.

======================

Jolie Hunt travels on her own dime for more than 50 percent of the year. She is the global head of public relations for Thomson Reuters, appointed April 2008. Prior to that, she served as global director of corporate and business affairs for IBM Corporation She was the director of PR for the Financial Times. She lives between New York and London.

Now read the comments up at the site:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-11-27/gal-with-a-suitcase-2/full

ENDS

Anti-NJ suffrage protests in Shibuya Nov 28 2009. The invective in flyers and banners: “Japan is in danger!”

Posted on December 4, 2009March 15, 2010 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. One of the more interesting proposals from the new DPJ-run Administration is suffrage for Special Permanent Residents. The Cabinet is ready to send a bill to the Diet so that Permanent Residents (in American terms, essentially “Green Card holders”) obtain the right to vote in local elections.

Regardless of whether you support or disapprove (Debito.org is in support, given how difficult it can be to get PR in Japan, not to mention how arbitrary the naturalization procedures are), what is interesting is the invective in the debate by people who oppose it. Numerous and very visible demonstrations by right-wing fringe elements (who also seem to get all xenophobic at, say, Hallowe’en being celebrated in Japan) are resorting to daft arguments that defy calm and common sense. Here are some photos and flyers, received from a witness of one demonstration in Shibuya November 28, 2009, courtesy of ER. Drink in the alarmism and panic by people who are probably going to lose the debate. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

PHOTOS FROM THE PROTESTS (click to expand in browser)

Lower flyer with PM Hatoyama proclaims with menace that the DPJ is trying to give foreigners the right to vote. Chinese and Korean flags background text that is illegible. Upper flyer proclaims opposition to the suffrage measure, declaring it unconstitutional, and throwing in a red herring that American league baseball players Ichiro and Matsui wouldn’t get suffrage in the US. (Okay. But Ichiro and Matsui aren’t AFAIK Permanent Residents there, nor at this time clearly immigrants; and would these opponents of suffrage for foreigners here be in opposition if fellow members of Team Japan COULD as foreigners vote in the US? Somehow I doubt it.)

The sound trucks and picketers in Shibuya depict “JAPAN IS IN DANGER” (nihon ga abunai), and “BLOCK THE DISSOLUTION (kaitai) OF JAPAN”. If I read correctly the yellow sign on the sound truck on the left, they are even claiming that Okinawa will even be snatched away if suffrage goes through! Not sure how that follows, but anyhoo…

This shirt lumps together a completely hitherto unestablished linkage between NJ suffrage and the Protection of Human Rights Bill (the jinken yougo houan, which is another item these alarmists get all dry-throated about). (And for those kanji nerds, the upper kanji are read soumou kukki, which I have looked up and pieced together a translation for; but never mind — it’s pretty esoteric.)

And finally, some more basic “We won’t give the vote to foreigners.” “Now this is a threat to Japan”, etc.

Freedom of speech allows more interesting arguments to be made in their flyers (click on image to expand in your browser), some of which I daresay would qualify as hate speech under UN Treaty:

This one makes the case that granting NJ suffrage is bad because:

1) It gives voting rights to people that don’t want to naturalize (i.e. don’t want to become Japanese), yet want to participate in the politics of this easy-to-live-in country Japan. (Oh, but you see, it’s so easy to naturalize, after all. Not.)

2) They have voting rights already in their home country of nationality (yet want to participate… repeated argument)

3) They don’t want to give up their special rights as Zainichi (such as tax breaks (??)) [even though not all PR are Zainichi, i.e. descendants of former colonial citizens of empire, generational foreigners born in Japan yet not citizens, usually Korean or Chinese “Special Permanent Residents”] (yet want to… repeated argument)

4) There are illegal overstayers and illegal entrants amongst these Permanent Residents [wait, that’s contradictory; that’s not how the visa system works], therefore criminals (yet want to… you get the idea).

5) There are some PRs who hold grudges against Japanese and Japan… [oh?]

6) They will vote for Diet candidates who will allow in huge amounts of immigrants from their mother countries. [I bet these people would make the same argument to take away voting rights from anyone they perceive would vote against their interests. They don’t believe in plurality and majority rule, I guess, even when they are in the majority.]

And more. The final question, with a poke at the DPJ, “We ask you, as Japanese citizens, ARE YOU [GODDAMN] SERIOUS?” [emphasis added to accommodate for expanded font size and boldface]

Here’s another:

This one’s all about protecting Japan from DPJ Dietmembers who are “selling the country off”, with little thunderbolts stabbing photos and points (particularly against Dietmember Madoka Yoriko, the Dietmember apparently submitting the suffrage proposal). Labelled as discriminatory against Japanese (!!), we’ve now rolled into this protest the gaikokujin jinken kihon hou (Basic Law for Human Rights for NJ), which has been on the drawing board for over a decade now) but now suddenly in the crosshairs (naturally; it just might come to fruition). Arguments against it include how it will empower Chinese and North Koreans (the perpetual boogeymen in these debates — it even asserts that the Chinese Embassy is controlling things), and how after only five years they could get the power to vote! (Methinks they don’t actually know how difficult it is to get PR.) And more. Love how the invective changes font sizes for individual kanji to project even more alarmism.

Here’s another target for Zeus’s lightning bolts. Much the same arguments as above (except now accusing the media in being complicit in stifling the debate; that’s rich), except the focus is on the next “sell-out”, Dietmember Yamaoka Kenji and his treasonous gang promoting NJ suffrage and the dissolution of Japan, by merely giving a few hundred thousand NJ (far less than 1% of the entire Japanese population, and scattered around Japan) the right to vote. Maa, you get the idea. Moving on:

Next on the laundry list of grievances against NJ is the claim that the Tsushima Islands (not the Takeshima/Tokdo disputed rocks, but the much larger islands in the channel between South Korea and Kyushu) will be invaded by Korea! Being wheeled out for speeches is pet former LDP xenophobe Hiranuma Takeo (from Okayama; I watched him get reelected in August with a comfortable margin — see his website and enjoy his depiction in English lamenting about how kids nowadays are ignorant of the date his family mansion was burned down) and pet former Japanese military revisionist Tamogami Toshio (who is clearly more in his element with extreme rightists after being kicked out of the JSDF last year). Oh, but these events bring out the self-important, don’t they. Particularly those who predict that any concessions towards foreigners means that Japan gets carved up.

And here’s a petition saying that Yonaguni Island, just off Taiwan, needs a JSDF military base to protect against Chinese invasion of Okinawa. Just imagine what cases these nutcases would come up with if Japan actually had any international land borders.

And here we have the webs the DPJ weaves (as opposed to the webs that the perpetually incumbent LDP wove during its 50 plus years in power): Supporters include leftist extremists and labor unions, socialists, revolutionary laborers, the Chuukakuha, Nikkyousou, the Red Army, North Korean group Chousen Souren, South Korean Mindan, the Buraku Liberation League, the Yakuza, the media (controlled by the DPJ regarding what you see and hear; again, that’s rich), and the kitchen sink. Great fun.

Finally:

In the same vein of how the DPJ has totalitarian powers, this last flyer declares that PM Hatoyama believes the Japanese Archipelago is not the property of the Japanese. And the DPJ’s grand plans include Okinawa getting 30 million Chinese (and, oh, giving Okinawa to China), and the abovementioned Human Rights Bill (which will allegedly enable searches without warrants, and has no Nationality Clause within to ensure that people who man the enforcement mechanisms are kept secure from foreigners). And of course that NJ suffrage thingie. But of course you’re not hearing about all this because the DPJ controls the media. Naturally.

ENDS

Scotchneat on Fuji TV show laying blind biological claims to intellectual Asian kids abroad

Posted on November 21, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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Hi Blog. Guest writing an essay for Debito.org is Scotchneat, regarding how some Japanese media editorial policies bring in tribal tendencies no matter how tenuous the link to the tribe. Read and consider. Arudou Debito in Shizuoka
——————–
Re: Sho Timothy Yano
By Scotchneat

Yano siblings show what’s right with America and what’s wrong with Japan (Comment on Echika no Kagami Kokoro ni Kiku TV aired on Nov. 1, 2009 21:30-22:24エチカの鏡ココロにキクTV 2009/11/ 1(日) 21:30～22:24)

There was a show on Sho Timothy Yano and his sister Sayuri on November 1. on Fuji TV. The two are child prodigies (http://www.facebook.com/l/aa682;en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sho_Yano) . The story of children of a multi-cultural family being free to achieve their goals in a supportive environment shows the positive side of America. However, the spin that show put on the story is very indicative about Japan.

The focus of the story was a mother pushing her children to succeed with much detail of the early childhood education and dietary regime of the two children. The show also put great emphasis on the prejudice that the two were subject to in America based on their Asian heritage, although it seems that the “prejudice” amounted to teasing by their fellow students, and it was unclear whether that was due to Asian heritage or the fact of the great age difference with their peers. The show claimed that Japanese and Koreans often face prejudice in the US, although no real examples were given other than a dramatization showing poor Sho being picked on by some big white bullies.

It is always strange that Japanese will point out the prejudice that exists in America while completely ignoring or being ignorant of the situation in their own country. Here we have two children with a Japanese father and Korean mother. One can only the imagine the prejudice that they would face in Japan. Although any form of prejudice is wrong, it is clear that the Yano siblings are not facing institutionalized prejudice in work and educational opportunities that they would face in Japan. Perhaps this why the show tread so lightly on the subject. One is reminded of the classic, “And you are lynching Negroes” response to the criticisms of the old Soviet Union.

Ironically, it seems that the Japanese, based on my impressions from watching the TV show, would like to claim the Yano siblings as their own. They get to be “Japanese”, despite being born, raised and educated in the US and having a Korean mother (normally any of these factors would raise suspicions of not being properly Japanese) and not speaking Japanese (considered mandatory for citizenship).

Moreover, child prodigies in Japan are not allowed to enter university (aside from a few small experiments), ostensibly because they lack “maturity”. Anyone familiar with Japanese university students will find that quite ironic. However, as often is the case, appeals to logic and common sense are useless in the face of entrenched prejudicial thinking. Basically, allowing two children to attend university (even for purposes of auditing) goes against an engrained dislike of breaking with conformity in Japan.

Perhaps, if the Japanese could get past looking at diet and over ambitious teaching regimes for toddlers, they might see the value of respecting diversity and breaking out of insular thinking.
——————–

ENDS

Japan Times JUST BE CAUSE column: “Demography vs. Demagoguery”

Posted on November 4, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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JUST BE CAUSE
Demography vs. demagoguery: when politics, science collide

The Japan Times Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2009
By DEBITO ARUDOU
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20091103ad.html

Last June, I attended a symposium sponsored by the German Institute of Japanese Studies. Themed “Imploding Populations: Global and Local Challenges of Demographic Change,” I took in presentations about health care, international and domestic migration, and life in a geriatric society.

Nothing surprising. The United Nations and our government acknowledged back in 2000 that Japan was heading for a demographic nightmare: a decreasing population, more old people than we can take care of, not enough young people to pay taxes, and economic decline.

Shocking, however, was the bad science: The presenting Japanese scientists were deliberately ignoring data fundamental to their field.

One panel was particularly odd. Panelists concluded, of course, that Japan must do something to stop this demographic juggernaut. A deputy director general at Japan’s National Institute of Population and Social Security Research even extrapolated that Japanese would be extinct by the year 3000! Yet the prospect of Japan’s decimation was no match for the fear of the foreign element.

During the Q-and-A, I asked: “Sir, only briefly in your presentation do you mention letting foreigners into Japan as a possible solution. However, you depict the process not as ‘immigration’ (imin), but as the ‘active use of the foreign working labor population’ (gaikokujin rodoryoku jinko no katsuyo). Why this rhetoric?”

The speaker hedged a bit, suddenly asserting that Japan is now a crowded island society. To paraphrase, “Immigration is not an option for our country. Inflows must be strictly controlled for fear of overpopulation.”

Afterward, one on one, I reconfirmed his intellectual disconnect. He further cited “a lack of national consensus” on the issue. When I asked if this was not a vicious circle (i.e. avoiding public discussion of the issue means no possible consensus), he gave a noncommittal answer. When I asked if “immigration” had become more of a political term than a scientific one, he begged off replying further.

Seems I opened Pandora’s Box. For the rest of the conference, whenever a Japanese presenter discussed every option for Japan’s future but immigration (they all avoided it), they played dodgeball with questions from other scientists. The ignorance was systematic — only one gave a begrudging acknowledgment that foreigners might be necessary for Japan’s future, although he personally couldn’t imagine it.

As a German expert of demographics told me afterward with consternation, “Demographics is the study of population changes: births, deaths, inflows and outflows. How can the Japanese demographers ignore inflows, even the possibility of them, in their assessments and still think they are doing good science?”

The reason is because this science in Japan has become riddled with politics. We know Japan’s population will continue to drop. Yet extinction still seems preferable to letting people in to stay.

Thus “immigration,” like “racial discrimination” (JBC, June 2), has become another taboo topic. One must not mention it by name, especially if you represent a government-funded think tank.

Then, when you have whole branches of government studiously ignoring the issue (even though last June the Health Ministry proposed training for companies to hire more foreigners, the former Aso Cabinet wouldn’t consider immigration as one of its top five priority plans), we can but say that the ostrich is in full burrow mode.

This is why I’m having trouble seeing any public policy — from the Nikkei workers being bribed to go home after two decades of contributions, to the proposed imports of Indonesian and Philippine nurses — as anything more than yet another “active use of the foreign working labor population.” Or, more honestly put, programs exploiting revolving-door employment regimes.

How seriously can we continue to tempt foreigners with the promise of a life in Japan in exchange for the best years of their labor productivity, only to revoke their livelihoods and pension contributions at the first opportunity, blaming globalization’s vicissitudes? How seriously can we make continued employment contingent upon a qualification hurdle (such as a tough nursing exam) that would challenge even native speakers?

This will only hurt us as a society in future. Again, we are on the cusp of a future in a society that can’t pay or take care of itself. It’s already happening in Japan’s depopulated countryside. Demographic science, if practiced properly, leads inevitably to that conclusion.

So here’s my reality check: Either way, people will come to Japan — even if it means they find an enfeebled or empty island to live in. With a new political administration in government, we might as well consider bringing in people now while we have more energy and choices.

Time out. Just like that guy at the think tank, time for me to be hit with a Debito-style question: “Who decides what Japan wants?”

Answer: We residents do, of course. But the people who represent or make decisions for us are not necessarily receptive enough (or all that developed as human beings) to understand one simple thing: People who appear to be different are not a threat. We cannot expect leaders and bureaucrats to guide us to a world they cannot envision.

So I will keep asking the Debito Questions, and argue that people like us are a viable alternative to Japan’s slow but inexorable decline. For Japan’s sake, we must save us from ourselves. I’ll suggest how next month.

Debito Arudou coauthored the “Handbook for Newcomers, Migrants and Immigrants.” Twitter arudoudebito. Just Be Cause appears on the first Community Page of the month.
ENDS

Asahi Shinbun EDITORIAL: Child abduction in Japan English Translation

Posted on October 22, 2009October 22, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. Official English translation of the Asahi Editorial on the Child Abduction issue, with Japanese in previous entry today. There are some tweaks within, to eliminate “culture” as a factor in some places, while other places add it (as in, the lack of a “culture” of joint custody? Isn’t that a legal issue?). And how about the literal translation of Japan signing the Hague Convention now could be “as ineffective as grafting a shoot onto a different kind of tree” (I’m glad the original Japanese didn’t use an expression involving breeding dogs or something). Again, the need to “protect our own from NJ” is still too strong; the argument should be how everyone in Japan benefits regardless of nationality if you safeguard rights of custody and access a la international treaty. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

============================

EDITORIAL: Child abduction in Japan

The Asahi Shinbun October 21, 2009, Courtesy of Matt D

http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200910210140.html

When the United States and European nations say that more than 100 children have been “abducted” to Japan, they are not lying.

Troubles involving children of international divorces being taken from their countries of residence by their Japanese parents and brought back “illegally” to Japan are creating an international stir.

More than 100 such cases have been filed in the United States, Britain, Canada and other countries so far. Some people even accuse Japan of “encouraging child abduction.”

Last month, a U.S. citizen was arrested in Japan for attempting to snatch back his two children from his Japanese ex-wife who had returned to Japan with them in August.

The trouble occurred because of differences in the rules for dealing with children of international divorces in Japan and the United States. The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, to which 81 nations are signatories, states that, in principle, when a child has been taken from his or her country of residence, the child must be returned to that country. The convention requires the governments of signatory nations to comply.

Among the Group of Eight countries, Japan and Russia are the only non-signatories to the convention. Disputes occur frequently between citizens of signatory and non-signatory nations.

Japan is now coming under increased pressure from abroad to join the convention. John Roos, U.S. ambassador to Japan, last Friday joined his European counterparts in urging Justice Minister Keiko Chiba to act.

Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada told a news conference, “We are approaching the matter with an open mind, but we must also take public opinion into account.”

How should disputes related to child custody be resolved between divorced couples whose cultures differ and who are subject to different laws? The argument that everyone should abide by the rules of the Hague Convention carries conviction.

At present, divorced Japanese parents whose children have been taken abroad by their non-Japanese ex-spouses have no legal recourse. The ranks of Japanese citizens marrying non-Japanese are swelling steadily, and the number tops 40,000 a year. It is probably not realistic for Japan to continue avoiding the Hague Convention.

On the other hand, there are other issues that need working out.

The great majority of parental child abduction cases filed in North America and Europe today involve ex-wives who are Japanese. And a number of these women say they have returned to Japan with their children to escape physical abuse by their ex-husbands. How can such women and their children be saved from their predicament abroad? This question cannot be ignored.

There are cultural and legal differences between Japan and the West. In the United States, visitation rights of divorced parents are clearly defined, but they are not spelled out under the Japanese Civil Code. Joint custody is not a recognized custom in Japan, and the overwhelming tendency here is to award custody to the mother.

Furthermore, courts of law are rarely involved in forcing one parent to hand the child over to the other. If Japan were to sign the Hague Convention now, the result could prove as ineffective as grafting a shoot onto a different kind of tree.

We must never lose sight of one fundamental principle–that each child’s welfare must trump everything. How do we respect the right of children to have a relationship with both parents after they split? This is an issue that has not been properly addressed, but it pertains to all divorces, not only international break-ups.

The time has come for Japanese society to seriously debate the welfare of children of divorced parents, in Japan and overseas.

–The Asahi Shimbun, Oct. 20 (IHT/Asahi: October 21,2009)

朝日社説：「国際離婚紛争—親権や面接権の議論を」

Posted on October 22, 2009October 22, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. The Asahi has this editorial from two days ago, in which it talks about the international attention being brought upon Japan for the child abductions issue. It gives a surprisingly balanced view (official English translation here). Although it threatens twice to devolve into issues of “differing customs and laws”, it does say that the Hague Convention should be signed, joint custody would still be an issue even if it was signed, and that abducted children should be returned. But then it falls into parroting the claim (promoted by crank lawyers like Onuki Kensuke without any statistical evidence) that “not a small number” (sukunakunai) of Japanese wives abducting their children are victims of NJ domestic violence. It also merely alludes to the fact that child abductions happen in Japan regardless of nationality, and that conditions under the Hague would help Japanese as well. Again, there’s just a little too much “Japanese as victim” mentality that somehow always manages to sneak back into any domestic-press arguments. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

国際離婚紛争—親権や面接権の議論を

朝日社説２００９年１０月２０日

http://www.asahi.com/paper/editorial20091020.html

１００人を超す子どもたちが日本へ「拉致」された、と欧米諸国から声が上がっている——。

作り話ではない。国際結婚が破綻（はたん）した後、日本人の元配偶者が居住国から子どもを不法に連れ去ったとされるトラブルが、国際問題化している。米英加などで計百数十件に上っており、「日本は子の拉致を助長する国だ」との過激な批判すらある。

帰国した日本人の元妻から無理やり子どもを取り返そうとして、米国人の元夫が逮捕される事件も起きた。

背景にあるのは、国際離婚の際の子どもの扱いについて定めたルールの違いだ。８１カ国が加盟する「国際的な子の奪取の民事面に関するハーグ条約」では、子が国外に連れ去られた場合、元の居住国へ戻すことを原則とし、加盟国政府は返還の協力義務を負う。

主要８カ国で締結していないのは日本とロシアのみで、加盟国と非加盟国の間で多数のトラブルが起きている。

１６日にはルース駐日米国大使ら欧米の大使が法相に加盟を求めるなど、海外からの圧力は高まる一方だ。岡田克也外相は「前向きに検討したい。ただ、世論がどう受け止めるかということもある」と記者会見で語った。

文化も法も異なる国の間で、離婚後の子の親権や監護権に関する紛争をどう解決するか。ハーグ条約という共通ルールに従うべきだという主張には説得力がある。現状では日本から海外へ子を連れ去られた場合も、自力救済しか手段がない。日本人による国際結婚は着実に増加しており、年間４万件を超えている。条約加盟を避け続けるのは、現実的ではないだろう。

その一方で、解きほぐさなければならない課題も山積している。

今、欧米各国との間でトラブルとなっているのは、元妻が日本人というケースが大半だ。元夫による家庭内暴力の被害を訴えて、逃げるように帰国する場合も少なくない。海外で窮地に陥った母とその子をどう救済するのか、という問いかけは重い。

欧米と日本の法や慣習のギャップもある。米国などでは離婚後に親が子と面会する権利は厳格に定められているが、日本では民法に明記されていない。両親が親権を持つ「共同親権」も日本では認められず、親権決定で母親が優先される傾向がある。裁判所が子の強制的な引き渡しにかかわることも少ない。現状のまま条約に加盟すれば、木に竹を接ぐような事態になる。

忘れてはならないのは「子の利益」を最も重視するという大原則だ。離婚後も両親とかかわりを続ける権利をどう尊重するか。国際結婚に限らず、なおざりにされてきた問題である。

国の内外を問わず、両親の離婚に直面した子どもたちの幸せについて、真剣に議論する時が来ている。

ENDS

Colin Jones in Japan Times: How J media is portraying J divorcees and child abductors as victims, NJ as perps

Posted on October 22, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. Lawyer Colin Jones has hit us with a one-two punch this week in the Japan Times — first by explaining what Christopher Savoie’s arrest and recent release for “kidnapping” his own kids has brought to light, and now about how the domestic media is reacting to it. Predictably, portraying Japanese as perpetual victim, NJ as perp and victimizer. I’ve mentioned the biased NHK report on the subject before (so does Colin below in his article). Now, here’s a deeper roundup and some crystal-balling about how this might affect NJ particularly adversely, as wagons circle and the GOJ protects its own. Excerpt follows. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

===========================

Tuesday, Oct. 20, 2009
Foreign parents face travel curbs?
By COLIN P. A. JONES
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20091020a1.html
Excerpt:

…While Japan signing the Hague Convention is certainly a desirable goal, it is probably convenient for everyone on the Japanese government side of the issue for foreigners to be the bad guys. That way they appear to be dealing with a “new” problem, rather than one that they have already ignored for far too long. From there, the easiest way to prevent further abductions is to require foreign residents seeking to exit Japan with their children to show proof that the other parent consents to the travel. This requirement, I believe, will be the most immediate tangible result of Japan signing the Hague Convention (if in fact it ever does).

If such a requirement is imposed, will it apply to Japanese people? Probably not: Japanese citizens have a constitutional right to leave their country. And foreigners? They apparently lack this right — the re-entry permit foreigner residents are required to have is proof that they are not equally free to come and go as they please!

Full article at
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20091020a1.html
ENDS

Letter to San Francisco Human Rights Commission re Japan Times letter to the editor from exclusionary landlord

Posted on October 10, 2009October 10, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. Busy day today, so let me just throw up this letter I emailed to San Francisco re a Letter to the Editor of the Japan Times. The author of it openly claims to engage in discriminatory practices in the US. If he is a real person, at a real company, then let’s hope San Francisco’s Human Rights Commission investigates and writes back. Worth a try. Feel free to email the HRC yourself, email address included. Arudou Debito in Sapporo, on the road this weekend (may be slow in updating comments and blog)

================================

Human Rights Commission
25 Van Ness Avenue, Room 800
San Francisco, CA 94102-6033
Phone: 415-252-2500
TTY/TDD: 800-735-2922
Fax: 415-431-5764
Email: hrc.info@sfgov.org

From: ARUDOU Debito
Columnist, The Japan Times newspaper (Tokyo)
[address deleted]
debito@debito.org, www.debito.org

October 8, 2009

To Whom It May Concern:

I am a columnist in the Japan Times (see archive of my columns at http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl-ad-all.html), and would like to report a public statement made by a person apparently writing from your jurisdiction publicly admitting to a discriminatory act.

A Mr Andrew J Betancourt, of “Redwood Properties Real Estate” of San Francisco has said, in a letter to the Japan Times dated October 6, 2009, the following:

“As a landlord in San Francisco with over 22 units, I have rejected foreigners just because they were foreigners.”

That letter in the Japan Times here (first letter in the list):

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20091006hs.html

I am sure you will agree that this is a discriminatory practice, and hope you see it within your mandate to investigate and, if necessary, take action against this within the letter of the law.

Thank you very much for your time and for reading this. If possible, please let me know what actions, if any, you take.

Sincerely yours, Arudou Debito, Hokkaido, Japan

Source on Mr Betancourt’s company “Redwood Properties Real Estate, San Francisco“:

ENDS

Terrie’s Take offers the best piece yet on the Savoie Child Abduction Case

Posted on October 5, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. Just received this. It’s good enough to quote in full. It’s the best, most thorough, most balanced opinion yet on the case, in my view. Let’s see if I can do better tomorrow in my Japan Times JUST BE CAUSE column. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

=================================

* * * * * * * * * T E R R I E ‘S T A K E * * * * * * *
A weekly roundup of news & information from Terrie Lloyd.
(http://www.terrie.com)

General Edition Sunday, October 4, 2009 Issue No. 536

+++ WHAT’S NEW

On September 28th this last week, news starting emerging on CNN and several other media about an American dad who was arrested in Fukuoka for trying to abduct his kids back, after his Japanese ex-wife had first abducted them from him in the USA. The Dad, 38-year old Chris Savoie, is now in jail in Fukuoka for some indeterminate period, while the police try to extract a confession from him.

Well… at least we think this is what is going on, because as many readers will know, the police can keep a suspect in detention for months for questioning, with very limited access to a lawyer, until they think the case is ready to send to the courts. This process is partly the reason why Japan has a successful conviction rate (versus a relatively low prosecution rate) in the 99%+ range.

Chris Savoie is not a wet-behind-the-ears foreigner who knows nothing about Japan and its customs. Indeed, he has led a highly successful business career here, and amongst other things built a pharmaceutical business called GNI in Fukuoka that went on to do an IPO on the Mothers market in September 2007. He is a strong Japanese speaker, has a PhD, and according to press reports naturalized as a Japanese national several years ago. So his being in jail is both a surprise and then again it isn’t.

No one other than Savoie himself knows what was going through his mind when he had a friend drive a car along side his ex-wife and two children, aged 6 and 8, while they were walking to school. However, according to reports he jumped out of the vehicle, bundled the kids into the car and raced to the U.S. Consul’s compound in Fukuoka. This was a big mistake, because at the compound he was not allowed entry by the guards, and since his ex-wife had already alerted the police, they soon arrived on the scene and nabbed both him and the kids.

While we don’t know what Savoie was thinking, we do know the facts surrounding his decision to try to get his kids back:

1. His wife is on record in a U.S. divorce court as stating that she would not abduct the kids, despite Savoie’s fears that this might happen.

2. She did abduct the kids and she clearly didn’t expect to return them to the U.S. Indeed, she was taking them to school, meaning that they weren’t just on holiday.

3. As readers will know from our previous commentary on this subject (http://www.japaninc.com/child_abduction), there are NO recorded cases of U.S.-Japanese kids abducted from the U.S. being returned to the custodial parent in the U.S. by court action, and only 3 that were mutually resolved between the parties. This among 102 open cases of abduction known to the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, and possibly several thousand unreported cases which have probably happened over the last ten years.

4. Previous cases we have heard of indicate that it is not a crime for a spouse to take the kids into hiding in Japan. The idea being that the abductor waits until the kids acclimate to them, before resurfacing. If the kids have been with that abducting spouse for more than a year, then typically judges will award that spouse custody on the basis that the kids should have a “stable home life” and better to have them not experience another major change. Until now that’s been the pattern of rulings, anyway.

5. While joint custody may be legally allowed in Japan, there has been no tradition nor legal enforcement of joint custody arrangements. So if a spouse, almost always the Japanese spouse, has possession of the kids and doesn’t want the other parent to see them, then the left-behind spouse can’t.

Given that Savoie has probably been aware of the legal situation, it is not so surprising that he attempted to get his kids back by taking preemptive action. He will have realized that the Family courts in Japan would pay no heed to his U.S. custodial rights (he has sole custody) and that Japan is well known globally as a destination for child abductors, not all of whom are Japanese. If he wanted to see his kids again, kidnapping them back again was about all he really could do. Otherwise he would have joined the ranks of hundreds of other left-behind parents who desperately miss their kids and can’t do anything about it. They are powerless in the face of a 19th century judicial values system.

But what is surprising is that he chose to get his kids back in a way that exposed him to many untested theories. One of these theories has been that it is OK to abduct your kids back. Indeed the police often do turn a blind eye to home disputes and will allow “mini-abductions” to happen. There was a case some years ago where Chinese American Samuel Lui tried, like Savoie, to abduct his child back on the streets of Osaka. Like Savoie, he also had sole custody rights awarded in the USA. Lui failed in his attempt, subsequently turning himself in to the Osaka police, who after questioning him for a day, rapped his knuckles and effectively said, “Don’t do it again.”

But in trying to regain possession of your kids, once trespass and violence or threat of violence are used, that is where a person steps over the line. Savoie must have known that the police here can pretty much arrest people whenever they want. If we’d been him, and were committed to such a drastic action, we would have used our local contacts to hide out for a while and figured out how to get the kids out of the country. As a Japanese, if he’d successfully kept off the police radar for more than 6 months, he might have even been able to apply to the courts for sole custody in Japan and have gotten away with it.

In the last couple of days, details surrounding Savoie’s divorce have emerged that paint him in a less than flattering light. In particular he seems to have been engaged in an affair with a person who has since become his new wife, and that this probably occurred around the same time he brought his ex-wife and kids to the USA. Comments of disgust about his possible manipulation of the ex-wife abound on U.S. comment boards of major news sites carrying stories about the case.

HOWEVER, again, we can only speculate about what really happened, and until the facts are made public, we can probably assume that Savoie was acting logically throughout — in that he was trying to get his soon-to-be ex-wife and kids into a jurisdiction (the U.S.) where the law protects BOTH parents rights and upholds the concept of joint custody. Whether his behavior is cruel or is manipulative is beside the point. Savoie would have known that if his divorce was contested in Japan, he would have been 100% guaranteed to have lost his kids, and would have been at the whim of his wife whether or not he would be able to see them ever again as children.

This situation is caused by the Japanese judiciary’s refusal to accept that divorced parents should have equal access to their children. The view of most judges (based on interviews with judges that we have done in the past) is that kids need to be insulated from the hurt between divorcing parents by giving them just one care-giver. But this is a traditional view and has no basis in fact. Child psychologists outside Japan generally agree that kids need the love and attention of both parents, even if they are divorced. Splitting the kids from one parent naturally causes them to side with the other (Parental Alienation Syndrome: PAS), which causes them to have complexes about the missing parent later in life.

PAS also works in reverse, because as the left-behind parent gets alienated, they simply stop paying child support, causing poverty and depression for the (typically) single-mother family. The fact is that if the Dads are not encouraged to feel a connection to their kids, and given that Japanese family law courts have little or no power to enforce child support judgments, then why would ex-Dads feel like paying for offspring who won’t even acknowledge them as a parent? Yes, the law says they should pay, but given the lack of legal enforcement, building a feeling of responsibility by the Dads is the only other way to get the money flowing again.

This situation is wrong and needs fixing.

Since there appears to be little will by the judiciary to change their ways or values, any change in the status quo needs to be a political one — using outside political pressure (“Gaiatsu”). This is a long-term project unfortunately, but it does give us a possible motive why an otherwise intelligent individual such as Savoie may have been driven to try kidnap his kids when such an undertaking would have such a high possibility for failure.

Finally, our take is that what he did is not right, but under the current legal system, it is understandable. We think similar incidents will happen again until things change.

ends

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Otaru Onsens 10th Anniv #6: How the J media whipped up fear of foreign crime from 2000 and linked it with lawsuit

Posted on September 26, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. In Part Six of this retrospective on the Otaru Onsens Case a decade on, I talk about how the J media misinterpreted the issues revolving around the “JAPANESE ONLY” signs up at Otaru Onsen Yunohana et al., and how they wound up fanning the fires of exclusionism by spreading fear of foreigners (particularly vis-a-vis foreign crime).

As I chart in book “JAPANESE ONLY“, when we first started this case in September 1999, NJ were seen as “misunderstood outsiders”, impaired by “culture” as their monkey on their back. But following GOJ policy putsches by politicians like then-PM Koizumi and Tokyo Gov Ishihara (who in April 2000 famously called upon the Nerima SDF to prepare for “foreigner roundups” to prevent riots in the case of a natural disaster), NJ became a public threat to Japan’s safety and internal security (even though NJ crime was always less than J crime both as a proportion and of course in terms of absolute numbers). Then more doors slammed shut and more signs barring NJ from entry went up — some of them direct copies of the signs in Otaru. Hey, as those onsens indicated, exclusionary signs are not illegal.

Thus, although we made progress in the first six months of the Otaru Onsens Case, getting signs down in two of Otaru’s three exclusionary onsen, we could not compete with the national government and media saturation, and lost all the ground we gained and then some. The media’s overfocus on NJ crime to this day affects the debate regarding assimilation.

Embedded videos of how the media could not escape linking NJ rights with foreign crime follow. Arudou Debito in Sapporo.

===============================

OTARU ONSENS TAPE (1999-2003) PART FOUR

INDEX OF PREVIOUS PARTS HERE

By Arudou Debito (www.debito.org, debito@debito.org)

6) UHB SUPER NEWS Beginning of the new year special on THE YEAR 2001 (Locally broadcast January 3, 2002) (15 minutes). Discourse on the nature of internationalization. Also brings in the spectre of foreign crime and terrorism, first brought up from April 2000 with the “Ishihara Sangokujin Speech”, and later used to justify further exclusionism towards foreigners. Part One of Two

(Part Two features me trying to explain “kokusaika” in terms of immigration and tolerance; love how the commentators then struggle to square the circles:)

7) NHK CLOSE UP GENDAI on FOREIGN CRIME (Nationally broadcast November 7, 2003) (26 minutes). The fix is in: Foreigners and the crimes they bring is now publicly portrayable as fearful, with no comparison whatsoever made to stats of crimes by Japanese (except those connected again with foreigners). A PSA posing as a news special, to warn Japanese about foreigners and their specific methods of crime.

Part One of Three:

ENDS

Otaru Onsens 10th Anniv #5: How the debate still rages on, article by TransPacific Radio

Posted on September 25, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. In their own commemorative-edition article, TransPacific Radio last night came out with a synopsis of how the Otaru Onsens Case is very much alive and well today as an issue, at least in terms of the NJ community and a few NJ pundits in particular (one of whom obsesses over it to the point of distraction and inaccuracy). Excerpting TPR:

In the ten years since the case, much has changed and debate over Arudou’s goal and tactics continues apace. As with any heated issue (and human rights issues are always heated), the disagreements range from perfectly legitimate concerns to objections that are, to put it nicely, based on misinformation or incorrect assumptions.

It is no secret that Arudou has many critics (in the interest of disclosure, it is worth it to point out that while we here at TPR pull no punches with the man and feel it necessary to play Devil’s Advocate at the least, we do know him sociably and will say that, politics aside, he’s a likable guy – just exercise caution before bringing up the topic of Duran Duran.) It is also no secret that, for a variety of reasons, his most vocal critics are almost entirely non-Japanese.

Among the most high profile of those critics is Gregory Clark, whose column in the Japan Times gives him perhaps a wider audience than most other writers on the topic. On January 15th of this year, Clark wrote a risible and deeply disingenuous column for the paper headlined “Antiforeigner discrimination is a right for Japanese people”.

In the column, Clark tries to paint a picture of a contemptible rabble-rousing jerk that he very clearly hints is Arudou (it’s not. As far as we can tell, there is no such person as the one Clark is writing about.) Wondering at Clark’s vitriol and some of his more outlandish statements, this observer settled on the following paragraph:

(…)

TPR article continues here:
http://www.transpacificradio.com/2009/09/24/otaru-10-years/
Have a read and a comment there if you like. More TV media from the case blogged on Debito.org tomorrow. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

Otaru Onsens Case 10th Anniv #4: J Media reportage of the Feb 1, 2001 Lawsuit Filing in Sapporo District Court

Posted on September 24, 2009September 24, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. In Part Four of this retrospective on the Otaru Onsens Case a decade on, I talk about how the J media received and reported on our filing of the lawsuit against Otaru Onsen Yunohana on February 1, 2001. The answer: Not well. Comment from me follows embeds:

OTARU ONSENS TAPE (1999-2003) PART FOUR

INDEX OF PREVIOUS PARTS HERE

By Arudou Debito (www.debito.org, debito@debito.org)

4) HBC NEWS (Locally broadcast March 27, 2001) on the OTARU ONSENS LAWSUIT FIRST HEARING (3 minutes). Otaru City claims impunity from CERD responsibilities due to local govt. status, while Yunohana Onsen tries to claim it was the victim in this case.

5) VARIOUS NEWS AGENCIES (Dosanko Wide, Hokkaido News, STV, and HBC) with various angles on OTARU ONSENS LAWSUIT FILING (Locally broadcast February 1, 2001) (15 minutes total). NB: HBC contains the only public interview given by Defendant Yunohana Onsen owner Hashimoto Hiromitsu. This interview was given live (the only way Hashimoto would agree to be interviewed, so that his comments would not be edited, according to reporter sources), where he states that he has never met us (of course; he always refused to meet us; the only time we would ever cross paths would be November 11, 2002, in the courtroom, when the Sapporo District Court came down in Plaintiffs’ favor).

COMMENT: By parroting the views of racists (such as the owner of Yunohana) and the completely negligent City of Otaru (which claimed on record, as you will see in the broadcasts above, that the UN Convention on Racial Discrimination does not apply to local governments; a complete lie obviated by a cursory reading of the CERD (Article 2 1(c))(*), they wound up perpetuating the dichotomy and convincing some that it’s perfectly okay to discriminate. Hey, it’s not illegal, is it?

This is one more, less obvious, reason why we need a law against racial discrimination in Japan. Because if this is not criminal activity, you wind up promoting the racist side as well for the sake of “balance”. For example, when lynchings were not illegal in the US South, you’d get reporters having to “tell both sides”, as in, “that black man looked at that white woman funny” or “he was getting too uppity, had to make an example”. And it becomes an example. However, if it’s illegal, then it’s a crime, and you don’t have to “give the other side” when the other side is already criminalized. Thus you nip promoting further racism in the bud. This does not happen in the broadcasts above, alas. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

(*) Regarding Otaru City’s assertion of exemption under the CERD, they had a good reason to be confident: Unbeknownst to us until April 15, 2002, during cross-examination in court, it turns out the City of Otaru had been coached by the Ministry of Justice, Bureau of Human Rights, Sapporo Branch, on November 29, 1999, that they need not take any measures to comply with the CERD. See original document in JAPANESE ONLY page 347. Why a GOJ agency entrusted with protecting human rights in Japan would coach a fellow government administration not to bother following the CERD remains one of the more disingenuous things I’ve ever seen in my life.

ENDS

Otaru Onsens Case 10th Anniv #3: “KokoGaHen” Feb 28 2001 and their critique of us plaintiffs

Posted on September 23, 2009September 23, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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OTARU ONSENS TAPE (1999-2003) PART THREE

By Arudou Debito (www.debito.org, debito@debito.org)

3) TV ASAHI tabloid show “KOKO GA HEN DA YO NIHONJIN”, on exclusionism in Wakkanai, Monbetsu, and Otaru (Nationally broadcast Feb 28, 2001) (16 minutes). Complete with brickbats for the Plaintiffs for filing suit from the screaming foreign panelists.

If you would like to download and watch this broadcast in mp4 format on your iPod in one part, click here: https://www.debito.org/video/kokogahen022801.mp4. (NB: if you want it to download as a file, not open up in a different browser: right-click for Windows users, or Control + Click for Macs)

There is also a complete transcript and English translation at https://www.debito.org/KokoGaHen1.html
Comment follows video embed (part one):

COMMENT: I remember clearly three things about that evening:

1) That ALL the panelists (the half-baked comment from Terii Itoh notwithstanding) on the Japanese side of the fence were very supportive — in fact, they wished us luck and success in the lawsuit.

2) That ALMOST ALL of the panelists on the NJ side did the same. In fact, it looked in danger of becoming a boring debate because it seemed so cut and dried. It was a tiny minority who stood up to offer brickbats. They were there, at least two of the panelists told me later, because they were chosen precisely because they had strong views antipathetic towards the case. Hence the emphasis, on foreigners who would oppose the lawsuit, as it would make for better television.

3) That Konishiki, sitting next to me, was goddamn HUGE! His chair, custom-made, needed four people to carry it on stage. We had a few words. Nice guy.

Quite honestly, I miss the show. Nowhere else offers opinions from NJ, however raw and ill-conceived, in their own words on a regular basis. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

Otaru Onsens Case 10th Anniv #2: HBC award-winning broadcast Mar 27, 2001 creates contentious dichotomies

Posted on September 22, 2009September 23, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

OTARU ONSENS TAPE (1999-2003) PART TWO
All TV shows in Japanese (no subtitles or dubbing) with amateur editing
By Arudou Debito (www.debito.org, debito@debito.org)

CONTENTS WITH TEACHING NOTES

2) HBC TV award-winning documentary on OTARU ONSENS CASE (Locally broadcast March 27, 2001). Gives the most thorough rundown of the issue and expresses the issue from a more “Japanese point of view” (i.e. the issue less in terms of racism, more in terms of cultural differences).

Starts here, then has a playlist that goes to the next part. Six parts, runs about 50 minutes total. If you would like to download and watch this broadcast in mp4 format on your iPod in one part, click here: https://www.debito.org/video/HBC032701.mp4. (NB: if you want it to download as a file, not open up in a different browser: right-click for Windows users, or Control + Click for Macs)

Comment follows imbedded video:

COMMENT: We have a decent establishment of the issue in part one, then in subsequent parts we have a whole bunch of pundits claiming this is a “cultural issue” (meaning misunderstandings of our unique J culture make refusals of NJ inevitable to some). Or somehow that it’s a Hobson’s Choice between “human rights of the NJ” and “the survival rights of the business” (which was always a false dichotomy — borne out in retrospect that none of the onsens have gone bankrupt since taking their signs down; quite the opposite in the case of Defendant Onsen Yunohana).

What happens is that the show becomes a”Japanese vs Non-Japanese” thing, where we get lots of old J men and women etc. saying how much they dislike NJ, vs NJ bleating about their rights despite having allegedly different and disruptive bathing rules. We even have Tarento Daniel Carr coming off all sycophantic — blaming NJ for their plight and pointing out their foibles. Teeth begin to itch before long.

Nowhere in the show is there anyone J saying, “Look, all you have to do is kick out those who don’t follow the rules. It’s not a matter of nationality at all. Just a matter of ill-mannered people, which is an individual matter, not a cultural matter.” But no. That would remove the drama that TV news reports are such suckers for, alas.

Of course, HBC gave this a good, earnest try, the best of all the shows that would come out, but it still winds up convincing the viewer that “East is East” in the end. I see this pattern constantly in J news reports — most resort to portraying Japanese as somehow victims, while few ever portray NJ as residents with as much right to life here in Japan as anyone else. And never, but never, is the issue shown as something as simple as stubborn and bigoted people butting heads as individuals regardless of nationality.

Arudou Debito in Sapporo

OTARU ONSENS 10th ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL: Index of online study aids of media on the event

Posted on September 21, 2009September 26, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Good morning Blog, and happy holidays to readers in Japan. This week I will continue a retrospective on the Otaru Onsens Case, with links to media I collected nearly a decade ago, charting the course of the debate, and how it went down a path that in fact ultimately encouraged people to discriminate. The full arc in my book JAPANESE ONLY, but here is a list of primary sources for your viewing pleasure.

If possible (my friend KM is also supposed to be on holiday, but he’s the one who has kindly converted my analog recordings into digital and YouTubed it), I will put up a link to each media every day, the first one this evening. There is also a DVD I can burn for those who wish to use this for educational purposes (contact me at debito@debito.org).

Here’s an outline of the media I have when I first offered this as a study aid three years ago. After that, the playlist, courtesy KM, on YouTube. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

=============================================

OTARU ONSENS TAPE (1999-2003)

All TV shows in Japanese (no subtitles or dubbing) with amateur editing

By Arudou Debito (www.debito.org, debito@debito.org)

Total time: 2 hours 20 minutes. Recorded on one VHS tape in 3X format.

CONTENTS WITH TEACHING NOTES

1) TV ASAHI NEWS STATION on ANA BORTZ DECISION (Nationally broadcast October 12, 1999) (10 minutes). National broadcast. Describes the first court decision regarding racial discrimination in Japan, citing the UN CERD Treaty, and the fact that Japan has no law against racial discrimination.

2) HBC TV award-winning documentary on OTARU ONSENS CASE (Locally broadcast March 27, 2001) (1 hour 2 minutes). Gives the most thorough rundown of the issue and expresses the issue from a more Japanese point of view (i.e. the issue less in terms of racism, more in terms of cultural differences).

3) TV ASAHI tabloid show “KOKO GA HEN DA YO NIHONJIN”, on exclusionism in Wakkanai, Monbetsu, and Otaru (Nationally broadcast Feb 28, 2001) (16 minutes). Complete with brickbats for the Plaintiffs for filing suit from the screaming foreign panelists. NB: Panelists were apparently chosen depending on whether they had strong views about the case. A special emphasis, according to media sources, was given foreigners who would oppose the lawsuit, as it would make for better television.

4) HBC NEWS (Locally broadcast March 27, 2001) on the OTARU ONSENS LAWSUIT FIRST HEARING (3 minutes). Otaru City claims impunity from CERD responsibilities due to local govt. status, while Yunohana Onsen tries to claim it was the victim in this case.

5) VARIOUS NEWS AGENCIES (Dosanko Wide, Hokkaido News, STV, and HBC) with various angles on OTARU ONSENS LAWSUIT FILING (Locally broadcast February 1, 2001) (15 minutes total). NB: HBC contains the only public interview given by Defendant Yunohana Onsen owner Hashimoto Hiromitsu. This interview was given live (the only way Hashimoto would agree to be interviewed, so that his comments would not be edited, according to reporter sources), where he states that he has never met us (of course; he always refused to meet us; the only time we would ever cross paths would be November 11, 2002, in the courtroom, when the Sapporo District Court came down in Plaintiffs’ favor).

6) UHB SUPER NEWS Beginning of the new year special on THE YEAR 2001 (Locally broadcast January 3, 2002) (15 minutes). Discourse on the nature of internationalization. Also brings in the spectre of foreign crime and terrorism, first brought up from April 2000 with the “Ishihara Sangokujin Speech”, and later used to justify further exclusionism towards foreigners.

7) NHK CLOSE UP GENDAI on FOREIGN CRIME (Nationally broadcast November 7, 2003) (26 minutes). The fix is in: Foreigners and the crimes they bring is now publicly portrayable as fearful, with no comparison whatsoever made to stats of crimes by Japanese (except those connected again with foreigners). A PSA posing as a news special, to warn Japanese about foreigners and their specific methods of crime.

Apologies that there is no footage of the actual District Court Decision of November 11, 2002.

All details and transcripts of many of these and other shows are available for students and scholars in books:

● JAPANESE ONLY: THE OTARU HOT SPRINGS CASE AND RACIAL DISCRIMINATION IN JAPAN (Akashi Shoten Revised 2006, ISBN 4-7503-9018-6)

● ジャパニーズ・オンリー　小樽温泉入浴拒否問題と人種差別（単行本　明石書店２００４年改訂版　ISBN: 4-7503-9011-9)

Ordering details at www.debito.org/japaneseonly.html

Original documentation and articles in English and Japanese at www.debito.org/otarulawsuit.html

Other bilingual interviews and radio broadcasts/podcasts available at

www.debito.org/publications.html#INTERVIEWS

More Japan Times articles on issues connected with rights of non-Japanese residents at

www.debito.org/publications.html#JOURNALISTIC

Thank you for your interest in this case and in this issue! Arudou Debito in Sapporo, Japan

J population drops, Internal Ministry converts it into rise, excludes NJ from tally.

Posted on August 15, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. Here’s one way to tip any undesirable downward trend in statistics: change the paradigms. In this case, the Internal Ministry considers “Japanese population” not only as births and deaths, but also inflows. That is, inflows of citizens only. Once again, inflows (or current residency) of foreigners are not considered part of the “population”, even though they pay taxes and contribute to Japanese society like any other living breathing soul.

Know of any other G8 country which refuses to include its foreign population as part of its total population? The fact is, given that we get plenty more than 45,914 foreigners per year coming in, the main thing keeping Japan’s population in the black is immigration. But again, that’s a taboo topic in public. We can’t act as if Japan actually needs foreigners, after all. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

=======================================

Number of citizens residing in Japan rises for 2nd straight year
Wednesday 12th August, 03:08 AM JST
http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/number-of-citizens-residing-in-japan-rises-for-2nd-straight-year

TOKYO —

The number of Japanese citizens residing in the country rose for the second year to over 127 million as of the end of March, partly because more people returned to the country than left after Japanese companies pulled back from overseas operations, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications said Tuesday.

The total number of citizens residing in Japan now stands at 127,076,183, up 10,005 from a year earlier, when calculated based on the number of citizens listed on basic resident registers nationwide, the ministry’s data showed. Japan saw more deaths than births, translating into a net drop of 45,914, but the decline was offset by factors including an increase in the number of Japanese people returning from overseas.

ENDS

Japan Times JUST BE CAUSE Column: “Unlike Humans, Swine Flu is Indiscriminate”

Posted on August 5, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

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JUST BE CAUSE
Unlike humans, swine flu is indiscriminate
By DEBITO ARUDOU
The Japan Times: Tuesday, Aug. 4, 2009

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20090804ad.html

The biggest news a few months ago, now affecting every prefecture in Japan, has blipped off our radar screens. For the time being.

I’m talking about the H1N1 swine flu virus that originated in Mexico, took wing across oceans and continents, and eventually settled down here despite our government’s panicky measures.

Time to learn some lessons. We need to prevent a public panic from once again causing discrimination against the ill.

H1N1 was first reported last March in Mexico, with an apparently high mortality rate. It was also newsworthy because for the first time we were charting a new virus from patient zero in real time.

But ideas spread faster than viruses. Once the former reached our fine land, Prime Minister Taro Aso, afraid of being seen as a “do-nothing” in the face of looming elections, turned uncharacteristically proactive — as in, taking measures against the outside world.

This is a government, remember, which institutes laws expressly targeting foreigners in the name of, quote, “effective prevention of infectious diseases and terrorism.” So, predictably, we prescribed hypochondriac policies against them.

Almost immediately our shores were scrubbed. Airports instituted (fortunately, pervasive and noninvasive) heat scanners to track cowls of fever. Ground staff donned violet spacesuits that, though not hermetic, were plenty intimidating. Whole countries were suddenly scarlet-lettered into no-go zones just because of a domestic case or two.

Conditions soon deteriorated. The first people diagnosed with H1NI in Japan were incoming foreign tourists. They were quarantined in hotels (not hospitals) with nothing but instant curry rice for company. Arriving international flights were grounded for hours while everyone was screened. The government forced international conferences to cancel because they might attract foreigners. Mainichi and Kyodo reported hospitals turning away feverish Japanese who happened to have foreign friends.

Just when it looked like we were going to go all SARS-scare again (when Japanese hotels in 2003 were refusing all foreigners just because one Taiwanese tourist caught that new variety of pneumonia), Golden Week intervened. Japanese returning from vacation imported contagion. It was no longer a “foreign” virus.

In a sense, good: That pre-empted pseudo-scientists from espousing the ever-resurfacing canards of Japan’s tribal invulnerability. (During SARS, these dunderheads were even theorizing, for example, that Japanese speakers spread less disease because they don’t spit when talking.)

But that didn’t immunize the public against discrimination. Taking advantage of the anonymity offered by the phone and Internet, Japanese patients received bullying messages and phone calls warning them not to spread their pox, as if these Typhoid Marys had become brain-dead zombies ready to bite Japanese society into dystopia.

The media propagated it further. Drafting the assistance of over-cooperative airlines, news broadcasts reported the seating arrangements of infected people. Then panelists wondered if anyone within a two-meter radius (the reputed range of the virus) of these individuals could rejoin our healthy society.

They even filmed airport quarantine rooms, where sweaty-handed bureaucrats tape-measured a two-meter distance between chairs down to the centimeter. Like Aso, everyone was so afraid of being seen to do nothing that they did too much.

Finally, Health Minister Yoichi Masuzoe called for reason: Calm down, everyone. It’s just the flu! Not much different than what we get every season.

Good, but this too is symptomatic: It’s usually not until Japanese become the target of discrimination that government agencies try to soothe the hotheads.

Let’s learn our lessons already. This will not be the last pandemic we experience in our lifetimes. The media is predicting a second round of H1N1 within a year. Even if that doesn’t happen, we will undoubtedly track future bugs in real time as they spread and sicken. That’s what bugs do — that’s how they survive. And it seems whipping up public fear is how media networks survive.

But if humankind itself is to survive, with any degree of integrity and protection for the people in weakened circumstances, we must learn not to succumb to what perpetually plagues the human condition: ignorance and panic. If people don’t keep a sense of perspective, they could wreak more damage than the flu did.

So let’s keep our radar screens on how these cycles of discrimination recur.

Beware the poxy mouths of irresponsible media, spreading misleading data from panic-addled pundits and profiting pharmaceutical companies (you think surgical masks actually filter out microscopic viruses?). Also, question the government’s readiness to treat Japan as a hermetically sealable island, walling it off from foreigners.

These are unhealthy trends that authorities rarely reflect upon or forsake. They even officially encourage the wagging tongues and clacking keyboards of anonymous ignorant, petulant bullies. The government might keep the germ out, but they won’t stop infectious ideas breeding and hurting people anyway.

So the lessons to be learned: Let cool heads prevail over feverish rumor; let sensible precautions and accurate information prevail over quick-fix elixirs and snake-oil social science; and for heaven’s sake, stop blaming the victim for being sick!

Above all, let everyone realize that infections, unlike people, are indiscriminate.

Debito Arudou coauthored the “Handbook for Newcomers, Migrants and Immigrants.” Twitter arudoudebito. Just Be Cause appears on the first Community Page of the month. Send comments to community@japantimes.co.jp
The Japan Times: Tuesday, Aug. 4, 2009
ENDS

Naturalized J citizen Jiei stopped by Osaka cops for Gaijin Card check. Shitsukoidom ensues

Posted on July 25, 2009July 25, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. Here’s an important bellwether essay from Jiei, a fellow naturalized Japanese citizen who was singled out for a Gaijin Card Check by Osaka Cops last night. He tells the story of how he stood up for himself despite being explicitly suspected of being drunk or on drugs, and for sitting on a swingset while white when taking a break from jogging in a park. He cites the law back to the cops chapter and verse, but they undeterredly continue the questioning and racial profiling. I won’t give away the ending.

The point is, this is going to happen more and more often as more people naturalize, and more Japanese of international marriages come of age and get hassled for not looking “Japanese” enough to allay cops’ suspicion. This is not legally sanctioned, in any case. Which means people must learn about their rights and assert them, because there are no other checks and balances here. Read on.

Thanks to Jiei for bringing this up to government-registered human rights group FRANCA. Join us if you like. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

REPORT BEGINS
============================
Like Debito, I am a former American naturalized Japanese citizen. While I don’t look Japanese, I also had to jump over many hurdles for my naturalization application to be accepted by the government a year ago, and now I’m proud to call myself a Japanese and be recognized as a fully contributing member of this country.

Living here has had its ups and downs; I’ve been stopped at least 10 times by the police when I was a foreigner (once when I was leaving my apartment in the morning to go shopping because I “just looked suspicious”!), yet I never tried to exercise my full rights as Debito did, partly because of ignorance and partly because of fear.

However, tonight (09/7/25) I just had my first experience being stopped by the police as a Japanese citizen, and the situation was different. This time, I was going jogging around the park near my house in Osaka prefecture around midnight (something I always do since I work late and cannot go jogging during the daytime.) The park is a popular spot for teenagers to hang out at night, so I was not alone that night.

I took a short rest on the swings and then tried to leave the park from the main entrance to continue my run, when two “around 30” police officers on bicycles approached me from behind and suddenly stopped me with a loud “Konbanwa! Doko ikun’ desuka?” I removed my headphones and took a deep breath since I knew exactly where this was heading, and tried to prepare myself for the coming debate.

The two officers “greeted” me again and the proceeded to surround me on both sides as if to stop me from escaping easily. I was looking down at my cell phone the time, so the officer on the left asked if I was drunk or on drugs. Slightly amused, I closed my eyes and touched my nose with my index fingers to show that I wasn’t drunk. The one on the right looked at my face and simply said “Torokusho!” I asked him what he was talking about, and he repeated “Gaikokujin torokusho!” while making a rectangular symbol with his hands.

I stared at him for a moment and replied, “I am a Japanese citizen, I don’t have any alien registration card.” He looked genuinely shocked and asked me again twice if I was indeed Japanese. I simply responded,”I am Japanese.” When asked to show my driver’s license to prove it, I replied, “I refuse!”

The officer on the left then ordered me to empty my pockets and show my identification, so I said “Sure, I have my identification right here!” and pulled a copy of the “Keisatsukan Shokumu Shikkou Hou” that I always keep in my wallet, and showed the officer on the right the letter of the law concerning voluntary questioning by police officers.

Surprised, he asked, “What is this? Why did you pull something like this out?” I told them it’s the law concerning police activity and asked them if my actions (kyodou) seemed strange (fushin) to them and if they had probable cause (soutou na riyuu) to stop me.

When they both responded with a strong and clear “yes,” I asked if going for a jog is a crime in Japan. They both responded no, and then asked if I lived near the park. I deflected the question and said that it was quite rude of them to approach me and assume I was a foreigner and treat me like this.

The officer on the right laughingly apologized but then continued to ask if I was “haafu” or where I was born. I told them I refuse to answer any questions because police questioning is voluntary. They asked me “Why do you keep a copy of the law in your pocket? Are you trying to hide anything?” I spread my palms out to show I had nothing hidden, and replied that I was studying law and asked them if they were aware of the constitution or the code of criminal procedure.

The officer on the left said, “then you must know that voluntary questioning by police officers is a legally sanctioned activity (keisatsu katsudou.) I replied “That’s true, and it is also voluntary, so I have the legal right to refuse your questioning.” The officer on the right then repeated, “but we have the right to stop and ask you.” I repeated, “I have the right to not answer.”

This was repeated many times and after calmly debating with them for five minutes about what the meaning of “voluntary” (nin’i) is, and after repeated requests to show my license, the officer on the right asked if this was my first time getting stopped by the police, to which I said, “What do you think? With a face like this I’ve been stopped many many times in my life.”

The officer on the left finally changed his attitude and said, “Well then, at least tell us your name, job, family member’s names and where you live!” Naturally, I refused this also and said, “if you want to search me or see my license, you first need to arrest me or have a warrant. I am not on drugs, nor am I a criminal. I have been singled out for looking different many times now and I refuse to put up with it any longer. I know the law, so I honestly want to be arrested and take this to court; I’m sure I’ll win in the end even if I have to take this to the Supreme Court!”

After asking if they had their handcuffs ready and if they were going to arrest me, they both laughed and the officer on the left said, “Who’s talking about arresting you, we just want to see your identification! Don’t you have anything?” I then pulled out my wallet and waved it around. “My identification is in this wallet but I refuse to show it and if you want to see it, arrest me here and now.”

After more repetitive requests to identify myself and prove I am Japanese, they received a police report on their walkie-talkies, and finally sped off on their bicycles without saying anything or even looking back at me.

All in all, they were actually very calm about the whole thing; they seemed half amused to debate the meaning of the law with a “suspicious foreigner looking type” like me. To tell the truth, I was surprised at how easily they gave up without ask me to go to a police station with them, trying to search my pockets, or even actually see my driver’s license.

While it may sound that I was fearless, I was actually quite nervous and my legs and hands were trembling, so I forgot to ask to see their badges and note their information or try to walk away during the questioning.

Yet when I returned home and told my native Japanese friends about this, they were not so supportive of me. They all simply asked why I didn’t show my license first and not go through any hassle. I told them that this was a bigger issue about legal rights. I am definitely not the fighting type, and I basically keep to myself and try not to make any waves. However, I refuse to be treated as a second-class citizen in my own country, and if need be, I am absolutely willing to risk being arrested for standing up for what I believe in.

I’m sure that I will be stopped again in the future many times, along with all other non-Asian looking people in Japan, but I plan to stand up for my rights every time. While confronting the police and asserting your rights so clearly like this is not for everyone, I hope that my experience proves that calmly using the law to assert your rights does work in Japan, and can make a difference!

ENDS

ADDENDUM:

By the way, concerning the legality of photographing police officers’ badges…unfortunately Japan has no clear law concerning image rights (shozoken) and the leading supreme court decision in the Hayashi Masumi case found that while people generally have the right to not have their images taken and published without reason, image rights still have to be considered specially in each case based on the situation…leaving things still unclear.

However, considering that they were public servants on duty and I needed to confirm their identity since I didn’t have a pen to write it doen, I think that I would have a case if it went to court. However, it would take a clear Supreme Court verdict to give a definitive answer. In any case, as seen from the many shokumu shitsumon videos uploaded on YouTube, the police aren’t actively pursuing fighting this.

ENDS

IHT/Asahi on Japan’s reticence to sign Hague Treaty on Child Abduction

Posted on July 17, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

twitter: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. Follow-up to the biased coverage by NHK two days ago on this issue of international divorces, we have the Japanese media once again quoting crank lawyer Ohnuki, depicting Japanese divorcees as refugees of violent NJ spouses. “Abductions”, of course, gets rendered in tentative “quotes”, and also you see how Japanese spouses have their cake and eat it too, with an example of the British legal system returning a child to the J side. Japan hasn’t signed the Hague Convention on Child Abductions yet, and why should it increase expectations of international cooperation by doing so?

I’ll say it:

The GOJ doesn’t want to cooperate with these international treaties because we have enough trouble getting Japanese to have babies. We don’t want to surrender them to NJ overseas. I have heard that theory off the record from an international lawyer quoting somebody in the ministries.

And I bet that even if Japan signs the Hague, it won’t enforce it (similar in the ways it will not enforce the CCPR or the CERD treaties). Why would the GOJ ever give more power over custody to NJ than it would its own citizens, who can already abduct and shut out one parent after divorce thanks in part to the koseki system? Arudou Debito in Sapporo

=============================
Tokyo in bind over treaty on child abduction
BY MIYUKI INOUE AND SATOSHI UKAI
THE ASAHI SHIMBUN 2009/7/16
http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200907160027.html
Courtesy of Paul Wong

Broken international marriages involving Japanese in which one parent takes offspring overseas without the other’s consent are on the rise, putting the government in a bind about how to deal with such cases.

The question is whether Japan should be a party to an international treaty aimed at settling such parental “abduction” disputes across national borders.

Tokyo is under pressure–from within and from outside–to join the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction of 1980, which now has 81 parties.

The rise in cases involving Japanese parents as “abductors” has led to stepped-up calls from countries in North America and Europe for Tokyo’s accession.

Some divorced parents say their children would not have been taken overseas by their ex-spouses had Japan ratified the treaty; or it would have been much easier to have them returned.

Opponents, however, say Japan’s ratification would make it difficult for victims of domestic violence to flee with children.

There are also cultural and systematic factors to consider, given that under Japanese law only one parent is granted custody of offspring after a divorce.

The convention, which went into force in 1983, requires a child to be promptly returned to the country of their habitual residence.

It also requests contracting parties to take “all appropriate measures” to expedite the return of a child.

Senior officials and diplomats of the United States, Britain, France and Canada held a news conference in Tokyo in May to press Japan to join the treaty.

They said if children of broken marriages are taken to Japan, a non-party nation, there is “little realistic hope” of having them returned.

According to embassies here, there have been 73 child abductions by Japanese parents from the United States, 36 from Britain and 33 each from Canada and France. [NB: Time period not indicated.]

Kurt Campbell, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific affairs who is visiting Japan from today, told a Senate committee in June that he would raise this issue in his first meeting with Japanese officials.

As it stands, the Foreign Ministry can only serve as “liaison” when it receives an inquiry from other countries.

The government has said it “is seriously considering” accession as it would help Japanese parents retrieve children from their ex-spouses.

A 40-year-old self-employed Japanese woman who faced difficulty regaining custody of her children said Japan should join. In 2007, her British husband went on a “trip” to Britain with the children, aged 5 and 9, and then told her they would never return. Communications were severed.

It took a month and a British lawyer’s services before she located the children at a school near London.

She finally got them back after a divorce mediation in Britain. She said lawyer fees alone cost 7 million yen to 8 million yen.

“Had Japan been a party to the treaty, their whereabouts would have been known right away,” she said. “It should have been much easier, too, to get them back.”

Another self-employed woman, 51, was cautious, however. She had long been a victim of domestic violence by her American husband.

The family moved from the United States to Chiba Prefecture in 1992, and she fled with two children to Tokyo in 1995.

She is now on an international wanted list on suspicion of abduction because the husband, saying the mother and children’s legal abode is in the United States, brought the matter before U.S. authorities.

The woman, who says “all I could do was flee,” thinks the treaty would make such escape difficult.

Lawyer Kensuke Ohnuki, who handles about 200 divorces among international matches a year, says most child “abductions” by Japanese women are a result of spousal violence.

The treaty does not take a parent’s reason for fleeing into consideration, he said.(IHT/Asahi: July 16,2009)
ENDS

Japan Times, NHK, Terrie’s Take & Mainichi on Japan’s child abductions from broken marriages, and Hague Treaty developments

Posted on July 15, 2009July 15, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. I received word from Paul Wong yesterday that NHK would be doing a segment this morning on child abductions after divorce, and Japan’s negligence towards signing the Hague Convention on this.

=========================
昨日、ＮＨＫのディレクターさんより連絡が来ました。

また、国会勉強会も7.15(水)１３時です。
ぜひ、みなさんのサイトでもご案内お願いします。
〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜〜
以下ＮＨＫから頂いたメールです。

さて、国際離婚とハーグ条約についてですが、
７月１５日（水）のおはよう日本特集枠で放送する運びとなりました。
朝の７時台に全国放送をいたします。
具体的には７：００−７：４５のどこかで放送する予定ですが、
政局関連や事件・事故・災害などの場合は延期する可能性もございます。

また、ハーグ条約賛成・反対どちらかを一方的に訴えるというものではなく、事例を紹介し視聴者の方に考えていただくという趣旨になろうかと思いますが、その点ご容赦ください。

また何か新しい情報などあれば、いつでもご連絡ください。
今後ともどうぞよろしくお願いいたします。
=========================

As the Japan Times reports:
/////////////////////////////////////
Japan’s allies urge government to sign Hague convention on child abduction
By KAZUAKI NAGATA
Friday, May 22, 2009
Full article at http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20090522a4.html
Excerpt:

The United States, Canada, France and the U.K. jointly urged the Japanese government Thursday to sign the Hague Convention on international child abduction, which is aimed at preventing parents from wrongfully keeping or taking their children to their countries before and after they divorce.

“Our joint statement demonstrates that very clearly Japan’s allies are united in their concern regarding this tragic issue of international child abduction,” said Michele Bond, a deputy assistant secretary for consular affairs for overseas citizen services at the U.S. Department of State, at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo. “We are acting together at this point to ensure that our concern for the children is heard.”

Diplomats from the U.S., Canadian, French and British embassies attended the press conference.

The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction is a multilateral treaty that entered into force between signatory members on Dec. 1, 1983.

The convention states that children who are abducted from their country of residence, or retained in a state that is not their country of normal residence, must be returned promptly to their original country of residence.

More than 80 countries have signed the convention, but Japan is the only nonsignatory state among the Group of Seven nations.

Among abductions involving Japanese whose parents have wrongfully taken or kept their children, Britain has reported 36 cases since 2003, with none of them resolved. There are currently 11 active cases, said David Fitton, deputy head of mission to the British Embassy in Japan. France has had 26 cases, half of which are still active, and the U.S has 73 active cases.
///////////////////////////////////
Full article at http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20090522a4.html

I watched the NHK report this morning, and was, frankly, gravely disappointed. After giving some stats on international divorce (around 20,000 cases last year, about double that ten years ago), NHK gave three case studies in brief:

1) One of an an American father in America who had lost his child to his abducting Japanese ex-wife. Point: How he loves his child and would like to be part of her life.

2) One of a Japanese mother with custody of kids trapped in America working waitress jobs because her Japanese passport has been impounded by an American court ruling (which is bullshit, as she can go to any Japanese consulate in the US and get new passports without the permission of both parents; the converse is not true), with bonus time devoted to how much she and her daughters would like to return home, see relatives, and eat Japanese food.

3) One of a Japanese mother from an international divorce who abducted her kids to Japan; she opposes Japan signing the Hague Convention because of her violent American husband (which she somehow blamed on differing cultures), and wouldn’t want to give up custody to him.

Then we had a Hitotsubashi prof who said Japan must sign because child abduction was unjust. And a lawyer named Onuki (who has represented these cases before, and claimed in the international media that somehow 90% of these abductions are due to NJ domestic violence.)

It even concluded with the typical relativities (i.e. how everyone’s doing it, therefore Japanese can too), mentioning in passing alleged cases of how NJ mothers were abducting Japanese kids overseas (meaning that now suddenly Japanese fathers were kawaisou; the bottom line was that Japanese are being kawaisoued). The MOFA was quoted as not being able to comment on whether Japan would be able to sign Hague.

No mention at all was made by NHK that there has not been a single case of children being returned to the NJ parent by Japanese courts (the converse is untrue), that Japanese are committing crimes (and not honoring overseas court custody rulings, such as the Murray Wood Case), or that (and I speak from experience of not seeing my kids for about five years now) the Koseki system will deny all title and access to Japanese parents too after divorce.

NHK tried too hard to be sympathetic to either abducting Japanese mothers, or the position of Japanese in general (not the kids and how they’re affected by not having both parents in their lives). What a crock.

Consider that biased coverage in light of the following articles. If you find the NHK report online, please feel free to send a link to the Comments section.

Other links on Debito.org:
https://www.debito.org/?p=2095
http://www.fromtheshadowsmovie.com/
https://www.debito.org/?s=%22child+abduction%22
Arudou Debito in Sapporo

///////////////////////////////////

* * * * * * * * * T E R R I E ‘S T A K E * * * * * * *

A weekly roundup of news & information from Terrie Lloyd.
(http://www.terrie.com)
General Edition Sunday, May 24, 2009 Issue No. 518

After the U.S. presidential election, the first foreign trip by his new Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, was to Japan. This was presumably to send a symbol to the Japanese that the U.S. values their relationship and not to cash in all those U.S. Treasuries that they are holding! Then in a symbolic action within a symbolic trip, Clinton visited with the Japanese families whose children and relatives were abducted by the North Koreans over a 30-year period since the 1970’s.

Clinton told reporters, “On a very personal and, you know, human basis, I don’t know that I’ll be meeting as a secretary of state any more than I will be meeting with them as a wife, a mother, a daughter, a sister.” This was the right thing to say in response to a situation that has the Japanese public outraged.

But there was one segment of the population in Japan that felt Clinton’s words were more like daggers than bandages. That segment is the foreign parents of children from international marriages, who have had their children kidnapped by the Japanese parent back to Japan, never to see them again. For these people the North Korean abductions of possibly 70 or 80 people pales into insignificance when compared to the hundreds (yes, that’s the number the CRC-Japan people are stating) of kids abducted to Japan.

And while there have been a handful of those North Korean abductees returned to Japan, there has NEVER been a successful return of a mixed nationality child to the foreign parent through diplomacy or court action. Further, U.S. officials say they only know of 3 cases where mutually agreed returns have occurred. And yet many court actions have been brought against Japanese abductors over the years.

This unbelievable state of affairs has started to cause major headaches for both legal and diplomatic agencies of Japan’s allies, and the U.S. in particular appears to be looking for ways to pressure Japan to mend its ways and to institute the necessary legal changes needed so as to support and enforce an eventual signing of the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. Japan is the only member of the Group of Seven not to have signed this important treaty.

The pressure ratcheted up several weeks ago when the embassies of the U.S., Canada, Britain, and France, along with various representatives from other nations and foreign parents trying to get their kids back, participated in a joint conference to discuss the issue and taking action that will precipitate change. While similar conferences have happened in previous years without much more than a bout of hand-wringing, this time, the U.S. and the other Japanese allies held a rare press conference to urge Japan to sign the treaty. Furthermore, they provided information on cases where foreign parents have been cut off from their kids.

The U.S. said it has been informed of 73 abduction cases of 104 kids with a U.S. parent but where that parent is not resident in Japan, and another 29 cases where the U.S. parent is here. The other allied nations reported an additional 95 cases. As this writer can testify, these cases are just the tip of the iceberg. Most foreign parents give up after going through the farcical proceedings of the Japanese Family Courts — realizing that there is no justice when there is no law to even enact justice in the first place.

For, above all, we need to remember that Japan has no concept of joint child custody and that abduction by one parent is not a crime. The judiciary in its wisdom still follows the feudal “Iie system” (House system) whereby it believes that the child should belong to one house only. Certainly, having a child undergo emotional surgery by cutting off one of the parents is a lot cleaner than the bickering and fighting that many western parents go through in their shared custody divorces. But for those parents adult enough to share their kids civilly, the law offers only heartbreak and no compromise. Officially, of the 166,000 children involved in divorces in Japan every year, less than 20% of them wind up with the father, and of course in the case of foreign fathers, the number is zero. One particularly poignant case of child abduction does not even include the Japanese parent absconding with the child, but rather her parents — who were able to convince a Japanese judge to give the child to them based on trumped up charges, rather than return her to her foreign father.

The story of Paul Wong is a story that epitomizes the problem — that of the judiciary and their slanted views on untrustworthy foreigners versus nice decent Japanese. Wong was happily married in the U.S. to a Japanese women, Akemi, and after many years of partnership, they finally had a daughter, Kaya. Unfortunately, his wife was diagnosed with a brain tumor before the birth in 2004 and this got much worse following the birth. Akemi and daughter Kaya went to stay with the grandparents in Japan one last time before she died in 2005. Akemi on her death bed asked Wong to leave Kaya in Japan with her parents for a while, so that Kaya could learn something about her heritage. Wong kept his promise, and after his wife died he made the decision to settle down in Japan so that Kaya could continue seeing her grandparents. He left Kaya with the grandparents while working his lawyer job in Hong Kong and looking for a transfer to Japan. He commuted back and forth for a year and eventually found a position in Japan.

After returning to Japan, he found that the grandparents wouldn’t let Kaya return to him, and they eventually claimed to the police that Wong had sexually molested Kaya during a visit — something which has since been disproven after a medical exam. Wong took the case to court, and despite evidence that contradicted the grandparents claims, the Judge decided that “The grandparents would have no reason to not make such claims,” so he sided with them and awarded custody to them, despite them being in their 70’s. After they die, Kaya will become a ward of the state.

And thus Wong was arbitrarily banned from access to his own daughter. He knows where she lives and where she goes to school, but thanks to trespass laws, he is unable to visit her. Wong reckons one of the grandparents’ motives for taking Kaya is the monthly government stipend they get for her, given that they are desperately poor themselves — and of course now they have a small piece of their dead daughter, so the emotional ties must be strong as well. So what to do? Wong has since spent millions of yen trying to work with the Japanese legal system, but has been stymied at every step. As other foreign parents quickly find out, there is no pre-trial disclosure of evidence and no cross-examination rights. Further, there is no ability to bring in outside counselors and child psychology experts to testify for either side. In the end, the judge makes their own decision, based on serial presentations, with little apparent interest in whether each side is telling the truth. Indeed, several years ago, this writer interviewed a retired Family Court judge who intimated that he expected both sides in a child custody dispute to be lying, so “evidence” didn’t really mean much.

So there really isn’t much that Wong can do, except hope that the recent pressure for Japan to sign the Hague convention will start a legal review of the current family law system. There are over 15 domestic NPO groups who are hoping for the same changes — since these outmoded laws also affect Japanese parents as much as foreign ones. But we think change will be unlikely. So perhaps Wong should take the advice of an old friend of this writer, who had a single piece of advice to counter the Japanese condition…

“…Get yourself another family, and next time don’t get divorced in Japan!”

For more on this subject, go to www.crnjapan.net.

////////////////////////////////////////////////
Japan urged to sign treaty against parental child abductions
(Mainichi Japan) June 2, 2009, Courtesy of Jeff K.
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20090602p2a00m0na014000c.html
Diplomats from the U.S., France, Canada and the U.K. are pressing Japan to sign an international treaty against parental child abductions.

The number of cases of parental child abduction being committed by Japanese is rising sharply. Officials from the four embassies say there have been 168 reported cases to date involving 214 children, and that there could be many more.

As a result, they are urging Japan to sign the Hague Convention, which came into force in 1983 and provides a legal means for returning abducted children. The country’s refusal to sign means that the government is not legally required to release any information in such cases and prevents it from soliciting help in repatriating children to Japan.

“If the well-being of the child is given top priority, he or she should be brought up with links to both parents. For a situation to not be addressed at all is a big problem,” said the officials during a press conference at the U.S. Embassy in Minato Ward, Tokyo, on May 21.

The U.S. Embassy reported one case of a Japanese woman divorcing her American husband, taking their child back to Japan with her and preventing her former husband from seeing the child. In another case, letters sent by a foreign father living abroad were returned, and all contact was effectively severed.

In the U.S., such parental abductions are considered a crime, with suspects placed on international watch lists by the FBI in some cases.

However, critics say that signing the convention will prevent Japan from protecting its citizens fully.

“The attitude of the government is non-involvement in civil affairs,” said the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ International Legal Affairs Bureau.

“However, with the number of international marriages and divorces rising, the possibility of signing is under consideration.”
ENDS
////////////////////////////////////////////

Click here for the original Japanese story

国際離婚：急増で紛争多発、日本に「ハーグ条約締結」要請

毎日新聞　2009年5月31日 22時59分

http://mainichi.jp/life/kirei/news/20090601k0000m040086000c.html

　国際結婚した日本人が離婚後、子供を日本に連れ帰り、相手方とトラブルになるケースが急増している。米国、英国、カナダ、フランスの４カ国との間に限っても、現在把握しているだけでトラブルは１６８件に上り、２１４人の子供が紛争に巻き込まれていることが各国の大使館の調査で分かった。国際結婚を巡る紛争の解決ルールを定めた「ハーグ条約」を日本が締結していないことが原因だとして、４カ国はこのほど日本政府に早期締結を求める異例の合同記者会見を開いた。

　４カ国の大使館によると、国際結婚の破綻（はたん）に伴うトラブルの報告件数は▽米国７３件（子供１０４人）▽英国３６件（同３９人）▽カナダ３３件（同３９人）▽フランス２６件（同３２人）。この多くで解決の見通しが立っていないという。

　米国大使館などによると、米国人の父親と日本人の母親が離婚し、母親が子供とともに帰国した後、連絡が取れなくなり、父親が子供と一回も会えない事例が報告されている。外国人の父親が日本の娘に手紙を書いても、すべて返送されてしまい、連絡がつかないという訴えもある。米国では、こうした事態は「子供を奪取する犯罪行為」として非難され、ＦＢＩ（米連邦捜査局）が幼児誘拐の疑いで国際指名手配するケースもある。

　４カ国が日本を問題視するのは、ハーグ条約を締結していないため、海外に住む親が子の居場所を捜してもらうなどの協力を日本政府から得られないためだ。日本から海外に子を連れて行かれた場合も、日本人の親は日本政府を通じ子の面会請求などができない。

　４カ国の大使館公使らは５月２１日、東京都港区の米国大使館で会見を開き、「子の福祉を最優先に考えれば、両方の親と接しながら成長していくべきだ。事態が一向に解決しないのは大きな問題」と、日本側の事態改善を訴えた。

　しかし、現状のまま締結した場合、十分な自国民の保護ができるのかなどの理由から慎重論もある。外務省国際法課は「『民事不介入』が日本政府の立場。ただ、国際結婚と離婚は増えており、締結できるか検討中だ」としている。

　厚生労働省の人口動態統計によると、一方が外国人の夫妻の離婚件数は０７年で１万８２２０件（離婚総数の７．１％）。９７年の９１４９件（同４．１％）から倍近くに増えた。【工藤哲、坂本高志】

　◇ハーグ条約

　国際的な子の奪取の民事面に関する条約。１９８３年発効。離婚などから生じる子供の国境を越えた移動自体が子供の利益に反し、子どもを養育する「監護権」の手続きは移動前の国で行われるべきだとの考えに基づいて定められた国際協力のルール。子を奪われた親が返還を申し立てた場合、相手方の国の政府は迅速に子の場所を発見し、子を元の国に返還する協力義務を負う。今年５月現在、米欧を中心に８１カ国が加盟しているが、Ｇ８（主要８カ国）のうち日本とロシアは未締結。

ENDS

Sunday Tangent: Stray thoughts on Rbt. McNamara’s timely passing

Posted on July 12, 2009July 12, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. As a tangent this Sunday, I thought I’d say a few words on the timely passing (hell, he was 93, and outlived most of his compatriots of this generation) of former US Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara — one of the most promising boffins of the 20th Century, and the so-called primary architect of the US’s involvement in the Vietnam War.

Disclaimers first: I of course did not know McNamara. I am not a scholar of his life, his generation, or his books (although I do have a Bachelor’s in Government from Cornell, where I was once studying to be a Kremlinologist mere months before Gorbachev came along and rendered that science obsolete). I did not grow up in the generation that called the war “McNamara’s War” (after all, born in January 1965 I missed the Baby Boomer Generation by 13 days). I do not have the bred hatred of him or what he stands for carried forth by millions of protesters (I consider Nixon, Kissinger, Haig, Rumsfeld, and Cheney to be far worse people than McNamara).

But I do see McNamara as a person who was too smart for his own good. As one of the “Golden Boys” within the Kennedy Administration Intelligentsia (carried on through to the end of Johnson in 1968), here was a man seen as able to take on all of the world’s problems with a slide rule and a command of statistics. As long has he had enough information, I believe (and so did many others believe) that he thought he could solve anything.

But even he, as his books and interviews revealed, realized that that wasn’t good enough. He put it down to the incredibly complicated calculus (or “Fog”, to use his term) of War that nobody could figure out (even though people far less bright than he could figure it out — Napoleon, Genghis Khan, Patton, Petraeus, Eisenhower –even his successor Clark Clifford to some degree managed to). So he spent the second half of his life disinterring the past, going over and over the data until he arrived at “Eleven Lessons” that he hoped people would listen and take to heart, so that the same mistakes wouldn’t be made yet again.

I laud that sentiment, in the sense that one must learn to avoid repeats. And I’m sure he would make the case that war in the Cold War Era and Nuclear Age offered unprecedented challenges (and I would agree). But the funny thing is, I sense through listening to him speak, give presentations, and answer questions, that he really wasn’t, despite his best efforts, listening to people. I believe that his fatal shortcoming was that he, for all his protestations, believed that nobody else had quite thought about things as deeply as he had, or had been exposed to as much information as he had, or shared the background he had. He was prone to interrupting questions with answers (even though the question was proceeding in a different direction than he was anticipating), and spent so much time anticipating and preempting others that he shut himself off to absolutely new viewpoints (such as the fact that the Vietnamese were simply not going to fight in ways that people, least of all the astoundingly culturally-ignorant American soldiers, were able to anticipate). He locked himself and his perceptions so far into the Bunker Mentality of the Superpower Nuclear and Space Race for years that he was simply unable to extricate himself from that mindset. I believe he brainwashed himself not into infallibility or invulnerability, but into the belief that the Americans were going to get their way, or some semblance of it, one way or another simply because they were so powerful.

This is a textbook definition of hubris. And it was McNamara’s undoing.

The reason why I don’t lump McNamara in with other felons of his generation (again, for example Nixon, Kissinger, Haig, Rumsfeld, and Cheney) because he was trying to go back and take issue with himself. Nixon, as the Frost Interviews demonstrated, still believed he was right, however “sorry” he said he was. Kissinger has written whole books justifying himself, and wants everyone to believe he’s still a credible source and not a war criminal. H, R & C are so self-assured and blindly hubristic they kept seeking office (they wanted to be entrusted with power yet again?!), without much of an urge to explain themselves. And they managed it, too, sadly.

McNamara tried to explain himself, run some self-diagnostics, show some contrition, and admit mistakes. That is very praiseworthy. He also created a written record of the era (the Pentagon Papers) so that others could look at the era more objectively (an impulse the Bush II Admin, full of Nixon and Ford Admin veterans, actively worked against; they learned exactly the opposite lessons from Watergate). We need more impulses like that, so that, again, we can learn from history.

Final word: McNamara still comes off in his interviews as disingenuous, and even a little contradictory at times. He has that hint of Nixon’s attitude of being “sorry, but still right”. Consider this: His concept of apologies, as expressed in a 1995 NPR interview with Terry Gross, when asked about his recently-published book:

MCNAMARA: Some people have used ‘redemption’ and ‘apology’ [regarding my book]. Forget ‘redemption’ and ‘apology’. I’d say that those of us, assuming for a minute that I’m correct — as I say in the preface I believe that it was an error, a tragic error — assume for a minute that my judgment is correct — then I think that we owe an explanation. To future generations. Of what happened, and how to avoid that in the future. That’s the purpose of the book.

TERRY GROSS: To explain.

MCNAMARA: To explain, and more than explain, to draw lessons, and suggest how to prevent similar tragedies in the future.

TERRY GROSS: To you think an apology is appropriate?

MCNAMARA: Well, if you want me to apologize, of course. But that’s not the issue. The issue isn’t apology. You don’t, I’ll call it ‘correct a wrong’ by apologizing. You can correct a wrong only if you understand how it occurred, and take steps to ensure it won’t happen again.

And afterwards I’m here shaking my head at how intelligent, yet how inept, this comes off. Sure, the lessons are what’s important. But when you get down to the basic human impulses of making up for wrongs, it’s not just a matter of learning your lesson. You MUST ALSO APOLOGIZE. From your heart. Because you want to. Not because others want you to — because that sounds worse than disingenuous — it’s insincere, and has exactly the opposite of a healing effect. You are responsible for the deaths of millions. If you are going to show any contrition at all, do it properly.

But a person as dry and trained to be intelligent as McNamara, who has long since been desiccated of the milk of human kindness, will always fall short of actually doing what he intends to do — convince people at the gut level that doing the wrong thing for all the right reasons is still the wrong thing. He will always fall short of his historical potential as a great man offering lessons because of that.

Again, McNamara deserves to go down in history as the man who was too smart for his own good. What a waste. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

Japan Times et al: Four people snagged for fingerprints over 7 months. No longer an “anti-terrorism” measure. Of questionable effectiveness anyway.

Posted on July 8, 2009July 8, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. Debito.org Reader AS makes the following poignant comment:

Hi Debito, You’ve probably seen this already, but just in case here is a link to a JT article on the “effectiveness” of fingerprinting at airports. http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20090630a4.html

Article excerpt:
=========================
The Japan Times Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Biometric ID system catches four

NARITA, Chiba Pref. (Kyodo) Immigration authorities have successfully detected four people since January trying to enter Japan illegally by trying to fool the biometric identity system…

The authentication system is designed to detect foreign nationals with a history of deportation from Japan based on fingerprint data…

The biometric identification system was introduced in November 2007 as part of antiterrorism measures under a revised Immigration Control Law.
=========================
Full article at
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20090630a4.html

COMMENT FROM AS: Apparently the system has resulted in a grand total of four people getting caught in the last seven months. To me that seems like a massive waste of national resources, especially since there are other ways of detecting illegal re-entrants.

Also, the article drops the pretense that fingerprinting is an anti-terroism measure:

“The authentication system is designed to detect foreign nationals with a history of deportation from Japan based on fingerprint data.”

So now apparently the purpose of the system is cracking down on illegal entry and over-staying.ENDS
===========================

Another Debito.org Reader commented thusly on much the same subject:

===========================
Dear Debito-San,

Last Monday, June 29th, Kyodo released a press anouncement from the Immigration Bureau that shows that fingerprint evasion happens on a larger scale than previously assumed (see http://www.japantoday.com/category/crime/view/altered-fingerprints-detected-in-illegal-immigration-attempts).

According to a friend of mine, an article on page 29 of the Kobe Newspaper (evening edition) had additional information. Note that I could not confirm the contents personally. But I send you the highlights anyway, with added personal comments.

Apparently one of the Immigration Officers was quoted saying that the machines could not be trusted anymore as so many new ways to attempt to evade them show up.

Comment: If this statement was quoted correctly as an official statement, it took the Immigration Bureau long enough considering that the groundbreaking article from Yokohama National University (http://www.lfca.net/Fingerprint-System-Security-Issues.pdf) on this subject was published more than seven years ago.

For me, two questions follow this anouncement: Did the Immigration Bureau also miss that people can become victims of such identity theft? And did they also miss that the machines can get it wrong even when there is no foul play at all. These two problems form parts of two branches of a fault tree (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fault_tree) where the undesired event of trouble for me as an innocent person is the root. The first step to cutting down this rather unwelcome tree is for the Immigration Bureau to know it’s business…

The article apparently went on to state two measures the Immigration Bureau announced to take against the problem of people trying to fool the system. First of all, they apparently wish to opt for checking the prints visually if the machine gives an error. Second, they apparently wish to install monitors on which the prints can be seen by the officers.

Comments: I will start with the second measure. By default, fingerprint scanners encrypt the captured images on the device itself. This is done as an extra measure of protection, mostly because hacking of computers – even ATM machines.

(http://searchfinancialsecurity.techtarget.com/news/article/0,289142,sid185_gci1357926,00.html) – is so widespread these days. To be able to put the prints on a monitor, that encryption must be turned off, or the images decrypted on the computer.

This is important. Identity systems such as this hinge upon the assumption that the rightful owner has the only key. Mind you, this is already so doubtful (see above) that the focus must be on protecting the owner from the bad consequences of other matching keys instead of beating the dead horse of keeping the key unique.

Nevertheless, removing the encryption opens two new branches in the fault tree of duplicate prints, the computer may not be trusted and the user behind the computer may not be trusted. It is against best practices and about the most irresponsible thing the Immigration Bureau could do. The mere fact that trying to go against a certain flow will not work is not an excuse for making the current run faster…

The good part is that it shows such an action is technically possible. Cybercriminals will find that out anyway, but at least the good willing people can know that too now…

The first measure doesn’t really impact me either way, though I would have preferred to hear something about informing the victims of identity theft as it is discovered and similar things… But it also casts doubt on the Immigration Bureau knowing it’s business, which we have established as a condition for acceptable levels of my safety under this program.

Why does this cast doubt? When someone turns up with fake fingerprints and the machine accepts that the pattern it acquires is not on the searchlist, that is in professional terms a negative. One can argue, depending on whether or not the machine should detect them as fakes, if it’s a true negative or a false one. In a true negative, the machine works as designed, it’s just a very smart attacker. But I digress.

When the machine gives an error, this is most likely a failure to acquire. The machine doesn’t get a useful pattern, or it concludes it’s not offered a live finger.

The two may coincide, but they’re not one and the same. After we already got in the situation where one can conclude that the Immigration Bureau missed a few things, it’s not very hopeful news that they send out an announcement suggesting that they can’t keep their errors apart. I would hope I’m never forced to fly with an airline which has just had a crash due to problems with the ailerons and announce that they are going to fix the flaps, at least not without explaining what they’re doing so that people can verify it was the right decision even though it sounds strange…

When I see things schemes like this fingerprinting, my first question will be: “Am I as an innocent person really reasonably safe with this system, given my overall situation?” The answer to that will almost always be yes, unless there’s a very cynical organization involved. My second question follows just as naturally: “Show me”. To me that’s the issue involved, they declined to show me, and when I started looking myself I increasingly find evidence I would have preferred to point to a different conclusion…

Coupled to this comes the use of a Hobson’s choice to extract the information, give or don’t show. Am I to be blamed that I view the combination of these effects as a sign of desiring not to invest the time and money to counter the risks to me precisely because they are that, risks-to-me (instead of them?). Is it strange therefore that I explain my point of view to people who may consider visiting Japan, and also to people with possibly enough influence to advocate my case, in both situations hurting Japan’s public relations? ENDS
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What do Debito.org Readers think? Debito

Japan Times on critics of new IC Chip Gaijin Card bill from the Right: too lenient!

Posted on July 4, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. The Japan Times is still at it, getting viewpoints regarding new legislation controlling NJ movements and visas and traceability (which looks like it will pass the Diet) from Dietmembers, bureaucrats, and left-wing opponents. Now we have the view of someone who thinks the laws, which will tighten things in directions Debito.org is not comfortable with, are too lenient! Excerpt follows. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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The Japan Times Wednesday, July 1, 2009
CONTROLS ON FOREIGNERS
Visa overstayers given too many breaks: rightist
By MINORU MATSUTANI, Staff writer
Fourth in a series
Full article at http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20090701a3.html

…Arikado also takes issue with the humanitarian reasons often cited by the justice minister when granting an illegal foreigner special permission to stay in Japan.

“Some foreigners claim to be political refugees. But in many cases, they just want to work,” he said. “Some Japanese died of hunger after they lost their jobs, so is it right to prioritize helping foreigners? Right now, everybody in Japan is losing their spirit as Japanese nationals.”…

Arikado cited the case of the Calderon family as an “obvious example” of the government’s softness.

Justice Minister Eisuke Mori ordered the undocumented Filipino parents, who entered Japan using someone else’s passports, to leave Japan in April. But he allowed their daughter, Noriko, 13, who was born and raised in Japan and speaks only Japanese, to stay.

“Mori established a precedent that children get to stay if illegal foreign parents beg,” he said, criticizing the media for overly sympathetic coverage of the family…

Arikado said he has no problem with giving the justice minister a certain amount of discretion in granting special permission to stay, but he wants the minister to prioritize the welfare of Japanese over foreigners.

Despite the faults he finds with the bills, he still praises them for boosting the government’s ability to wield greater scrutiny over foreigners. Hopefully, punishment for violating the regulations stipulated in the bills will be more strictly imposed than now, said Arikado, whose day job is as a journalist at the Chuo Tsushin news service.
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EXCERPT ENDS
Full article at http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20090701a3.html

Osaka Nishi Yodogawa Police “Beware of Suspicious Foreigners” poster

Posted on July 2, 2009April 30, 2021 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

Hi Blog. The NPA is once again ramping up its public calls for surveillance of “suspicious foreigners”.

The previous wave of this basically started with Tokyo Gov. Ishihara’s now infamous “Sangokujin Speech” in 2000, when he called on the Nerima Self Defense Forces to round up suspicious foreigners “committing heinous crimes” in the event of a natural disaster. He made no distinction how one would determine “suspicious”, however, or how people would not resort to racial profiling.

They never broke the mold. That wave continued through World Cup 2002 (although it mutated into “hooligans”) onto police nationwide (particularly the Kanto cops) putting up posters warning the public against “suspicious foreigners”, whatever that meant. After protests, some police amended their notices to focus on the crimes, not the nationalities, but still exceptions popped up from time to time in prefectures with beaches (such as Ibaraki), warning people to “protect our shores” (complete with visual invasion motif).

Now, according to Debito.org Reader JL, who found this notice up in his apartment, the Osaka Police are once again warning people about “suspicious foreigners”, for they might be illegal laborers or overstayers. Here’s the poster, dated June 2009. Osaka Fu Nishi Yodogawa Keisatsusho:
(click on image to see it larger and legible)

Again, how will people distinguish without suspecting anyone who looks foreigner as “suspicious”? Will our boys in blue ever learn some sophistication?

Probably not. It’s been nearly a decade since Ishihara’s speech. And fear campaigns are very helpful with budget approvals. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

NEWS FLASH: Roppongi cops confirm subjecting NJ to urine tests

Posted on July 1, 2009July 1, 2009 by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

UPDATES ON TWITTER: arudoudebito

DEBITO.ORG NEWS FLASH
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JAPANESE POLICE NOW DEMANDING URINE SAMPLES
FROM FOREIGNERS ON THE STREET
RECOMMEND JOURNALISTS AND OTHER CONCERNED PARTIES
READING THIS INVESTIGATE FURTHER
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Released July 1, 2009, freely forwardable
By Arudou Debito (www.debito.org, debito@debito.org, twitter arudoudebito)
Sapporo, Japan. Freely forwardable.

SUMMARY
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Debito.org has received a number of reports that police in Roppongi and Shibuya are rounding up Non-Japanese exiting bars, and bringing them in police wagons for drug testing.

They are demanding urine tests from their detainees.
This is an act of extremely questionable legality.

This was confirmed at 3PM July 1, 2009, when I telephoned the Azabu Police Department (http://www.keishicho.metro.tokyo.jp/1/azabu/index.htm) phone 03-3479-0110 (dai) and talked to an Officer Teshima, who refused to give more details about his official rank in the police department, what sort of methods are being used, their criteria for selecting their detainees, what they do if detainees do not cooperate, and if they have warrants. Our conversation in paraphrase below. Further links to sources also below.

If true, this could be the dawn of new practices and extensions of police power in Japan. This author believes that racial profiliing, already standard operating practice for bicycle checks and ID checks on the street (https://www.debito.org/?p=1802), is now involving more invasive methods– bodily fluids.
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MORE INFORMATION
The testimonials of eyewitnesses to these raids in Roppongi and Shibuya are blogged and linked at Debito.org at
https://www.debito.org/?p=3709

The conversation I had with Mr Teshima today went approximately as follows:

===================================
ME: My name is Arudou Debito, calling for Human Rights Group Ippan Shadan Houjin FRANCA (I gave the full official translation of the group (http://www.francajapan.org), and I have heard that there are police stopping foreigners exiting bars and asking them for urine tests.

TESHIMA: Who is this and why are you asking?
ME: (repeats name and details about FRANCA).
TESHIMA: We have been doing more policing.
ME: Are you doing urine tests (nyou kensa)?
TESHIMA: Depends on the situation (toki to baai ni yoru).
ME: But are urine tests happening?
TESHIMA: Depends on the situation.
ME: But they are happening.
TESHIMA: Yes.
ME: Are you doing this as part of clamping down on drugs?
TESHIMA: Yes.
ME: Are you targeting foreigners?
TESHIMA: We are testing people. We are not just testing foreigners.
ME: What are your criteria for choosing people for testing?
TESHIMA: I don’t have to answer that. (kotaeru hitsuyou ga nai)
ME: Would you answer me if I asked the question as writer for a newspaper?
TESHIMA: I am under no obligation to answer.
ME: Do you have warrants to ask for urine samples?
TESHIMA: I don’t have to answer that. Depends on the situation.
ME: But you can’t ask for urine samples without a warrant, right?
TESHIMA: We don’t always need a warrant. Depends on the situation.
ME: What situations do you not need a warrant?
TESHIMA: I don’t have to answer that.
ME: But if they give you their permission for a sample, you don’t need a warrant?
TESHIMA: If they cooperate, we don’t need a warrant.
ME: What if they don’t cooperate?
TESHIMA: I’m not going to answer that.
ME: Can they be charged under the Interference of Duties–?
TESHIMA: Look, I’m busy.
ME: Understood. Could you please tell me your position in the police department, Mr Teshima?
TESHIMA: I don’t have to answer that.
ME: Okay, thank you for your time.
CLICK
CALL ENDS
===================================

Give Mr Teshima a call yourself at 03-3479-0110 (dai) and see if you can get any clearer answers.

CONCLUSION
In recent months, there has been a lot of scandal about sumo wrestlers (Japanese and Non-Japanese) using cannabis, and media (including Japan Times, see http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/ss20080903a1.html) have reported them saying they procured the substance from Roppongi foreigners. There are police raids continuing on Roppongi bars (https://www.debito.org/?p=3305), most recently last Friday (http://www.japanprobe.com/?p=11055). Plus stoppages on the street, according to commentators to Debito.org, and searches of bags and pockets for being of foreign extraction.
https://www.debito.org/?p=3709#comment-179636

This indicates that the Japanese Police seem to be targeting areas with high foreigner concentrations. Foreigners may be being singled out on the street as more likely to be possessing. Given that Japan has no right of habeas corpus (https://www.debito.org/whattodoif.html#checkpoint), no clear checks against interrogational abuses (https://www.debito.org/whattodoif.html#arrested), and few recourses against wrongful arrest, police with this much power using racial paradigms against Non-Japanese and people who look foreign will result in racial profling — with innocents being targeted, detained, and subject to police practices of interrogation under questionable legality. Such as the circumstantial evidence of exiting a bar while looking foreign.

I encourage readers to read, investigate, and report these developments.
Arudou Debito in Sapporo
www.debito.org, debito@debito.org, twitter arudoudebito
July 1, 2009
ENDS