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DEBITO.ORG NEWSLETTER MARCH 31, 2024
Hello Debito.org Newsletter Readers. It’s been some time since my last Newsletter, as my teaching schedule is now about six classes and 19.5 credits per semester. Nevertheless, I’m still putting out a monthly column at SNA, and putting up newspaper articles with noteworthy content and comment. Have a look:
Table of Contents:
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1) My SNA Visible Minorities 54: “Non-Japanese Residents claim political power” (Mar 31, 2024), where I argue the power of the vote matters whether you are a candidate or part of the electorate; the J Govt tries hard to make sure neither happens for Japan’s Immigrants.
2) Kyodo: “Record 3.4 million foreign residents in Japan as work visas rise” in 2023. Only a brief reference to foreign crime (i.e., overstaying) this time. Fancy that.
3) Debito.org Reader XY on “Rakuten Card is asking for sensitive Koseki Family Registry documents for Naturalized Japanese clients as a prerequisite for continued service”, even though nobody is clearly requiring them to.
4) My SNA Visible Minorities column 53: “Miss Japan Shiino Karolina lost her crown. Inevitably.” (Feb 26, 2024)
5) Reuters: Visible Minorities (“Foreign-born residents”) file lawsuit against government for police racial profiling. Good. Go for it.
6) My latest SNA VM column 52: “Positive Steps for Non-Japanese in Japan” (Jan 23, 2024), a report of a month spent in Tokyo and all the progress towards tolerance observed.
7) Japan Times: “Japan should aim to maintain population of 80 million by 2100”, says private panel of business interests. 24 years later, no new ideas, since it calls for rises in birthrates, not immigration, yet again.
… and finally …
8 ) Japan Times: “Fukuoka court rules ban on dual nationality is constitutional”. Debito.org makes the case for why banning dual nationality is unrealistic, not to mention just plain stupid, with an excerpt from my book “Embedded Racism”.
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By Debito Arudou, Ph.D. (debito@debito.org, www.debito.org, Twitter @arudoudebito)
All Debito.org Newsletters are freely forwardable
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1) My SNA Visible Minorities 54: “Non-Japanese Residents claim political power” (Mar 31, 2024), where I argue the power of the vote matters whether you are a candidate or part of the electorate; the J Govt tries hard to make sure neither happens for Japan’s Immigrants.
SNA: I teach Political Science at the university level. In my first lecture every semester, I try to convince skeptical students why they should bother studying Political Science at all. I argue that understanding how power flows through political structures will help students enfranchise themselves in a democratic system. Because if they don’t, other people who understand the system better will use it to their advantage instead. But this assumes one major fundamental: that they can participate in the democratic system at all. Fortunately, most of my students are citizens, so they can vote. Given how abysmal youth voter turnout generally is, I consider it a major educational outcome if they bother to. Persuading people that their vote matters is the bare minimum a civics class can accomplish.
If I have the opportunity in higher-level classes to proselytize further, I encourage them to engage in community building, such as organizing into interest groups and consolidating power into voting blocs. My real converts consider running for local office, thereby embedding themselves within the very power structure itself. Because political power, especially for minorities in any society, is rarely surrendered without a struggle. We need more diverse views in office as demographics change the makeup of future majorities.
That’s how democracy is supposed to work. Unfortunately, this is a lesson that Japan’s Non-Japanese (NJ) Residents and Visible Minorities still have trouble grasping. As a result, they are letting the Japanese government deprive them of their potential as a political force in Japan…
https://www.debito.org/?p=17392
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2) Kyodo: “Record 3.4 million foreign residents in Japan as work visas rise” in 2023. Only a brief reference to foreign crime (i.e., overstaying) this time. Fancy that.
Kyodo: “The number of foreign nationals residing in Japan hit a record high of over 3.4 million in 2023, government data has shown, with employment-related visas seeing significant growth amid the country’s efforts to address its acute labor shortage. As of the end of December, 3,410,992 foreign nationals resided in Japan, up 10.9% from the previous year to mark a record high for the second consecutive year, the Immigration Services Agency said Friday.
“The number of specified skilled workers jumped 59.2% to around 208,000, while trainees under Japan’s technical internship program grew 24.5% to around 404,000 to approach the record high level marked in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic, the data showed. The specified skilled workers visa, which allows the holder to immediately take on jobs in designated industries without the need for training, was introduced in 2019 in response to Japan’s severe labor shortage resulting from its declining birthrate, with the aim of attracting foreign workers.
“Meanwhile, permanent residents, who made up the largest group by residential status, stood at around 891,000, up 3.2%. Engineers, specialists in humanities and international services, including foreign language teachers, rose 16.2% to around 362,000. By nationality, Chinese accounted for the largest population of foreign residents at around 821,000, followed by Vietnamese at around 565,000 and South Koreans at around 410,000…”
COMMENT: So the foreign labor imports have resumed, and how. Also interesting is that Kyodo doesn’t seem to feel the need to shoehorn in foreign crime statistics this time (just a brief allusion to overstaying at the very end). I incorporated these stats into my next SNA Visible Minorities column (see above), and argue how this influx can translate into political power.
https://www.debito.org/?p=17390
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3) Debito.org Reader XY on “Rakuten Card is asking for sensitive Koseki Family Registry documents for Naturalized Japanese clients as a prerequisite for continued service”, even though nobody is clearly requiring them to.
Dr. Debito, I’m writing you because I’m experiencing a new type of discrimination by Rakuten Card.
I’ve been a Rakuten Card owner since 2014, and it is the card I’ve hold the longest, making it the biggest chunk of my credit history. Also, I’m a naturalized Japanese citizen, that naturalized back in 20XX, and one month afterwards I had already completed all the requirements for change of name and status according to what I was asked by Rakuten Card, which, if I remember correctly, required me to send copies of documents proving my change of name and status.
About a month ago, I received a mail by Rakuten Card asking me to send them a copy of my current Residence Card. I was very confused by this, so I contacted them, and they told me that since when I applied for the Card I was a foreigner, I needed to provide them with something that “proved” my residence status, and they asked me for my Koseki Family Registry, which is insane. I told them that I already gave them the documents they required back when I naturalized, that I’ve never been asked this by any other Bank or Credit Card company, and that it is insane for them to ask me for a Koseki, which is a very sensitive document that should be handed for these kind of requests, since something as simple as my Juminhyo Residency Certificate, which I think is what I sent back in 20XX proved my nationality, and they also have my “My Number” information, which should gave them access to corroborate this.
They insisted that this was something that the Financial Services Agency as part of an anti Money Laundering KYC thing, I asked them to give me more specifics on this, and they refused to do so, so I called the Financial Services Agency… (continues)
COMMENT FROM DEBITO: The dragnet of suspecting any foreigner, including NJ Residents, of being a money launderer expands to people who are no longer foreign as well.
https://www.debito.org/?p=17382
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4) My SNA Visible Minorities column 53: “Miss Japan Shiino Karolina lost her crown. Inevitably.” (Feb 26, 2024)
SNA: You might have heard the big news last month about Shiino Karolina, a Ukrainian-born Japanese citizen who won the title of Miss Japan. You have also heard earlier this month that she lost her crown due to allegations of her having an affair with a married man.
Yappari. I thought that might happen. How convenient. Let’s put this event in perspective.
This not the first time a Japanese beauty contest in has chosen a person not “pure-blooded” to represent Japan. In 2015, African-American-Japanese Miyamoto Ariana was chosen as Miss Japan in 2015.
This was big news back then too for winning despite her biracial status. I say “despite” because oodles of internet trolls questioned whether a half-Japanese could represent Japan.
And guess what? She could, since lightning struck a second time a year later, when Indian-Japanese Yoshikawa Priyanka was crowned Miss World Japan.
However, with Shiino, the third time was not the charm. She only lasted two weeks. Why? Because she was a bridge too far…
https://www.debito.org/?p=17378
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5) Reuters: Visible Minorities (“Foreign-born residents”) file lawsuit against government for police racial profiling. Good. Go for it.
Reuters: Three foreign-born residents of Japan filed a lawsuit on Monday against the national and local governments over alleged illegal questioning by police based on racial profiling. It is the first such lawsuit in Japan, according to the plaintiffs’ lawyers, and comes amid a sharp rise in the number of foreign workers coming to the country to help stem labour shortages as its population ages and declines.
The three men filed the lawsuit with the Tokyo District Court demanding that the national, Tokyo Metropolitan and Aichi Prefecture governments recognise that it is illegal for police officers to stop and question people solely on the basis of their race, nationality or ethnicity.
COMMENT: This has made big international news, the likes I haven’t really seen since the Otaru Onsens Case. Good. Debito.org has reported at length on how racial profiling is standard operating procedure for the Japanese police, so it’s an issue that deserves to be pursued in court. We’ve also sued the government before, and think it’s unlikely they’ll win (we didn’t). But it’s worth doing for the awareness raising. If we can get it on the record that the judiciary recognizes this as “racial profiling”, or even that “racial profiling” actually exists in Japan as a term and a phenomenon, this will be a big step ahead. Plaintiffs, go for it, and good luck, says Debito.org.
https://www.debito.org/?p=17371
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6) My latest SNA VM column 52: “Positive Steps for Non-Japanese in Japan” (Jan 23, 2024), a report of a month spent in Tokyo and all the progress towards tolerance observed.
SNA: Last month SNA (and this column) went on vacation for Christmas and New Years. During the hiatus, I spent a month in Tokyo meandering around visiting sights and people, developing my inner flaneur as well as conducting relaxed random research. Tokyo, a walking city riddled with world-class transportation and public facilities, is an ideal place for that.
This month’s column will offer my impressions about how much Japan has changed regarding the issues that have always been on my radar screen — society’s openness to Newcomers. On that score (in contrast to what’s happening with the debate over Miss Japan), I have some positive developments to report…
https://www.debito.org/?p=17367
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7) Japan Times: “Japan should aim to maintain population of 80 million by 2100”, says private panel of business interests. 24 years later, no new ideas, since it calls for rises in birthrates, not immigration, yet again.
JT: Amid concerns over rapid depopulation, a private panel has proposed that Japan should aim to have a stable population of 80 million by 2100 in order to maintain economic growth. Last April, the government released an estimate that the population would be reduced by half to about 63 million in 2100, with 40% of people expected to be 65 or older.
Japan has wrestled with the issue of a declining birthrate for decades, but the situation is about to “change drastically,” with the country now entering a serious phase of population decline, the panel, headed by Nippon Steel honorary chairman Akio Mimura and consisting of 28 members including prominent academics and business leaders, said Tuesday. […]
To avoid such a future, Japan needs to slow down the pace of the decline and eventually stop it, the panel said, adding that government strategy should focus on stabilizing the population at around 80 million by 2100. As of last month, Japan’s population was estimated to be 124 million. The panel carried out several simulations and argued that if the country raised the total fertility rate — the average number of children a woman gives birth to in her lifetime — to 1.6 by around 2040, 1.8 by around 2050 and eventually 2.07 by 2060, it could maintain a population of around 80 million by 2100.
COMMENT: Nothing new here when you have the same old people retreading the same old shinola to the same perpetually-elected party in power. Getting all these people together to wish for a skypie solution of increasing birthrates (while somehow also boosting productivity) is silly, as it has already been proposed multiple times over the decades without success. This is no way to craft public policy that actually solves a problem.
Indicatively, *once again* this report makes no mention of immigration, despite both the UN and then-PM Obuchi agreeing as far back as the *YEAR 2000* (see below) that immigration is inevitable to keep the economy going. But as we saw afterwards in 2009, xenophobic politics intervened, and even Japan’s demographers are forbidden to mention foreign inflows as part of Japan’s domestic demographic science. (See My JT column on that here.) In conclusion, a quarter-century later nothing has been learned.
A further note: Whenever you have business interests involved (as if they’re any experts on demographic engineering), the primary concern will be about business interests, i.e., profits and cheap labor. Now remember what the likes of elite business lobby Keidanren wrought by bringing in foreign labor on exploitative revolving-door visa regimes since 1991 (the “Trainee” slave-labor program, for example). Allowing the grubby little hands of Japan’s business lobbies any more input into future policy drives only guarantees more inhumanity, because with population drops and an elderly society come labor shortages. Who will fill them? Robots; but robots don’t pay taxes into the rickety national pension system. So foreigners. Hence business interests will only continue to advocate importing labor without ever letting foreign workers become permanent Japanese residents.
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… and finally…
8 ) Japan Times: “Fukuoka court rules ban on dual nationality is constitutional”. Debito.org makes the case for why banning dual nationality is unrealistic, not to mention just plain stupid, with an excerpt from my book “Embedded Racism”.
JT: The Fukuoka District Court ruled Wednesday that Japan’s law that bans dual nationality is constitutional, rejecting an argument by a Japan-born plaintiff who lost her Japanese citizenship after she naturalized as an American. Yuri Kondo, 76, had argued that the nationality law — which stipulates that Japanese nationals will lose their citizenship if they become a citizen of a foreign country — undermines fundamental human rights to pursue happiness, self-determination, and identity, as guaranteed under the Constitution. While the nationality law was deemed constitutional, presiding Judge Fumitaka Hayashi said the wish of the individual who would lose their nationality should be considered as it is part of a person’s identity.
COMMENT: Most arguments made by the Japanese Government dovetail around the idea that people will be somehow confused in terms of national allegiances if they have more than one nationality. For what if Japan went to war with the country you have a second passport for? Where would your allegiances lie?
Making public policy merely on the basis of hypotheticals is not the best way to make laws. As noted above in the article, the number of countries allowing dual nationality is in fact increasing (“the number of countries allowing dual nationality has increased from one-third to three-quarters worldwide”), as more people around the world travel, resettle, immigrate, marry, and have multinational children as well as lives. Forcing them to give up their other nationality is to force them to give up part of their identity — a completely unnecessary and moreover psychologically damaging move just for the sake of bureaucratic convenience. And that’s before we get into issues of arbitrary enforceability, as discussed in my book excerpt below.
The increase in diversity should be reflected in laws to accommodate reality. Instead, we have pig-headed J politicians who can’t imagine a life beyond their own experiences (with the exception of the LDP’s Kouno Taro, who actually argued for dual nationality, albeit to coat the Kokutai in more glory, not for the sake of the individual’s identity) and refuse to legislate reality into reality. And that feeds into a hidebound judiciary that claim they can only enforce the law as it’s written (even presiding Judge Hayashi above expressed regret at that).
To finish up, let me excerpt from my book “Embedded Racism” on this topic. It’ll make the case about why public policy is as stupid as it is as best I can…
https://www.debito.org/?p=17349
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That’s all for now. Thanks for reading! Debito Arudou, Ph.D.
DEBITO.ORG NEWSLETTER MARCH 31, 2024 ENDS
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31 comments on “DEBITO.ORG NEWSLETTER MARCH 31, 2024”
Indeed: Japan is leaning more heavily on foreign labor as the skilled worker program expands (Japanese language paywall version here).
From the article: “In 2023, the rate of reliance on foreign laborers among all industries was one in 33 people. This was more than double the ratio of one in 88 recorded in 2013.”
Plus, the automotive transportation, railways, forestry, and timber industry have just been added to the “specified skilled worker” status of residence. Additionally, the GoJ will accept up to 820,000 NJ workers through fiscal 2028.
Finally from the article are these gems:
Far right sentiment is ramping up in Tokyo and the surrounding areas currently.
In other news, Japan accepted record-high 303 refugees in 2023.
On the subject of NJ labor, the GoJ plans to OK home care visits by more foreign workers amid shortages.
At first, the Zainichi Koreans were the target of hate speech. But now the Kurds are the ones on the receiving end!:
‘I became afraid to go out’: Hate speech escalates against Kurds in east Japan (Pt. 1)
‘Showered with abuse’: Hate toward Kurds in Japan surfaces via phone calls, email (Pt. 2)
Japanese language paywall versions:
電話口に響いた男の罵声 埼玉のクルド人に向けられたヘイト
日本のクルド人支援団体に差別的メール 広がるヘイトの矛先
Kawaguchi again. The place where police arrested a Japanese woman for “looking like a foreigner”. Also, I witnessed violent demonstrations there in 2010 against giving NJ residents a local vote and natch, the city hall backed down as usual. I suppose the power to decide on garbage collection days hit a nerve. Which brings us to the article:
“‘People have complained to authorities about local Kurds before, including over noise and obeying rules about taking out the garbage.”
So, they get hate speech and harassment because of that crucial policy item for Japan’s survival “Rules of Taking out the Garbage”- the sheer Homer Simpson level of absurdism and the wrong priorities….
Additional reporting on this story courtesy of Asahi Shimbun:
Hate speech escalates against Kurds living close to Tokyo / 埼玉の在日クルド人に差別や攻撃 県外からも電話「SNSで見た」 (Japanese language paywall version)
I think one of my neighbors used to sift through my rubbish in the hopes of spotting something not supposed to be there. That would be someone regarded as not very well mentally in other places.
2 points I want to make : A lot of the rubbish segregation is not only done for environmental reasons, but also so the someone can be thrifty and save money on rubbish bags, which you have to buy and in some prefectures are 400 yen for a set of 10. So if you can sort your rubbish out, you can dispose of it for free. Protip, if you are very busy as most people are, and don’t have time and don’t have a housewife at home to do it for you, a lot of things can be disposed and in the burnable garbage, such as shoes. It seems like the whole thing is unnecessarily confusing, just to save a few yen. And many Japanese are clearly confused by it also, judging by the increase of hoarder houses.
Second point, I DO understand why rubbish disposal is such an issue here. Its because of the unholy insects that exist here. So if there is even a hint of people not doing it right then it does bring up issues that don’t exist in most other countries.
That being said, the “garbage housed” that are cropping are Japanese people.. So even though foreigners might struggle more to understand the system, Japanese people do too.
Props to Osaka Prefecture for working to help students maintain their cultural roots. (Japanese language paywall version here: 外国出身の高校生に「母語」を必修にするわけは 大阪、一部公立校で)
Question: does the overtime cap apply to NJ bus/taxi/truck/train drivers possessing a “specified skilled worker” residency status?
I can’t help but think that the reason Okazaki City and Meitetsu Bus have teamed up to is to exploit a legal loophole.
Japan adds driver, railway roles to skilled foreign worker visa
Meitetsu Bus joins hands with central Japan city to train foreign bus drivers (Japanese language paywall version here: 外国人の運転手を育成 岡崎市と名鉄バス、包括連携 「特定技能」に運送業)
so people on the internet always tell me that Debito isn‘t a reliable source on this, because he‘s not a lawyer. Here‘s a professional Japanese lawyer saying what Debito has been samying for decades on this website:
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20240405/p2a/00m/0op/026000c
So what will the apologists come up with next?
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20240413/p2a/00m/0na/011000c
‘Understanding systemic discrimination’ new students’ 1st homework: U of Tokyo president
April 13, 2024 (Mainichi Japan)
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20240413/p2a/00m/0na/011000c
TOKYO — The University of Tokyo entrance ceremony was held at the Nippon Budokan here on April 12, and the school’s president told new students their first homework assignment is to understand structural discrimination.
During the formal address in Tokyo’s Chiyoda Ward, President Teruo Fujii touched upon the gender imbalance among new students, telling them, “Various kinds of systemic discrimination will not just dissolve naturally, so we need to recognize them, reflect on ourselves and take action.”…
Of the 3,126 students newly entering the university, 2,480 are male and 646, or around 20%, are female. Fujii highlighted the overwhelming lack of women in decision-making positions in economics and politics, saying, “In education as well, the existence of barriers that prevent women from advancing their studies and taking entrance exams focusing on science has been noted.”
He continued, “We have a responsibility to break the reproduction and expansion of systemic discrimination and realize a society in which all members have equal rights. Society is richer when people of all backgrounds are able to play active roles.”
Fujii then told the students, “Knowing where all of you now stand in terms of systemic discrimination may be the first homework assignment for each of you.”
Fujii urged, “Those who know the structure have the power to change it. I’d like you to explore the power you may have for changing the current social structure in a desirable direction together.” ENDS
Good, but what about racial discrimination? You could argue that this is covered under his statement “We have a responsibility to break the reproduction and expansion of systemic discrimination and realize a society in which all members have equal rights.”
Two problems though:
1. Most Japanese consider “society” to only include Japanese people (kokumin).
2. Why does he only mention discrimination against women as an example? What’s with immigrants, refugees, disabled people, poor people, burakumin, “hafu”, naturalized citizens, Atomic Bomb survivors, etc?
To be fair, maybe the speech did contain more examples, but the Mainichi just chose to quote one, because they definitely didn’t print his whole speech. But somehow I doubt that the Mainichi would omit immigrants, if they were mentioned.
The Kokumin conceit strikes again!:
Bar associations blast rejections of foreign arbitrators / 外国籍の調停委員を拒み続ける裁判所 離婚や相続…トラブル時に障壁 (Japanese language paywall version)
I wonder if something similar will ever happen in Japan.
INTERVIEW/ German expat: Japanese need to end ‘purity of blood’ thinking / （耕論）「日本人」を決めるのは マライ・メントラインさん、福岡安則さん、星野ルネさん (Japanese language paywall version)
Now NHK World made a segment about how some local governments scrapped the nationality clause.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkIFIEJ7OPo
Of course someone had to say the famous phrase “it feels like foreigners outnumber us, the Japanese!” (oh no, the shock of natural demographic changes).
It’s funny how they feel that way even though only 2% of the population holds a non Japanese passport. Tells you everything you need to know.
The guy at 4:20 get’s it right though.
“it feels like foreigners outnumber us, the Japanese!”
– new take; if a J-Govt that actually took measures to encourage starting a family (i.e. Japanese living standards and income) was ever elected, then there would not be a shrinking or emigrating Japanese population, would there!
To be fair, no matter who you elect, the birthrate will never recover as much as it needs to, without immigration. It‘s the same for all industrialized nations. But yes, 70 years of LDP reign and their conservative family policies which are stuck in the 80s surely didn‘t help. The problem is that even back in the year 2000 the UN and Japanese experts told the government that immigration would be the only solution and now it‘s too late I‘m afraid. These LDP oyajis always dreamt of Japan being able to launch into the second bubble era, but the reality is that they‘re just another Asian country now, miles away from the US and China, and soon miles away from Germany and South Korea (even though both countries have a much smaller population).
Well at least the cheap yen is boosting tourism. I wonder how long that will hold though, with several cities and towns trying to ban foreign tourists from basically anything because they‘re „meiwaku“.
They can throw around „omotenashi“ as much as they want to, but foreigners not being allowed to enter the Geisha‘s district, not being allowed to celebrate Halloween, plus all the private establishments with a „Japanese only“ sign, it sounds more like „apartheid“ to me, which was proposed by an ex Abe advisor, so it looks like the ghost of Abe still haunts Japan.
Now there‘s even a seperate bus for tourists and locals in Kyoto. I wonder what would happen if a visible minority living in Kyoto took the bus meant for locals? There should be a Japanese version of Rosa Parks in my opinion.
https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN0LH0M4/
Not to mention everything that happened during covid and how badly immigrants, especially those from other Asian countries are treated in general. But I‘m preaching to the choir here.
Anyways, telling NHK that 2% of the popoluatiin is outnumbering you is ridiculous. They act like they‘re Qataris in Qatar and only make up around 10% of the population, instead of 98%.
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20240424/p2g/00m/0na/065000c
„However, the panel pointed out that an increase in foreign residents led to the improvement and warned, “The trend of a falling birthrate has not changed at all.”
Like I said in my previous post, Japanese people just don‘t see immigrants as part of society. You‘re just a glorified tourist, even with PR. If the new law passes which will make taking away PR even easier, it even becomes more useless.
How many decades will it take them to realize that the birth rate will never recover to baby boomer levels? Literally all other industrialized countries in the world (except for China, what a coincidence) have realized decades ago that immigration is the only solution.
Yeah, good luck repopulating those areas with only „pure Japanese“ women and children. Since foreigners and their children (some of whom have Japanese citizenship) don‘t count anyway in the statistics just because they‘re not Japanese, why would they even want to move to these middle of nowhere inakas and start a family there? Not only would they have to face local racial discrimination by their neighbors, but even the government and private companies making studies such as this one, tell them: „we technically need you, but you‘re not part of our community, so we‘ll make that part clear when talking about the statistics“.
@Niklas “Now NHK World made a segment about how some local governments scrapped the nationality clause.”
NHK are reporting it like it has already happened. It hasn’t happened yet. The city made a statement that they were planning to do it. But they will not do it.
Sorry, but my understanding is that it already happened in some towns. If I remember correctly a Mainichi article I posted a few months ago already confirmed that some towns scrapped the nationality clause, but foreigners are still not allowed to collect taxes or become supervisors. They‘re basically only allowed to do supporting and low administrative tasks. Even the NHK report I posted shows a Brazilian woman working in Oizumi town hall, which means they already removed the nationality clause for certain positions.
If you‘re talking about it being abolished for all positions and foreigners being seen as equal employees with equal rights, including the right to become a supervisor, I agree that that will probably never happen. The NHK segment actually says that something like that would require a law change by the national government, which the LDP will never allow. They would rather see towns and villages go extinct than to give equal rights to foreigners.
So basically still no NJ can be the boss of a Japanese.
Watch out Elite Foreigners! you could be the fall guy for the next Olympus style money siphoning scam…
Looks like Kyodo is at it again with the misleading gloss — the headline says ‘Ukrainian Refugees’ but as we all know there’s no such thing — just ‘Ukrainian evacuees’:
As war rages on, Ukrainian Refugees ready for long-term stay in Japan
With that out of the way, let me dive into the article:
Great, but is the GoJ facing up to the same reality?
And what is the GoJ doing to lower some/all of these hurdles?
So a 1-year working visa is now considered ‘long-term resident status?!’
How much more benefit could be realized if instead the GoJ granted the Ukrainian diaspora refugee resident status!
Why is it up to NPOs to fill in the void left by the central government?
Gee, here’s an area where the GoJ can lend a helping hand!
Oh, you bet there are!
No, but the GoJ won’t go down without a fight!
Here’s some food for thought: at some point in the near future, the world population of refugees will exceed the population of Japan!
Life in Japan: Lowering the drawbridge to accept immigrants / 移民や難民受け入れへ 「跳ね橋」を下ろす (Japanese language paywall version)
Wow, the level of omotenashi at work here is over 9,000!:
Town to block view of Mt. Fuji, citing badly behaved tourists / 富士山「映えスポット」苦渋の黒幕設置へ 訪日客あふれ、苦情相次ぐ (Japanese language paywall version)
Mount Fuji view to be blocked as tourists overcrowd popular photo spot
Overrun Japanese town putting up eight-foot barrier to block tourist photos of Mount Fuji
A Japanese town will erect a large mesh barrier to stop negligent foreign tourists from taking photos of Mount Fuji
Wait, all the fuss is over a view of fuji-san that is partially blocked by a Lawson?!
Why don’t they just arrest anyone who litters, instead of punishing the rest? Nope, gotta tar everyone with the same brush…the “gaijin”
Japan relying on tourism just is not suited to Japan and their “wa”. “Omotenashi” really means the tourist knowing their place in the Genkan and getting to watch but not participate or enter into Japanese cultural “mysteries”.
Visiting Japan is like prepping for some problematic country like China i.e certain things cannot be said or done and we have to walk around on eggshells, preferably with a tour guide.
Honestly they should just go back to manufacturing reliable electronic products. As trade tensions between China and the USA persist, this is surely a golden opportunity to go back to those good old days of 70s quality control and manufacturing
Well speaking of Apartheid in Japan and Japan’s effort to ban everything that was to do with fun and foreign tourists, here’s another example:
https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/15248923
I mean, I understand the concerns of the clinic’s owner and that traffic safety is very important (after all the city is obliged to protect the safety of both its residence and the tourists), but I’m sure there’s a better solution than literally blocking the view of Fuji on a public street. It’s a stupid move in my opinion, since the crowds will just move a few meters further to get a picture. Yes, they won’t be able to capture the convenience store in front, but I’m sure most of the tourists came for a photo of Fuji and they don’t really care if a convenience store will be in the front of the photo or not after all.
Anyways, this doesn’t seem purely racially motivated as all the other bans (Shibuya Halloween, Kyoto Geisha district), but it’s still funny to me how Japan will gladly take tourist’s money, but in turn block them from having a typical tourist experience. I’m also concerned that the article only talks about “foreign tourists”. Sorry, but there is no way domestic tourists always abide by the rules. I can’t even count how many times an oyaji salarymen tried to sneak in front of me in a line, or even tried to physically push me away, because I’m just a “gaijin” and they thought they could do whatever they want.
Or they’ll just go to a different Lawson:
富士山“目隠し”騒動 別のコンビニに外国人観光客集結…撮影スポット化で車の妨げに【知ってもっと】【グッド！モーニング】(2024年5月3日) (skip to the 5:00 mark)
Looks like there’ll be another black plastic sheet going up!
I thought the same as well. But nope: they’re coming for a picture of fuji-san rising above a conbini.
Frankly, I don’t understand it, but that’s what the tourists are coming for.
If the local government were smart, it would promote this phenomenon instead of trying to discourage it. Carrot vs. stick.
— Well, we don’t want a bunch of motley gaijin coming to this neighborhood. It might scare the local grandmas and grandpas. There’s quite a long history of that.
Well now they finally got someone to admit what everyone here knew already. The police is actively targeting foreigners for their illegal stop and searches.
His naivete is amazing though:
“Yamada continued, “I assume there are a lot of racial profiling victims out there who feel there’s nothing they can do every time they get questioned and searched. But every police headquarters has a consultation desk, and you can go there and tell them, ‘I’ve been racially profiled, at this time on this date.’ Police have to record every consultation, and try to solve the problems brought to them. If more and more racial profiling complaints are filed, I think that the police won’t be able to ignore it and will be forced to deal with the problem. It’s possible to get the number (of complaints) up to that level, though it will take time and energy.”
Yeah sure lol. As if that works.
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20240427/p2a/00m/0na/019000c
Great, but are NJ interested in working in Japan?
Poll: 62% in favor to policy accepting foreign workers / 外国人労働者受け入れ「賛成」62%、高齢層で大幅増 朝日世論調査 (Japanese language paywall version)