{"id":14071,"date":"2016-06-27T13:41:02","date_gmt":"2016-06-27T23:41:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=14071"},"modified":"2016-06-27T16:48:38","modified_gmt":"2016-06-28T02:48:38","slug":"shibuya-police-asking-local-minpaku-airbnb-renters-to-report-their-foreign-lodgers-to-avoid-olympic-terrorism-comes-with-racialized-illustrations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=14071","title":{"rendered":"Shibuya Police asking local “minpaku” Airbnb renters to report their foreign lodgers “to avoid Olympic terrorism”. Comes with racialized illustrations"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Hi Blog. Buzzfeed News’s Hatachi Kouta wrote up a report dated June 26, 2016<\/a>, where he found the following Shibuya Police poster in a residential area:<\/p>\n

\"Courtesy<\/a>
Courtesy of Hatachi Kouta of Buzzfeed.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The poster reads:<\/p>\n

=============================<\/p>\n

WE ARE ASKING FOR\u00a0INFORMATION FROM MINPAKU HOSTELERS<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Minpaku” is defined as\u00a0the service of offering paid accommodation using empty rooms etc. from individual homes.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

To prevent terrorism and for the success of the Olympics, we need information from everyone.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

We are especially asking for information from individually-standing homes doing Minpaku.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Please call the Shibuya Police Department, Head of Crime Prevention, at 3498-0110 ext 2612.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

=============================<\/p>\n

That’s the literal translation of the text. \u00a0Note how there is no reference whatsoever textually about foreigners. \u00a0However, contextually, in the margins there are illustrations of eight racialized “foreigners” of ostensibly European, African, and Middle-Eastern extractions complete with differentiated eye color, hair color, skin color, and facial hair. \u00a0Note how there is no representation of “Asian” foreigners, even though they make up the majority of Japan’s tourists. \u00a0I guess they’re not the type that\u00a0Shinjuku\u00a0cops are looking for.<\/p>\n

My\u00a0comments about this are seasoned to the point of\u00a0predictably: \u00a01) Once again, Japan’s police are using racial profiling to determine who is a foreigner as well as a terrorist<\/a>. \u00a02) Japan’s police are rallying the public to do their bidding on unlawful activities (i.e.,\u00a0scaring them with the threat of terrorism into reporting their foreign lodgers to the police, which neither minpaku\u00a0nor actual hotels are required\u00a0to do<\/a>). \u00a03) The use and proliferation of racialized caricature seems to be normalized standard operating procedure with Japan’s police<\/a>. \u00a0(Why not? \u00a0Nobody’s going to stop them<\/a> when they keep Japan’s public constantly afraid of foreigners<\/a>\u00a0to the point of normalized targeting.) \u00a0And 4), as I have written before, Japan is not mature enough as a society to host these international events<\/a>, for the National Police Agency whips everyone up into a frenzy about foreign crime<\/a>, hooliganism<\/a>, and\/or terrorism<\/a>. \u00a0And then the NPA\u00a0uses the events to clamp down on civil liberties for everyone<\/a>. \u00a0Thus there is insufficient check and balance<\/a> to keep these bunker-mentality\u00a0bureaucrats<\/a> from exaggerating their mandate<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Tokyo Olympics are still more than 4 years away. \u00a0Expect even more of this embedded racism<\/a> to surface into full-blown state-sponsored xenophobia in the meantime. \u00a0Dr. ARUDOU, Debito<\/p>\n

PS: \u00a0The Buzzfeed article in itself is interesting, as the author tries to hold the Shibuya Police accountable for their poster, and\u00a0(citing inter alia his lack of membership in the Press Club)\u00a0they evaded answering written questions about the poster’s contents, intent, or how it reflects police attitudes or official policy towards foreigners. \u00a0(As they did with me here when they were taking urine samples for drug tests only from foreign-looking customers on the streets in\u00a0Roppongi back in 2009<\/a>.) \u00a0According to the article, Shibuya Police also denied any ill-will towards foreigners, claiming that the foreign caricatures appeared\u00a0“so foreigners can also have more relaxed stays too” (gaikokujin no katagata mo,<\/em>\u00a0anshin shite taizai shite itadaku\u00a0shushi de, gaikokujin\u00a0fuu no irasuto o mochiita mono<\/em>). \u00a0Oh, so being racially profiled is for NJs’ own peace of mind? \u00a0Makes perfect sense — in NPA Bizzarroworld.<\/p>\n

Read the article for yourself here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

==============================<\/p>\n

Do you like what you read on Debito.org? \u00a0Want to help keep the archive active and support Debito.org’s activities? \u00a0We are celebrating Debito.org’s 20th Anniversary in 2016, so please consider donating a little something. \u00a0More details here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Shibuya Police poster reads:
\n=============================
\nWE ARE ASKING FOR INFORMATION FROM MINPAKU HOSTELERS
\n“Minpaku” is defined as the service of offering paid accommodation using empty rooms etc. from individual homes.
\nTo prevent terrorism and for the success of the Olympics, we need information from everyone
\nWe are especially asking for information from individually-standing homes doing Minpaku.
\nPlease call the Shibuya Police Department, Head of Crime Prevention, at 3498-0110 ext 2612.
\n=============================<\/p>\n

That’s the literal translation of the text. Note how there is no reference whatsoever textually about foreigners. However, contextually, in the margins there are illustrations of eight racialized “foreigners” of ostensibly European, African, and Middle-Eastern extractions complete with differentiated eye color, hair color, skin color, and facial hair. Note how there is no representation of “Asian” foreigners, even though they make up the majority of Japan’s tourists. I guess they’re not the type that Shinjuku cops are looking for.<\/p>\n

My comments about this are seasoned to the point of predictably: 1) Once again, Japan’s police are using racial profiling to determine who is a foreigner as well as a terrorist. 2) Japan’s police are rallying the public to do their bidding on unlawful activities (i.e., scaring them with the threat of terrorism into reporting their foreign lodgers to the police, which neither minpaku nor actual hotels are required to do). 3) The use and proliferation of racialized caricature seems to be normalized standard operating procedure with Japan’s police. (Why not? Nobody’s going to stop them when they keep Japan’s public constantly afraid of foreigners to the point of normalized targeting.) And 4), as I have written before, Japan is not mature enough as a society to host these international events, for the National Police Agency whips everyone up into a frenzy about foreign crime, hooliganism, and\/or terrorism. And then the NPA uses the events to clamp down on civil liberties for everyone. Thus there is insufficient check and balance to keep these bunker-mentality bureaucrats from exaggerating their mandate. The Tokyo Olympics are still more than 4 years away. Expect even more of this embedded racism to surface into full-blown state-sponsored xenophobia in the meantime. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67,54,36,33,52,5,4,10,13,65,17,55,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-embedded-racism","category-pinprick-protests","category-bad-social-science","category-fingerprinting-nj","category-hate-speech","category-human-rights","category-japanese-government","category-japanese-policeforeign-crime","category-media","category-racist-images-in-media","category-sport","category-tourism","category-8"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14071","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14071"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14071\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}