{"id":14441,"date":"2017-01-08T10:10:56","date_gmt":"2017-01-08T20:10:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=14441"},"modified":"2017-02-05T10:16:28","modified_gmt":"2017-02-05T20:16:28","slug":"japan-times-jbc-column-104-the-top-ten-human-rights-events-of-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=14441","title":{"rendered":"Japan Times JBC Column 104: The Top Ten Human Rights Events of 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

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JUST BE CAUSE<\/strong>
\n\"justbecauseicon.jpg\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Japan\u2019s human rights issues fared better in 2016<\/strong>
\n BY DEBITO ARUDOU<\/strong>
\n The Japan Times, Jan 8, 2017, Column 104 for the Community Page<\/strong><\/p>\n

Print version at\u00a0http:\/\/www.japantimes.co.jp\/community\/2017\/01\/08\/issues\/japans-human-rights-issues-fared-better-2016\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Version with links to sources follows<\/p>\n

Welcome back to JBC\u2019s annual countdown of the top issues as they affected Non-Japanese (NJ) residents of Japan. We had some brighter spots this year than in previous years, because Japan\u2019s government has been so embarrassed by hate speech toward Japan\u2019s minorities that they did something about it. Read on:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

No. 10) \u00a0Government \u201csnitch sites\u201d close down after nearly 12 years<\/strong><\/p>\n

We\u2019ve named and shamed this before (\u201cDownloadable Discrimination,\u201d Zeit Gist, March 30, 2004<\/a>). From Feb. 16, 2004, Japan\u2019s Immigration Bureau had websites where anyone could anonymously rat on foreigners for any reason whatsoever<\/a> \u2014 including (as a preset option) the xenophobic \u201crepugnance and anxiety\u201d (ken-o fuan). This occasioned calls for abolition from rights groups, including Amnesty International, and government leaders. As the Japan Federation of Bar Associations pointed out in 2005, \u201cThe program has ordinary citizens essentially spying on people suspected of being illegal aliens, which serves only to advance prejudice and discrimination toward foreigners.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Yet Japan\u2019s police \u201csee no evil\u201d when it suits them. According to the Asahi in 2015, the sites were being inundated with hate emails \u201cslandering\u201d Japan\u2019s Zainichi generational Korean community<\/a>. Immigration suddenly realized that false leads from trolls were a waste of time. Yep, we told you so more than a decade ago. Glad it sunk in.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

9 Priyanka Yoshikawa wins Miss World Japan<\/strong><\/p>\n

This year showed us that 2015 was not a fluke. In 2015, multiethnic American-Japanese Ariana Miyamoto won the Miss Universe Japan competition<\/a> as Japan\u2019s first biracial national beauty queen. In 2016, Indian-Japanese Priyanka Yoshikawa was elected to represent Japan despite protests about whether she is a \u201creal\u201d Japanese<\/a>. Although these events are cheer-worthy because they demonstrate that \u201cJapaneseness\u201d is not purely a matter of looks, they\u2019re more important because the women\u2019s stories of being \u201cdifferent\u201d have highlighted their struggles for acceptance. When the domestic media bothers to report them, that is<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The discussion has mostly been a shallow one about \u201clooks.\u201d Sadly, this is par for the course. As I said to ABC NewsRadio Australia<\/a>, \u201cWhy do we keep doing these 19th-century rituals? Demeaning women by putting them on a stage, making them do debasing things, and then saying, \u2018This is a standard of beauty that is or is not Japanese?\u2019 How about we just call it what it is: incitement to superficial judgment of people not as individuals but by physical appearance?\u201d Progress made, yes, but the real progress will be when beauty pageants stop entirely.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

8 Japan\u2019s multiethnic citizens score at 2016 Olympics<\/strong><\/p>\n

Similarly, Japan\u2019s athletes have long been scrutinized for their \u201cforeignness.\u201d If they are \u201chalf\u201d or even naturalized, their \u201cforeignness\u201d becomes a factor no matter what.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

If they do badly, \u201cIt\u2019s the foreigners\u2019 fault.\u201d As seen when Japan\u2019s men\u2019s rugby team lost in 2011 and the nation\u2019s rugby union criticized coach John Kirwan for using \u201ctoo many foreign players<\/a>\u201d (including naturalized former NJ). The team was then ethnically cleansed. When multiethnic Japanese figure skaters Chris and Cathy Reed underperformed in 2014, Tokyo 2020 Olympics Chair Yoshiro Mori essentially labeled them leftovers, bashing them (mistakenly) as \u201cnaturalized citizens\u201d who couldn\u2019t make the U.S. Team<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

But if they do well, they get celebrated. Remember October 2015, when Brave Blossoms<\/a>, the men\u2019s rugby team, scored an upset over South Africa, and their players\u2019 enhanced physical strength was attributed to their multiethnicity? Suddenly the fact that many players didn\u2019t \u201clook Japanese\u201d (11 were even born outside Japan) was no problem.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Same when Japanese athletes did well in Rio last year<\/a>. Prominent performances by multiethnic Japanese, including Mashu Baker (Gold in Judo); members of Japan\u2019s Rugby Sevens (the men\u2019s team came in fourth); other members of Japan\u2019s soccer, basketball and athletics teams; and most prominently, runner Asuka Cambridge (who missed out on Gold only to Usain Bolt) made it clear that hybrid Japanese help Japan in sports. If only people would stop putting up the extra hurdle of attributing success or failure to race.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

7 Renho Murata takes helm of the Democratic Party<\/strong><\/p>\n

After years of tired leftist politics with stale or uninspiring leaders, last September the main opposition Democratic Party made young and dynamic Taiwanese-Japanese politician Renho Murata its leader<\/a>. It was the first time a multiethnic Japanese has ever helmed a major party, and immediately there were full-throated doubts about her loyalties<\/a>. Media and politicos brought up Renho\u2019s alleged ties to untrustworthy China (even though Taiwan and China are different countries; even the Ministry of Justice said that Taiwanese in Japan are not under PRC law), or that she had technically naturalized (Renho was born before Japanese citizenship could legally pass through her mother) but had not renounced her dual citizenship, which wasn\u2019t an issue when she was a Cabinet member, nor when former Peruvian President and dual citizen Alberto Fujimori ran for a Diet seat in 2007 (Zeit Gist, May 5, 2009<\/a>).<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Whatever. Renho has proven herself a charismatic leader with an acerbic wit, ready to ask difficult and pointed questions of decision makers. She famously did so in 2009, during deliberations to fund the \u201cworld\u2019s most powerful computer,\u2019 when she asked, \u201cWhat\u2019s wrong with being number two?<\/a>\u201d The project still passed, but demanding potential boondoggles justify themselves is an important job. The fact that Renho is not cowed by tough questions herself is good for a country, which with 680,000 Japanese dual citizens<\/a> deserves fresh unfettered talent with international backgrounds.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

6 Abubakar Awudu Suraj case loses once and for all<\/strong><\/p>\n

This has made the JBC annual Top 10 several times, because it\u2019s a test case of accountability when NJ die in official custody. In 2010, Ghanaian visa overstayer Abubakar Awudu Suraj was so \u201cbrutally\u201d (according to this newspaper) restrained during deportation that he was asphyxiated. Suraj\u2019s widow, unsuccessfully seeking justice through Japan\u2019s criminal justice system, won civil damages from the Immigration Bureau in a 2014 Tokyo District Court decision. However, last January, the Tokyo High Court overturned this<\/a>, deciding that the lethal level of physical force was \u201cnot illegal\u201d \u2014 it was even \u201cnecessary\u201d \u2014 and concluded that the authorities were \u201cnot culpable.\u201d Suraj\u2019s widow took it to the Supreme Court, but the appeal was rejected last November<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Conclusion: Life is cheap in Japan\u2019s Immigration detention systems (Reuters last year reported more NJ deaths in custody due to official negligence<\/a>). And now our judiciary has spoken: If NJ suffer from a lethal level of force \u2014 sorry, are killed by police \u2014 nobody is responsible.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

5 2016 Upper house elections seal Shinzo Abe\u2019s mandate<\/strong><\/p>\n

Past JBC columns on Japan\u2019s right-wing swing<\/a> anticipated that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe would capitalize on the left\u2019s disarray and take Japan\u2019s imagined community back to an imagined past. Sure enough, winning the Upper House elections last July and solidifying a majority in both houses of Parliament, he accomplished this hat trick. Since then, Abe\u2019s popular support, according to the Asahi, remains at near record-highs (here<\/a> and here<\/a>). There\u2019s even talk of changing the rules so he can be PM beyond his mandated five-year term.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

That\u2019s it then, really. Everything we feared his administration would do since 2012 is all coming to pass: the dismissing of universal human rights as a \u201cWestern concept,\u201d the muzzling and intimidation of the press under a vague state secrets act, the deliberate destabilization of East Asia over petty territorial disputes, the enfranchising of historical denialism through a far-right cabal of elites, the emboldening of domestic xenophobia to accomplish remilitarization, the resurgence of enforced patriotism in Japan\u2019s education system, the further exploitation of foreign workers under an expanded \u201ctrainee\u201d program, and the forthcoming fundamental abrogation of Japan\u2019s \u201cPeace Constitution.\u201d<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Making Japan \u201cgreat\u201d again, similar to what\u2019s happening in the United States under President-elect Donald Trump, has been going on for the past four years. With no signs of it abating.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

4 Next generation of \u201cGreat Gaijin Massacres\u201d loom<\/strong><\/p>\n

In April 2013, Japan\u2019s Labor Contracts Law was amended to state that companies, after five years of continuous contract renewals, must hire their temporary workers as \u201cregular employees\u201d (seishain). Meant to stop employers from hiring people perpetually on insecure contract jobs (\u201cinsecure\u201d because employees are easily fired by contract nonrenewal), it is having the opposite effect: Companies are inserting five-year caps in contracts to avoid hiring people for real<\/a>. Last November, The Japan Times reported on the \u201cTohoku University job massacre<\/a>,\u201d where 3,200 contract workers are slated to be fired en masse in 2017.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

JBC sees this as yet another \u201cGaijin as Guinea Pig\u201d scenario (ZG, July 8, 2008<\/a>). This happened in Japanese academia for generations: Known as \u201cAcademic Apartheid<\/a>,\u201d foreign full-time scholars received perpetual contract employment while Japanese full-time scholars received permanent uncontracted tenure from day one. This unequal status resulted in the \u201cGreat Gaijin Massacre\u201d of 1992-4<\/a>, where the Ministry of Education (MOE) told National and Public Universities not to renew the contracts of foreigners over the age of 35 as a cost-cutting measure. Then from 1997, the MOE encouraged contract employment be expanded to Japanese full-time educators. From 2018, it will be expanded to the nonacademic private sector<\/a>. It\u2019s a classic case of Martin Niemoller\u2019s \u201cFirst they came \u2026<\/a>\u201d poem: Denying equal rights to part of the population eventually got normalized and applied to everyone.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

3 The government surveys NJ discrimination<\/strong><\/p>\n

Japan has been suddenly cognizant of \u201cforeigner discrimination\u201d this year. Not \u201cracial discrimination,\u201d of course, but baby steps. The Asahi kicked things off in January by reporting that 42 percent of foreign residents in Tokyo\u2019s Shinjuku Ward encountered some form of discrimination, and nearly 52 percent of that was in finding apartments<\/a>. Glad to have the stats, albeit localized.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Then the Ministry of Justice\u2019s Bureau of Human Rights conducted its first-ever nationwide survey of discrimination toward longer-term NJ residents<\/a> by mailing them a detailed multilingual survey (available at www.debito.org\/?p=14298<\/a>), asking questions specifically about unequal treatment in housing, employment, education, social situations, etc. It even mentioned the establishment of \u201claws and regulations prohibiting discrimination against foreigners\u201d (not a law against discrimination by race, natch).<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Although this survey is well-intentioned, it still has two big blind spots: It depicted discrimination as 1) due to extranationality, not physical appearance, and 2) done by Japanese people, not the government through systemic racism embedded in Japan\u2019s laws and systems (see my book \u201cEmbedded Racism\u201d for more). As such, the survey won\u2019t resolve the root problems fundamental to Japan\u2019s very identity as an ethnostate.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

2 Blowback involving NJ tourism and labor<\/strong><\/p>\n

Japan\u2019s oft-touted sense of \u201cselfless hospitality\u201d (omotenashi) is an odd thing. We are seeing designated \u201cforeigner taxis<\/a>\u201d at Kyoto Station (with a segregated stop), \u201cforeign driver\u201d stickers<\/a> on Hokkaido and Okinawa rental cars stigmatizing NJ tourists (and NJ residents touring), and media grumblings about ill-mannered Chinese crowding stores, spending scads of money (diddums!) and leaving behind litter. (Japan\u2019s tourist sites were of course sparkling clean before foreigners showed up. Not.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s the omnipresent threat of terrorism, depicted for years now by the government as something imported by foreigners into a formerly \u201csafe Japan<\/a>\u201d (although all terrorist acts so far in Japan have been homegrown). To that end, 2016 was when Japan\u2019s Supreme Court explicitly approved police surveillance of Muslim residents due to their religion<\/a>. (What\u2019s next? Surveilling foreign residents due to their extranationality?)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Yet foreigners are a necessary evil. Japan still needs them to do its dirty work<\/a> in the construction, manufacturing, agriculture, fishery and nursing sectors. So this year the foreign \u201ctrainee\u201d work program was expanded, along with measures against abuses. About time \u2014 bad things, including NJ slavery and child labor have been happening for decades<\/a>, with the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry acknowledging that about 70 percent of employers hiring \u201ctrainees\u201d engage in illegal labor practices<\/a>. Omotenashi has been counterweighted by government-sponsored exploitation of NJ, and now with the upcoming 2020 Olympics, there\u2019s plenty more dirty work out there.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

And after all this, 2016 offered one big bright spot:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

1 Hate speech law gets passed \u2014 and enforced<\/strong><\/p>\n

Japan\u2019s first law protecting \u201cforeigners\u201d from group denigration in public was passed nationwide in May. JBC (Feb. 1) heralded it as a step in the right direction. Critics quickly pointed out its shortcomings<\/a>: It doesn\u2019t actually ban hate speech, or have penalties for violators, and it only covers people of overseas origin \u201cwho live legally in Japan\u201d (meaning \u201cforeigners,\u201d but not all of them). Plus it skirts the issue of racial discrimination, natch<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

However, it has had important effects<\/a>. The law offered a working definition of hate speech and silenced people claiming the \u201cWestern construct\u201d of hate speech didn\u2019t exist in Japan. It also gave Japan\u2019s bureaucrats the power to curtail haters. The Mainichi Shimbun reported that this year\u2019s xenophobic rallies, once daily on average somewhere in Japan, had decreased<\/a>. Rallies also reportedly softened their hateful invective. Since Japan\u2019s outdoor public gatherings need police and community approval (ZG March 4, 2003), even an official frown on hatred can be powerful.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Official frowning spread. The National Police Agency advised prefectural police departments to respond to hate speech demos. A court banned a rally in a Korean area of Kawasaki for \u201cillegal actions that infringe upon the personal rights for leading a personal life.\u201d Another court ordered hate group Zaitokukai to compensate a Zainichi Korean<\/a> for public slurs against her. Both judges cited the United Nations Convention on Racial Discrimination<\/a>, which has been ignored in lawsuits against \u201cJapanese only\u201d establishments.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

These are remarkable new outcomes in a society loath to call \u201cNo Foreigners Allowed\u201d signs discriminatory, let alone order police to take them down. Progress to build upon.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Bubbling under the top 10<\/strong><\/p>\n

11 Population of registered NJ residents reaches record 2.23 million<\/a> despite significant decreases in recent years.<\/strong><\/p>\n

12 \u201cSpecial economic zones\u201d expand to the aging agriculture sector, and want \u201cskilled foreigners\u201d with college degrees and Japanese-language ability to till fields on three-year visas. Seriously<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

13 The Nankai Line train conductor who apologized to passengers for \u201ctoo many foreigners\u201d on an airport-bound train is officially reprimanded<\/a>, not ignored.<\/strong><\/p>\n

14 Osaka sushi restaurant Ichibazushi, which was bullying foreign customers by deliberately adding too much wasabi, is forced by social media to publicly apologize<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

15 Debito.org\u2019s archive of human rights issues in Japan celebrates its 20th Anniversary.<\/strong><\/p>\n

——————–
\nDo you like what you read on Debito.org? \u00a0Want to help keep the archive active and support Debito.org’s activities? \u00a0Please consider donating a little something. \u00a0More details here<\/a>. Or even click on an ad below.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Japan\u2019s human rights issues fared better in 2016
\nBY DEBITO ARUDOU
\nThe Japan Times, Jan 8, 2017, Column 104 for the Community Page<\/p>\n

Welcome back to JBC\u2019s annual countdown of the top issues as they affected Non-Japanese (NJ) residents of Japan. We had some brighter spots this year than in previous years, because Japan\u2019s government has been so embarrassed by hate speech toward Japan\u2019s minorities that they did something about it. Read on:<\/p>\n

No. 10) Government \u201csnitch sites\u201d close down after nearly 12 years\u2026<\/p>\n

Rest of the article at
\nhttp:\/\/www.japantimes.co.jp\/community\/2017\/01\/08\/issues\/japans-human-rights-issues-fared-better-2016\/
\nVersion with links to sources now up on Debito.org<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67,18,43,36,22,34,33,47,35,52,20,5,12,37,26,4,10,14,16,15,13,64,17,55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-embedded-racism","category-academia","category-bad-business-practices","category-bad-social-science","category-cultural-issue","category-exclusionism","category-fingerprinting-nj","category-food","category-good-news","category-hate-speech","category-history","category-human-rights","category-immigration-assimilation","category-injustice","category-ironies-hypocrisies","category-japanese-government","category-japanese-policeforeign-crime","category-japanese-politics","category-labor-issues","category-lawsuits","category-media","category-sitys","category-sport","category-tourism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14441","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=14441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14441\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}