🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <CLAUDE.92Sep9114425@tokyo.trc.mew.mei.co.jp> claude@trc.mew.mei.co.jp (Claude Huss) writes:
 >I wonder why the japanese
 >say "there's no immigration here" and there are about 1 million Japanese-
 >Koreans and some hundred of thousand of chinese/taiwanese living here
 >even before the WWII. (I'm not sure about the numbers... :-) )

The fundamental policy of Japanese government towards non-Japanese
residents has been the same before and after the WWII: non-Japanese
residents should not form major ethnic groups here or they should
re-nationalize.

 >Their adaption was the saddest one: "They quitted their identity, they
 >hide themselves, They lost their language and their culture, they didn't
 >have basic rights for a long time". Sometimes, I wonder if this is not
 >the kind of adaptation that the japanese society expects about the
 >foreigners...

Well that's also the case for a person like me who went abroad 18
years ago and spent 15 months there (in USA) and came back to Japan. I
was 10 years old then and people surrounding me in the elementary
school I went after coming back here simply tried to re-nationalize me
- denying different values, denying different customs (e.g. 
outspokenness) - and forced me to obey. Since then I live in the world
of double-standard values, the world inside and outside myself, often
disputing with each other. The adaptation mentioned by Claude-san is
not only expected to non-Japanese residents but also to Japanese
dissidents. :-<

// I intentionally avoid using the word "foreigner" to a person
// who lives in a country but does not have a nationality of the
// country. The word "foreign" itself has an implicit meaning of
// "not belonging naturally" and I think using this kind of words
// is itself discriminative. I urge those who are using "foreigner"
// to reconsider its usage. CNN has done this and in their
// broadcasting programs they have banned using the word "foreigner".

// Kenji Rikitake