Ask a Japanese American

[Japanese_American]

I don't think we're on the same page here... citizenship and ethnicity are different things. You don't carry Japanese citizenship, but you identify yourself as Japanese and American, then you call Japan racist. And keep using Africa as a reference, where the lines between nationality and ethnicity are even more blurred?

OK, nevermind. You're a beautiful snowflake that can use chopsticks. Good for you. Sorry I didn't have more questions like "what's it like to look Japanese but not know the language?"

Well, apparently, using white may be incorrect. I never said Japan is a racist country. Again, you don't read fully my statement, but oh well, just keep on sending.

 

[Half-n-Half]

I never said Japan is a racist country. Again, you don't read fully my statement, but oh well, just keep on sending.

Japan is racist, or they have the right to do so.

And are non Japanese living in Japan a gaijin? If so, then Japan is racist.

Can you see why nice gaijin made that statement?

 

[Emoni]

I'm back to prod this mess with a 11-foot pole, for the sake of backing NiceGaijin up a bit.

First, I'm starting smell a troll or at least troll like behavior. Your reply to my post made NO sense, and pretty much stated that you haven't technically broken any rules so you are going to run with this travesty as far as you can. Not what I consider a promising direction for this thread, nor was it even remotely related to what I posted even.

Second, I know NiceGaijin in real life and he pays VERY close attention to details and what is said and what is NOT said in a much more coherent manner than this thread deserves. Honestly, he likely he may have more experience with "Japan and Japanese culture" than you, or at the very least he has thought more subjectively about what he does know. He's made some very valid statements about this post that you have not answered, and you are now veering off the statements and questions he posed towards attacking (unjustifiably) his alleged inability to "read fully (your) post."

I highly "recommend" you check your attitude before further posting as you are not making many friends with your current demeanor.

 

[Japanese_American]

This is quickly becoming one of my favorite threads.
OK, so, let me ask you a question. Do you think Japanese-Americans (or Japanese Americans) are being discriminated against in the United States?

Good question. The problem is, Japanese Americans are grouped up in a category that's offensive to us. For example:

Model minority myth:
Model minority refers to a minority ethnic, racial, or religious group whose members achieve a higher degree of success than the population average. It is most commonly used to label one ethnic minority higher achieving than another ethnic minority. This success is typically measured in income, education, and related factors such as low crime rate and high family stability. The term is often characterized as a myth which amounts to racial stereotyping, and that its use may be a political tool and its implications incite jealousy and fighting among ethnic minorities, an example of leveraging majority power dynamics to provoke ill sentiments between minority groups.
In the United States, the term has usually been associated with East Asian Americans and Indian Americans. Recently, the term has been broadened in some circles to include recent African immigrants.
A common misconception is that the affected communities usually hold pride in their labeling as the model minority. Statistics are often cited to back up their model minority status such as high educational achievement, overrepresentation at Ivy League and other prestigious universities, and a high percentage of Asian Americans working in white collar professions (jobs such as medicine, investment banking, management consulting, finance, and law). Part of the myth is that the Asian American community embraces the model minority label as empowering to their image, implying that Asians are the "model" for other minority demographics to emulate. For example, second generation Chinese American, Frances Kai-Hwa Wang, notes that East Asians should not only accept the model minority stereotype, but embrace it because East Asian educational values are a special legacy of their heritages.
While some Asian Americans hold pride in the model minority image, the consensus in academia and the field of Asian American studies is that the Model Minority Myth is detrimental to the Asian Pacific American community, used to justify the exclusion of needy APA communities in the distribution of assistance programs, public and private, and understate or slight the achievements of APA individuals. Communities that are especially affected are South East Asian communities, e.g. Cambodian-American, and the Pacific Islander community, e.g. persons with origins in Guam and Micronesia; these communities have much lower education rates and higher poverty rates. Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Indian Americans are over twice as likely to attend college than other types of Asians. The Model Minority myth relies on the aggregation of success indicators, hiding the plight of recent first-generation immigrants under the high success rate of more established Asian communities.
The term "model minority" was coined in the mid-1960s by William Petersen to describe Asian Americans as ethnic minorities who, despite marginalization, have achieved success in the United States.
The purpose was to provide a comparison of capitalist and socialist economies: as capitalism was equated with inequality, particularly in reference to poor African Americans, Asian Americans were chosen as an example of a minority group who could succeed by "merit" alone. Modelminority.com writes: "While superficially complimentary to Asian Americans, the real purpose and effect of this portrayal is to celebrate the status quo in race relations. First, by over-emphasizing Asian American success, it deemphasizes the problems Asian Americans continue to face from racial discrimination in all areas of public and private life. Second, by misrepresenting Asian American success as proof that the US provides equal opportunities for those who conform and work hard, it excuses US society from careful scrutiny on issues of race in general, and on the persistence of racism against Asian Americans in particular."

Also:

Almost at the same time, Japanese officials, including Michio Watanabe and Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone, were criticized for making racially insensitive remarks targeted at blacks and hispanics. Nakasone said that African and Hispanic Americans had been lowering America's intelligence level because of their low literacy rate (he claimed 25%), and praised Japan's "racial homogeneity" and working ethics, claiming that American workers were lazy. Nakasone was forced to make an apology to the people of both the United States and Japan for his comments. Notably, it has been claimed by scholars that "a large number of Japanese actually agreed with [Nakasone's] comments, but were merely angered by the embarrassment that it had caused Japan by him making them."

So with these types of stereotypes, there are no reason why Asians need any help, support and now, Asians are classed as white in affirmative action, because we are the model minority.

Is there racism in the states? There is, but it's so subtle, it's hidden in plain site. Ask an Iraqi or Afghani after 9/11.

Originally Posted by Japanese_American View Post

I never said Japan is a racist country. Again, you don't read fully my statement, but oh well, just keep on sending.

Originally Posted by Japanese_American View Post

Japan is racist, or they have the right to do so. (the conjunction negates the first comment)

Originally Posted by Japanese_American View Post

And are non Japanese living in Japan a gaijin? If so, then Japan is racist. (stop being so selective. If you're from Japan and you moved here and you become a naturalized citizen then you're an American. If you're not a a citizen, then guess what, it's racism. Racism is a combining of two words. Race and the isms of race. )

Can you see why nice gaijin made that statement?

Can you see why nice gaijin made that statement?

 

[nice gaijin]

I don't mean to judge, but trolls smell like the inside of a bellybutton.

Emoni, there's no reason to get worked up over this kid, his haphazard statements are a goldmine of self-destructive logic.

 

[Japanese_American]

Glenski says: The "right"? Think again. The country signed a treaty against racial discrimination over a decade ago, thus stating to the world that it did NOT have such a thing (the "right"). Sadly, it has not done anything to enact laws against such discrimination.

Oh, and the laws on dual nationality are up for change again here.

Your whole thread is full of confusing posts.

You're not into anime, yet you boast about knowing some history because you are an anime freak. Huh? How's that?

I watched anime as a kid

Glenski says: You say you are sansei because dad was nisei, but in the same paragraph you write "my mother was from Yamagata Shinjo-shi. I don't speak Japanese very well and I'm a nisei." Am I missing something here?

Sure when half asked.

Glenski says: You clearly call yourself Japanese-American, yet you wrote "I am not a compound adjective." Choose, ok?

"Ideas for an ESL Compound Adjective Worksheet
ESL Compound Adjective Worksheet Idea #1

For this worksheet, have students match the compound adjectives used in the right-hand column with the ideas presented in the left-hand column to create a complete sentence. The compound adjectives listed in this exercise are commonly used in English, and the context clues from the sentence as a whole should help ESL students understand the meaning and proper usage of these descriptive tools.

Again, students will learn that compound adjectives are hyphenated when they proceed a noun, and that they perform the same function as other types of adjective which is to modify the noun that they proceed.
1. Organ donors perform a. a long-winded man.
2. After a day in the sun I crave b. a six-sided die.
3. The long speech was given by c. a sure-footed animal.
4. Yahtzee is a game played with d. a tight-fisted woman.
5. The mountain goat is e. an ice-cold lemonade.
6. Don't go the wrong way down f. a five-page book report.
7. The manager of the bank is g. a ten-dollar bill.
8. My homework for tomorrow is h. a life-giving service.
9. My friend Scott lent me i. a three-hour movie.
10. The theatre is showing j. a one-way street."

This help you?

Glenski says: This quote is chocked full of weirdness:
For starters, I live in Japan, yet I am not Japanese (just like the other 2 million of us foreigners).

Did you give up your citizenship from your country of origin? When my mother became a U.S. citizen, she's now an American. If you did the same in Japan, then suffice to say you are?

Glenski says: Your example of the white person becoming naturalized is a test of semantics. He is only technically African American; he is also technically a mere naturalized US citizen. And, no the title African American is not reserved only for people with black skin, but they represent the vast majority of people with that moniker. It's a mindset. Lastly, non-Japanese living in Japan are considered gaijin by some. A more proper and polite term is gaikokujin. Gaijin is often an offensive word.

Semantics? So if a white person was born in Africa, he or she is not an African? And when they give up their allegiance of their country of their birth, they are not truly a citizen? you may have a point. With the war on terror, one can lose their citizenship and be deported a lot easier than prior to 9/11. You are correct there. Oh as for the gaijin, I was called that by the jr. high school kids in Japan. They found out I was from Japan and they yelled at me: America ni kaire baka gaijin.

Glenski says: HalfNHalf wrote: Living in Japan does not automatically make you Japanese.
You responded: No but it makes you your ethnicity Japan.
Totally wrong in more ways than one. You just don't get it.

my mother can run for Congress or run for governor but not President or vice president. But if George H.W. Bush gets his way and amends the constitution of the United States, Arnold Schwarzenegger can run for president, as he cannot, because, he was naturalized.

 

[Emoni]

I don't mean to judge, but trolls smell like the inside of a bellybutton.

Emoni, there's no reason to get worked up over this kid, his haphazard statements are a goldmine of self-destructive logic.

Oh, I'm not no worries. It's just kind of sad to see this kind of crap on the board after decent posts and posters have gone down so much the past year. This could have been a good thread, but oddly enough the OP and his behavior kicks the chair out from underneath the whole topic. I'm honestly not sure what his motivation is actually. I'm teetering between trolling or mental masturbation to the ability to copy-paste stuff and behave like a celebrity in his own mind.

 

[Japanese_American]

I'm back to prod this mess with a 11-foot pole, for the sake of backing NiceGaijin up a bit.

First, I'm starting smell a troll or at least troll like behavior. Your reply to my post made NO sense, and pretty much stated that you haven't technically broken any rules so you are going to run with this travesty as far as you can. Not what I consider a promising direction for this thread, nor was it even remotely related to what I posted even.

Second, I know NiceGaijin in real life and he pays VERY close attention to details and what is said and what is NOT said in a much more coherent manner than this thread deserves. Honestly, he likely he may have more experience with "Japan and Japanese culture" than you, or at the very least he has thought more subjectively about what he does know. He's made some very valid statements about this post that you have not answered, and you are now veering off the statements and questions he posed towards attacking (unjustifiably) his alleged inability to "read fully (your) post."

I highly "recommend" you check your attitude before further posting as you are not making many friends with your current demeanor.

Well again, if I'm doing anything wrong or offensive, then report me and have my post removed. But guess what? I'm not.

 

[nice gaijin]

that's it, I'm moving to Africa so I can be black.

 

[Japanese_American]

that's it, I'm moving to Africa so I can be black.

Are you black? I'm an American because I was born here and my mother is an American because she became a citizen.

 

[Emoni]

Are you black?

Zoom! Right over his head!

 

[Japanese_American]

Zoom! Right over his head!

What went over my head? The fact that you want to move to Africa and want to be black? And I asked, are you black or are you implying that you will become black moving to the continent of Africa?

 

[nice gaijin]

no, that's what you implied.

No but it makes you your ethnicity Japan. Like, African Japanese or Italian Japanese or British Japanese. Because there is no way I can get rid of my Japanese aspect of me, and American is not an ethnicity either, contrary to popular belief.

What do you think ethnicity means?

 

[Emoni]

1$ IRL that he says you can't read his posts correctly or simply ignores it and goes on to talking about himself. (

(Edit: Aww no fair you reworded the question~)

 

[nice gaijin]

I'll take my dollar now!

 

[Emoni]

Nah, you'd have to wait a bit That way the value can drop down even further and I'll feel like I gave away less.

 

[nice gaijin]

ok, 75 yen then

 

[caster51]

I think he has two character in his Identity like this?
http://lions.fau.jp/ben05rm/05-sp11.wmv
外国人による日本語弁論大会 2005

 

[Japanese_American]

no, that's what you implied.



What do you think ethnicity means?

My nationality is USA.
na⋅tion⋅al⋅i⋅ty
/ˌnæʃəˈnælɪti/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [nash-uh-nal-i-tee] Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun, plural -ties for 1, 2, 5, 6.
1. the status of belonging to a particular nation, whether by birth or naturalization: the nationality of an immigrant.
2. the relationship of property, holdings, etc., to a particular nation, or to one or more of its members: the nationality of a ship.

My ethnicity is Japanese.
eth⋅nic⋅i⋅ty
/ɛﾆ津?#712;nɪsɪti/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [eth-nis-i-tee] Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun, plural -ties.
1. ethnic traits, background, allegiance, or association.
2. an ethnic group: Representatives of several ethnicities were present.

Hope that solves the confusion

Nah, you'd have to wait a bit That way the value can drop down even further and I'll feel like I gave away less.

Thank the IMF, thank Japan's trade policy and thank the Bush administration. Oh and Hank Paulson's federal reserve antics. A government entity which is not.

 

[Japanese_American]

I think he has two character in his Identity like this?
http://lions.fau.jp/ben05rm/05-sp11.wmv
外国人による日本語弁論大会 2005

Takashi is an American. He is also ethnically Japanese. Being an American is not being a certain race, as I am Japanese, born of Japanese parents but am an American citizen. Actually, there is no ethnic group in the U.S. Well, maybe I and many others who were born and raised here or naturalized by the ICE formerly INS, we're United Statese Wow, people born in the U.S. are not an ethnic group and i could see why Japanese people from Japan can't grasp this concept. That's why they called me a baka gaijin and nihon ni kaire. But I have no ethnic background other than Japanese.

Takashi is an American. If he gives up his American citizenship and becomes a Japanese, then he's Japanese as he no longer associates his life or his identity to the U.S. But the next question is, will the Japanese government recognize that? If he commits a crime, can he be deported once naturalized or will he have the opportunity to become naturalized?

 

[nice gaijin]

My nationality is USA.
na⋅tion⋅al⋅i⋅ty
/ˌnæʃəˈnælɪti/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [nash-uh-nal-i-tee] Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun, plural -ties for 1, 2, 5, 6.
1. the status of belonging to a particular nation, whether by birth or naturalization: the nationality of an immigrant.
2. the relationship of property, holdings, etc., to a particular nation, or to one or more of its members: the nationality of a ship.
My ethnicity is Japanese.
eth⋅nic⋅i⋅ty
/ɛθˈnɪsɪti/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [eth-nis-i-tee] Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun, plural -ties.
1. ethnic traits, background, allegiance, or association.
2. an ethnic group: Representatives of several ethnicities were present.
Hope that solves the confusion

I know what the dictionary says, that wasn't my question.

 

[Japanese_American]

I know what the dictionary says, that wasn't my question.

no, that's what you implied.



What do you think ethnicity means?

And I wrote it down. Do you want a philosophical answer? Something pensive or thoughtful? If no, then i don't understand the question

no, that's what you implied.



What do you think ethnicity means?

 

[nice gaijin]

Takashi is an American. He is also ethnically Japanese. Being an American is not being a certain race, as I am Japanese, born of Japanese parents but am an American citizen. Actually, there is no ethnic group in the U.S. Well, maybe I and many others who were born and raised here or naturalized by the ICE formerly INS, we're United Statese Wow, people born in the U.S. are not an ethnic group and i could see why Japanese people from Japan can't grasp this concept. That's why they called me a baka gaijin and nihon ni kaire. But I have no ethnic background other than Japanese.
Takashi is an American. If he gives up his American citizenship and becomes a Japanese, then he's Japanese as he no longer associates his life or his identity to the U.S. But the next question is, will the Japanese government recognize that? If he commits a crime, can he be deported once naturalized or will he have the opportunity to become naturalized?

Aww, it's just so sad. You are totally misunderstood by both Americans and Japanese alike. You are so unique, nobody gets you. Like a pre-op tranny.

And I wrote it down. Do you want a philosophical answer? Something pensive or thoughtful? If no, then i don't understand the question

Nah I was just hoping for some clarification, like why you would say that moving to another country or even becoming a naturalized citizen would change your ethnic identity. Seems like you're the one who is confused, or perhaps just the source of confusion here.

 

[Japanese_American]

Aww, it's just so sad. You are totally misunderstood by both Americans and Japanese alike. You are so unique, nobody gets you. Like a pre-op tranny.

Gee, that's an insult to the LGBT crowd. Come on insult me if you wish, but don't insult the LGBT groups

Nah I was just hoping for some clarification, like why you would say that moving to another country or even becoming a naturalized citizen would change your ethnic identity. Seems like you're the one who is confused, or perhaps just the source of confusion here.

Ethnic? I said nationality. I can change my nationality but I can't change my ethnicity.

 

[nice gaijin]

Gee, that's an insult to the LGBT crowd. Come on insult me if you wish, but don't insult the LGBT groups

Insult? I just said that you were misunderstood. You should be so lucky to be compared to a pre-op tranny.

Ethnic? I said nationality. I can change my nationality but I can't change my ethnicity.

Do you ever read what you write, or does it all just come gushing out like a lanced boil?

Originally Posted by Half-n-Half View Post
I think what he meant was that someone living in Japan might not necessarily be of Japanese decent or a citizen. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Mikawa Ossan, who you directed one of your posts toward, does not have any Japanese ancestry. Living in Japan does not automatically make you Japanese.
What do you mean?

No but it makes you your ethnicity Japan. Like, African Japanese or Italian Japanese or British Japanese. Because there is no way I can get rid of my Japanese aspect of me, and American is not an ethnicity either, contrary to popular belief.