FrustratedDave said:I put it forward to you , find statistics that prove me wrong.
caster51 said:His japanese is poor more than I expected
I hardly see what he said as an insult. He was expecting better Japanese, and he does have quite a bad "namari" (No I am not trying to insult him)That's not very nice. Why the need to toss insults?
questioning competion by police
debito on TV(ﾂ債ｷ窶｢ﾃ岩?堙ｰﾂ食窶堋｢窶｢ﾂｨ窶堙俄?堋ｵ窶堙??敖ｽ窶愿ｺﾅ?ﾋ??慊ｮ窶堙ｰ窶堋ｷ窶堙ｩﾅ陳ｳﾆ但ﾆ陳?椎?ﾆ谷ﾂ人)
His japanese is poor more than I expected
Police doesn't question to only foreigners
caster51 said:Can't see what his Japanese level has to do with the thread....
FrustratedDave said:how often do you think someone could be from another country other than yours when they don't speak your language very well even though they could possible a citizen of your country?
The first video is a training video for police on how the effectively use the the "shokumu" law when apporching a suspicous person.Can't see what his Japanese level has to do with the thread....
I see two links with interesting video's, but I can't understand it because my Japanese is probably lower than the Debito guy... so how about a summary what the video is about?
I don't know,but you have have been one of the most vocal in this thread but don't seem to answer valid questions that do pertain to the content of this thread.Shouldn't this be its own thread?
This whole thread has gone off course. I vote we lock it until people cool off.
This is all I could find on JREF.
A poll on how many Kanji people on this site know or who voted know. 45% only know up to 99 kanji. The next 10% know up to 200 kanji.
How many Kanji do you know?
Another poll and low and behold 70% have JLPT of level 4 or less,
Do you speak Japanese?
So far my estmates have pretty much been varified by at least these polls.
Your call Orochi...
This whole thread has gone off course. I vote we lock it until people cool off.
Sigh... Charles where is your evidence that the people who voted on those polls had not already been to Japan? And heck, what is anyone doing when it comes to another language, learning perhaps, even those in Japan? Thanks for your insight... You know what the problem is with foriegners judging other foreigners Japanese ability, most of them can't speak reasonable Japanese so anyone who seems better than them MUST be good. But yet if to be evaluated by a native speaker they may still only have basic vocab and speaking skills.You are citing a JREF poll? Are you kidding? That poll is in a Japanese learners forum on a website perhaps primarily frequented by those living outside of Japan, many of whom are kids who just came on the cite because they are into anime. 勘弁してくれよ。
However, I put quite a bit of effort into writing my previous post, and once again, you didn't even respond to the simplest, most direct question. Could you please do that so the rest of us have something to go on and can actually contribute to the thread with relevant info?
My question was: what more do you want us to talk about here?
Frustrateddave and caster, I'll ask you as the original poster of the thread, could you please veer a bit more in the direction of the legal topic instead of bashing some guys Japanese?
If you have your alien card or passport on you and you have done nothing wrong, I imagine the officer will look at the card or passport and move on.Dave,
Just how does one "prepare accordingly"? What sort of phrases and expressions should a traveler (or even short-term resident) plan to memorize/learn? I think this is being a little unrealistic. Too many possible situations and too much vocabulary.
If you have your passport and all they are doing checking that you have the correct papers to be in Japan then I doubt very much they would take you down town. Does it have anything to do with your leagal rights? Yes it does, b/c if you can't answer the officers questions and they are suspecting something then your right to temporay freedom will come into jeopardy pretty fast. And when it does, don't go complaining that you were unfairly treated and had your rights violated, this is reality.Yes, some cops may take your lack of Japanese ability the wrong way, but what would they expect to gain by bringing you "downtown" if you can't understand them? They would probably just toss out the few English words they know (Passport! Passport!) and shrug you off if communication becomes impossible. Of course, if there were some situation where you HAD to do some communication, but then we are back to planning for a lot of contingencies.
Therefore, I think the language issue is irrelevant to the topic one's legal rights as a foreigner. Just my opinion.
Like I said before, misunderstandings can deprive you of your rights.I'm curious of how MUCH of the issue of legal rights is related to language though... as that seems mostly based on misunderstandings rather than the following of the law.
You don't know they would try speaking English to you. Plus, you seem to keep coming back to an ill-defined solution of being fluent in Japanese. I'm asking how fluent, but you don't answer. Nice sidestep, but it is a non-answer that I take for being unable to answer, which only weakens your case.All we get is half the story and anyone who is quite fluent at Japanese now will be able to look back and see just how much misunderstanding you had in conversations ,but at the time still think that you understood everything perfectly. You can't expect the police to read you mind. At least they would try to speak English to you.
Of corse it is speculation, but it is just common sense that things could be cleared up much quicker if you know Japanese.Dave,
We're going to have to agree to disagree on a point or two, and unless you or I know of specific instances, what you say is merely speculation IMO. Neither of us knows for certain what will happen if "someone is suspected of something and the police are asking questions. And if this situation arises and you have done nothing wrong".
Huh??? Where did you ask how fluent someone needs to be, I recall you asking what kind of phrases would someone need to know? So I answered in my previous post, Quote by me "learn Japanese well enough to converse" . But if you want an answer to your new question,Which BTW is next to impossible to estimate, you have to be fluent enough to not misunderstand what you are being asked and be able to express yourself well enough for the other person get a full picture of what you are saying. So yeah , I would say you would have to know Japanese pretty well. Maybe a junior high school students level in speaking would be sufficient, which is pretty high. About the English point, when I was last pulled over for speeding, I was spoken to in English first. I answered in Japanese and from then on in not once did one of them try to explain anything in English. And for the purpose of the thread, my Japanese is the level of any other Japanese business man or women, no one knows I am not Japanese on the phone unless they know me, so it would be safe to say I have no "namari". Did this add to the reason why I why not asked for my alien card? I would say it was a very big factor.You don't know they would try speaking English to you. Plus, you seem to keep coming back to an ill-defined solution of being fluent in Japanese. I'm asking how fluent, but you don't answer. Nice sidestep, but it is a non-answer that I take for being unable to answer, which only weakens your case.
Leading to your rights being violated or actually having your rights violated due to language deficiencies, I don't know which one is worse. In any case you get my point.You wrote that "misunderstandings (as a result of poor language fluency) can deprive you of your rights". No, the police or court system deprives you. Your poor language level only leads to it, and even so, there are cases where clear understanding of the language is not enough to stop police from doing what they want. Simple case is Debito's report from the Chitose airport where, despite his fluency and clear statements to the officer about his being Japanese, the officer asked him several times for his ID. A more complicated one and one with more far-reaching and serious tones is the false arrest and incarceration of a man, mostly because he was a foreigner and denied his rights. http://www.debito.org/?p=547 [I think this was the case. If not, it is still a case of heinous deprivation of human rights IN and out of jail.]
My point about being able to covey ones self, is this not depriving his rights due to the fact that she could not answer the court sufficiently? An extra month incarceration? Or am I missing something here?a) The court interpreter (which the court appoints) was not very good. Consequently the judge didn't understand Osayuwamen's wife's testimony. So they have to repeat the hearing and Osayuwamen has to languish in jail another month.