81–90 of 157 posts
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It's also taboo for white people to call some non-white people racist but then we can't actually have a discussion about racism.
My two cents here: non white people can certainly be racist, but racism is a structural thing, so it doesn't make sense to talk about racism by people that are not white, in the United States, since the structure isn't there. But I think it makes perfect sense to talk about it in other places.
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Except the US has been pretty open to immigration for the last 250 years, while Japan is 98% Japanese.
US has been pretty open to immigration at some points, and relatively closed at others. For the most of last 250 years, it has been mostly closed to non-white immigration, for example. With the exception of black Americans, the current racial and ethnic diversity in the US is a rather recent phenomenon.
Irish and Italians are lumped into White and now we have comments like yours. Most of the people in the US are from Europe so of course they favored family, friends, and countrymen coming over.
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> Countries exist that have dozens of languages and tribes. They usually have endless social problems, unrest, civil wars and often break up. Oh yeah, the history of the Swiss in the context of Europe is just non-stop insanity and violence. If only they could aspire to be more monocultural and peaceful, like their neighbors, the Germans...
External wars != internal strife. Also, Switzerland is still fairly homogeneous despite having several official languages. Moreso than say, China, India, even France or Spain.
If language isn't the thing that matters for national harmony, then this is at best a red herring and at worst a fig leaf.
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> Countries exist that have dozens of languages and tribes. They usually have endless social problems, unrest, civil wars and often break up. Oh yeah, the history of the Swiss in the context of Europe is just non-stop insanity and violence. If only they could aspire to be more monocultural and peaceful, like their neighbors, the Germans...
External wars != internal strife. Also, Switzerland is still fairly homogeneous despite having several official languages. Moreso than say, China, India, even France or Spain.
No historian worth their salt would be foolish enough to compare the circumstances of individual European countries with that of their former colonial subjects, nor things like the shifting borders and variations of thousands of years of Chinese history. Strife in China and India isn’t even independent from the influence of “homogenous“ countries in Europe!
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So, I don't understand this perspective at all. Help me get it. It seems to me that speaking a language is a skill. I know from my own experience trying to learn a second language that it isn't an easy skill for many people to acquire. Why should I be more irritated that someone doesn't speak English than that they, say, can't make a cabinet or can't write Java, or any other mildly demanding skill? I get the argument…
If someone doesn't speak my language I'd sell them groceries out of politeness, but other than that they're worthless beggars until they prove themselves to be good for my local culture.
Let’s consider: what is the value to a nation of importing immigrants?
First, they offer different perspectives, which is highly valuable in business.
Second, they introduce new customs, food, ideas, etc which help others in the community.
Etc, etc, etc.
All of this is lost if there is a strong language barrier between the existing culture and the immigrant. The immigrant who does not integrate, at least partially, brings little value to the broader community, though the community may bring value to him or her.
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It's also taboo for white people to call some non-white people racist but then we can't actually have a discussion about racism.
My two cents here: non white people can certainly be racist, but racism is a structural thing, so it doesn't make sense to talk about racism by people that are not white, in the United States, since the structure isn't there. But I think it makes perfect sense to talk about it in other places.
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The global superpower fears were wild exaggerations. They didn’t have the pop (workers and also consumers) to support those claims. Of course contributing to those fears was vast underinvestment in modernization by US firms which were still relying on very old and inefficient technologies, so of course to some stateside companies (and “pundits”) they looked like worldbeaters.
They do have the population. Just the prefecture of Tokyo is more populated than the whole continent of Australia (32 million vs 23 million)
Economical measures are hard to interpret, but they can give an indication: Japan GDP/capita is standing at 48,920 USD, and Australia at 56,919 USD. Germany is at 47,502 USD, France at 43,664 and UK at 42,986 USD. Japan is there, slightly ahead of Europe. Australia is somewhat ahead, but benefits from way more natural resources (minerals and oil). You can only grow fast so far: once your entire country is middle-class growth will be slower.
By comparison, Korea is at 26,762 USD, and China at 7,755 USD. These two countries have way more potential for growth, but also because they are way less developed for large groups of people. I forgot the exact salary difference for the same job between a chaebol and a small company in Korea, but I think we are talking 4x or 5x more at the chaebol.
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> I get the argument that someone who doesn't speak your language doesn't participate fully in your culture either, but I guess I'm still not sure why I should be upset about that. Societal harmony matters. It's why universal healthcare exists. It's why welfare exists. It's why affirmative action exists. Why countries spend money integrating immigrants. Everything that helps out poorer people is done with societal ha…
> Countries exist that have dozens of languages and tribes. They usually have endless social problems, unrest, civil wars and often break up. Oh yeah, the history of the Swiss in the context of Europe is just non-stop insanity and violence. If only they could aspire to be more monocultural and peaceful, like their neighbors, the Germans...
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External wars != internal strife. Also, Switzerland is still fairly homogeneous despite having several official languages. Moreso than say, China, India, even France or Spain.
Wait, doesn't that blow up this whole line of reasoning? If language isn't the thing that matters for national harmony, then this is at best a red herring and at worst a fig leaf.
Culture is language + religion + food + social norms + ideology and probably other things. Not everything needs to be the same, but if too many are in conflict, social problems arise.
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Japan has virtually identical GDP/capita to the UK, the numbers are a little out of date as GBP has fallen in last few years. Maybe UK could try to emulate Japan to try to catch up with it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)...
Your claim is correct only between 1985 and 1995. Since 1995, Japan's economy has stagnated but UK's has grown significantly. source: https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...