121–130 of 232 posts
This whole section was nonsensical.
There may be more diversity in Japan than given credit but there is more similarities between a Korean and a Japanese than there are between someone from Syria and a French person. Pretty naive to gloss over that fact.
Actually out of curiosity, I'd love to hear a Japanese or Korean persons take on this claim. Im from the Middle East so Syria and France seem pretty different for me, but maybe if you're from the country/region being compared it's a lot easier to see the differences.
Subjectively, it seems to me like Japan and South Korea are somewhat culturally similar, but they are not the same, and the differences are important to people there. Furthermore, 20th century history has created a lot of hatred on both sides. These wounds are starting to heal with time and _I think_ the younger generation in Korea tends to care less about the issue. Many people in both countries go to the other country for tourism, and each country's cultural exports are popular in the other country.
For an analogy (though not a close analogy, because the political situation is different): Israel and Syria are pretty similar though, right? Both speak Semitic languages, they have similar food, similar weather, similar religions, and often you can't tell them apart just by looking at them. So they should be friends. :)
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The Ainu are a tiny tiny minority. Even moreso since (Yamato) Japan colonized the island. Okinawans are pretty much culturally Japanese with a different flavor like Kanto is different from Kansai.
> Okinawans are pretty much culturally Japanese Try saying that in a bar in Okinawa and see how well it goes over. > a different flavor like Kanto is different from Kansai. It’s not uncommon to hear people from Tokyo describe people from Osaka as “not being Japanese.”
Okinawa has been a part of Japan for over four centuries, so they’re pretty much integrated and there isn’t much daylight.
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If that is true could Olympus elaborate on how?
There’s another large Muslim minority group called the Hui, who aren’t included in the Xinjiang camps and are generally treated well by most accounts I’ve seen.
Now, arguably the anti-halal policies were about trying to ban misleading advertising, because it's a bit silly to claim halal status on everything. Malaysia is another country that also has a bit of problem with this. But then, China has an awful lot of other misleading advertising and false claims (in particular around TCM and efficacy of folk remedies) that the government ignores or promotes. Why only target halal?
Misleading advertising aside, it's definitely the case that Arabic script for halal disappeared from legitimately halal restaurants all over China as part of this crackdown. The message seemed to be that it is okay to be Muslim, just keep quiet about it and do not advertise it too much.
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Just off the top of my head for countries that also track ethnicity/race in government statistics: Belgium (because the Walloon/Fleming ethnic divide is so central to its politics), Germany (under the euphemism "migration background"), Russia, Israel, Lebanon... Ethnicity is an extremely important identity category, and if you want to manage that diversity you need information.
France. No government agency can mention or ask about ethnicity - in particular, our national statistics agency, the INSEE. Private organizations can, but this is not often seen. I think its an heritage from WWII, in particular the "yellow star". France refuses to consider racial differences (and religious differences too), it seeks unity in everything, to the point that it almost drove local languages to extinction.…
What you describe is the French dream but is that somewhat a reality?
"To some on the Right, Japan is a paradise of racial purity..." Is it now considered a de facto truth that people identifying as "Right" are racists? If not, why bring up the Right in this sentence? When I was growing up, Right overlapped with Conservative, but racists were a discrete group of people. If Right now means racist, what is the label for someone with the political attributes of Right, but who is not racis…
There isn't one. Many liberals consider conservative beliefs to be inherently racist. Opposition to the ACA, for example, was decried as "racist": https://www.forbes.com/sites/peterubel/2013/11/21/is-opposit....
A lot of this worldview isn't unwarranted. Conservative opposition to the federal government is perceived very differently among say Black people, who relied on the federal government to protect their Civil Rights. A conservative might point out, "many homogenous countries have weak federal governments--it's a general principle that's valid irrespective of racism." And at the same time, the view of a Black Democrat on that point is totally valid too.
I think this article goes through a lot of micro-exercizes and micro-corrections and semantics to avoid the obvious conclusion that Japan is mostly honogenous, and to a far more degree than the US or a lot of European countries. Counter-examples don't refute a general observation. They can only refute an absolute statement. But when it comes to actual numbers and breakdowns (which would put a general observation into…
> I think this article goes through a lot of micro-exercizes and micro-corrections and semantics to avoid the obvious conclusion that Japan is mostly honogenous, and to a far more degree than the US or a lot of European countries. It depends on what one looks at. The U.S.A., culturally, most famously treats race as if it be an ethnicity. As such, in their perspective what they call “African-American" and “European-Am…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> what is the label for someone with the political attributes of Right, but who is not racist? I hope I get this right. Everyone is racist, but it's only bad to be a racist if you have power. White people have all the power and so are the worst type of racist. To deny being racist is to be fragile and also proof that you're a racist. So 'someone with the political attributes of Right, but who is not racist' doesn't e…
I hope you don't believe the absolutism of "white people have ALL the power"...