John R. Yamamoto-Wilson wrote:
> CL wrote:
> 
>  > On my planet, in 23 years of residence, I have never been denied
>> access to an onsen.  
> 
> Well, but he has. And he sued and won:
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onsen#Recent_controversy

Shameless self-promotion.  But Wikipedia is famous for that.

> Even if he went there knowing its reputation and looking for a
> confrontation (and I don't know if it was like that, but it seems not
> unlikely), hasn't he done a service to us all by highlighting the issue,
> winning the case and forcing others to think twice before discriminating
> in the same way?
> 
> I'm just asking here; if there's a valid reason why it isn't all as it
> appears I'm perfectly open to it.

Sorry to be so long in waiting to reply, but life interfered.

Let me ask you what someone from a Hokkaido government office asked me
-- do you think that there's any chance Debit profited financially from
the exchange?  Think about it from a host national point of view:  He
goes into an overpriced, overdecorated sento that has been having cash
flow problems, raises hell, sues them and then ... suddenly ... the
story gets into the local and some of the national press and
(presto-change o), the sento is doing a land office business, making
money off of "supporters" who begin showing up in groups.

Debit gets a giant jolt of the self promotion and self gratification
that keeps him going and the sento owner gets through a rocky patch.
Might there have been more?

Now, I'd be perfectly happy to dismiss this rumor as sour grapes, except
I have heard it from several people including a couple who would have
been in a position to know about traffic flow.  I am doubtful, but no
one seems to worry about how it is perceived locally.  Everyone just
goes on with that fat, dumb, certainty that they can do no wrong.

>> I've never been stopped by the police in an airport for an ID check.
> 
> Neither have I, but I am a white academic. OK, so is he, but that's not
> my point here. My point is that the axe he's grinding applies much more
> forcefully to other, non-white, minorities. I wonder what sort of
> feelings people from Korean, Chinese, Brazilian or other backgrounds
> have about him?

This is Missionary Church thinking at its finest.  The inferior,
non-white heathen cannot fend for himself but, with the help of me, the
strong white man guided by the Hand of God (tm) I can help him rise
above his Life of Pain (tm).  I agree with our hosts that carrying one
of their passports doesn't make a person one of them and think Debit
could very well be the poster child for that.

>> I've never been stopped when on my bicycle for an ownership check
> 
> That happened to me. I waved my gaikokujin touroku shoumeisho in his
> face, then took out my university ID, saying, "Well? Do you think I
> steal bicycles in-between lectures?" and he left me alone.

Good move.  I am sure that brightened his day to no end.  It probably
made the life of the next gaijin he stopped extremely interesting for
ten minutes, or so.

I've been stopped several times by police who just wanted a closer look
at my bike which, if they ask, is never a problem.  But, if they handle
it like a traffic stop, I just ask them to show me their Keisatsu-techo
and then take out a pen and notebook as though I am going to write down
their name and rank.  That usually gets the techo slammed shut and
stuffed in a pocket, so I ask the name of their -sho, the name of their
shocho, and whether he is Kenkei or Keishicho.  Usually, by that time,
they wonder who or what I think I know and are pretty much in a mood to
get rid of me.

Before anyone gets too exercised ... I was taught to do that by a
bengoshi I go riding with occasionally.  He attended Todai during the
white helmet, face mask, fire hose period and never lost his interest in
screwing with authority just enough to keep it from screwing back.  A
kotsu kidotai in our group confirmed the effectiveness of the strategy.

8>< schnitt

> If you mean you think he goes out of his way to sniff out racism I'd
> say, yes, some of the time he obviously does, although some of the
> scenarios he describes he didn't apparently go in search of. And of
> course if a racial issue comes up he'll be in there. It may not be your
> way of doing things, or mine, but isn't it a good thing that there are
> people out there who are saying, "Look, this is discriminatory, it needs
> to be dealt with", rather than just skirted round and avoided?

I don't think the Subject of this exchange knows the difference between
"discrimination" and "this is Debit not getting his own way."  Most of
what he writes about conjures up visions of the latter.  He also writes
as though he believes that the host nationals are too stupid to do
things his way (another 19th Century Protestant Missionary Society
attitude, by the way).

As far as things being "discriminatory" life is about discrimination.
there would be no human beings if it wasn't.

Most of the issues where true discrimination in the negative sense occur
are well outside the purview of white academics who have no conception
of how a factory floor is organized or how factory laborers are being
forced to live.  The thing is, that the law and the legal order are
extremely frangible and malleable when approached in the correct manner.
 That isn't to say that someone like Debit can't get lucky and win
despite the way he does things.

The Korean community is going about things in as confrontational a
manner as works within the Confucian system -- which is unfortunate by
Western standards, but it is progress within the social standards that
exist.  There _are_ Western ways to jimmy the system, but many are
dependent upon venue and getting a particular set of judges.  Too many
foreigners mistake Japanese television advertising and the products on
offer in the stores for the existence of a Western style social order
and I believe Debit is one of them.

>> The way he goes about things and the constant "shooting off" does
>> more to engender hard feelings where none need to exist 
> 
> Wouldn't another way of putting that be to say he forces people to do a
> bit of soul-searching where otherwise they might just blandly carry on
> with their discriminatory attitudes? Again, I'm just asking; I'm not
> grinding his axe for him.

Probably not.

>> -- or to cause serious issues to be dismissed simply because he's
>> the one bringing them up 

Bingo!

> Is that what's happening? Going back to the onsen issue, I would have
> thought his action in suing probably did more to raise Japanese people's
> consciousness about the issue than anything else ever has.

Disagree.  It probably did more to circle the wagons, if what the host
nationals say is true.

> 
>> As far as Japanese racism ... what's the problem with simply
>> acknowledging the fact and getting on with things?  
> 
> No problem. But does that mean other approaches are invalid?
> 
> John