Here is a good post by Gaijin Smash. It is a great post in understanding how minority is hurt with innocent but ignorant attitudes by Japanese. Let"s not lose friends who love Japan by our ignorance.
UPDATE
Don't forget to look at the comment section. There are full of thought-provoking comments.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
When I first came to Japan as an exchange student 3 or so years ago, I saw Bobby on TV. I was absolutely shocked that such a character would be on TV. My black classmate was stunned and saddened...
I know many ethnic African people hate him.
In my opinion, it is kinda inevitable that people form stereotypical image of a specific type. When the sample is large, and if you see the variety of people in there, people correct their concept about the type, and people will come to understand that a specific person of the type is not representative of the type.
And that way, people will understand race does not matter, it
all depends on individual.
In case of Japan, there is few number of "foreigners," much less ethic Africans. I don't know if the population of Black people will drastiacally increase in Japan, but I think people need to know how it feel to be called Bobby on a daily basis.
As much as ethnic African people hate Boby, I think he had a positive aspect.
Most Japanese know little about Black people except on TV drama and films. Japanese concept of etinic African is that little. All most of Japanese know is Black people through films and such.
When people see Boby talking with Japanese, making Japanese laugh,I think Japanese felt Black person much closer than before. When he fought on the ring, Japanese fought with him in imagination.
when Japanese people call Az Bobby, I don't thihk they wanted to hurt him, but people didn't know they were hurting:it might be true that ignorance is sin.
Definitely Japanese society should do someting about this kind of issue before more people are hurt.
At the same time, I think it is important to send the message from minority's point of view so that Japanese start understanding there are issues here.
.
Post a Comment