Korean net cafe signage informing patrons that the establishment enforces a strict “No Japs Allowed” policy – unless the prospective customer shouts “Dokdo is Korean territory!” three times – is currently attracting much attention online.
The sign was introduced by a South Korean net cafe in response to the continued existence of Japan and its nefarious insistence that the sovereignty of the islands in question should be determined by impartial UN adjudicators, and was soon proving popular on major Korean forums (although the absence of Japanese wording did not escape comment).
As with Japan and most of East Asia, Korea has no real laws against racial discrimination, let alone any official willingness to enforce them, and the sort of xenophobia Korea is known for makes even the likes of Japan look like a European-style multi-cultural paradise.
The Japanese Internet is as ever full of kind words for their excitable peninsular brethren and their unique approach to fostering goodwill amongst the Yamato, not least thanks to their mighty president’s recent and highly successful charm offensive:
“These guys are insane…”
“Who would go there anyway?”
“Nobody is going to Korea anyway, so who cares what they get up to.”
“Please do it over here in the pachinko parlours!”
“What a crude people.”
“Nice move – nobody who dislikes Korea would be going there anyway, so the only ones who’ll see this are the ones who didn’t dislike the place, not a state of affairs likely to continue with such a welcome.”
“More anti-Japanese marketing?”
“Could you actually get way with this in Japan?”
“If only they’d put this up at immigration.”
“This sort of crass racism only exposes you to ridicule.”
“Not embarrassed at all by this racist marketing of their cafe?”
“Not the first time they have been putting up ‘no Japanese’ signs…”
Lets stick to the point of the article.
Regardless if the Koreans or Japanese do it, putting up racists signs like these is WRONG and should be discouraged in any way possible, including legally.
I’m not fluent in Japanese (yet), but when I was studying abroad there, I understood enough to see that some people were wondering why I was there. Granted the most obvious of those people were a couple of kids asking their mom why there was a gaijin reading a manga in the bookstore. Anyway, I did also notice that if you are of Asian or white descent and American, Canadian, Australian or British, they will be nicer to you than most others.
Sounds about white
With all the no foreigner signs posted in Japanese stores (particularly the ones people would want to visit), I find myself in a state of total indifference. At least there is a they’ll actually let you in.
It’s simple as hell. Racists are racists, non-racists are non-racists, and those two types exist everywhere. To me the guy who put the sign at the cafe AND the guy who wrote the those comments at the Japanese website look exactly the same. The reason racist Koreans target Japanese is so clear too, the Japanese government(hence the people) didn’t truly apologize to Koreans about the invasion and colonization of Korea, or at least most Koreans feel so and it’s an emotion too easy to target, but wait, Japanese racists target Koreans the same way. RACISM IS EVIL, not Koreans or Japanese itself.
I’m a Korean but basically I like Japanese people, even considering all this Dokdo-Takeshima dispute. It’s politicians, extremists and ネトウヨ that’s fighting, not the normal people, and I don’t feel I have anything to do with it. I’d like people to know the noisy are the minority, and the silent are the majority.
HAHAHA I find it very funny the guy that said “these guys are insane” where there are s♥♥t LOADS of signs in japan with the “NO Forginers/Gaijins”.
Not only that but a lot of the companies there dont deal with forginers like banks, ppl that rent apartments and so on or just the really bad places.
God, most japanese ppl seems to look down on forginers :/