From: ishikawa@ds5200.personal-media.co.jp (Chiaki Ishikawa)
Newsgroups: fj.misc,fj.soc.law
Subject: Re: Racism in Japan (was CFA/CFD:fj.life.in-japan)
Date: 30 Jul 92 11:04:47 GMT
	<CLAUDE.92Jul28180617@tokyo.trc.mew.mei.co.jp> <2185@aegis.or.jp>
	<CLAUDE.92Jul29093529@tokyo.trc.mew.mei.co.jp>
	<ISHIKAWA.92Jul29171510@ds5200.personal-media.co.jp>
	<CLAUDE.92Jul30095149@tokyo.trc.mew
Reply-To: ishikawa@personal-media.co.jp
Followup-To: fj.misc
Organization: Personal Media Corp., Tokyo Japan
In-reply-to: claude@trc.mew.mei.co.jp's message of 30 Jul 92 00:51:35 GMT


[fj.misc $@$K(Jpost$@$5$l$?309q$N?M$,It20$r$+$j$?$H$-$K$+$J$j87$7$$>r7o$r$D(J
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$@$J$$$N$G%/%m%9%]%9%H$7$^$9!#(Jfollowup$@$O(Jfj.misc$@$K$7(J$@$F$"$j$^$9!#(J
 fj.misc Message-ID: <CLAUDE.92Jul29093529@tokyo.trc.mew.mei.co.jp>$@$h$j(J
>Of course some japanese will not see any kind of relationship in what
>I am going to say, but this reminded me when I was looking to rent a
>new apartment... Everybody refused me "only" and "only" because I was
>a foreigner. Some real estate agents said "Foreigners cannot understand
>our values", or a merely "I don't like foreigners, I don't like english
>(sic)". AT LAST, I found a place, but my landlady "forced" me to sign
>a contract with clauses like "You must pledge to don't speak in loud
>voice", "You must pledge to don't invite friends from your country",
>"You must pledge to don't laugh", etc. etc.  ]

I am crossposting this just in case the topic merits attention from
the readers of fj.soc.law. Follow up to fj.misc.

>>>>> On 30 Jul 92 00:51:35 GMT, claude@trc.mew.mei.co.jp (Claude Huss) said:

Chiaki> 	But this landlady is excessive, isn't she?  I mean I can
Chiaki> certainly understand that "we shouldn't speak in loud voices" after
Claude>                            =================================

Claude>In fact, I cannot understand it too. This clause was not included in the
Claude>contract of other tenants, I think. 
	If this is the case, that is too bad.
Claude>And could you tell what is the
Claude>concept "Speak in loud voice"? How many dB would be ??? :-)
	Just lould enough to wake up your neighbors and make them
angry enough to complain to you or to your landlady :-)
When I was a student, we (my friends and I) had so much fun playing
games late at night, and an irate neighbor came in and shout
obscenities at us. We felt very sorry for the poor man who lost sleep
because of the noise we made.

Claude> In fact, my company rented the apartment and said few days before about
Claude> those clauses... They said to don't take it in care. If I knew about it
Claude> before, I never would go there. This in another matter, but japanese 
Claude> "sometimes" don't take contract seriously as westerners, probably this
Claude> was the reason that landlady (or real estate agent) included such kind
Claude> of clauses.

	If you company people knew this, and OK'ed it, then maybe you
have to live by with it. But when you want to bring your friends to
your room just tell the landlady that they are your
sisters/brothers/cousins, etc. She may think that you have a BIG
family :-)

Claude> It's very interesting to know there's some comitee for Human Rights
Claude> in Japan. 3 years ago, I had the same problem (Rent an apartment) and
Claude> I had a lot of trouble. Some real real estate were *REALLY* nasty. 
Claude> I thought to prosecute one, but some friend of mine said "RACISM is
Claude> not illegal" in japan. Is that true? I asked a Korean-japanese friend
Claude> of mine and he said that was true... 
	I don't think "racism" per se in the sense of speech (like
giving racist remarks, handing out pamphlet, etc. is illegal. (After
all, freedom of speech is important issue guaranteed in Constitution.)
But, if it escalates it into physical violence, that of cource is
illegal. But there are many subtle forms of actions caused by
"racism" or more likely to be caused by xenophobia atually (but I
digress) which can't be really prosecuted by the existing laws or anything.
(I think the committee's role was to mediate in these grey cases, but
correct me if I am wrong.) 


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