HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: masuda@fcs280b.ncifcrf.gov (Michiaki Masuda)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Please give your opinions...
Date: 12 Nov 92 00:23:54 GMT
Article-I.D.: ncifcrf.BxKuFv.CHF
Organization: Frederick Cancer Research and Development Center


   Hewww. "Louisiana" no tsugi wa "gaijin" kaaa...

In article <31613@twics.co.jp> dcroz@twics.co.jp writes:
>In <SMITTIE.92Nov6133823@tui.csulb.edu> Smittie says:

><<Gaijin is traditionally translated as foreigner.>>

>     But "traditionally" is not a synonym for "correctly."

   Considering that it is almost impossible to translate one word
into another in a different language "correctly" in its most srtict
meaning, I think that Smittie-san's choice of the word "traditionally" 
is a very respectable one.

><<From this we can conclude. . .>>

>     Nothing, if this is not a correct translation of the word.

   Actually, this is correct in some cases such as high school exam.
Would it make any difference?

><<"Mr. Alien" would be an accurate translation of "gaijin-san," "Mr. Japanese"
>would not.>>

>     Both terms address a person in terms of "otherness."  In this they are
>comparable.

   If I call another Japanese as "Mr. Japanese" (why not?) that would not 
address "otherness." As I understand it, the word, "alien", inherently has
a meaning of "otherness" while "Japanese" does not.

><<I do not agree with the premise that if I think a word sounds bad I can then
>infer inherent malice whenever it is used.>>

>     Has anyone made such an argument?  It rather looked to me like people were
>saying the opposite:  that because they detect a given connotation, they infer
>that this is part of the word's emotional freight, and therefore its meaning.

   And we are trying to correct this misconcept regarding "gaijin".

>     It is true that not every person who uses the term bears malice toward
>non-Japanese people.  However, this does not answer the question of whether the
>meaning, "member of an inferior race," is conveyed when one Japanese uses it in
>speaking to another.  The question of conscious malice is irrelevant.

   It's my impression based on my experience of Japanese conversation with
other Japanese that "gaijin" conveys the meaning of "member of a different
group." In most cases, the attribute that determines the group is nationality.
The word by itself does not convey any concept of inferiority nor superiority.

--Michiaki
From: blamb@hri.com (Bill Lambert)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Try it again - RE: Please give me your opinions...
Date: 9 Nov 92 21:20:53 GMT
Organization: Horizon Research, Inc.

Smittie pretty much summarized what I might have to say
about that article: rehashing Japan bashing.

I might like to add that many complications in business
relationships arise when there is no commonly understood
standard that applies. For instance, what may be seen as
illegal collaboration here, is cooperation in Japan. And
so it goes...

It's as if US and Japanese businessmen decided to play
poker. Although both played poker in their countries,
the rules had evolved differently. When the game started,
one of the Americans was dealing and mistakenly flipped
over a card being dealt to one of the other Americans.
That man said, "I'll take a new card." The Japanese go
crazy. "You can't get a new card. We don't play that way!"
Later, after some heavy betting which forces out everyone
else, an American exposes a winning hand of complete garbage.
The Japanese players say, "What is that?" The American
replies, "That's called 'bluffing'." The Japanese reply,
"What the hell is buraffingu? We never heard of that."
And so it goes. Different cultural values affect business
conduct.

I might add one point that people may not appreciate. The
Japanese - in some large part - view business as their
national defense. We - in large part - view national defense
as our business. Both countries, in carrying out policy
that they view as key to their respective national defense,
sometimes overstep the bounds of what is acceptable to each
other in the process. While we cite certain standards for 
business conduct that we claim the Japanese lack, at the
same time we sometimes implement policy in the area of
National defense that is less than clean, but justifiable
nonetheless because of adherance to some "higher" ideal.
In pursuit of their national defense, the Japanese sometimes
implement policy that is less than acceptable to us, but
justifiable to them because of coincidence with some
"higher ideal". We both do it with great zeal, and great
effectiveness. Not many people understand that we are both
doing the same thing, but in generally non-overlapping
areas of human endeavor.

The article - as Smittie mentioned - omits any counter
arguments or examples whereby US-to-US of Japan-to-Japan
business practices may be shown to be just as - if not
more so - unfair and/or predatory. A very large ommision,
from my point of view, is failure to mention two areas
of business where their ethics seem to have an edge over
their US counterparts. Those are company/employee relations
and company/customer relations. In regards to those two
areas, the typical Japanese business concern excells. In
my view, these are the two most important areas of business
ethics, not the aspects of head-to-head economic competition.
In a dog-eat-dog world, they are wise enough not to bite
the hand that feeds them.

That article is basely rubbish.

- Bill Lambert
From: wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.MIL (Wm. Douglas Withers -- math  FACULTY <wdw@sma.usna.navy.mil>)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Japanese exchange student killed in Louisiana...
Date: 6 Nov 92 14:52:33 GMT
Organization: U.S. Naval Academy

In article <5855@balrog.ctron.com> smith@ctron.com writes:
>In article <1992Nov5.064635.26650@nntp.csl.sony.co.jp>, kono@csl.sony.co.jp (Shinji Kono) writes:
>>The murderer had many other choices, for example,
[some of Mr. Smith's commentary deleted]
>>    Wait and see,
>
>He was frightened enough to have gotten a gun out, _something_ was happening
>that was scarey.

This is blatantly circular reasoning.  You want to argue that Peairs was
justified in shooting Hattori.  Your basis is `Well, he must have had a good
reason for getting the gun out.'

>Besides, he was being approached.  He may not have been
>able to see the kid's arms - or he could see them doing _something_, like
>pulling a knife or whatever.

All right, back this one up.  Where have you seen reports that Hattori
pulled a knife?  Or `whatever'?

>
>>    Shut the door again,
>
>Leaves a potential assailant running loose.  Besides, the reports I heard
>had him confronting the kid away from the door.
>

If this is true, than Peairs must have been chasing Hattori.  Otherwise he
would still be in the house.  But I doubt that you have your facts any
straighter here than elsewhere.
[more deleted]
>
>Look, _we_ don't know the circumstances here, _that's_ what grand juries
>are for.  If the homeowner was unjustified or negligent, he _will_ be charged.
>That much of our legal system still works - if it's not drugs or traffic, the
>US legal system is pretty reliable, if slow.  It is not for anyone not
>possessed of the facts the grand jury will review to try and convict this
>man in absentia.

Nor to acquit.

>Maybe he _does_ have delusions, maybe he _did_ plan to
>kill Hattori.  But the grand jury seems not to think so.

Another excursion into Fantasyland.  The grand jury did indict Peairs.

I've said it before.  Argue against gun control if you want.  That's a
great American debate.  But if you try to argue that the shooting of
Hattori was justified you come off as a boob (and help to make the
gun control advocates' case that some people cannot be trusted with
guns).
-- 
Els Withers                   email: wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.mil
          phone: (410)267-3192 / fax: (410)267-4883
When orbiting particle-beam weapons are outlawed, only outlaws will have
orbiting particle-beam weapons.
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: a7657@mindlink.bc.ca (Stephen H. Kawamoto)
Subject: Re: 50th Anniversary of Japanese Amer. Internment
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 19:52:30 GMT

(whisper)
Maiko, he's a national sent here from Japan to put the West out of business.
(I read an article here about it all. It's an interesting read. I may email
you a copy of the edited version for your edification.)

(half&half joke mode off)

 He's not too bad. Though some of us wish the Korean fellow belted him one.


--
PGP 384/D7484F Stephen Kawamoto

a7657@mindlink.bc.ca.


UUENCODED on MIND LINK! Fri Oct 30 10:35:08 1992


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M```````````````````````````!)@``````````````````````````````
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M\.7_P?#E_\'PY?_!\.7_P?#$_\'/X/_!\,3_P<_@_\'PQ/_!Q\W_/]+_P?#$
M_\''S?\
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: jfriedl+@CS.CMU.EDU (Jeffrey Friedl)
Subject: Japanese Constitution Found (sort of)
Reply-To: jfriedl@cs.cmu.edu
Organization: Carnegie Mellon / Omron Corporation
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1992 05:13:50 GMT

I have received a copy of the Constitution of Japan [thanks to you-know-
who-you-are!] in Japanese (which is the language it's written in) and
Jim Breen has kindly placed it on his ftp archive monu6.cc.monash.edu.au
(130.194.1.106) as "pub/nihongo/japan.constitution".

If anyone happens to have a translation of it to another language
(particularly English and German) that they would like to share, please
contact Jim (jwb@capek.rdt.monash.edu.au) or me (jfriedl@omron.co.jp).

Jim's also asked me to mention that there's another new file in pub/nihongo:

losewar.pbs        The transcript of the FRONTLINE program on the US
                   (allegedly) losing the hi-tech product "war".

Enjoy,
       *jeff*
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey Eric Francis Friedl   jfriedl@cs.cmu.edu -or- jfriedl@omron.co.jp
Omron Corporation, Section RZC, Shimokaiinji, Nagaokakyo Kyoto 617, Japan
Visiting researcher to the Mach Project, Carnegie Mellon University
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: sakimura@sscl.uwo.ca
Subject: Re: new newsgroup discussion
Organization: Social Science Computing Laboratory
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 22:57:36 GMT

In article <MS-C.721414192.1103527590.mrc@Ikkoku-Kan.Panda.COM>, Mark Crispin <mrc@Ikkoku-Kan.Panda.COM> writes:
>  4) Newsgroup restructuring/partition.  Split s.c.j. into various parts, and
>     perhaps have some of them be moderated.  

Excellent!!!

There could be a news group which deals with popular topics of the time
like exchange student case, too.

--
Natsu
From: robohen@ocf.berkeley.edu (Henry Robertson)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: call for a new newsgroup
Date: 10 Nov 1992 23:12:45 GMT
Organization: U.C. Berkeley Open Computing Facility
NNTP-Posting-Host: planecrash.berkeley.edu

Don't forget to add soc.culture.cybercocaine.japan to that list!

Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: smittie@beach.csulb.edu (Smittie)
Subject: Re: Try it again - RE: Please give me your opinions...
Organization: Cal State Long Beach
	<1992Nov10.000753.13204@oakhill.sps.mot.com>
	<1992Nov13.001904.16035@oakhill.sps.mot.com>
Distribution: na
Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1992 04:53:31 GMT

Comments from rvkl60@aus18a25.sps.mot.com (Tom Mathes) delete for the sake of
bandwidth.

Mr. Mathes, Mike Fester did a very complete and thorough job of critiqueing the
paper that was posted here. It was far more detailed than I would ever take the
time to be largely because it's all ancient history to anyone who has been
studying Japan for as long as Mr. Fester and I have. Motorola HAS been
successful in opening markets in Japan and they should be congradulated for
their efforts.

You sir do not listen to what is said. I have no problem with people critizing
Japan. I do have a problem with people trying to make Japan some big bad
monolithic economic monster that will destory us all. Japan is not some
economic Godzilla. Anyone who thinks Japan is doesn't know enough about Japan.
In the case of Motorola some trade barriers were broken down. More might fall
yet. That's a good thing for everyone. In other cases America simply does not
do the research necessary, make a product to fit the market, or whatelse might
be necessary to exploit the market even if it were open. The "Trade Problem" is
not all Japan's fault, nor is it all America's fault. In my estimation the
fault lands about even.

>Our present Administration ignores business.
President Bush went to job with three auto making kings in tow. Any one those
American Auto CEOs made more money in one year than all three of the Japanese
auto CEOs combined. Japan said they would try to buy more auto parts from
America. All of SE Asia then cried foul and said that America should compete
with everyone else for Japanese markets.

>Consumer publications like Consumer Reports seem to bash just about any
>American car they review. 
That is a rather subjective statement. You may not agree with the report while
I may find the report right on the money.

smittie

-- 
                             Tada mono de ha nai
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
GEnie, MCI, AOL:Smittie   All of these accounts except MCI will die on or
smittie@beach.csulb.edu   about Dec 31. UNIX will be forwarded for 2 weeks.
From: t_yamasi@hoffman.cc.sophia.ac.jp (Yamashiki Tsuyoshi)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Try it again - RE: Please give me your opinions...
Date: 6 Nov 92 05:04:43 GMT
Organization: Computer Center, Sophia Univ., Tokyo, Japan

"DOES AMERICA SAY YES TO JAPAN"
Oh, that boring article again?
I say, this is one of the stupidest views of Japan I've ever read.
There's dis part that says: "It seems Japan is in some kind of
economic war against us."  What a bullshit.
-- 
Tsuyoshi Yamashiki, lost boy in cyber space.
From: kanekawa@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Nobuyasu Kanekawa)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: the mystery of Rikiya Asano
Date: 12 Nov 92 23:20:47 GMT
Article-I.D.: cs.1992Nov12.232047.1527
Organization: UCLA, Computer Science Department


I am extremely confused when I read this newsgroup. :-)

Do you know which is true ? :-)
  (1) Rikiya Asano is not REAL Rikiya Asano.
  (2) Rikiya Asano's mom has commited suicide.
  (3) Rikiya Asano's mom's maiden name is Taguchi.
  (4) Rikiya Asano's VISA has expired.
  (5) Rie-chan's marriage.
  (6) Right-wing killed 47 students.
  (7) Restriction on photos with pubic hair is relaxed.
-- 
Nobuyasu KANEKAWA  (E-mail address in Japan : kanekawa@hrl.hitachi.co.jp)
   Ich bin am gluecklichsten wenn Ich bei dir bin.
  "Boku ha kimi to iru toki ga ichiban shiawase nanda." Yuzo Kayama
Xref: sparky soc.culture.japan:10271 talk.politics.guns:23698
From: n9020351@henson.cc.wwu.edu (James Douglas Del-Vecchio)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,talk.politics.guns
Subject: Re: Japanese exchange student killed in Louisiana...
Date: 7 Nov 92 04:35:09 GMT
Article-I.D.: henson.1992Nov7.043509.23720
Organization: Western Washington University

masuda@fcs280b.ncifcrf.gov (Michiaki Masuda) writes:

>>>It is illegal to drive a car without a license. ...
"It's only illegal to drive it without a license if you are on public property.

>  Can you run over someone in the next door when you are driving in your 
>private property?

	Yes, if you lose control of the car.   (i.e. you are negligent).

>  Can you shoot someone in the next door when you are handling your gun in
> your private property?

	Again, yes, if you are negligent.   

Jim Del Vecchio
From: yoichi@carson.u.washington.edu (Yoichi Ii)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Sumo - Kyushu Basho (Day 2)
Date: 13 Nov 92 17:06:01 GMT
Article-I.D.: u.1992Nov13.170601.26625
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle

keis@psy.uwa.oz.au (Keis Ohtsuka) writes:
> [...]
>I am rather tired of parochial mentality of Japanese Sumo
>fans pitting Japanese Sumo wrestlers against "them."
> [...]
>Isn't it time to recognize their merit as Sumo wrestlers
>as it is: great Sumo wrestlers. I don't care where they
>come from so long as they are good at it.       

One's birth place seems to be quite important in sumo.  During the 
dohyou-iri (ring entrance ceremony), each wrestler is identified by 
his name, stable (heya), and birth place.  Many fans cheer for their 
home-town boy.  Maybe this is a bad thing ... but it's so easy to do
and everyone seems to do it.  One peculiarity I'v noticed in the 
Seattle are TV stations is that they always try to find "the local
connection".  Sometimes this gets pretty funny ... "The new nobel
laureate's cousin's friend's former roommate live in Seattle. We
now go live to Mr. James who was the roommate ..." :-)
From: cb522@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Cathy Atwood)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: internment camps
Date: 11 Nov 1992 01:22:01 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
NNTP-Posting-Host: hela.ins.cwru.edu


There is a good book about the internment camps, which is
for children as well as for adults.  _The invisible thread_ by
Yoshiko Uchida.  Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Julian Messner, 1991.

The rest of this post is copied from the back cover of this book:
"Do you cut Japanese hair?"
This was only one of many humiliating questions Yoshiko Uchida
asked as she grew up in California during the 1930s.  Longing to
be accepted as any other American, she was instead perceived as a
foreigner--someone different--and was once told, "My, you speak
English so well, " by a woman who saw only her Japanese face.

When Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, Yoshiko and her family, along with
120,000 West Coast Japanese Americans, suffered the most cruel and
unjust rejection of all.  Because they _looked_ like the enemy, our
government treated them as the enemy.  Because our government 
feared they _might_ be disloyal, they were imprisoned, without
trial or hearing, in concentration camps.

Enduring this tragedy, Yoshiko slowly came to acknowledge the 
invisible thread that linked her to her Japanese heritage--a 
legacy that gave her the strength to withstand the deprivations
of that dusty, desolate prison camp called Topaz.  Yoshiko and
her family survived the ordeal with their spirit and courage 
intact...

Cathy Atwood
From: yuk@hpopd.pwd.hp.com (Yuk Lun Chan)
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 17:53:33 GMT
Subject: Multi-byte character set
Organization: Hewlett-Packard SSG/CCSY-PWD, UK.
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan

Hello. Something technical this time. 

I need some information in multilingual character sets. How do normal ASCII 
characters represented in multi-byte character code? When you try to type 
a '=' in a multi-bytes language (ex. Chinese or Japanese). Does it stored as 
1. Escape sequence to ASCII, 0x3d then escape sequence back to multi-byte 
char set, 2. a multi-byte code e.g. something like 0x83 0x44, or 3. Depends 
on what mode when the user was typing. The languages I need to know are

Chinese (GB and Big5) NB. I know GB is depends on user
Japanese
Korean
and Possible Other Asian langauges.


Any help is welcome.

Yuk

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
 Yuk Lun Chan,  Software Development Engineer
 CCSY-Pinewood
 Hewlett-Packard                Phone    : (+44)/(0)344 763736
 Nine Mile Ride                 Fax      : (+44)/(0)344 763526
 Wokingham                      E-mail   : yuk@hpopd.pwd.HP.COM
 Berkshire  RG11 3LL            Desk     : Yuk Lun Chan/HP1600
 England                        Openmail : Yuk-Lun Chan/pinewood,lab,hpopd
 United Kingdom                 X400     : C=GB, ADMD=GOLD 400, PRMD=HP, 
                                           ORG=HP, OU1=pinewood,
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
From: fester@island.COM (Mike Fester)
Subject: Re: Japanese Govt (Was: New era in American politics....)
Organization: /usr/local/rn/organization
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1992 17:04:04 GMT

In article <jwb.721281240@capek.rdt.monash.edu.au> jwb@capek.rdt.monash.edu.au (Jim Breen) writes:
>underdog@leland.Stanford.EDU (Dwight Joe) writes:
>
>>One of the first things that Japan should do is to reform the position
>>of prime minister by making it a _directly_ _elected_ position and renaming
>>it "president".  This will have the twin beneficial effects of (1) making
>>it very hard for any single party (like the LDP) to control the Japanese gov't
>>and (2) injecting youth and change into the position of prime minister.
>
>Hmmm. While there are a lot of problems with the structure and functioning
>of Japanese government, inflicting it with a US-style presidency is 
>probably not an optimal solution. I greatly prefer a parliamentary
>democracy to the semi-paralysis of the US's model, which is based on
		  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>a late 18th century concept of an elected monarchy with congress holding
>the purse.

I do believe such paralysis is not peculiar to our system. I believe many
parliamentary nations dissolve their government due to much greater degrees
of gridlock. All well and good, but frequently elections are held multiple
times until a relatively workable government is in place (particularly 
Greece, Israel, and others).

>What Japan could do with is some electoral reform which resulted in people
>having a real choice. The highly malapportioned multi-member

What ALL systems could do with is "some electoral reform which resulted in 
people having a real choice". The question is how to bring this about.

>electorate system in Japan has meant a locked in arrangement of a
>permanent governing party and a permanent opposition. Changing either
>to a PR system (e.g. like Germany), single member with transeferable voting
>(e.g. Australia) or even first-past-the-post would work wonders.

Single-seat constituencies have been looked at and quietly dropped. My original
question was - why do the opposition parties oppose the reapportionment AND
the single seat constituency?

>BTW 1, there is a team of Japanese electoral officials in Australia right
>now studying or electoral system(s) as a possible model for change.

They started studying in 1989. Seems to be a long study. (Also, I believe they
were studying other systems).

>BTW 2, I suspect the fact that Japan is a Monarchy might make it just
>a little difficult to have a "president".

Surely, not with the constitutional guarantees of separation of the Emporer
from all governmental duties.

>BTW 3, after 8 years of Reagan, not to mention 68 yo Bush, point (2)
>above is a little weak.

Given that the up-until-very-recent heads of the LDP were all over 70 (Kanemaru
was 77) 68 years old is fairly young. Also, Kennedy, LBJ, Nixon, Carter and now
Clinton are/were all under 70 (in a few cases, WELL under 70), so the point
stands.

Mike

-- 
Disclaimer - I'm only doing what the little voices tell me to do.