An intercultural conflict that many of Japanese has struggled with is that stereotyping and having prejudice about other countries in Asia. There are so many stereotypes and prejudice that we need to deal with to live in a diverse society. Here, I have an example of a struggle of the Japanese with China.
Japan used to import so many things from China, such as Chinese characters, Confucianism, and many other technologies before. China has such a long history and Japanese people used to respect the country and the people so much. Now, the Japanese has forgotten to respect Chinese people and the country.
Japan has lost the Second World War against America and some other countries and it was controlled by American Army after that. Japan needed to recover from the devastation of the war and it needed help from America to restructure the country. It had a rapid economic growth and Japan became one of the powerful countries in the world. It welcomed Western cultures and it became much more modern than before war. It is said that the Japanese appreciated what America did for Japan after the war. They have come to think of Western countries with admiration and to think everything about West, especially about America, is good. They started despising other Asian countries because Japan was accepted by Western countries as one of the powerful countries economically.
On the other day, I was talking with my Japanese friends about my international friends from China. One of my friends said that he wouldn’t date a girl from China. Other girl said that she didn’t know if she could be good friends with people from China. There is so much news about imitation goods or characters in China broadcasted in Japan, and there was an incident which happened in China. A Chinese worker put some poison into dumplings that were exported to Japan and some people got sick because of it. My friends can’t get rid of these bad images of China. It’s true that those unfortunate events have occurred, but they have nothing to do with my friends. They are kind, hardworking, and they and I became really good friends. I was disappointed and felt sorry because my friends admire Japan as a good country and they love the people, too.
I think this conflict is dominating style which win/lose style reflects high concern for self and low concerns for others. Japan just thinks of advantages that if gains from Western countries and it left other Asian countries behind.
I don’t think all the Japanese has only negative images toward China, but I’m sure that so many people hold stereotypes and prejudice toward it. I assume one of the reasons is that media gives us only negative information about the country. They broadcast imitation news, incidents, and how poor villagers are, but not good things. People are too naive so that they believe those are only about China. If we could change the media structure and if they could give us many other perspectives of the country, I think people would have less stereotype and prejudice.
Another reason that I think of is that many Japanese people don’t have experience or interact with those people. Not everyone can go to China and interact with people there, so those who can’t experience have only one way to know about the country which is media and they believe it. If they could get to know each other with them actually, they will know that how good they are.
Question: What do you think is the best way to prevent people from having stereotypes?
The best way is for them to be in contact with these people and see for themselves that these people they hold stereotypes again can be very nice and generous people. However, it is not always possible for these people to get to know each other in person. As someone who has met them, you can be a representative and continue to tell people are your good experiences with these people.
返信削除I think the best way to prevent such stereotyping of other groups of people is through education. Having a greater awareness of other cultures makes a person more capable of forming healthy relationships with someone different from themselves when presented with the opportunity. Exposure greatly helps with this problem as well.
返信削除Both Mindy and bars make excellent points. There is no greater way to learn that stereotyping is inaccurate than to meet people to break down prejudices. Education is also an essential component. Combining these two aspects of the solution help make an even greater impact. Also, being aware of journalistic bias helps.
返信削除I think preventing people from stereotypes is a really hard thing to do. People are always going to believe what they wanna believe. But we can try, and just gain knowledge about people and what we should know about them. When we learn things we wont make up our own judgements.
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