Fingerprint scheme exposes xenophobic, short-sighted trend in government
As Japan sinks into elderly obsolescence and threatens to retire to the economic backwaters, it needs more openness, not less. Yet our leaders insult [non-Japanese] residents by calling them names and policing them further. Not to mention the purposeful xenophobes, capitalizing on a complicated world, who whip up public fear of foreign terrorism and crime. The nation is being run by people out of sync with Japan’s present and future, who won’t live to see the full extent of the damage they are wreaking anyway.
We cannot expect people like these to lead us to a world they cannot envision. Neither Japanese citizens, nor the international residents who plight their troth here, deserve this fate. At the very least Japan needs a change in leadership. Knock the LDP from its half-century in power, for starters.
As for the media, let’s have a pro-gaijin campaign for a change.
