Quote Originally Posted by leonmarino View Post
It seems like you are saying it is ok to discriminate against people of lower class and not against others. I know you don't mean that, and that you say it is understandable (from a historical/social point of view) why people would discriminate against people of lower classes, right?
Yes. Discrimination is nothing more than rejecting certain category of people which are not considered "good enough" to socialise with, work with, or even do business with (e.g. rejecting potential customers because we fear they might cause more trouble than profit). Usually lower-class peolpe, in any society, are those that do not have enough manners, education or good behaviour to be accepted by the others. It used to be ok when the lower classes made up most of the population (until the mid-20th century in the West, and until now in developing countries). It was a richer minority who didn't want to associate with the "poor, dirty and ill-mannered" majority.

Now that such lower class people have become a minority, the term "discrimination" has become more significant for them. The problem in Europe nowadays is that economic migrants, especially from Africa, are even lower in the social scale than the native lower class. The gap being so big, many natives don't want to interact or socialise with such immigrants because they look so dirty, benighted, or even scary because of their less refined manners and lack of respect for many social conventions (e.g. they throw more rubbish in the street, urinate in public, commit acts of vandalism, talk too loud, spit, behave aggressively...). So yes, it is normal, and even natural, for people of higher classes not to want to associate with such people, regardless of their ethnicity. So even "natives" can belong to the discriminated group.

Japan's case is a bit different from Europe. The Japanese being so "narrow-minded" in their social expectations and respect of conventions (so much that many Japanese who can't take it anymore leave Japan to live in more liberal Western countries), it is not surprising that their level of tolerance and acceptation toward non-Japanese is so low. It is not necessarily racist because even Japanese born or educated abroad, as well as some Japan-born ones, face such discrimination. People who look non-Japanese are easier targets, because even if they try to behave like "good Japanese", they are rarely given the chance to be accepted as such, just because of their different appearance. This, however, is racism or xenophobia.

In Europe, I am personally ready to accept immigrants that do effortts to adapt to their host society, behave well, learn the language and culture, etc. I never have negative feelings against well-educated and well-mannered people from any ethnic origin. I have interacted and socialise positively many times with middle or upper-middle class Moroccans. But I just can't accept the "underclass" I often see in the streets of Brussels, because they are very ill-mannered, troublesome and scary (enough to make why wife cry for being around them). So discrimination in this case is not only understandable, it is a natural reaction to protect oneself.

In Japan, however, I cannot see how some well-educated and well-behaved upper-middle-class Westerners who come to Japan to learn more about the country they like, and even get to know more about the local culture than some natives, should be seen as any "threat" to the locals. Discrimination against them is not based on a major difference of social level, so only actual xenophobia is the cause, which I cannot accept.