"Japanese Only"

Back in 2006, I was in Sendai, Japan one night and decided to take a stroll around the business and nightclub district.

While walking down a main street lined with nightclubs and bars, I noticed that some of them had signs posted that said "Japanese Only." I have heard of these before, but this was the first time I've encountered such signage. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera with me at the time to shoot photos of these signs. Although I heard there are signs of this nature in Tokyo, I have never seen any.

Many, if not most, foreign visitors to Japan find these signs as discriminatory and offensive. However, many businesses don't intend to discriminate against non-Japanese people, many of them just put the signs up to tell them that they only understand Japanese. Other businesses have put them up due to past bad experiences with foreign visitors.

Still, the issue of "Japanese Only" signs still rages and the Asahi Shimbun has a new article on the subject.

It begins with:

A “Japanese Only” banner at a professional soccer game made international headlines and led to unprecedented penalties. But such signs are not new in Japan, and some have even appeared at tourist hotspots. 

It is true that some signs like these have been put up by people who genuinely dislike citizens of other countries. But many others say they had no intention to be discriminatory, and that their “Japanese Only” displays stem from the language barrier and problems with foreign customers unaware of Japanese rules and customs. 

Two apparent reasons why these signs keep showing up is a general sense of apathy among the public and a lack of understanding at how offensive the words can be for foreigners in Japan.

Thankfully, according to the article, these kinds of signs are appearing less frequently as people in Japan are learning how offensive and discriminatory they are.

To read the article, go here.