Japanese Tourists Asked to Pay Special Peter Rabbit “Tax”

“Everyone is equal in Japan,” he said. “If you distinguish between Japanese and others, you run the risk of appearing discriminatory.”

Ha! Tell that to any foreigner who has tried to get an apartment through a Japanese agency and has been told the landlord said “No foreigners.”

I think Mr. Oikawa is being a bit naive here, however, only asking Japanese tourists to pay this “tax” is a bit ridiculous. It’s targeted donations requests, which makes sense given the numerous Japanese visitors who show up there, but it’s still a bit silly.

SO NE Jordon. “Everyone is equal in Japan,” he said. “If you distinguish between Japanese and others, you run the risk of appearing discrimininatory.” I live in Japan and they have many places that say “Japanese Only” and a lot discriminination like in the workplace etc..Its probably cos most or all the people going there are Japanese cos there into those character fetishes. So charge them and everyone cos of the damage they are causing to the enviroment there.

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“The initiative, believed to be the first of its kind, was born when Japanese Travel Trade, effectively the Japanese tourist board, approached Japan Forum, run by Lakeland businesses.”
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Hang on so the whole idea was started by the Japanese tourist board? Maybe I misread the article or something.

Umm, guys, I understand your frustrations and whatnot, but let’s keep this on topic mkay?

This isn’t about how you feel about Japanese immigration or Japanese race relations in society.

What Mr. Oikawa says is quite true. It IS discriminatory if one group of people are asked for special concessions and no other. What happens in Japan in regards to race has absolutely zero relevance to this particular topic.

What we’re talking about here is whether it’s fair for one group of people to be asked to pay something and no other group. Nothing more, nothing less. And it doesn’t matter if it’s ‘voluntary.’ It’s almost like when the supermarket cashier asks you if you’d like to donate to the ‘charity of the week’ with 4 other people behind you. Or when the Best Buy clerk asks you which supplementary insurance plan you want for your appliance, 2 years or 3 years. Both cases, strictly voluntary, yet there is that “pressure” involved to pay up or participate, if you don’t, you are made to feel like a cheap skate or worse.

It doesn’t quite approach the concept of ‘dual pricing’ found in many parts of the world though.

OMG．．why only japanese..
it’s clear racism.
what an ignoble barbarians.
shame on you,RACIST．．
Um,Italia,Greece,and U.K.,?
why European countries are low level so much?
sure,Japanese people never do this..
The customer comes first．
do you understand?
OMG..
If you don’t stop racial discrimination, we’ll impose economic sanctions.
YES,Japanese people should not go to these barbaric country ever again.
we’ll be only scoffed at by them．

I really don’t understand what most of you are doing here if your experiences are so negative. Seems like masochism to me. I have yet to experience any discrimination here in Japan, and any negative experiences I’ve had here are FAR outweighed by the many negative experiences I had nearly everyday in the states.