Gregory Clark in newsgroup bitch-fight

[Mulboyne]

Gregory Clark has been having some lively exchanges with contributors over at his Google group. [The thread has been deleted from the original thread but has been re-posted here]

Clark:Dear Steve: The answers to your questions are:
One: Use commonsense, and if you live in Japan keep your eyes and ears open. Two: Stop quibbling
Steve Silver: If you are willing to write opinion pieces for major newspapers, then you should be willing to engage in rational debate and discussion of what you write. Instead of becoming defensive, it would be beneficial if you would provide data to support your arguments, rather than being condescending or contemptuous of those who challenge your views.
Clark: Are you really as dumb as you seem?
S.S.: You say much more about yourself with that comment than you do about me, sir.
DS: Your constant ad hom attacks on those who try to drag Japan into the 21st century as "do gooders" do both you and your position little good.
Clark: Are you illiterate or something? Or do you only read what you want to read and ignore anything that contradicts your prejudices. I have rarely come across a debate so one-sided and bigoted as this debate over Otaru bathhouses.
petrad: I think many will agree with you. But I bet most of the people see the bigoted side not where you are seeing it.
G.Evan Bennett: As Dr. Clark is a 68 year-old man, he's not much longer for this world. Those of less advanced age, however, will remain for some time to come. They're the ones who will inherit the dysfunctional society created by Dr. Clark and all the other ideologues of Japanese uniqueness.
Clark: It convinces me even more than before that this moralistic determination to condemn the Japanese as inborn racists regardless of facts and situations really is part of some white, mainly Anglosaxon, racial arrogance towards Japan. The guiding spirit, to put it simply, is: Let's show those little yellow bastards how to behave, so that we can enjoy life in their country, according to our rules and morality.

[Marvin Feltcher]

Sorry!

[Steve Bildermann]

I've just read through as much of the debate as I could handle

As always Marvin - you're a better man than I. Couldn't get past two paragraphs.

Why do people do this to themselves

[Marvin Feltcher]

Sorry!

[Taro Toporific]

Gregory Clark has been having some lively exchanges with contributors over at his Google group[

Hee, hee...You saw that too, hey? Gregory Clark has been on my mental Kingyo-no-fun List since my first day in Japan. Every time I read his Japan apologist yawping I have to remind myself that he's just trying to show the Japanese point-of-view in an rational way that Japanese are incapable of, and he makes a good living doing it.

[Maths Dude]

G. Clark is da man. If gaijin dont like the way things are then F*CK OFF back to where you came from. As for me I banned certain nationalities from staying at my backpackers, if they didnt like it, I told them to f*uck off. The reason was simple, 10% of them disturbed everyone else, thus driving away customers, therefore I had to ban the lot. If all the gaijin who went to bathhouses behaved there would be no reason to get banned. Just a few bad eggs is enough to send any proprietor over the edge, I know, I was there. Really, if foreigners came to Australia complaining, I'd vote in a government whose policy it was to kick those shits out. Those in Japan who cant handle the way it is, I repeat - GO HOME.

[Ptyx]

I've just read through as much of the debate as I could handle and think Greg Clark deserves a medal for being so consistently polite amid the turbluence caused by a bunch of blind zealots.

Blind zealots ? The guy is giving tons of data to back up his claim. That's not what i call blind. Clark, on the other end, tends to describe Japan as he sees it not as it is. The guy's also very polite and not once in the discussion attacks Clark personaly.
Basically this is the fact Clarks bases himself on to back up his article :

Media here report most serious breakin crime. By my subjective count, in
at least one third of the cases it is reported that the attackers were of
Asian appearance and speaking bad Japanese.

Finally by posting this :

Dear Steve: The answers to your questions are:
One: Use commonsense, and if you live in Japan keep your eyes and ears
open.
Two: Stop quibbling
and Three: See my previous posts.

He admits that he didnt do any kind of serious research on the subject he's talking about. That Silver guy brought facts to the discussion, Clark responded with common sense. When you you're talking about society as a whole, common sense is not enough.

[Mulboyne]

Clark deleted the thread because it got even nastier but someone posted the archive here. I'll change the link in the original post.

[Big Booger]

They both have very interesting points.. it's just a different side to the same coin.. one sees it one way, while the other sees it another...

[Socratesabroad]

Gregory Clark has been on my mental Kingyo-no-fun List since my first day in Japan. Every time I read his Japan apologist yawping I have to remind myself that he's just trying to show the Japanese point-of-view in an rational way that Japanese are incapable of

Maybe I should cut him some slack...

and he makes a good living doing it.

On second thought, I'll just disdain him for what he is:
[img]http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu:1852/utc/media/onstage-images/@raster?filename=tspostr4646.jpg]

[Captain Japan]

Racist banner looks frayed
By GREGORY CLARK of the Japan Times

Understanding Japan and the Japanese was never meant to be easy. This is especially true for the Japanese attitude to foreigners -- at times exclusivist and at other times extremely open. There is an answer to the seeming contradiction, but it requires outsiders to accept that the Japanese might have a value system just as valid as their own -- something many find hard to accept.

Back in the 1970s, when Canberra was determinedly trying to understand the nation that was suddenly supporting Australia's economy with large food and raw materials purchases, it gave the well-known author Hal Porter a generous cultural grant to travel around Japan and discover its people.

In his subsequent book, "The Actors," Porter describes the Japanese as a robotic people quite incapable of expressing genuine sentiment -- a surprising conclusion for anyone who has seen the animated faces of the Japanese crowds as they head home from work on a Friday evening.
...snip...
Perhaps the worst example was a Washington Post report claiming that a Tokyo store selling Sambo dolls proved that racist Japanese attitudes toward black people existed. It triggered a strong anti-Japan campaign in the United States -- until someone discovered that the offending dolls had come from the U.S. and were on sale there, too.

The Post went on to discover, back in the days when Japan was prospering and the U.S. economy was in trouble, that the Japanese had invented the term "bubei," or contempt for America. It even splashed the ideographs on its front page, which is just as well because we could not find them being used in Japan.

The newspaper USA Today followed up with a report from a Tokyo-based journalist saying the Roppongi fleshpots were riddled with "No Foreigner" and "Japanese Only" signs. Once again, no visible proof could be provided. When I checked with the author of the report, he complained how his copy had been deliberately changed by U.S. editors determined to believe such signs existed.

With the trade frictions largely ended, the banner has been passed to ultrasensitive foreigners here in Japan. They too complain of a rash of "No Foreigner" signs. What's more, they are determined to take legal action against the "racist" offenders. But when one checks out the claims, invariably it is a situation where some unfortunate Japanese proprietor has suffered severe damage or loss at the hands of foreigners, and does not want to see a repetition.
...snip...
Now we have the problems in Otaru, a Hokkaido port regularly visited by small rust-bucket Russian ships. A bathhouse that had suffered severe property destruction at the hands of drunken Russian seamen had felt it had no alternative but to put up a "No Foreigner" sign. It too was hit with a suit claiming it had violated the U.N. convention.

The litigious foreigners involved have now published a book, detailing their fight against yet another example of Japan's alleged racial discrimination (for a review, see the Jan. 30 article "Bathhouse pushes a foreigner into the doghouse").

Yet to anyone who visits Otaru and speaks to the seamen, as I have done, it should be obvious that, while these are very likable people, it is most unlikely that they would be able to respect the rituals and atmosphere of the Japanese bathhouse, even when sober. Japanese customers would begin to fade away. The owner would feel obliged to protect his business.

He really toned this stuff down from the arguments on his Web page.

[Captain Japan]

A few Letters to the Editor of the Japan Times from Wednesday, March 9, 2005...

Faulty critique on discrimination

In his Feb. 17 article, "Racist banner looks frayed," professor Gregory Clark referred to my story in USA Today four years ago about the discrimination against foreigners in Japan. Despite my correcting him previously on this, he is still getting it wrong.

Clark complains that "no visible proof could be provided" for the claim in USA Today that "Roppongi fleshpots were riddled with 'No Foreigner' and 'Japanese Only' signs." The reason for the lack of proof is simple: The USA Today story never said any such thing. The only thing it said in relation to signs was one sentence that read: "Bars, hotels and other establishments often post 'No Foreigner' signs." That was it. No reference to Roppongi and no mention of the word "riddled." To go on to suggest that USA Today editors "deliberately changed" the copy "determined to believe such signs existed" is, ipso facto, nonsense.

If Clark wants to continue writing about this claim, I still think he should actually read the story he is critiquing. I'll gladly send him a copy. I have the greatest respect for Clark, but I would suggest that in his eagerness to discredit the foreign media maybe he is determined to believe that such quotes existed.

Clark is correct, however, in stating that I was not happy with the published article in USA Today. My original proposal was a story about three antidiscrimination lawsuits that were making front-page news in Japan at the time. As often happens, the editors in Washington saw some hidden depths there, with the result that the story tended to simplify the complex attitude of Japanese toward foreigners in their midst.

PETER HADFIELD
Hamble, England

Fueling antiforeigner sentiment

I read Gregory Clark's Feb. 17 article with great interest, since I was one of the plaintiffs in the Otaru (Hokkaido) Onsen lawsuit. Clark writes: "A bathhouse that had suffered severe property destruction at the hands of drunken Russian seamen had felt it had no alternative but to put up a 'No Foreigner' sign. It too was hit with a suit claiming it had violated the U.N. convention."

This is not true. The bathhouse in Otaru that was sued by the three plaintiffs did not suffer any property destruction by foreigners. The court documents do not mention property destruction. There is no police report either. The bathhouse put up the "Japanese Only" sign more or less from day one of their business.

By leaving the false impression that the bathhouse had suffered "severe property destruction," Clark portrays me as someone trying to profit off a victim of violence. Is it too far-fetched to think that some sick elements in this society might read Clark's articles and, after thinking that even a famous foreigner like Clark hates the plaintiffs, go one step further? My property has been vandalized (three times in six months) in such a way that my family and I have felt as if our lives were threatened. I don't know that these incidents are related to the lawsuit, but I'm guessing the chances are high that they are.

I did not make the decision to sue the bathhouse lightly. I knew of the possible consequences. My family and I were willing to take the risks. Those risks are already high enough. We don't need someone as intelligent and influential as Clark pouring oil on the fire of antiforeign sentiments by spreading rumors.

By the way, I have not written a book about my experiences, as Clark's remark about "litigious foreigners" suggests.

OLAF KARTHAUS
Sapporo

Gregory Clark replies

To letter No. 1: Peter Hadfield neglects to mention that, in a conversation with me following sensational press reports here about his article and its claim that "hotels, clubs and bars" across Japan were publicly excluding foreigners, he claimed there were indeed many places in Roppongi that did bar foreigners. When I asked for evidence, he said he had heard how someone outside Shinbashi station touting for a Roppongi sauna was carrying a placard that said foreigners were excluded. Hadfield has now sent me a copy of his original article, and I note that it mentions Shinjuku, not Roppongi, as the scene of alleged exclusions.

Regarding the second letter: My remarks were not directed at Olaf Karthaus. They were directed at another of the plaintiffs who on an Internet site some years ago had said he would take legal action against the owner of a foreigner-refusing Otaru bathhouse, despite the fact that he knew it had suffered severe damage at the hands of drunken Russian seamen.

A bathhouse owner who then took what many would see as legitimate measures to prevent a repeat of such damage was indeed subsequently dragged through the courts and heavily fined. It is my understanding that there was also legal action by Karthaus and others against Otaru city on the bathhouse issue despite admitted damage to bathhouses in the city.

GREGORY CLARK
Tokyo

[Mulboyne]

This one won't go away.

...In response to his allegation of "flaming", I note that when others have attempted to ask Mr. Clark for clarification regarding the assertions he has made in his writings, he has responded calling them "stupid", "from another planet", and even demanding that they "shut up". On his website, he has gone so far as to refer to this particular individual as "Hitlerarian", a term which, as a Jew, I find particularly offensive. I believe forum members can make their own conclusions with regard to such rhetoric...

[Catoneinutica]

This one won't go away.

"Tedious" doesn't begin to describe that thread. Perhaps "stupefying"? Despite Clark's sometimes-caustic, always-condescending tone, the snarkiest remark was made by an anti-Clark-er, to the effect that Clark is an old man of 68 and isn't long for this world. In other words, your grave awaits you, Mr. Clark!

He's really just ambient gaijin noise at this point, like Dave Spector or Bobby Ologun. At least the latter two don't seem to have pretentions of being taken seriously in their home countries, though.

Edit: That's MISTER Clark, not Dr. Clark