Debito Arudou

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Contents 1 Background 1.1 Early life 1.2 Japanese naturalization 2 Otaru onsen lawsuit 3 Current activities 4 Quotes 5 Publications 6 Criticism 7 Notes 8 External links 9 Reference links

Debito Arudou (有道 出人, Arudō Debito^?), a naturalized Japanese citizen, is a teacher, author and controversial activist.

[edit] Background

[edit] Early life

Arudou was born David Christopher Aldwinckle in California in 1965.^[1] He attended Cornell University, first visiting Japan as a tourist on invitation from his pen pal (and future wife) for several weeks in 1986. Following this experience, he dedicated his senior year as an undergraduate to study the Japanese language, graduating in 1987.^[2] Aldwinckle then taught English in Sapporo, Hokkaidō, for one year, but "swore against ever being a language teacher again, plunging instead into business."^[1] After returning to the United States to enter the Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies (IR/PS) at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), Aldwinckle deferred from the program in order to return to Japan, whereupon he married a Japanese national in 1989, spending one year at the Japan Management Academy in Nagaoka, Niigata Prefecture. In 1990, he returned to California to complete his Masters of Public and International Affairs (MPIA), and was awarded the degree in 1991.^[3]

Aldwinckle then joined a small Japanese trading company in Sapporo. It was this experience, he recounts, that started him down the path of the controversial activist that he would later become. "This was a watershed in my life," Arudou writes. "...and it polarized my views about how I should live it. Although working [in Japan] made my Japanese really good—answering phones and talking to nasty, racist, and bloody-minded construction workers from nine to six—there was hell to pay every single day." ^[1] Claiming to be the object of racial harassment,^[4] Aldwinckle eventually quit the company. In 1993, despite his previous pledge “against ever being a language teacher again,”^[1] Aldwinckle joined the faculty of Business Administration and Information Science at the Hokkaido Information University, a private university in Ebetsu, Hokkaidō, teaching courses in English as a foreign language. He is currently an associate professor.

[edit] Japanese naturalization

Aldwinckle became a permanent resident of Japan in 1996. He obtained Japanese citizenship in 2000, whereupon he changed his name to Arudou Debito, a kanji transliteration that, according to Arudou, has the figurative meaning of "a person who has a road and is going out on it." To allow his wife and children to retain their Japanese family name, he adopted the legal name Sugawara Arudoudebito—a combination of his wife’s Japanese maiden name and his new transliterated full name.^[5] He gave the following amongst the reasons for naturalization:

“

[To] me naturalization is just an obvious extension of what somebody in my position would desire anyway—the right to vote and to LEGALLY participate in society the same as any other citizen. I am already as entrenched as any other citizen: I have a house and land with a debt of a quarter-million dollars; with a thirty-year loan I really *cannot* leave Japan...Moreover, naturalization has knock-on benefits that suit a person with my personality. It will enable me to stand on my rights (yes, more than I do now!) with renewed vigor—because I will indeed HAVE more rights, as well as a firmer ground to demand even more (I can except myself from, say, this 'as a foreigner, you are a guest in our country so shut up' bullshit). And—dare I say it?—I would be able to participate in politics as a *candidate* if I so choose).[1]

”

Arudou initially maintained dual nationality in violation of Japanese nationality law which requires those who naturalize to renounce their former citizenship. According to Arudou, in 2002 a U.S. consul in Sapporo threatened to divulge this information to the Japanese government following a disagreement with Arudou regarding his activist activities near Misawa Air Base. U.S. Consulate officials deny the allegation (see Criticism below). Following the incident, Arudou chose to renounce his U.S. citizenship.^[6]

Following a divorce^[7] from his wife in September 2006, Arudou petitioned the Sapporo Family Court to delete his ex-wife’s Japanese maiden family name from his koseki, or Family Registry, thus officially changing his name to Arudou Debito in November 2006.^[8]

[edit] Otaru onsen lawsuit

Arudou was one of three plaintiffs in a racial discrimination lawsuit against the Yunohana Onsen in Otaru, Hokkaido. Yunohana maintained a policy to exclude non-Japanese patrons, which the business claimed to implement after Russian sailors allegedly scared away patrons from one of its other facilities. After reading an e-mail posted to a mailing list digest complaining of Yunohana's policy in 1999,^[9] Arudou visited the hot spring (onsen), along with a small group of Japanese, Caucasian and East Asian friends, in order to confirm that only visibly non-Japanese people were excluded.^[10]

Arudou assumed that when he returned in 2000 as a naturalized Japanese citizen, he would not be refused; but the manager, although accepting that he was a Japanese national, refused him anyway on the grounds that his foreign appearance could cause existing Japanese customers to assume the onsen was admitting foreigners and take their business elsewhere.^[11]

Arudou and two co-plaintiffs, Kenneth Lee Sutherland and Olaf Karthaus, in February 2001 then sued Yunohana on the grounds of racial discrimination, and the City of Otaru for violation of the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, a treaty which Japan ratified in 1996. On November 11, 2002, the Sapporo District Court ordered Yunohana to pay the plaintiffs 1 million JPY each in damages. The court stated that "refusing all foreigners without exception is 'unrational discrimination' [that] can be said to go beyond permissible societal limits." This made the ruling a lukewarm victory for the plaintiffs, as it did little to change legal precedent towards racial discrimination in Japan.^[12] Arudou's claim against the city of Otaru for failing to create an anti-discrimination ordinance was dismissed as without merit.^[13] These rulings were upheld by the Sapporo High Court on September 16, 2004 ^[14] and the Supreme Court of Japan denied review on April 7, 2005.^[13]

[edit] Current activities

Arudou is currently planning a multi-party lawsuit against the Japanese Government for allegedly failing to protect the human rights of foreigners.^[15]

In 2006, Arudou spoke on racial discrimination issues in Japan at the University of British Columbia in Canada, as well as in several places in the United States, including the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Columbia University Law School, New York University Law School, Amherst College, Massachusetts, and the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington, Seattle.

In February 2007, Arudou commented on Gaijin hanzai ura file (Secret Foreigner Crime Files) a mook (magazine/book) published by Eichi Suppan on January 31. The mook contains images and descriptions of what the magazine says are crimes committed in Japan by non-Japanese, including graphs breaking down crimes by nationality. The magazine includes a caption describing a black man as a "nigga", an article entitled "Chase the Iranian!" and calls Tokyo a "city torn apart by evil foreigners." ^[16] Arudou posted a bilingual letter for readers to take to FamilyMart stores protesting against "discriminatory statements and images about non-Japanese residents of Japan."^[17]

[edit] Quotes

• "Other people have called me a 'human rights' activist. I don't mind the label, but I don't think I'd go so far...I'm just an average guy with a bigger mouth than average."^[18]

• "Japan is not an outlier in terms of racism, but it is in terms of protections against it."^[18]

• "Starting from 1993 in Otaru, Hokkaidō, and now running unchecked throughout Japan, signs saying 'Japanese Only' have gone up, making an unspoken undercurrent of fear of the outsider into clear, present, and brazen exclusionism—following the best traditions of segregation and apartheid."^[19]

• "Truth be told, having two passports in Japan is not necessarily a problem. If one lived a quiet life, one could conceivably keep renewing a non-Japanese passport ad infinitum. The USG permits dual citizenship and doesn't go out of its way to tell other governments about the nationalities of their citizens. However, as you know, I don't live a quiet life."^[6]

[edit] Publications

Arudou has written a book about a particular incident of discrimination he faced, in which he went with his family and some friends to an onsen (hot spring) in the Hokkaidō town of Otaru in 1999. The book was originally written in Japanese; the English version, Japanese Only—The Otaru Hot Springs Case and Racial Discrimination in Japan (ISBN 4-7503-2005-6), was published in 2004 and revised in 2006.

Arudou has also written several textbooks on business English and debating in addition to many journalistic and academic articles.^[20]

[edit] Criticism

Arudou's tactics have been seen by some as unnecessarily confrontational with supporting research that is sometimes inadequately substantiated, spurious or exaggerated in its claims.

“	People, including me, are fascinated by Debito Arudou because we wonder why he wanted to become Japanese in a country where he finds so many wrongs.	”
—Robert C. Neff [21]

Some of his former colleagues who were initially active in the BENCI (Business Excluding Non-Japanese Customer Issho) project (unconnected to Arudou's "Community in Japan" project) have criticized his apparent unwillingness to co-operate within a larger organization. Such friction contributed to a split with some of his initial supporters in the BENCI project.^[22] They have also criticized his alleged thirst for personal publicity, a claim which he has repeatedly denied.^[23]

Some critics question Arudou's brand of conflict resolution: the judicial system. Alex Kerr, author of the best-selling Dogs and Demons: Tales from the Dark Side of Japan (ISBN 0-8090-3943-5), criticized such tactics as "too combative," is doubtful "whether in the long run it really helps," noting that "in Japan...[the combative] approach fails." Acknowledging positively that "gaijin and their gaijin ways are now part of the fabric of Japan's new society," Kerr also feared that Arudou's activities may "confirm conservative Japanese in their belief that gaijin are difficult to deal with."^[24] On 7 April, 2007, Arudou publicly criticized Kerr’s comments on his personal blog and mass e-mail newsletter lists. Following Arudou's public criticisms, Kerr responded in an open e-mail posted by Arudou elaborating on his initial impressions of Arudou’s tactics, his current impressions of Arudou’s newsletter and website, and Kerr’s own distinct techniques for being critical in the field of “traditional culture, tourism, city planning, and the environment”—“to speak quietly, from ‘within.’” Respecting Arudou's "undoubtedly combative" tactics, Kerr now concluded by stating: “I wholly support [Arudou’s] activities and [his] methods.”^[25]

In terms of research, Arudou appears to forgo systematic evidence to support the allegation that "Japanese Only" signs are "proliferating" nationwide, preferring to depend on anecdotal evidence. His "Rogue's Gallery" published on his website^[19] appears to have been collected in an ad hoc manner. As of January 2006, the gallery contained 28 signs in 15 venues, a very small percentage of nationwide businesses that allegedly demonstrate discriminatory practices based on race. In a number of publications, Arudou claimed that "Japan happens to be the only OECD country without any form of domestic law against racial discrimination" without offering documented proof.^[26] Responding to numerous allegations leveled at the US State Department in the Hokkaido International Business Association (HIBA), Alec Wilczynski, Consul General, American Consulate General Sapporo, criticizes Arudou’s “antics,” “omissions” and “absurd statements” as part of a deliberate attempt “to revive interest in his flagging ‘human rights’ campaign.”^[6]

Indeed, some critics question Arudou's repeated claims that the Otaru Hot Spring case reflects a significant problem that requires immediate attention. Critics, such as Gregory Clark, Akita International University Vice-President, view the lawsuit as the product of "ultrasensitivity" and "Western moralizing."^[27] Other critics, such as Robert Neff, recognized authority and author of Japan's Hidden Hot Springs (ISBN 0-8048-1949-1), acknowledge the odd clash with an allegedly xenophobic hot spring proprietor, but ultimately views much of Arudou's campaign to be "faux" and ironically divisive.^[21]

“	Arudou and his family should not have been excluded from the onsen in Otaru, but I suspect I am not alone in objecting to the way this unpleasant, but essentially trivial incident has been parlayed into a career opportunity.	”
—Peter Tasker [28]

Some critics object to Arudou's attempt to evoke parallels between the institutionalized racial discrimination historically exhibited in South Africa, and the American segregated south with the alleged examples occasionally debated in Japan.^[18][19] Peter Tasker, author of numerous best-selling non-fiction and fiction works on Japan, argues that in "attempting to monster [Japan] into George Wallace's Alabama, [Arudou] trivializes the real-life brutal discrimination that still disfigures our world and the heroic campaigners who have put themselves on the line to fight it."^[28] Others question how a small and motley collection of allegedly discriminatory bath-houses, "soaplands," massage parlors, and nightclubs is representative of Japan's civil rights situation in any meaningful sense.^[29]

[edit] Notes

[edit] External links

• Official Site

[edit] Reference links

• Debito Arudou's blog
• Patrick Rial,"Debito Arudou: Evangelic Activist or Devilish Demonstrator?," JapanZine (December 2005)
• The first of a three-part interview with Arudou Debito on Yamato Damacy (February 2006)