Quote:
Originally Posted by MMM
In Japanese culture your body is considered a gift from your parents. To mark it up is considered an insult to your father and mother. Even piercing was relatively rare until the most recent generations.
Tattoos are associated with the yakuza, where they literally give their bodies to their "new parents" so to speak. The tattoos show an undying dedication to their yakuza boss.
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Yes, but this isn't so in foreign culture. Why should foreigners be subject to this standard?
Quote:
Originally Posted by MMM
Here's an example:
This is exactly the attitude I see in usually non-Japanese speaking foreigners in Japan who get frustrated after a few months or more of living in Japan.
I don't think I am the one being arrogant. But this isn't about you and me.
Japan doesn't see itself as the center of the universe, but it does see itself as the center of Japan, and to come into a foreign country and say "I am doing things my way, like it or not" is the top of the heap of arrogance. New visitors should be quite the opposite: humble...at least until they know their way around.
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MMM, I'm not going to conform to a foreign culture that tries to tell me I'm a gansta who disrespected my parents because I got a tattoo. I'll simply tell them that the world might be a little bigger than they once thought, and I'll welcome them into it.
Yes, I'm familiar with your type here in Thailand, also.
Actually, in my experience, most of the tourists who just arrive are your type, and when they stay a bit longer some stay the same, but a lot change into what I am.
It's impossible, you see, for someone to become as pissed off as I am until they get a decent understanding of it. Most the things I'm pissed off at, I wasn't aware of them until I'd been here over a year.
In Thailand, we call people like you "Asiaphiles", "**** heads", or "**** suckers". I'm not saying I call you that, but just giving you an idea.
Most people who get down on their knees and take it, in Thailand, are the ones who're always trying to defend the Thais. It's like they think they're perfect, or something, and just can't bear to have anyone insult their precious Thais.
Of course, people like this piss me off, because they usually end up defending plain double standards. Things I've told you before, where white men have to pay more simply because they're white. This is so common in Muay Thai training.
There is no cure for people like you, as you're not sick. The problem is physically embedded in your brain, and can only be smoothed out with hard blows with a baseball bat.
See, all I ever wanted was to be treated the same as Thais, but people call me the racist one... because I want equality?
Well, I found a non racist Muay Thai gym and have some real great Thai friends now. I don't get ripped off anymore. You can find good people in this horde of Thai scammers, you just have to look for them.
In the case of Japan, if I were to go there with my tattoos, I'd be politely asking them to respect my culture and show just a little social acceptence. If you've got a problem with that, then keep calling me a racist idiot like eveyone else does. But I rest assured that social acceptance and equality are things worth persisting for.
Also, I started drinking long before I hated racism in Thailand. I started in Germany when my life fell apart and I lost my job.