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Forced Fingerprinting in Japan
Ron Fujiyoshi
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The issue of forced fingerprinting of all foreigners in
Japan has come to the forefront due to the courageous actions of a few conscientious
persons. Reprinted below is a statement by Ron Fujiyoshi, a Japanese-American
missionary, which he made at the Summary Court on Sept 27, 1982 and circulated
by the Committee for the Study of the Fingerprinting System.
The Kobe Public Prosecutors have declared on a number of occasions that
fingerprinting is not an infringement of human rights. My views run contrary to
this statement, and I hope the majority of Japanese people will agree with me.
Before presenting a summary of the reasons for my refusal, I must
clarify my motivations in taking this action. I believe that individuals are
the sum total of their heritage, experiences, and beliefs. Therefore, it is
necessary to understand something of my personal history to assess my action.
My heritage is related to the history of Japanese-Americans. In 1868,
the first boatload of Japanese immigrants was taken to Hawaii to work on sugar
plantations. More and more Japanese continued to emigrate until the number of
Japanese in Hawaii totaled approximately 150,000 or about 38% of the population
in 1936. My grandparents, both paternal and maternal, were part of this
migration. Time does not permit a more detailed explanation, but the primary
motivating factor for our ancestors migrating to America was to improve their
economic situation, the same reason other Asians continue to live in Japan.
The other crucial episode in the history of Japanese – Americans was the
World War II experience. Most of you are aware that the Japanese – Americans
residing on the mainland U.S.A. were forcibly placed into concentration camps
scattered throughout the country because they were suspected of being spies for
Japan. Approximately 110,000 people of Japanese heritage, 75% of whom were
second-
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generation
Japanese-Americans, were incarcerated. What many of you may not know is that no
Americans of German of Italian background suffered this injustice because they
were of a different color. As a result, anyone coming from this kind of
experience would be sensitive to any state, which treats an ethnic or racial
minority in a discriminatory manner.
Although I was born in Los Angeles, California before the outbreak of
the war, my family was fortunate in returning to Hawaii just three months prior
to the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Had we remained three months longer, we would
have accompanied my mother's family to the concentration camp in Grenada,
Colorado. Because Japanese-Americans totaled 40% of the population in Hawaii,
the sheer size made it impossible for all to be placed in concentration camps.
However, there were numerous checks for espionage on us. For example, my father
was a Christian pastor of a small Japanese-American church in a sugar
plantation town on the island of Kauai. One unit of the U.S. military lived in
the church buildings, and someone was assigned to attend the Sunday worship
services, taking notes to ensure my father's sermons did not discredit the
U.S.A. If time permits, there are more experiences, which I would like to share
later in this trial to illustrate the way we Japanese-Americans were made to
feel inferior to other Americans and somehow made ashamed because we were of
Japanese background. Although there was never a shred of evidence of
Japanese-American disloyalty, we were discriminated against merely because of
our Japanese heritage. According to U.S. law, anyone born in the U.S.A. is
entitled to American citizenship; yet, 75% of the incarcerated
Japanese-Americans were second-generation Japanese in America who held American
citizenship.
In my grammer school class of about forty
students, only two were White-both sons of managers of the sugar plantation.
Although Japanese comprised the largest ethnic group in Hawaii, we grew up feeling
inferior to the White
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man. It
was only after attending seminary on the mainland U.S. that I was able to fully
convincing myself otherwise. The seminary I attended was in Chicago, where I
lived for five years. I was fortunate to work in the Black ghetto, sharing some
of their lives and problems they faced, and am grateful to them for educating
me about racism and how it is related to economic exploitation.
Perhaps the most instructive part of my experience was meeting liberal
Whites who truly believed they did not bear prejudice towards Blacks, but their
subtle paternalism emerged in a variety of ways. I found that being an
Asian-American working in Chicago was unique: Whites didn't treat me like a
Black, and Blacks didn't treat me like a White. However, since I was an
Asian-American, I yearned to learn more about my Asian heritage and
decided to come to Asia. A Japanese friend advised me not to go first to
Japan because I had a Japanese face and was not versed in Japanese at all. I
took his suggestion seriously and in 1968 departed for Singapore. Altogether, I
spent five years in Southeast Asia before coming to Japan.
In Southeast Asia, I was perceived by some to be an American, by others,
Japanese. I began to understand concretely what American imperialism meant. I
also began to realize that my being educated in America had imbued me with
aspects of American chauvinism that needed to be shed if truly wanted to be in
solidarity with other Asians. I learned much about the Japanese as reflected
through the reaction of Southeast Asians toward them and was surprised that
many resented the Japanese not only from experiences during World War II but
from their actions and attitudes in the more recent past. It baffled me that
the Japanese looked at other Asians with condescension. While in Southeast Asia
– Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand – working among a number of different
'ethnic minorities added to my experience
and furthered my
understanding of discrimination
and how it works.
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I came to Japan nine years ago to work together with Koreans in Japan.
Much of my time was spent in Ikuno Ward of Osaka where the largest number of
Koreans in Japan resides. I have also been fortunate to visit South Korea many
times and treasure the friendship of many Urban Industrial Mission workers
there. I had heard about Japanese discrimination towards Koreans even before
coming to Japan, however, I was surprised to hear from Japanese and even a few
Koreans in Japan that there was no discrimination in Japan — at least not
anything like the discrimination of Whites toward Blacks in America. Through my
experience in Ikuno-ku, I realized that although it may be a little more
subtle, there is clear discrimination of Koreans by most Japanese. When real
estate dealers publish notices of apartments for rent with Gaijin fu akimasen
or Gaijin fuka or Jumin hyo yo, they are clearly advertising in a
discriminatory manner. One agent informed me that Koreans drink every night and
get into fights. If this is so, there must be a lot of "Korean"
salary men taking the late night train back to Kobe with me. My personal
experiences have confirmed that prejudice similar to that which Blacks suffer
in America does exist among many Japanese toward Koreans. What I found
difficult to understand was why Japanese who held a high opinion of Koreans in
the past now looked down upon Koreans.
With this background of my personal history, I can proceed to explain
the basis for my refusing to be fingerprinted. Very simply, there are two
reasons. First, fingerprinting is an infringement of an individual's human
rights. The process of being fingerprinted is a degrading, humiliating
experience. The only Japanese citizens who are forced to undergo fingerprinting
are those who have broken the criminal law as determined by the Japanese state.
Thus, the majority of Japanese associate fingerprinting with
the investigation of criminals. And this is historically correct,
because fingerprinting was developed as a method to trace criminals. Sir
Richard Henry, who later became the
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commissioner of Scotland Yard in England, developed this system, which was adopted
by Great Britain in 1902 and is used throughout the world today. Recent
evidence indicates that elements within the Japanese Ministry of Justice have
planned for the computerization of all fingerprints, allowing for more
efficient processing and control of individuals who have been fingerprinted.
Seen against this background of criminal investigation, the requiring of
fingerprinting of only foreigners is a violation of their individual human rights.
Second, fingerprinting is an infringement of the human rights of other
Asians in Japan, especially those of the Koreans in Japan. As a missionary of
the Korean Christian Church in Japan, I have worked mainly with Koreans for the
last nine years. Since about ninety percent of all foreigners in Japan are
Koreans, the fingerprinting law affects them more than any other foreigners do.
In fact, when this law was originally drafted during the time of the U.S.
Military occupation, it was clearly done with the Koreans in mind. Recently, a
Western missionary in Tokyo protested his being fingerprinted; he was told that
the law was meant for Koreans and not for him. As an American citizen, I feel a
responsibility for the role, which the U.S. has played in affecting the legal
status of the Koreans in Japan. For example, the 1951 Japanese immigration law
used as a model the U.S. immigration law, which was discriminatory towards
Asians then.
As I questioned the origin of Japanese prejudice toward Koreans, I began
to understand that behind the laws that deal with long-term Asian residents of
Japan is a policy that for want of a better term I call "coerced
assimilation." After studying, the Sakanaka thesis, which was published by
the Ministry of Justice in 1977, this policy, became clearer. Since then both
the Immigration Law and the Alien Registration Law have been revised. On the
surface, a variety of restrictions has been lifted. However, the main
discriminatory aspects remain. For example, the legal
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staus of Koreans in Japan was determined by the Japan-Korea
Normalization Treaty of 1965. The grandchildren of Koreans living in Japan in
1965 find that their legal status is an even less secure one than of their
grandparents. I know of no other country in the world where the legal status of
people residing there gets worse. Most countries recognize birthplace as the
basis for citizenship rights. There is no positive attitude toward recognizing
Korean ethnic education, the Korean language, or Korean names. The position of
Koreans in Japan is a discriminated, insecure one. The alternatives available
are not attractive. Either one remains in this insecure legal situation with
the threat of deportation always present or one can become a
naturalized Japanese, but without using one's Korean name.
What are human rights? It should not be viewed as a slogan that has
recently swept the international scene. Since I come from a Christian
background, I ground my understanding of human rights in that all persons are created
in the image of God. Japan ratified the International Covenant on Human Rights
three years ago. However, the violation of human rights lies in this policy of
coerced assimilation by will-fully refusing to respect the ethnic pride of
long-term Asians living in Japan. A refusal to respect the culture, history,
language and names of Koreans is a refusal to respect their existence as a
people. This is the fundamental failure to respect the human rights of the
Korean people. But can this policy be changed? Yes. China has an enlightened
policy toward the ethnic minorities who live there. A friend of mine visited
China six years ago to study its policy towards the five percent of Chinese who
are not ethnic Han people. At a visit to a Han elementary school, he saw first
grade students learning a Korean dance. The school principal, who was an ethnic
Han, explained that older Han Chinese cannot rid themselves of prejudice toward
the minority groups because of the chauvinistic education they received.
Prejudice, however, can be eliminated if children are taught to respect the
culture of others. Imagine what
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would
happen if every Japanese first grader learned to dance an Okinawan dance! Its
beauty and intricate movements would impress every student with a respect for
the Okinawan people. Yes, instead of an assimilation policy, the Japanese
government should maintain one where all people are treated equally without
discrimination.
Finally, I would like to pose the question, "Why does the Japanese
government follow a policy of assimilation of long-term Asians in Japan?"
I submit that this is related to the ideology of nationalism that was used to
rationalize the cannot simultaneously consider themselves Asian While believing
it justifiable that Japan invades other nations in order to build itself into a
world power.*
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Taken from Praxis Nos. 3-4, 1982.