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Comment by skeledrew | Hacker News Reader

Doesn't seem they're really aware that they're something of an endangered "species". Although technically they'd still be endangered even if they open up seriously, as then there's heightened possibility of bloodline dilution. I wonder sometimes if that'd be a good or bad thing in the long run: loss of that which makes them pretty unique vs blending more with the world.

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> heightened possibility of bloodline dilution

In my experience, born/raised in Japan, domestic Japanese people have a very different reaction to local "Hafu" people where one of their parents is a Caucasian person from the US, UK, AU, NZ (or similar), vs "other" countries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C4%81fu

Colonial mentalities carry on for decades.

I mean, Japan's experience with colonialism was decidedly on the colonist side: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_East_Asia_Co-Prosperit...

That, and things like being an enthusiastic and early customer of British industrial/steam powered equipment in what we would broadly call the Victorian era. The early Japanese pre-dreadnought and dreadnought class battleships, for instance, were a clear descendent of British (or competing French) designs. Railway stuff as well. Lots of things that weren't British origin were American.

I have a personal unscientific theory that some of it, domestically within Japan, is as simple as a heightened degree of racism towards people with darker skin color.

From research I've learned that placing a high value on blending in is a cultural thing. There's the resulting good, like the focus on harmony which promotes good relationships (and is a major contributor to the low crime rate), and there's the bad, like spurning those who look/speak different (I've heard stories from a few who went to visit seeing signs that gaijin aren't allowed in certain establishments, etc).

> (I've heard stories from a few who went to visit seeing signs that gaijin aren't allowed in certain establishments, etc)

I've heard stories more specifically that certain type of gaijin were allowed in certain gaijin-suspicious establishments (US/UK/Canadian tourists), while their counterparts of Indian, Bangladeshi descent were not.

“Bloodline dilution” is only a thing if you believe your race is superior.

I'm pretty sure there are many non-Japanese who're attracted to Japanese primarily because of their homogeneity.

You mean western dudes who fetishize/exotify eastern women?

Korean men and Japanese women make up the biggest share of international marriages in Japan so there's something more going on here that makes Japanese women highly desirable to men in general.

2016 https://www.nippon.com/en/features/h00174/

~70% of int'l marriages in Japan are Japanese men + foreign brides.

Of the women marrying foreign husbands, 25.7% Korean, next is 16.7% American, then 12.5% Chinese.

or if you just care about your race, which is a normal thing to do

it's an extended family of sorts

If the extended family incorporates other races, does it stop being extended family?

there's a difference between an individual family changing its composition because it has an interracial marriage, and an entire country needing to do so just because they've taken in immigrants

why would the entire country be "needing" to change its composition?

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