HAI^^ unfortunately i have no hats... maybe i should go buy some^^:rheart: :rheart:

i just have a military unisex hat from puma xD
works just dandy for me =3



see? xD

Maybe that's that Gothic Lolita stuff ? :D
but white skin color is beautiful! i have white skin and it looks cool , even when summer is, and you look diferent ...
but i think that, you should ask some japanece boy or girl, why they want have white skin? :D

that's what asians think
 

may be it's the same reason why white people want to get tan.
I'm asian and asian find that white skin people(speacially girls) look pretty.

The white colour that japanese n asian wants is not the pink white that western ppl have. Basically it's pale white, like some kinda perfect animation skin.

The reason is pretty simple: it looks pretty cute on them if they have bright white skin. On the other hand, if u have dark skin, when u bleech ur hair blonde or very bright colour, it wont fit u.

That's what i think!

don't know
 

honestly, i have no clue. i have pale skin, and would love to have darker skin! (It's so hard to get a tan without burning)

Well, I read a couple of articles about this subject, the last was this summer in the newspaper. xD
It said that in Japanese society being tanned is associated with working in the open air, like farmers and construction-builders and people like that. Those are very often relatively poor people, so being tanned kind of means you are poor. When you are white, you don't have to work much, don't need to go outside when you don't want to, etcetera.
It also said something about people in Japan going more and more to beaches and so, but with umbrellas and hats to protect themselves from getting tanned. xD

It's only what the article said, I don't know if it's really true!

Light skin has been associated with beauty and high social status in Japan for centuries. Members of the royal family and the upper class could afford to spend most of their time indoors, limiting their sun exposure, and therefore having paler skin. The lower class working in the fields had darker skin. Well, this is what I've heard from some of my aunts. Wanting to have pale or tanned skin is a matter of personal opinion. Not all non-European people want to be lighter. Hell, I'm Asian and Hispanic and we tan as much as much as White people do.

Aren't Japanese white? o.o

Personally, I like tanned skin on my body more because it
shows muscles and thinness off.
I like whiter skin for my face though, just because I think
it looks better... but I can't do both of those or I would
be given some strange looks.

The white skin was what they used for geishas? Maybe
they think it looks elegant or secretive.

Pale not White
 

The extent is important.
 

I dont think too white skin is so nice. And too black is the same. I like so-so colored skin. Too white skin can lead an image of sickness to me. You can see that white one on some horor movie, can't you? I feel so frighten or scary. I like japanese-color. We need to have in some extent melanine on our skin!! Cosmeticlly and for health.

nobody is black and nobody is white. were just people, and that is a race of its own.

i'm not japanese but i'm chinese but i want white skin because it will look good if i'm in a chineese dress :mtongue: but i dont think i'm that white

People should be more proud of their skin tone, I was born in England but have a South Asian Ethnic background and I don't feel people with a pale skin tone look any better than a person with a tanned/brown tone.

I guess girls are just a little picky about these things:) .

I live in England... and my skin is SOOO pale already.. I wouldn't try to be any paler because then I'd look like paper :P I wear a little pink blusher on my cheeks because it looks nice with my skin tone.

I don't know, I guess it's just that we always want what we don't have..
Like people with curly hair want straight hair, and it works in reverse too.

I don´t like too much pale skin on european people but on asians it looks great in my opinion :)

It's not a racial thing. It just looks better on most far east asian people as our skintones are yellow, so going tanned doesn't look as good compared to a lighter colour.

How does it look lol

This....is NOT true. I am pretty white...and I most definately do not want to be dark.

it's just got to be said. beauty is in the eye of the beholder. be what you want nothing else. just be beautiful/handsome or whatever you want to be that makes you happy.

Some of it is historical like said before. If you were tan, it meant that you worked outside and were a farmer. White skin is sometimes seen as more elite. but this is not always true in japan. Why does there have to be a reason to have white skin. You dont ask why does everyone want a tan in the US.

I agree with Barone1551 on this. Thais are the same when it comes to their skin.

Gothloli! LOL.

It's because they're racist. It is to do with class structure, mostly. Physical labour jobs require "fun in the sun", where as middle class jobs are indoors. No man wants to be seen married to the farmers daughter when he is trying to socially climb.

Japan is better than most Asian countries. Thailand is a shocker. They plainly think all black people (Africans, Aussie Aboriginals) are simply ugly. But a lot of Japanese still think like that.

As a person mentally advances, they overcome the fear of the sun...

I'm not quite sure that means they are racists. They (at least my Japanese friends I cant speak for a whole country) don't equate a tan with being African American. That sounds absurd. I think it simply boils down to what the culture thinks is attractive. It may have roots in history, of why they like pale skin. But those things barely hold true. I know plenty of Japanese girls who are tan and don't get ridiculed. They arent looked down upon. I think in modern times it all has to do with personal preference. We do it all the time here in the US some people want to be tan becuase they think it makes them look healthy. I personally hate getting a lot of sun. I would rather be pale as well, but that in no way makes me racist.

Yes, I said as you mentally progress, you overcome it.

Japan is progressing, and losing racism, so it isn't so bad anymore. Japanese girls are embracing water sports and Japanese men are still chasing them. Japan is moving on.

But this is why it is so. It is more bad in other Asian countries, especially my home, Thailand. My wife is South Thai, meaning she naturally has extremely dark skin (she looks half African, literally). No Thai man has ever been interested in her. Seriously, for no other reason than her skin color, people think she is ugly.

This isn't tied to culture as much as arrogance. I mean, I never had blacks around when I grew up, nor Asians, but I find both attractive when it's the right girl.

Ok I think its just the wording that we are disagreeing on. I dont think it has to do with mentally growing. That implies that as you get smarter the less racist you are. Its just more of a time period thing and as views change. There are smart racist people and vice versa. I think we agree for the most part, I was just kind of confused by the wording you had.

light skin color may have used to mean you were elite but now dark skin means you have time to play or just tan.

Yeah. I use some colorful words sometimes. It is hard to exactley understand why I say the things I do unless you also have experienced it first hand.

Because that's a basic quality of internalized racism that plagues the world.

Dark skin is beautiful.

There are a lot of assumptions going on with this entire thread that I think that are based in something less than fact, but the Japanese history within Japan of the attractiveness of white skin has nothing to do with internalized racism. How could it when Japan was an island country with only one race when this tradition first arose?

Internalized racism can also refer to the idea of "white features" being considered more beautiful. No, Japan doesn't have many more races - but that doesn't mean it's completely cut off from the world. Maybe many Japanese citizens haven't seen black people with their own eyes, but they DO see them - and they DO exist. They might see black people, or anyone with darker skin, portrayed on the TV or in movies. The way that many black people and darker skinned people are portrayed influences people's thoughts and ideas.

If all you see on TV are people with lighter skin, and shows and movies suggest that people with lighter skin are more beautiful than people with darker skin - then yes, you can fall victim to internalized racism. It doesn't matter where in the world you are. Media has a huge control over race relations. All you need is a TV.

And ESPECIALLY for something like fashion, where most models are going to be people with lighter skin because lighter skin is considered more beautiful - yeah, internalized racism is pretty prominent, no matter where you are.

Actually when this tradition began that is exactly what Japan was: cut off from the rest of the world. No foreigners were allowed into Japan. It was called a "chain country" meaning it was like a chain was around the isolated islands of Japan.

The pale skin of the elite was considered more attractive than the darker skin of those that worked in the fields. At the same time, black or crooked teeth were not considered a negative and there are stories of women with perfectly white teeth who break them with rocks to get a man.
Again, the tradition of lighter skin as more attractive than darker skin is has a long tradition before the modern era in Japan, and before black people were in Japan.

Nowdays that tradition is just that, a tradition. For as many women that avoid the sun to keep their skin pale, there are as many women who go to tanning salons and beaches to get their skin dark. Neither fad, fashion or tradition has anything to do with black people. I am not saying there isn't racism in Japan, but this "truism" really has nothing to do with black people...or white people, for that matter.

We're not stuck in the Meiji Era. It's 2009. I've seen plenty of dramas and movies and magazines with black people in them. They are not cut off from the world - at least, not enough to not know who black people and white people are. I believe that internalized racism exists in Japan, to the point where many young people have looked at Western foreigners in the media and have wanted to copy them by bleaching their hair blonde and wearing light color contacts. Internalized racism shows itself in the women who get eye surgery to make their eyes look more "Western." With the ideas of wanting to look attractive by looking Western are the ideas that is unattractive to be black.

Light skin being more attractive is also a tradition in America and in most countries you travel to. Saying that it was a tradition in Japan long before black people set foot in the country doesn't change the fact that, today, when I step foot in Japan, people will see my skin and think that I'm not attractive - just as when I step foot in America, Brazil, England, ANYWHERE.

In the days of the confederate flag in the USA, people wanted to defend tradition - leaving the essentials rights of human beings behind. No, Japan isn't America. That doesn't change the fact that these are two countries filled with human beings - and human beings, around the world - no matter the history or geography - has the same habit of racism and oppression, no matter how subtle it is.

Mercedesjin, racism is wherever you want to find it, and if you want to find racism in Japansese traditions that have nothing to do with black people, then you certainly can. Your stay in Japan will certainly be an exercise in frustration if this is the approach you want to take.

You are making the assumption that Japanese traditions do not influence the mindset of modern Japanese thinking. Yes it is 2009, but that doesn't mean that history and tradition do not influence the choices people make today.

Bleached hair: Everyone in Japan has black hair. So why would someone want a different hair color? Because that want to look more white and less black? C'mon! How arrogant do we have to be to think all Japanese fashion is based on white people and black people? Doesn't it make sense that hair bleaching is not about looking more like Britney Spears, but just being different than mom? If it was about being more white than black, then explain to me why Japanese girls perm their hair, and some (men and women) even perm them into afro-style looks?

Color contacts: Everyone in Japan has brown eyes. So to want a different eye-color that happens to be the same eye-color as most black people is racist? Again, how arrogant do we have to be as non-Japanese to think like this? Japanese don't get different color contacts to be more white and less black. If that were true why are non-natural (in the white world) colors as popular? (yellow...cat eye...all black)?

Eye surgery: You got me stumped on this one. How is larger, rounder eyes "less black"? If anything is it more black. If they made their eyes more narrow, then you might have an argument.

The idea of pale skin being attractive for Japanese comes from the tradition of pale skin being attractive for Japanese. I am not going to apologize when I say in a mono-racial society, it's not about you.

But to look at it another way, in popular culture right now (especially as summer begins) multi-ethnic artists and darker skin are very popular. I have a Japanese friend who is in Hawaii right now getting as tan as she can before heading home. It's not about being black or being white (why would it be) but being in fashion. Japan is not a multi-racial country like America, England or Brazil, and to think they think about these racial issues when tanning or avoiding the sun is, again, arrogance.

1) To compare the history of the confederate flag in any way with a Japanese woman's desire to use a parasol in the sun to protect her skin is the paramount of bulls***.

2) Not all human beings around the world have the same history, background, inclinations, and upbringings. So if you want to say the isolated Eskimos in Alaska are as equally racist as the KKK of the American south, the nationals of Haiti and the aboriginal Ainu of Hokkaido , that is your right as a person, but it seems like a very short-sighted perspective to me.

Japanese women like to protect their skin from the sun and go to extreme lengths to achieve it. So no doubt that's why many have white skin.

Certainly in my location we have many Japanese and their skin goes very brown here in the tropics. You really couldn't live here if you liked white skin as the radiation is extreme.

Thailand both male and female or also the same.

Simple as that really..

Then you get the Aussie chicks that wanna be black and lay at the beach all day plastered in oil and end up looking like fried lobsters!

When they get older, their skin starts to resemble soggy uncooked chicken skin with some crinkle cut pattern atop, and faces like peperoni pizzas!

If you have a look at older Japanese (Usually the women are more sun conscious than men), you will see how good the skin is.

Older people in the UK are similar to Japanese.

Of course living in Australia, we are very close to the sun.

Hope this places some more sensible rectification on your original query.

I'm sorry, this is all I read and that's all I will read. This is the most common comment made by men and women who have privilege in whichever society they live in, and simply do not want to see the oppression created by human society to keep groups of people down economically and emotionally. I've also experienced too many people who simply will not see racism, because that makes them personally feel uncomfortable, and will defend racism to no end - even people who have been oppressed.

I'm sorry if it's offensive that I haven't read or responded to your entire post, but you suggested a few days ago that I pick and choose my battles. I'm definitely not choosing this one. I'm done.

I am sorry you have chosen not to read my post because I address every point you mentioned.

I hoped we could have had a good discussion on this topic, but you have chosen to close the door on a perception you have already decided about a person you know nothing about. (A little like when you said my uses of the word "gays" was condescending.)

I was hoping I could help give you a wider perspective before your departure, but am sorry you have decided this veteran of Japan and veteran of fighting for equality probably before you were even born is not a reliable source of information.

Best to you and I am sure you will find what it is you seek.

EDIT: actually this is the second time I have uses the phrase "racism is wherever you want to find it" with you, but for some reason it didn't seem to bother you the first time.

Again, I hoped we could have had an open discussion about these topics. If the words I use shut down the ability to communicate, then...

I got a kick out of this one.

I have dyed my hair black a couple of times in my life. Never due to racial influence, even if it is uncommon for anglo-saxons to have truly black hair. It was just gothic fashion, as Japan has its own fashions today, yet most a fairly original.

Of course, a lot of Asia is heavily influenced by the west, mostly because we rode in on horses with bags full of gold (or stealing bags full of gold...) and have managed to dominate the world vastly since that era. But that is little racism. Every powerful nation influences its weaker neighbour heavily. As the English are strong now, but why not inquire as to why there are so many Arab words in our language?

Hair color, I don't see as western influence. But if you look at the fashion things that are, such as closed shoes, WOW, ... I mean, you must have a grudge against trade... it isn't an issue.

I think the desire to have larger eyes comes from viewing their own race, rather than ours. Simply, it is what they find attractive, but it doesn't mean it is our influence, and it certainly doesn't mean racism is involved.

White people have long noses, and often complain about their nose being too big. But that doesn't mean we want to have flat noses like Asians do, it is just what we think looking at ourselves.

It only becomes racism when social exclusion occurs due to someone not being able to tick all the desired boxes. This isn't the case with passing fashions.

You fail then because MMM's points trump yours.

I'll just add that you can only say Internalized racism is a factor when dealing with race directly. Any connection you make between mainstream Japanese perceptions of beauty amongst themselves and portrayals of Black people by the media are not very credible because you can do little more than suggest them. Also that this tradition has been long established before black people even existed in the consciousness of Japanese society is a much better, more rational explanation.