This policy was a surprise to those of us who watch NHK-TV news daily.

So, for people who are at work, commuting, or otherwise engaged during the news broadcasts, or who don’t watch much news at all and don`t read newspapers regularly, this policy really is surprising. (Incidentally, TV and newspapers are falling by the wayside due to Internet news.)

So many people remain as ignorant as I was until the fingerprint and mug shot policy came into force.

But remember, the native born people of any country can go through an entire lifetime without knowing the immigration policies and practices in their own countries.

If you never immigrate and never meet an immigrant, or if your immigrant friends are too polite to tell you about their bad experiences, you will never know about them.

Take Canada. It is very difficult for ordinary people to get through Canada’s very difficult immigration system. Yet, according to the Government of Canada, 89% of Canada has no permanent settlement.

Canada is the second largest country in the world, smaller than Russia and bigger than China. Canada contains 10 million square kilometres and has only about 30 million people.

Even doctors immigrating to Canada end up driving taxis instead of practicing medicine.

To Dave: Thanks for explaining SOFA. It sounds very Pentagonish. So you must be talking about the U.S. military, right? (Please don’t say, “Is there any other?” even if that might be the case.)

By the way, I have no idea what “SOFA” means, other than chesterfield or couch. I wonder how many people, even anglophones, know what it means. Could you please spell it out.

Thank you for your comments. I have nothing further to add on this topic, but I will read any further comments from you and other people.

By the way, I have managed to get a hundred Japanese citizens, people I know personally, to write to the prime minister, so far. Perhaps you could do the same?

Have you written to your elected representatives in your nation-state yet to complain about the U.S. and Japan? It is better to act than to simply grumble to yourself or to shout into the great cyber void.

A little harsh to say I didn’t read and think before responding. After I reread the article I could see your point. I thought you were saying that as foreigners, we are excluded from the normal passages of debate and so we should write letters. Now I see you’re directing that towards Japanese themselves.

Are Japanese overly concerned about this though? Some may try to use the recent alleged rape allegation by a US marine as evidence for this to continue, but they forget that SOFA status personnel wouldn’t be fingerprinted anyway.

You are pointing out a big problem with the internet. It does not encourage people to read and think before giving an instant reaction.

My comments above are addressed to Japanese citizens only, not to non-Japanese citizens such as yourself.

So your note could be misconstrued as an attempt to try to discourage Japanese citizens from participating in Japan’s democratic process. I am sure that was not your intent, so please join me in supporting Japanese citizens who want to participate in the democratic process.

By the way, if citizen participation, such as simply writing to one’s elected representatives were a “revolution” now, democracy and freedom would be dead and we would all be lining up for the death camps.

To All non-Japanese citizens:

I also encourage you to write to your nation-state governments.

Since the human rights violations were initiated by the U.S. government, I encourage all U.S. citizens to write to their president and members of congress. Otherwise JFK, RFK, and Martin Luther King died in vain.

The U.S. actually exempts some foreign citizens from the criminal treatment, including Canadians and citizens of 27 other countries.

However, non-Canadian citizens, including Japanese citizens, are forced to carry passports with computer chip tracking devices in them as a condition of avoiding being fingerprinted and mug shot at the U.S. entry points. Imagine what Hitler could have done with that kind of identification card.

So I also encourage all non-U.S. citizens to write to their governments and ask them to tell the U.S. that its policy is unacceptable. The U.S. has only 4.5% of the human population and should not be permitted to ride roughshod over the world, as if the U.S. were the former minority rule dictators of South Africa.

Remember Mahatma Gandhi, who campaigned against the compulaosry fingerprinting of people from India in South Africa.

Brazil is already retaliating against the U.S. by fingerprinting and taking mug shots of only U.S. citizens. While this is appropriate, it is not a good idea because it simply spreads the problem.

Finally, I have travelled, worked, and lived in military dictatorships, including General Pinochet’s Chile and Suharto’s Indonesia, as well as the former military dictatorship in South Korea, etc. But none of those dictatorships demanded or took my fingerprints or mug shot.

So no “democracy” should be worse than these dictatorships. We are all giving up the freedom that millions have died to protect and preserve. They were not political leaders or revolutionaries. They were just ordinary people who said “No.” to dictatorship.

Try wearing a “Yokoso Japan 11/20 commemorative tee” around town. Guaranteed to spark conversation and interest in the cause from foreigners and Japanese nationals alike. I have found my “voice”!

http://samuraicanuck.tripod.com

Sorry for not feeling the “Revolution!” vibes but that’s my opinion on the subject.