The romanticization of Japan and the consequential pushback AGAINST the romanticization of Japan (calling “Japan glazers” “cringe” and whatnot) has made it difficult for me to exist comfortably within my Japanese identity.
Obviously there is a lot more nuance in the above issue. I’m in more of a middle ground. People shouldn’t be punished for having a liking to anything Japanese so long as they aren’t appropriating the culture and/or completely ignoring the glaring issues the country has.
But I feel like it’s become two extremes. It’s either you’re unreasonably obsessed with Japan or you think liking anything Japanese is embarrassing or even a moral failing. And as someone who doesn’t “look Japanese” I feel like I have to constantly justify my identity in order to simply live my life.
I grew up using a username with “chan” after my name because that’s what my mom calls me. It’s my childhood name and it’s cute. But now I feel like “(name)chan” has become so associated with being “cringe” that I couldn’t possibly go back to using it. I changed it a long time ago.
Similarly my mom once told me that I should incorporate Japanese phrases into my commentary for my job because it would make me more interesting. I told her I couldn’t. The internet would see it as cringe. I think that’s when I realized my thinking was an issue. I essentially told her that speaking our language was “cringe.” I felt so bad because like, isn’t that so fucked up to say?
I get that generally no country should be glazed to hell and back but it reaches a point where you’re just making fun of the culture and language. There are real people that live that culture and speak that language. Please stop using everything Japanese as a punchline I’m so TIRED
This is japanophobia