Just to add, "gaijin" is more to casual way of speaking. I doubt people who don't know the foreigner will call them "gaijin", or at least not as I know. No one ever call me that even though I'm clearly not Japanese, and I've been communicating with Japanese people ever since I was 12, that means it's been 12 years. People will usually refer foreigner as "gaikokujin", which is the polite and correct term of saying foreigners.
EDIT: After I read the comments below seems like I'm just lucky to find good friends who never call me "gaijin" or other offensive words.
And about "ganbatte", it can be offensive to people who are not Japanese I guess. Japanese people say ganbatte so casually it sometimes can annoy you, but the meaning not about "do your best" all the time. It's more to good luck charm for Japanese people. When they visit me last year and ask me to cook, they said "ganbatte" to me even though they know I can cook pretty well. It's just more like a habit to them. Whether it's offensive or not, it's each of their own I guess.
I agree, but I also kind of got the feeling from being in Japan that you can be there for as long as you want but you'll never really be accepted as one of them? I mean, maybe it's an internalized knowing of this whether its subconscious or not that makes them say "Try your best because lol you won't ever get anywhere, but hey, hang in there"
To build off the other comments, "gaijin" literally means "outside person" whereas "gaikokujin" means "outside country person". In Japan, if you are "outside" the group, you are shunned and a nobody. So basically "outside person" means you're ostracized from the bigger group as opposed to just being described as somebody from outside the country.
To me even "gaikokujin" is racist, because they lable you based on your looks.
You don't look Japanese thus you can't be Japanese thus you have to be from another country. Siumple as that. They need to wake up. Just one example: one of my previous co-workers was born and raised in Japan. She speaks Japanese fluently, of course. She IS Japanese, right? Wrong. She gets the same shit all the tourists get every single day because she is blonde, has blue eyes and just looks very Western. And she doesn't have a Japanese passport, cuz despite being born and raised in Japan her parents aren't Japanese, so it's impossible.
So, she's not considered as a Japanese citizen. She can't vote in elections etc.
It's not so much the word that is racist, but the way it's being used.
"gaikokujin" is the good word. My penpal dislikes the word "gaijin" because apparently a professor said it was racist on TV (Japan of course). So, I'm pretty sure that on the tone you say "gaijin", it is probably offensive in some context.
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EDIT:
After I read the comments below seems like I'm just lucky to find good friends who never call me "gaijin" or other offensive words.
And about "ganbatte", it can be offensive to people who are not Japanese I guess. Japanese people say ganbatte so casually it sometimes can annoy you, but the meaning not about "do your best" all the time. It's more to good luck charm for Japanese people. When they visit me last year and ask me to cook, they said "ganbatte" to me even though they know I can cook pretty well. It's just more like a habit to them.
Whether it's offensive or not, it's each of their own I guess.
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btw jun <3<3 ^^
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You don't look Japanese thus you can't be Japanese thus you have to be from another country. Siumple as that. They need to wake up.
Just one example: one of my previous co-workers was born and raised in Japan. She speaks Japanese fluently, of course. She IS Japanese, right?
Wrong. She gets the same shit all the tourists get every single day because she is blonde, has blue eyes and just looks very Western.
And she doesn't have a Japanese passport, cuz despite being born and raised in Japan her parents aren't Japanese, so it's impossible.
So, she's not considered as a Japanese citizen. She can't vote in elections etc.
It's not so much the word that is racist, but the way it's being used.
Reply
My penpal dislikes the word "gaijin" because apparently a professor said it was racist on TV (Japan of course).
So, I'm pretty sure that on the tone you say "gaijin", it is probably offensive in some context.
Reply
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