I agree. There are a lot of serious problems not addressed, such as pedophilia and sexism towards women.

i get what the guy's trying to do with this. but i do think that all countries have their idiosyncrasies - you could make a similar video about the individual quirks of the UK or France or Netherlands and there would be particular practices considered totally normal within those cultures that, viewed from outside, seem bizarre.

I didn't find it too offensive apart from maybe the sarky voiceover “Why do they do that?”. Having lived in Japan for a few years, I can definitely say that the points made are true and laid bare. I shared this with my Japanese friends and they found a lot of humour in the clip. There are some that are able to laugh at themselves and there are some (who I've met) that are very proud and would deny some of the points raised. The country is an island technically and metaphorically.

I find this extremely offensive. The graphics and the style are really interesting, but the creator needs to take a step back himself and take a look at what he's doing. He made a video that basically says, “Here are all the stereotypes about you, Japan” and then ends it with, “And whose fault is it that there are these stereotypes? Yours.”

People can be racist even if they're a member of the culture they're deriding…but I don't think it's the case here. This guy is true to his word, trying to get Japanese people to take a look at some of the problems in their own country. He also helpfully translated it into English and (if you'll do a little search) you'll notice he has allowed it to be translated into like 10 other languages. However I agree that it's kind of convenient that he didn't address any of the more problematic parts of Japanese culture…aka attitudes toward women, pedophilia, attitudes toward drug use, discrimination against foreigners (and by this I do not mean white people who go over there and cry about “racism”…read up on Japanese-born Koreans or Filipinos sometime…). Anyway, this was amateurish…whoever said that had it right.

A little bit of digging gives us this, from Kenichi Tanaka, who authored the project: “This is my final thesis project. I created info-graphic, motion piece. My objective is to make Japanese people to think about that everything happening here in Japan, isn't that normal. So I created this video from foreigner's point of view, rather than Japanese people's point of view.  Both English and Japanese versions are available. By the way, please don't call me racist, because I am one of short, small eyes Japanese ;P” Kenichi's a 22 year old artist who might be ignorant and prone to statistical manipulation, but enough with the 'racism' chant. Not every mention of race is racism. Also, I imagine that if one of these infographics filled with unreliable information and half-truths about the US showed up the knee-jerk liberals of Buzzfeed would be lining up to congratulate the creator.  http://www.kenichi-design.com/

oh cool. i'm in Japan right now.  I guess if you were raised and living in a place as largely populated as Tokyo, you'd be pretty lonely and depressed.

What exactly is racist about this?

how did that guy poop through his pants into the squat toilet???

I didn't really see this as a great example of how the outside world views Japan. Sure it was a bunch of 'facts' but what about all the strange crap that Japan does? Weird game shows, pedophilia, anime crap, etc…

It's not racist so much as rife with sterotype and a bit of amateurism. Still fun to watch and you end up learning something.

See the original Youtube page. This project was apparently a Japanese student's thesis. Still sounds a little racist to me, though.

I honestly can't tell if this is just really liberal or racist. Its like if the BBC suddenly decided it needed to be more offensive.