Let me begin with my experience. I was born and brought up in Kyoto, where it is said that douwa problem still remains. As far as I remember, I had douwa kyouiku classes in elementary school, junior high school, and high school. I don’t remember the detail, but I do remember the video I watched maybe in elementary school. In the video, one burakumin-girl was discriminated when she tried to get job just because she was burakumin, and she was again discriminated when she was getting married. After watching it, we all were required to tell how you felt about the video. That’s all. This is the typical way of douwa kyouiku I think. But to tell you the truth, I think this kind of education is nearly nonsense. It’s very easy to say “discrimination is evil” isn’t it? Who would be against it? I was just a little boy at that time but I wonder that class made sense.

If you call douwa education like I had as a positive approach, there is a kind of negative approach as well. Some people believe that ignoring and stopping telling children about buraku will eliminate discrimination and buraku problem will disappear. Their theory is sometimes referred as “netakowo okosuna” theory. “Netakowo okosuna” is a kind of proverb, which means let a sleeping child asleep (it corresponds to “Let sleeping dog lie” or “Wake not a sleeping lion” in English). Their argument is sometimes based on the fact that people in kanto or touhoku, who hasn’t been told about buraku problem in school are unaware of it. A half-century later, people who know much about buraku or who discriminate buraku people will pass away and unaware people will be left. In this way, buraku problem completely disappears. They think douwa education promote discrimination rather than solve it. What is more, some of them believe douwa education is designed to retain douwa problem by people who have interest in anti-discrimination activities.

The theory of “netakowo okosuna” is often criticized for these following reasons. First, ignoring can’t be a solution. Even you ignore it, discrimination still exists. Discriminated people will not be helped if everyone is blind to the problem. Second, ignorance can lead and spread lies, wrong information, rumors that are not true. You can discriminate burakumin without awareness. Third, you should know the truth, what happened in the past, and what is happening today.

In my opinion, “netakowo okosuna” theory will work because I think it is poverty that causes problems on buraku people rather than discrimination itself. As some statistics show, the conditions and living standards of buraku people are much better than before, and discrimination is declining. Therefore, I strongly believe the solution for douwa or buraku problem is not douwa education, but the policies to help people get out of poverty. My opinion is really close to that of JCP, or Zenkairen, and quite different from that of BLL(Kaidou), who promotes douwa education.

Useful links
The introduction of Zenkairen http://www.geocities.jp/zenkairen21/08.html
BLL (Kaidou) http://www.bll.gr.jp/

by Anonymous