I'm half-white, half American Indian. In my opinion racism in Japan is much more severe than in the United States, save for that exhibited by minorities towards whites ( and ESPECIALLY successful, conservative minorities). I do not have much experience with other English speaking countries.
Some reasons:
1. Japan does not allow mass immigration. In the United States, we are brow-beaten into not only allowing mass immigration, but are actually forced into accepting voluntarily changing the ethnic make-up of the nation , which screws poor minorities even more than whites.
2. Politicians in Japan almost universally reflect the dominant ethnicity there, whereas the most powerful leader in our nation, as well as A huge chunk of his cabinet, the congress, and the Supreme Court consists of minorities.
3. Minorities can actually burn down a huge chunk of a city, murder whites (a Bosnian immigrant was beaten to death with hammers recently- and sure enough, the authorities insisted it was not a hate crime, lmao) because a clear-cut legal case doesn't go their way, and guess what- the police area they standing down and allowing them to do it. Now imagine that happening in Japan.
4. In the u.s., the nation's history is vilified in university level
Courses, and even in high schools today. In japan actual war crimes are denied or glossed over. Whereas white Americans will never be forgiven for slavery.
5. In the u.s., a minority can rob a gas station, muscle a small, elderly
Store owner, and assault a police officer and try to take his gun, and STILL a HUGE chunk of the nation supports him and condemns the policeman who killed him, THIS IN SPITE OF UNDENIABLE EVIDENCE/ a BLOOD TRAIL proving the guy charged the cop. Imagine that in Japan.
6. In the u.s., minorities can call for white genocide openly, while whites are fired for expressing their ethnicity's interests in the slightest. Imagine that in Japan.
Ultimately what it boils down to is that the u.s. Population is forced to accept millions of non-native blacks/whites/others . Many bitch about racism, but yet they stay, with many doing everything they can to become citizens. Compare that to Japan. It's not even close.
Hell, if I had a dollar for how many times white people have tried to shut me down for criticizing the more deviant forms of black culture and other forms of anti-Americanism, i'd be a wealthy man. i'd be even wealthier if I had one for every time a white person backed down to me just because I'm Indian, out of white guilt, of which I have zero, in spite of being half white.
The vast majority of racist acts I've experienced have been because of blacks. I'm fact, there are grants out there for me to continue my work JUST BECAUSE IM INDIAN. How many Ainu have scholarships and set-asides in Japan?
Some guy doing the "slant eyes" thing is not a big deal. Neither is some redneck not being able to tell the difference between Asian cultures, or assuming an Asian knows karate.
In Japan I've experienced a man actually grabbing my penis at the beach, wanting to know how big it was. Japanese people have actually avoided sitting by me on trains. Servers have made it clear that I'm not welcome in a couple of restaurants. And how many people have reported having trouble with renting, buying perp perry, getting a driver's license, etc. ? The "language issue" is a smokescreen. Even fluent gaijin have reported being rejected.
But most of all, it's the staring that I'm going to have to learn to live with. I'm a big, fairly tall guy just naturally. And it freaks people out. That IS racism, as Being physically large is a big part of being Kiowa. If a white person is out off by a black person's size, or an Asian guy is not considered attractive because of his height and/or facial features, MANY people in the u.s. Would say that's racist. Now in Japan........
What it boils down to is that Americans are willing to share their territory with non-Americans, allow them to become permanent Americans, while japanese desire to keep their nation homogenous. If a white American were to say that it'd be racism, so what's good for the goose.....