  By the way half the links you showed are pointless, i can also show you links to japanese tanning booths (by the way my mom has a natural white skin like a northern european while my dad is a bit browner i came out inbetween), where the harujuku girls try to become as brown as bark. I wonder if people seriously will believe everything they will read on the internet, do you expect to come to japan and see japanese come to you and say Oh my i wish i was white! I worship you! No instead youll probably be greeted with gentle people but that for the most part dont want you in japan, and you might even see japanese nationalists driving by you yelling at foreigners. Many people in the west have a very misinformed view of japan that it is an anime, hentai land.   As I said before, I think that there is a dual superiority/inferiority complex going on in the modern Japanese psyche. Many Japanese that are more cognizant will freely admit this.    The We mentality that you speak of is more of a group thing than a nationalistic thing. In my observation (and those of others, some of them even pontified) Japanese separate other Japanese into two groups:   People you know and have some sort of relationship with   People that you don't know and treat more or less like poo    If you are in the same group (work, club, school, customer, etc.) then there is a reason to be civil and exercise good manners and restraint. Outside of this group you are essentially no more than an obstruction in the way and the manners and restraint seem to fly right out the window.    Funny how when you walk or drive about town, you would also see the police banners that read 暴力団に断る勇気 (Have the courage to say no to organized crime) posted on signs and pedestrian bridges, etc. There is a cozy relationship between the two actually, and the average Japanese is duped into believing that the police care about them (We) when they in reality do not.    I think that I can sum up Japanese We thinking using an old English proverb:    Me against my brother, me and my brother against the world    Don't get me wrong, the we can be a very positive force in society. No doubt about that. It can also be used to obfuscate and make you feel like you belong, when the powers that be really have no other intention for preaching this other then to keep the populace in line. Japan is historically not a we culture, and I would argue that it is currently very much a me culture hiding behind a thin facade of we mantra.