>>>Japan has yet to get over racism. There is racism against the bloodlines of Japanese whose ancestors did jobs involving blood (ie, butcher, leather), there is racism against the native people of Japan the ainu, and of course there is racism against the foreigners. Considering how they view racism as 'don't talk about it and it doesn't exist' vs. how the rest of the world views it...it doesn't take a huge leap of logic to realize that the way they would portray the subject in their games is very different than how the rest of the world would.
Not sure if I totally agree with you in regards to your assessment of the rest of the world. Too often Americans (assuming you are American) link any kind of discrimination to the word racism which is incorrect. The problem stems from the fact that Amerca is viewed as a melting pot with one supra-culture that everyone buys into. Culture is connected to skin color because of the diversity of people in the country.
The type of discrimination in Japan and most of the other parts of the world is ethnocentrism. This is true for France, England, Japan, China, India, even the Middle East (particularly Iran and the Gulf States).
Of course what most Americans lack in internal ethnocentrism is made up for with nationalistic ethnocentrism (the our secular human-rights democratic feministic race-less gender-less idealistic view of how the world should be run mentality).
Just my 2 cents.
And I agree with your second point. The video games we play and the way we are presented ideas is in a manner the developer deems appropriate. The result of which, can influence how we interact with one another. I could get started on the movie "Hero" but I'll spare you the diatribe...
