Eh, what do you expect. Us NAs don't really make ourselves come across as friendly and nice people. There are plenty of NA players who give a bad name to us as a whole, players who make fun of the japanese language, players who check japanese at will, players who aren't careful of what they say around the japanese, so on, so on, but don't let that list deter you. I can vouch that that list doesn't apply to a large majority of the japanese. Though there is a all japan blacklist, it really isn't as effective as you think. I'm an NA player, I started with NA PC release, and about 1/4 of my 130 some registered FFXI friends are Japanese. Japanese people are all about respect, and their concept of casual respect is a lot different from ours. They are a very shy, very proud group of people. When we check them, it's embarrassing to them, because they feel like they're having their privacy invaded (I would know, my Japanese friends have told me that's how they feel). Also, they don't like to party with NAs usually because they're embarrassed about their inability to speak english well. They'd rather avoid partying all together because of embarrassment about poor english, than to give it a try.
That list, like any forums, is basically just a flames forum for all the people to ***** about someone else, in particular the non-japanese community. When you see JP Only, that really doesn't mean JP Only at all, many times, if you're polite, you will get a positive response from them. Just, be careful about them though, remember, many of them have very poor english, and if they see a spare JP and some words they don't understand, it's easy to assume that they're being categorized as just "JPs" and not as players themselves, which will lead to them feeling insulted. It's the same for us, if we see the phrase "NA" in a party of all foreigners, and then see a string of words before or after, many would be under the assumption it's something bad being said about them, and become very uncomfortable until someone explains to them what is going on. If anything, every JP I have been polite, courteous, and respectful to has shown me the same. Even if they decline a party invite, they at least put in the effort to be polite about it and give a reason. I hang out with and talk to a few very prominent japanese players, if the list were to BList japanese players that associate with NA players, then many of the very prominent japanese players should be on that list --> Masterasia, Badieh, Aeqking, Keitia, Caile so on and so on. If they were blacklisted because of association with NAs, then why are they doing so damn well in their HNM LSs that willingly give them many of the best items? It's because the list really doesn't apply to anyone but those who take a flame forum seriously. If anything, the people that listen to the list are the people you wouldn't want to party with anyways, they'd play their job by how they were told rather than trying to find out what works best most likely, since those listening to the list are like sheep.
As for BLing between HNM LSs, what do you expect, this is the most competitive part of the game, 5+ HNM LSs sitting around camping for the same mob, only one gets to walk away with it, of course there will be bitter feelings from the other LSs who did not get the pull.
Edited, Fri Dec 10 13:16:10 2004 by shortyellowbus