> They always respond to applications.

That's not true. YC startup Tailor, the first (and only?) Japan startup that YC funded, left me on read on LinkedIn. They ignored my application without a response, too. Pretty confident this company discriminates against non-Japanese.

To be fair, the whole American tech culture of inclusitivity is not really a thing in Japan or most Asian countries. My freind works as a designer at a bank's tech arm, and told me wild stories of coworkers parading their sex videos around the office. Her boss straight up told her she was hired because she pretty, and that he was proud of forming a team of models (both male and female). I talked to other people who worked in East Asia, and they found these stories to be unsurprising.