Yeah it's such a major problem over here that no one I've aksed even knows or cares about it. And none of the news programs have seen fit to mention it. So it can't be that big a deal when they can spare a 2 minute section of news to speak about a seal.

That's good, there's no real point in bringing up the whole burakumin thing, it's ridiculous.

my wife's half japanese and speaks it fluently, they do mix up the l and the r, but they cannot say a pure r sound, its impossible (trust me i've tried with her relatives). Usually the sound is closer to an L than an R, and they keep telling me its the same sound each time even though it slightly changes from word to word... the Korean's do the engrish thing, japanese would be more like englishu... they can't end words without vowels, its awesome.
Anyway, as to the maps, from what I read earlier there are people who are still discriminated against according to who their ancestors were like 4 generations ago and can't get some of the better jobs, I think the point of the outrage over the maps was that people could use those maps to check someone's address and check if they live in a predominantly lowest class area and then discriminate against them, not necessarily that its racist exactly to show them. weird cultural thing.

The pronunciation of R & L depends quite often on how much manly you feel...if you're like JPop star, it would be much closer to L, while if you're yakuza-like, it can be very strong R....mine is completely R muhahahaha....
The term eta is a bit out of interest right now...what I found horrible, that most of Japanese still separate places called buraku, which were officially liberated in 1871. When Google is pointing out Tokyo as eta place, it is in fact nice irony, because I'm quite sure, that most of people in Tokyo would tell you, where the buraku places are...and that's racism...