There talking dogs and cats and there's dinosaurs and the anime is Japanese but the main characters like goku , Bulma ,gohan vegeta , look white or Caucasian . Yajorobi and chiatzo(however you spell it ) look more Japanese .
Nothing about this guy looks white, his skin tone has a undertone of yellow/beige, caucasians have a pink undertone. We already know that Toriyama meant Goku to be Asian, so based on that alone he should be Asian. But if we must analyze his appearance, then ok.
Black hair - most commonly associated with Asians
Straight thin hairs - most commonly associated with Asians
Puffy lower eyelid - most commonly associated with Asians
Thick eyebrows that tapper towards the center of the face - most commonly associated with Japanese
Angular or "V" shaped jaw line - most commonly associated with Japanese and Koren's
High cheekbones that protrude forward - most commonly associated with Japanese
Smaller lips - most commonly associated with Japanese
Light skin shade with a undertone of yellow/beige - most commonly associated with Japanese
Black/very dark brown eyes - most commonly associated with Asians
Ears...do I really have to say? Let's just consider how much our western comics emphasize ears, then compare that to DBZ.
If anything Toriyama caricaturized features that a majority of people associate with Asians and Japanese specifically. Anyone who studies facial anatomy would see these things easy.
This is what made the SSj transformation so odd looking, their skin changes white (with a pink undertone) and their hair changes color and texture, effectively turning them into white Asians.
To understand this, you must understand the social significance of skin color in Asian countries (not different races, but different tones of the same race)
People who had to farm for a living became tan from all that sun time, while the wealthy got shade (no tan). This began the association of light skin signifying 'superior' as rulers started coloring their faces white (this is why Frieza is all white, he's emulating those feudal lords)
A transformation into SSj wouldn't hold any
visual significance if Goku already looked white (since Japan holds white skin in such high esteem, their fiction would reflect that).
