[tanjtanjtanj]

I mean there are widely spoken regional dialects that make no pitch distinction between the pronounciation of 橋 and 箸. You may get looked down on for not speaking the Queen's English (I mean standard Tokyo Japanese) but you are still speaking fully correct Japanese.

[throwaway2037]

This is exactly why I say it is nothing but cultural/linguistic gatekeeping. Even natives between regions disagree on the "correct" way to pronouce these terms. This further proves to me how little Japanese varies throughout the country. It is freakishly regular for the size of Japan.

Consider a place like UK with four constituent countries: England, Wales, Scotland, and North Ireland (not to mention the channel islands and other oddities). They range of accents (without huge mountain ranges!) is wildly different. And the change in vocabulary for vernacular speech is far larger than the United States, which Google AI tells me is 40x larger(!).