Teaching Japanese Children Not to Love the Bomb

[N35t0r]

Originally posted by JohnT
"(it did not start with japan bombing pearl harbor...)"

For America, it did. Are European kids taught that WW2 didn't end until September, 1945 or do y'all think the war ended in late May?

America entered the war then, but the war was (oficially) started with Hitler's invasion of Poland.

I know the war didn't end in may... i also know that ground offensives didn't end in may either.... And i'm not European...

[Dinner]

Actually, I'd say the real fighting started before Poland with the Japanese invation of Manchura and the Italian invasion of Ethiopia. It continued through the Japanese invasion of China and the Spanish Civil war where all the major powers had proxi forces.

Poland was just the next domino to fall.

[N35t0r]

besides, it is much more justifiable (sp?) to claim the latter than the former... you are talking of 2 years and the occupation of France, the low countries, the balkans, poland.... vs. a few months and some bombs...

besides, i'd say that there aren't many europeans who forget the end of the war in the pacific... with the two bombs and all....



Going back to this thread's original topic, it is expected that Japanese boys will start to care less about the bomb as time goes by.... the same happens here with the military dictatorship, and probably the same will happen in the us with the sept. 11 attacks.... It's a great thing, collective memory, and its impressive capacity to forget certain things...

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by JohnT
Not as disturbing as this quote by the teacher:

"In my day we had trouble just surviving every day, whereas these days everyone in Japan is comfortable," Ms. Iwamoto added. "Children learn about war through manga [comic books] and think it is kind of cool. They have no particular sensation of Japan's defeat."

Why is it that people think it is ennobling to suffer?

It's not ennobling to suffer. It is useful to understand why that suffering occurred, particularly for a society with much of it's history based on an ethnocentric, stratified, elitist warrior culture where everyone knew their place and where questioning authority is still largely an alien concept.

[N35t0r]

Oerdin, that's why i put 'officially'

going that way, you could go back to the origin of mankind.... History is all Cause->Effect (or mostly)... Big artificial separators are needed for the sake of simplicity....

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by DanS
Personally, this doesn't disturb me. Is there a museum for the firebombing of Tokyo, and is it given more emphasis in schools than Hiroshima/Nagasaki, as it should be?

There were more fatalities (short term), but no long term effects, and fires in old Japanese cities, earthquakes, etc., were nasty affairs.

It wasn't that interesting, though, because nobody nowadays has the ability to send 3,000 bombers and escort aircraft to set 50,000 little fires and run amok. Mass killing nowadays is much more likely to be done by nuke.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by JohnT
"(it did not start with japan bombing pearl harbor...)"

For America, it did. Are European kids taught that WW2 didn't end until September, 1945 or do y'all think the war ended in late May?

From the Japanese perspective at the time, the casus belli started with Perry's black ships in 1854, and the cholera epidemic of 1882. The Great White Fleet guaranteed the US would be one of the prime targets.

[DanS]

Mass killing nowadays is much more likely to be done by nuke.

Point well taken.

the casus belli started with Perry's black ships in 1854

It's interesting that Japan actually thought this was as big of an event as US history books make it out. A couple of days ago, I read Perry's notes to the Japanese while he was in Tokyo's harbor. Really fun reading!

[MichaeltheGreat]

It's pretty culture shocking for a xenophobic warrior culture to suddenly realize you're at the mercy of foreigners who are technologically nearly three centuries more advanced than you.

It also had an impact in that the initial landing by Spaniards in 1543 was supposed to be another conquistador conquest, with some 800 conquistadores. Too bad for them, or lucky for them, depending on perspective, that they landed in Satsuma-han, where the Shimazu were based. The mounted archer contingent of the Shimazu' samurai was 12-15 thousand by itself, and Shimazu had more men under arms than the King of Spain, yet wasn't more than a regional power. That cured the Spanish of designs for outright conquest, but the Japanese were very aware up to the time of Sekigahara that Christian foreigners were trying to use internal subversion to conquer by proxy.

That really added to the shock factor of Perry's ships, and the cholera epidemics in 1858, 1877 and 1882 (all traceable to western foreigners, the 1882 epidemic being caused when a known sick crewman was forcibly landed) reinforced the sense of helplessness and national humiliation that gave rise to the renewed militarism of the Meiji era.

[Lord Merciless]

Japanese also had firearms against the Spaniards.

[St Leo]

Japanese also had metals against the Spaniards.

[Lazerus]

"The only thing we learn from history is that we never learn from history."

don't know who said it but it's a decent quote that i like.

[Q Classic]

it happened in korea, china, and japan.

all three nations had the same materials for the same technology that the west had... they just didn't have some of the more recent developments, i.e., industrial revolution/mass production.

so naturally, the white man had better goods... and forced himself upon the exotic east orient. (oh, one could go on for pages about the sexual symbolism of that, as evidenced by miss saigon, madame butterfly, et al.)

that's what drove japan to industrialize. it pushed korea to industrialize, but it was behind japan... making it ripe for annexation, unfortunately. china, well... china...

it's too bad that japan's children don't know too much about their history. the less savory part, anyway. then again, i suppose it's a tendency of most nations to do that.

[Zero]

Originally posted by Azazel

I think the notion that suffering makes one better is very popular: why else are men who go into battle seen as "heroes", besides the point that we think becuase they risked danger, death and suffering somehow makes them more "worthy" than those that stay home?

Not only because of the self-sacrifice, but self-sacrifice done for a good cause. Otherwise, the 9/11 bomber would be seen by everyone as heroes.

by some people they are

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Lord Merciless
Japanese also had firearms against the Spaniards.

No, the Spaniards and Portuguese sold firearms to the Japanese later on. Since the Japanese longbow was more accurate and had longer range, and a much better rate of fire (but required a much higher skill level), firearms didn't catch on in a big way until Oda Nobunaga used them en masse (3,500) at the battle of Nagashino in 1576, 33 years after the Spanish langing in Satsuma.

The mass formation employment of matchlock muskets shredded attacking Takeda forces, and demonstrated that firearms could be employed in a way to get adequate volume of fire.