Is anyone else still slightly creeped out by the Japanese?

Quote:

---

Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN:

Quote:

---

Originally posted by AURaptor:

Quote:

---

Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN:
Anime? hello?

---

I never got anime. Never did appeal to me. Too over dramatic and simplistic, at the same time. Despite the cool visuals, it bores me.

---

Are you Japanese? Do you buy other Japanese stuff? Or are you more patriotic and buy only the Chinese stuff at Walmart?

---

I don't get anime. What's that have to do w/ anyone being Japanese ( Which I'm not ) or buying other stuff ?

I was speaking of the cartoonish sci-fi anime stuff only.

I like Chinese food, of course.

NOTIFY: N  | REPLY  | REPLY WITH QUOTE  | PERMALINK  | TOP  | HOME

One of the things I noticed about things Japanese when I started watching cartoons like Yu Gi Oh and Pokemon (with my son) was how competitive they are. All those cartoons involve strong levels of competing to win moulded into their storylines.

A great Japanese move.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089881/

Pretty much anything by Kurosawa.

Pre CGI. Kurosawa must have used 1000's of extras to make this film.

I don't mind a bit of anime, loved this film

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0347149/ Howl's Moving Castle.

NOTIFY: Y  | REPLY  | REPLY WITH QUOTE  | PERMALINK  | TOP  | HOME

Some atrocities still not acknowledged or no responsibility taken.

Armenian Genocide
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_Genocide

Indonesian 'Year of Living Dangerously'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_killings_of_1965%E2%80%

Ukranian Holdomor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor

The Algerian Harkis
http://thinkafricapress.com/algeria/review-harkis-wound-never-heals

NOTIFY: Y  | REPLY  | REPLY WITH QUOTE  | PERMALINK  | TOP  | HOME

"In the history of human rights, the ... are always committed by somebody else, never us"

http://www.chomsky.info/articles/20120606.htm

Quote:

---

On May 10, the Summer Olympics were inaugurated at the Greek birthplace of the ancient games. A few days before, virtually unnoticed, the government of Vietnam addressed a letter to the International Olympic Committee expressing the "profound concerns of the Government and people of Viet Nam about the decision of IOC to accept the Dow Chemical Company as a global partner sponsoring the Olympic Movement."

Dow provided the chemicals that Washington used from 1961 onward to destroy crops and forests in South Vietnam, drenching the country with Agent Orange.

These poisons contain dioxin, one of the most lethal carcinogens known, affecting millions of Vietnamese and many U.S. soldiers. To this day in Vietnam, aborted fetuses and deformed infants are very likely the effects of these crimes -- though, in light of Washington's refusal to investigate, we have only the studies of Vietnamese scientists and independent analysts.

Joining the Vietnamese appeal against Dow are the government of India, the Indian Olympic Association, and the survivors of the horrendous 1984 Bhopal gas leak, one of history's worst industrial disasters, which killed thousands and injured more than half a million.

Union Carbide, the corporation responsible for the disaster, was taken over by Dow, for whom the matter is of no slight concern. In February, Wikileaks revealed that Dow hired the U.S. private investigative agency Stratfor to monitor activists seeking compensation for the victims and prosecution of those responsible.

Another major crime with very serious persisting effects is the Marine assault on the Iraqi city of Fallujah in November 2004.

Women and children were permitted to escape if they could. After several weeks of bombing, the attack opened with a carefully planned war crime: Invasion of the Fallujah General Hospital, where patients and staff were ordered to the floor, their hands tied. Soon the bonds were loosened; the compound was secure.

The official justification was that the hospital was reporting civilian casualties, and therefore was considered a propaganda weapon.

Much of the city was left in "smoking ruins," the press reported while the Marines sought out insurgents in their "warrens." The invaders barred entry to the Red Crescent relief organization. Absent an official inquiry, the scale of the crimes is unknown.

If the Fallujah events are reminiscent of the events that took place in the Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica, now again in the news with the genocide trial of Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic, there's a good reason. An honest comparison would be instructive, but there's no fear of that: One is an atrocity, the other not, by definition.

As in Vietnam, independent investigators are reporting long-term effects of the Fallujah assault.

Medical researchers have found dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukemia, even higher than Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Uranium levels in hair and soil samples are far beyond comparable cases.

One of the rare investigators from the invading countries is Dr. Kypros Nicolaides, director of the fetal-medicine research center at London's King's College Hospital. "I'm sure the Americans used weapons that caused these deformities," Nicolaides says.

The lingering effects of a vastly greater nonatrocity were reported last month by U.S. law professor James Anaya, the U.N. rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples.

Anaya dared to tread on forbidden territory by investigating the shocking conditions among the remnants of the Native American population in the U.S. -- "poverty, poor health conditions, lack of attainment of formal education (and) social ills at rates that far exceed those of other segments of the American population," Anaya reported. No member of Congress was willing to meet him. Press cov

NOTIFY: Y  | REPLY  | REPLY WITH QUOTE  | PERMALINK  | TOP  | HOME

1KIKI

Monday, October 6, 2014 4:41 AM

One of the things I noticed about things Japanese when I started watching cartoons like Yu Gi Oh and Pokemon (with my son) was how competitive they are.

---

Is that for the male characters, or both sexes?

---

---

---

SAGAN: We are releasing vast quantities of carbon dioxide, increasing the greenhouse effect. It may not take much to destabilize the Earth's climate, to convert this heaven, our only home in the cosmos, into a kind of hell.

NOTIFY: N  | REPLY  | REPLY WITH QUOTE  | PERMALINK  | TOP  | HOME

Quote:

---

I could give you dozens of countries that have either not acknowledged atrocities or they have written their history in a way that justifies or minimizes atrocities, the US included.

---

Really? You think dozens of countries compare to Japan in this respect? Few countries even compare to Japan in terms of atrocities committed: murdering 200,000+ in the rape of Nanking; starving and brutalising and murdering tens of thousands of POWs; forcing 400,000 women into sadistic forced prostitution - http://www.vice.com/read/seventy-years-later-japan-is-still-denying-th
e-systematic-sexual-slavery-of-chinese-comfort-women

And then 70 years later, the average Japanese person not knowing anything about these incidents, in a democracy?? I don't see how you can say that's the norm. There's only one country I can think of that's as seriously in denial about its awful history, and that's Turkey - but they're still a young (and imperfect) democracy. You bring up the USA, so let's look at the USA. Americans took land off the Native Americans - but this is well known and discussed. Slavery - ditto (also they inherited that from us, the British). The firebombing and atomic bombing of Germany and Japan in WW2 is well known and often debated - very brutal and morally questionable by today's standards but both served legitimate military aims, and helped shorten the war. They are morally ambiguous - not like Japan's massacring and sexually torturing hundreds of thousands just for the pure sadistic joy of it. So in conclusion Japan's sins are black and white, and barely acknowledged, whereas America's sins are more grey (some of them), and they are openly discussed and debated. Not really much comparison there for me.

Quote:

---

Granted parts of it are difficult to understand and accept, but I find your attitude of defining something this complex 'creepy' kind of ignorant and immature.

---

Perhaps I would find these cultural attitudes quirky and quaint and amusing, if not for the line that my mind draws between them and some extremely horrific wartime activities, that the society hasn't even begun to process and accept accountability for. It could be I'm wrong and there is no connection between Japan's national psyche and its past atrocities. Let's hope so.

It's not personal. It's just war.

NOTIFY: Y  | REPLY  | REPLY WITH QUOTE  | PERMALINK  | TOP  | HOME

What creeps me out about the Japanese is how rapidly and easily Japanese victims of Fukushima Dai-ichi became non-persons to the rest of Japan. And the hostility they received and still receive when trying to move anywhere, or get medical care or compensation.

But then the same thing happened here to the victims of Katrina. Their role was to be made to disappear as quickly as possible, so the rest of the country could absolve itself of any inkling of mutuality, and continue unruffled. Only the widespread hostility at all levels seems to be missing.

The same thing happened to Maggie Thatcher's victims of 'efficient' industry.

And then there's the victims of war and expansion the US simply steamrolled over and forgot

When I think about it, we have our own share of non-persons who've been written off.

---

---

---

SAGAN: We are releasing vast quantities of carbon dioxide, increasing the greenhouse effect. It may not take much to destabilize the Earth's climate, to convert this heaven, our only home in the cosmos, into a kind of hell.

NOTIFY: N  | REPLY  | REPLY WITH QUOTE  | PERMALINK  | TOP  | HOME

Quote:

---

Originally posted by kpo:

Quote:

---

I could give you dozens of countries that have either not acknowledged atrocities or they have written their history in a way that justifies or minimizes atrocities, the US included.

---

Really? You think dozens of countries compare to Japan in this respect? Few countries even compare to Japan in terms of atrocities committed: murdering 200,000+ in the rape of Nanking; starving and brutalising and murdering tens of thousands of POWs; forcing 400,000 women into sadistic forced prostitution - http://www.vice.com/read/seventy-years-later-japan-is-still-denying-th
e-systematic-sexual-slavery-of-chinese-comfort-women

And then 70 years later, the average Japanese person not knowing anything about these incidents, in a democracy?? I don't see how you can say that's the norm. There's only one country I can think of that's as seriously in denial about its awful history, and that's Turkey - but they're still a young (and imperfect) democracy. You bring up the USA, so let's look at the USA. Americans took land off the Native Americans - but this is well known and discussed. Slavery - ditto (also they inherited that from us, the British). The firebombing and atomic bombing of Germany and Japan in WW2 is well known and often debated - very brutal and morally questionable by today's standards but both served legitimate military aims, and helped shorten the war. They are morally ambiguous - not like Japan's massacring and sexually torturing hundreds of thousands just for the pure sadistic joy of it. So in conclusion Japan's sins are black and white, and barely acknowledged, whereas America's sins are more grey (some of them), and they are openly discussed and debated. Not really much comparison there for me.

---

Did you check any of the links I provided?

I dont want to justify any of the atrocities, but it is by far and away the norm for countries to minimize their own actions in wars and conflict and to maximize their victim status. Yes, and even America does it. what seems grey to you as an american living on american soil probably does not seem grey to Native Americans, and to countless other cultures who see themselves as victims of American military action or support for tyranny.

I dont want to get into an American bashing thread, but I think your being completely myopic about your view of Japan.

Quote:

---

Perhaps I would find these cultural attitudes quirky and quaint and amusing, if not for the line that my mind draws between them and some extremely horrific wartime activities, that the society hasn't even begun to process and accept accountability for.

---

quirky? quaint? amusing?

Have you been brought up in a box? Is that what you think about other cultures that you dont find 'creepy'? If you found the culture of 4 billion humans benign instead of being subservient and creepy, that is how you would choose to think about it?

NOTIFY: Y  | REPLY  | REPLY WITH QUOTE  | PERMALINK  | TOP  | HOME