Unable to leave history in the past...

[SoulKiss]

Spinning this off from the Japan Earthquake/Tsunami thread so as not to de-rail it

Originally Posted by Ed

Am following this nuclear business with interest. It just gets worse and worse. After FIL's awful experiences at the hands of the Japanese at the end of WW2 I have tried to avoid Japanese stuff - yes I bought a SV and a Hornet - but this shows how silly all that is - they are people, cut them they bleed, just like us - and they need help.

What does that actually do or prove?

If a product has ANY chips in it made in Japan then you are buying Japanese, same as your TV or Microwave.

Is it only things MADE in Japan, or do you extend this to itms that are made from ideas and concepts developed in Japan, even if made in another country by a company in no way connected to Japan?

How about if you need life-saving surgery, but the technique was pioneered and developed by a Japanese doctor?

Originally Posted by specialone

Ed, I have thought similar things tbh, not my opinion but I bet a lot of people mistreated in ww2 by the japs see this as a bit of karma?

Its been 65 years since the end of the war, how many little old 85 year old Japanese men got their "just deserts" the other day?

How many of the dead were women and children who's only connection to the war is that their Great Grandfather died when Hiroshima happened?

Its holding on to stuff like this, things that didn't affect us directly, that fuels on-going ill-feelings and problems.

I have to say, I fully agree with SK here.

Someone the other day made a comment to me about Pearl Harbour and I laughed in their face. These people affected now but the earthquake and tsunami have nothing to do with Pearl Harbour, no more than you and I have anything to do with the Iraq war or whatever.

[timwilky]

My mother actively avoided Japanese product as she had a brother and two close family die in Burma.

What the Japs did to prisoners of war was inhumane and there is a generation of mainly elderly who remember their loved ones not coming home and the stories of those that did. You cannot blame them.

We live in a more enlightened world, but the atrocities did happen and many believe they were conveniently swept under the carpet and they were not prepared to forgive a nation so easily.

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by timwilky

My mother actively avoided Japanese product as she had a brother and two close family die in Burma.

What the Japs did to prisoners of war was inhumane and there is a generation of mainly elderly who remember their loved ones not coming home and the stories of those that did. You cannot blame them.

We live in a more enlightened world, but the atrocities did happen and many believe they were conveniently swept under the carpet.

No, I cannot blame them, and yes these things happened and must NEVER be forgotten.

I would even argue that its valid for you to have similar feelings and attitude.

Your kids however?

Forgive and Forget?

Well forgive anyway, lets not forget it so that the memory stops a repeat of these things.

Then David you might as well ask about events closer to home - the Battle of the Boyne, 12 July no??? - and a whole host of other events in Scottish and Irish history which are still commemorated today.

I'm with TW on this.

But the whole point of what I wrote was that these people are suffering - terribly - and having a rather blinkered approach doesn't help.

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by Ed

Then David you might as well ask about events closer to home - the Battle of the Boyne, 12 July no??? - and a whole host of other events in Scottish and Irish history which are still commemorated today.

I'm with TW on this.

But the whole point of what I wrote was that these people are suffering - terribly - and having a rather blinkered approach doesn't help.

I fully accept your point - you did after all say "but this shows how silly all that is".

MY point was how even after so much time has passed, no matter what the event was, then yes remember it, but don't perpetuate the hate.

The people who did the bad things, and indeed even the regimes under which they were commited have changed.

Oh and I had to look up that Boyne thing, everyone knows that the history is a sham and it was actually Davepreston that started it - and ended it

Seriously on that one tho, its a good example of how arguments about Invisible Friends can get out of hand.

Also that one has never really finished in some peoples eyes, with the conflict being ongoing.

wheres the dam popcorn giff when you need it


ps careful ed my boy lol

As I've owned a multitude of Japanese bikes, cars and other products it's never been a problem, but when I was a small child living in Singapore the legacy of the Japanese occupation was still there for all to see walking the streets with limbs missing and disfigured faces. I've seen first hand what the Japanese did to the local population 20 years after the war ended and read books like 'The Naked Island' and 'End of a Hate' by Russell Braddon to know what the occupying soldiers involved were capable of.

My father refused to buy a Japanese car or much in the way of electrical goods until 1996, 30 years after we'd gone to Singapore, because as an adult he'd obviously seen and heard about more atrocities than we as kids had. I'm guessing the older generation take more convincing that the current generation of Japanese aren't to blame for the sins of their fathers, and our generation are far more tolerant, forgiving of this sort of thing and more likely to build bridges between us and countries who have committed these type of acts.

Anyone who claims this is Japan getting divine retribution for WW2 is an idiot. If that's the case, when can Britain and America expect their natural disasters in payment for the atomic bomb and the effect it had on the mainly civilian population of Hiroshima, Nagasaki and the surrounding areas?

[21QUEST]

I very much agree with what SK has written.

Thing is, we must remember, there are not many(if any) nations that can claim to the righteous.

I am pretty sure there are some people from other countries/continents who could argue along such lines ith regards to atrocities they believe/deem/know to have been commited by another set of humans...one example could be 'The Great British Empire' .

War I'm sure has allways been brutal and brutal actions have been carried out by all parties that have been involved. We might argue and refer to "elightended times" but the "fundamentals" of war could be argued, as reverting back to "primal" .....

A few years back I went to Burma, while I was there I visited the Death Railway and a Museum set up to honour the Allied troops. The Museum was so poignant full of heartbreaking and horrific stories. The place was a reconstruction of the huts and conditions the troops were made to stay in and were tortured in.

I stayed there all day and the only race of tourists that didn't respect the solemnity of the place were the Japanese. I promise you they chattered and laughed and took photos all over the place like it was Disney World.

I also worked in Japan for a spell and I sensed no sense of national regret about WW2 there. So I sympathise totally what happened in Japan last week, but I do try and avoid Japanese products too, albeit an almost impossible task.