Not even close. He opened the door and was suprised when people walked through.
To get back to China-Japan …
First blush thoughts from someone who gets his news from my Yahoo headlines and NPR were that anti-Japanese sentiment is longstanding with this flare probably more genuine than not, although allowed to occur for particular reasons perhaps different than why protesters came. That Japan should apologize first and has some chutzpah asking for one from China.
So far I haven’t read anything here or linked that makes me change that assessment.
Japan has never acknowledged the atrocities of their past, let alone offered an apology. Now they want to move towards further denying they occurred. Brush that on top of generations of distrust and animosity and you get some back hairs to bristle.
For the government add in Japan making noises that they want to act like the regional powerhouse that China fashoins itself to be (permanant seat on security council; noises over Taiwan) and you get some percieved major dissing going on. (And the fact that the Communist Party has itself been revionist in the past is irrelevant to these points.)
And what is Japan pissed about? A protest that was less violent than a Bulls championship victory celebration? (Back when they actually had them!) No one actually hurt, some property damage and some yelling.
I gotta say as governments go the Japanese are looking the petty ones.
This is no longer true. There have been numerous apologies and statements of remorse on the part of the Japanese (Wikipedia has a list here). Here are two of the more recent ones:
The Chinese are obsessed with the idea that they are superior to everyone in everything. I’m not sure why. Americans (as do many others) have a sort of casual arrogance, but Chinese, from what I’ve heard, are positively terrified by the fact that nobody in the modern world gives a flip for their culture or poltiical leadership, outside of North Korea, except as enemies. But I’m not an expert in Chineses psychology; that’s the opinion of several commentors I’ve heard, and from older Chinese sources.
The link I set also had a very good point: the riots were declared verboten but not actually restricted, which makes it sound as thought the leadership isn’t pushing to reign it in. Whether this means that the Chinese are actually doing it on their own and the leaders just want to make it appear as if they’re in control, I don’t know.
I do have a hard time imagining it could happen without their [the leader’s] say-so. 20 years ago, the Chinese were extremely tightly controlled. It’s so much better now, especially in a place like Shanghai, but I don’t see the Chinese loosening up that much.
Thank you for the references, my ignorance is reduced. Nevertheless I suspect that the average Chinese has also been unaware of this list or unimpressed by it. And I still do not understand wh this fairly minor public protest warrants so much Japanese discomforture.
Can someone tell me why Japan thinks they are deserving of a permanent seat on the Security Council?
Because they’re rich and influential. In general, I’d argue that France probably shouldn’t have one anymore, regardless of the fact I dislike them. Russia possibly shouldn’t either, and India and Brazil possibly should.
They are a fairly large country and an exceedingly large economy. They make large contributions to the UN as well. Thus, they feel that they are deserving of such access. (I will note that most proposals that include Japan also include India and Brazil).
While I am currently living in Japan, and thus have sseen the protests covered on the news day in and day out (decontextualized), I have not yet formed an opinion on Japan’s diplomatic maturity. It seems as though a fairly small group of ultra-nationalists are having dramatically disproportinate effects on national policy, something that will certainly have to stop.
I don’t know if you could call it minor. In Seoul people have been cutting their fingers off to protest (link) and in China people have been burning flags and vandalizing Japanese owned businesses. I imagine this would disturb the Japanese quite a bit.
As for the formal apologies, it’s not so much the words as Japan’s attitude: honoring war criminals, refusing to offer any kind of recompense to former comfort women, etc. Until Japan actually starts acting sorry, I doubt China (or Korea) will be appeased by any apologies, formal or otherwise.
This is not the first time the issue has come up, which is probably one of the reasons why the Chinese, government or otherwise, might feel a little ticked off about it. The book in question was first approved for use in schools by the ministry of education in 2001, and one of the reasons it was not adopted by most schools, despite its being on the list as meeting standards that the Japanese government deemed acceptable for teaching, was the rather large reaction from Japanese teachers as well as protests in Korea and China, among other places. It’s also not the first time someone has called the Japanese government on their crap. A Japanese historian, Professor Ienaga has been fighting the government on censorship of history texts since 1965. This link also has an overview of the controversy and Ienaga’s legal battles.
When The Rape of Nanking was published, several books of various levels of credibility were written with a revisionist bent as a reaction to it. Some small details were found to be a bit off, but on the whole, Chang’s book held up pretty well to the intense scrutiny and negative pressure brought against it. She had, at one point, reached an agreement with a Japanese publisher to get her book published in Japanese in Japan, but had to withdraw permission due to the extensive changes the publisher requested to be allowed to make. In effect, her entire work would have been gutted by the publisher. Her book will probably never be published in Japan, though several of her detractors’ have been.
The court cases regarding reparations and an apology for ianfu or “comfort women” were dragged out for decades, probably in the hopes that most of the women would die before Japan had to get around to deciding what to do. Most of them did, in fact, die of old age. Most of them had had to live with health complications related to sexual diseases or injuries resulting from their time as forced prostitutes in the program sponsored by the Japanese government. As recently as 2001, the justice ministry had kept ruling in favor of the Japanese government. Government officials have publicly denied that the story these women were telling was true. Here is a good overview of this issue, with sources.
The main difference between Germany and Japan is that the German government has not only apologized and paid reparations, they’ve acknowledged their past and have tried to make sure it won’t happen again. German schools are required by law to teach about the horrors Germany perpetrated in WWII. In contrast, Japan’s education ministry gives tacit approval and lends credibility to the views of right-wing revisionist “historians” while another branch of the government drags its feet on making any kind of reparation to anyone Japan harmed during the “War of Asian Liberation” as it used to be known.
like to see a cite. japanese style restaurants have been vandalized, but in my experience the vast majority are chinese owned, chinese operated, the suppliers are chinese. btw, i personally know and frequent about 10 of these places.
iris chan’s rape of nanking was sensationist and her academic due diligence was somewhat lax. the rape of nanking did occur and was a horrific tragedy, but some people especially japanese right wing militants discount the entire event based on sensationalist exaggeration. ain’t saying that’s right, but i would argue that the rape of nanking needs no exaggeration and she lost credibility because of it. [well worth visiting the memorial in nanjing where one can personally see a partially excavated mass grave at the museum.]
Any chance of a revision to the Japanese textbook as requested, but on the condition that future Chinese texbooks tell of the brutal massacre of peaceful pro-democracy protestors in June 1989?
Sorry, I just re-checked the article and you are right:
Cite
From the BBC article:
I skimmed through it the first time and somehow missed the "even though many are Chinese-owend part. My point was that it’s not a “minor” protest - I’m sorry for the misinformation, but I don’t think it disproves what I was trying to say.
Re the thread title: Who are these “Dang Chinese”? Was there in some historical period a Dang Dynasty?* 
- Cartoon I saw once in some magazine, might have been National Lampoon, might have been The New Yorker: Two Chinese gentlemen, in traditional Confucian dress, are sitting on a bench, with the Great Wall looming in the background. One says to the other: “You know what would really be funny? A Wang Dynasty! Now that would really be funny!”
Agreed! It would be good strategy and just plain right, as you say. 75% of the Japanese populace would think it’s a good idea. But the right-wingers in the government will never let it happen.
I think some opposition from teachers could also be expected, unless the unit was in some way incorporated into entrance examinations.
Okay, now the Chinese are coming off petty and the Japanese mature.