Japanese lack of contrition

[cckerberos]

@col_10022

So I recognize that there have been things that you might point to and call an apology. Can you cite to a relatively unqualified apology for comfort women?

From the cite I already posted:

“The problem of the so-called wartime comfort women is one such scar, which, with the involvement of the Japanese military forces of the time, seriously stained the honor and dignity of many women. This is entirely inexcusable. I offer my profound apology to all those who, as wartime comfort women, suffered emotional and physical wounds that can never be closed”

Prime Minister Murayama

[tomndebb]

@DragonAsh

On days five or so they will ‘regrettably find some irregularities by some rouge employees’

It’s always the damned commies behind it.

[Zoe]

I’m no longer quite so hung up on the war crimes of other countries. I’m ashamed that I even pay my Federal taxes anymore.

[LonesomePolecat]

@Zoe

I’m no longer quite so hung up on the war crimes of other countries. I’m ashamed that I even pay my Federal taxes anymore.

I’m not much interested in the so-called war crimes of my own country. They almost always turn out to be greatly exaggerated, entirely fictional or taken badly out of context, and then used as an excuse to bash my nation and my people.

[Whack-a-Mole]

@LonesomePolecat

I’m not much interested in the so-called war crimes of my own country. They almost always turn out to be greatly exaggerated, entirely fictional or taken badly out of context, and then used as an excuse to bash my nation and my people.

Well, in any armed conflict there are likely to be atrocities committed. That does not excuse them but given the circumstances they are hardly surprising. What does bug me is officially sanctioned atrocities. Atrocities such as Bush fighting against an explicit prohibition against torture…nevermind the Geneva Convention, abundant evidence that it is useless as a means to extract useful information and just plain common decency.

[spifflog]

@Askance

Indeed, in retrospect this is one of the biggest arguments that A-bombing Japan was overall a bad idea - it gave them a reason to adopt victimhood and help them avoid facing the fact that the Pacific war was entirely of their nation’s making. So it contributed to the ability to rationalise their state of denial to this day. Note I am NOT saying this was knowable by the Allies at the time.

So the allies should not have dropped the A-bomb so that at some point in the distant future the enemy might realize that they were to blame for starting the war? How does this balance with the projected 500,000 allied causalities and millions of Japanese that would have died in the war? Have you read about the battle of Okinawa? That battle was complete and total hell. And the Japanese treat Okinawians like (the Japanese version) of red headed step children. The invasion of Japan would have been a blood bath.

[Askance]

@spifflog

Originally Posted by Askance
Indeed, in retrospect this is one of the biggest arguments that A-bombing Japan was overall a bad idea - it gave them a reason to adopt victimhood and help them avoid facing the fact that the Pacific war was entirely of their nation’s making. So it contributed to the ability to rationalise their state of denial to this day. Note I am NOT saying this was knowable by the Allies at the time

So the allies should not have dropped the A-bomb so that at some point in the distant future the enemy might realize that they were to blame for starting the war?

What part of “I am NOT saying this was knowable by the Allies at the time” did you not understand?

[spifflog]

@Askance

What part of “I am NOT saying this was knowable by the Allies at the time” did you not understand?

Thanks much for the English comprehension lesson. I infer, perhaps incorrectly, from your response that if U.S. leadership had your infinite wisdom concerning international relations, global war fighting strategy and world culture, they would have acted differently and sacrificed half a million causalities so that 50 years after the war they could teach their old enemies a lesson in contrition. I feel this supposition is in error. How we do’n now?

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Sweet Mercury

I am aware that it can and that such an event has happened. It still begs the questions: who is doing the apologizing, and to whom are they apologizing? If everyone involved is dead, then we are basically talking about a polittically correct PR stunt. It’s stupid and somewhat insulting.

The reason I brought all this up is because there are still a few old comfort women who are floating around. They seem to care deeply whether or not everyone (including the Japanese) acknowledge that they were not willing whores but the victims of war. They aren’t asking for money, they just want to die knowing that noone is calling them a whore.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@DragonAsh

And, as has been noted already, Japan has already apologized numerous, numerous times.

Please cite. Not because I don’t believe you but because I would like to be able to tell these people “they already apologized, what more do you want”

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Grossbottom

Main Entry: un·rea·son·able
Pronunciation: -'rEz-n&-b&l, -'rE-z&n-&-b&l
Function: adjective
1 a : not governed by or acting according to reason

You haven’t given a reason, you just keep trying to shock people like with that uterus thing right there. So, what’s your reason for trying to make millions of people feel sorry for stuff they didn’t do?

I was giving examples of the sort of things that happened. Sometimes the truth is shocking. Girls (by that I mean 14 year olds and younger) were kidnapped and put into brothels and serially raped (I don’t know about you but if you are forced to have sex it is rape even if you are in a military brothel, especially if you are forced to be in that military brothel) the fact of the matter is that several of the comfort women say that they were kept in these brothels until their uteruses fell out from disease, when this happened, they weren’t shipped back home, they were basically dropped off in the nearest village or city. Of course not everyone’s uterus fell out, some of them made it through just fine but almost all of them ended up with some sort of venereal disease and were beaten by drunken soldiers.

So let me rephrase and say that they were kidnapped (often as children, assuming you think a 14 year old girl is a child) and serially raped (assuming you consider nonconsensual sex rape even if the Japanese government has labelled these girls prostitutes) until they were so diseased that they could no longer be used at military brothels and some became so diseased that their uteruses fell out.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@furt

The OP, as I understand it, is wondering why the Japanese people* as a group * do not feel contrition for their national sins. In both cases, individual persons’ feelings are beside the point.

Actually no. Most Japanese people I have met are either very sorry or they have no idea what I’m talking about but are apologetic when I explain it to them. I don’t know if this is all an act but at least they, on an individual basis, are apologetic (They are also generally younger and my impression is that the reaction may be different from the older generations). The problem is that the government has (to my knowledge) never issued an unqualified apolgy to the comfort women.

[Captain_Amazing]

@col_10022

Please cite. Not because I don’t believe you but because I would like to be able to tell these people “they already apologized, what more do you want”

cckeberos both linked to and then posted Prime Minister Murayama’s apology to the "comfort women.

The problem of the so-called wartime comfort women is one such scar, which, with the involvement of the Japanese military forces of the time, seriously stained the honor and dignity of many women. This is entirely inexcusable. I offer my profound apology to all those who, as wartime comfort women, suffered emotional and physical wounds that can never be closed.

In addition, btw, Prime Minister Miyazawa had already apologized in a visit to Korea in 1992.

“Recently the issue of the so-called ‘wartime comfort women’ is being brought up. I think that incidents like this are seriously heartbreaking, and I am truly sorry”

And then, also in 1992, Chief Cabinet Secretary Kato said:

The Government again would like to express its sincere apology and remorse to all those who have suffered indescribable hardship as so-called ‘wartime comfort women,’ irrespective of their nationality or place of birth. With profound remorse and determination that such a mistake must never be repeated, Japan will maintain its stance as a pacifist nation and will endeavor to build up new future-oriented relations with the Republic of Korea and with other countries and regions in Asia.

And in 1993, Chief Cabinet Secretary Kono:

Undeniably, this was an act, with the involvement of the military authorities of the day, that severely injured the honor and dignity of many women. The Government of Japan would like to take this opportunity once again to extend its sincere apologies and remorse to all those, irrespective of place of origin, who suffered immeasurable pain and incurable physical and psychological wounds as comfort women.

Then, in 1997, Prime Minister Hashimoto in a summit meeting in Korea:

“Nothing injured the honor and dignity of women more than [the comfort woman program] and I would like to extend words of deep remorse and the heartfelt apology”

Then, in 1998, in a letter to the Prime Minister of the Netherlands, he said:

The Government of Japan, painfully aware of its moral responsibility concerning the issue of so called “wartime comfort women,” has been sincerely addressing this issue in close cooperation with the Asian Women’s Fund which implements the projects to express the national atonement on this issue. Recognizing that the issue of comfort women, with an involvement of the Japanese military authorities at that time, was a grave affront to the honor and dignity of large numbers of women, I would like to convey to Your Excellency my most sincere apologies and remorse to all the women who underwent immeasurable and painful experiences and suffered incurable physical and psychological wounds as comfort women

And, in a 2001 letter addressed to all the former comfort women, Prime Minister Koizumi wrote:

As Prime Minister of Japan, I thus extend anew my most sincere apologies and remorse to all the women who underwent immeasurable and painful experiences and suffered incurable physical and psychological wounds as comfort women. We must not evade the weight of the past, nor should we evade our responsibilities for the future. I believe that our country, painfully aware of its moral responsibilities, with feelings of apology and remorse, should face up squarely to its past history and accurately convey it to future generations.

[Captain_Amazing]

The Japanese government has also established the Asian Women’s Fund, which has paid compensation to surviving comfort women, serves as an education resource on the comfort women issue, and is working today to improve the rights of women, and fight against domestic abuse and violence, in Japan, Asia, and around the world

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@cckerberos

From the cite I already posted:

“The problem of the so-called wartime comfort women is one such scar, which, with the involvement of the Japanese military forces of the time, seriously stained the honor and dignity of many women. This is entirely inexcusable. I offer my profound apology to all those who, as wartime comfort women, suffered emotional and physical wounds that can never be closed”

Prime Minister Murayama

OK I drop my point. These look like real apologies to me unless the guy was smirking while he said it, I am not sure what else they could ask for. The comfort women have already said they do not want money only an apology and frankly these seem to fit the bill. I guess I’ll have something to say the next time someone brings this up.

[slaphead]

I wonder how much of this comes down to the ethnic and cultural divide between Japan and China/Korea being much larger than that between Germany and the rest of the western world?
I sometimes get the feeling that the Nazis have a certain dark fascination for us westerners as being a distorted reflection of ourselves, whereas many Asians see Japan as an island full of monsters from which they can expect nothing but woe.

[Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor]

@slaphead

I sometimes get the feeling that the Nazis have a certain dark fascination for us westerners as being a distorted reflection of ourselves, whereas many Asians see Japan as an island full of monsters from which they can expect nothing but woe.

If anything, the US & Japan view thenselves as mirror opposites.

[yanaginoki]

[they refuse to apologize for forcing young women into prostitution to service their soldiers; their textbooks still don’t mention the rape of Nanking or any of the atrocities they committed during the war]

This is no true.
I grew up in Japanese education system.
I leaned from “the text books” about the Nanking.
And, most Japanese people are aware of the atrocities.

[Lust4Life]

The "innocent"civilians of Hiroshima and Nagasaki may not have carried out the attacks on Pearl Harbour,Hong Kong,Nanking and the rest but they sure as heck did everything in their power to give their family members and friends in the forces positive encouragement to carry out the deeds either by praise or by using shame ,or duty as a spur.While you can never make a sweeping statement about 100% of even small populations it is a socio dynamic that there was NO noticeable restistance at all to the war either nationally or locally ,and only a minute amount of opposition to the government !and that by professional politicians . If you encourage others to murder and torture then you are just as guilty as though you carried out the deeds yourself ;and personally I wouldn`t shed too many tears for those who not only did nothing whatsoever to resist the war movement but actively encouraged it ; and subsequently died as a result of the very war they promoted .An old family friend who was part of the post war occupation forces said that he never once came across any individual Japanese of either sex who showed any remorse for their actions during the war (let alone pass these sentiments onto their children),the only thing that they regretted was losing the war.