Anti-Japanese "Protests"

[burlives]

For the last three weeks every weekend there's been organised rallies to complain about the Japanese and history. Text books and their glossing over of WWII history is one focus.

In WWII China equalled Russia for sheer number of civilian deaths. Nanjing itself was big and horrible. China has a right.

But here's a thing I saw made mention of. After WWII historians in France and Germany got together in a commision to establish a common history. It appears in their text books. Apparently the history described is on a par with that described in American books. Other things happened too, apparently. Things like German civil servants going to work in France. There's probably some dirty pool in there, but on the face of it, that stuff was the basis for Germany's reconciliation with its neighbours, such as it is.

With what little I know of China and Japan, I don't see either peoples being liberal enough to allow such exchanges to happen. They are losing their right to be angry.

I only worked that out the other day. I'd been wondering why I didn't just let Chinese be Nanjing crazy. Seems harsh, though.

[Nate M]

While the textbooks in question are awful, I don't think they account for this:

instapundit.com/archives/022480.php


...given the fact that they are only in use in 18 schools in the entire of Japan.

story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050414/ap_on_re_as/japan_tempest_in_a_text

TOKYO - A nationalist textbook newly approved by the Tokyo government is driving the deepest wedge in Japan-China relations in decades, but few of the country's students have ever read it.

Though given away for free, the book titled "New History Textbook" is used by only 18 of 11,102 junior high schools in Japan, reflecting many teachers' concerns over its content. It has been denounced by the leading teachers' union, and is well to the right wing of mainstream public opinion.

[Raoul Duke]

Yeah, but a good protest is a heck of a lot more fun than watching CCTV or squatting in the dirt in front of the train station.

I'm continually surprised by the depth and virulence of hatred for the Japanese here. Taxi drivers will smile and tell me they like Americans...and then rail for 10 minutes about how much they hate the Japanese. Perfectly nice young people- even kids- turn ugly when the subject comes up. I generally point out that these things happened many years ago and have little to do with most Japanese of today, and this normally elicits the kind of smile one puts on when indulging the fallacies of a small child.

I sometimes suspect the real culprit here has much more to do with jealousy at differences in wealth and living standards, and some extremely arrogant behavior on the part of some visiting Japanese, and China's deeply-rooted national inferiority complex, than it does with anything that happened 60 or more years ago.

[Lotus Eater]

Got into this topic at 2:00pm last night with my Japanese colleague, and the Japanese student here studying Chinese - after a party for Japanese department students at the Japanese colleagues unit. Their view was only based on the history book information, and they had no idea that there were political implications, economic power struggles or UN connections etc. At that time they decided they would go to the demonstration here in Xi'an, given that they are ALWAYS mistaken as Chinese! I thought I would go with them as well - protection or interest I'm not sure which!

But as it started at 10:00am, and we didn't go to bed until nearly 6:00am, I don't think any of us were awake

[Lotus Eater]

PS - previous university I was at took the foreign teachers on a trip for the sports day holidays (I don't get these ). At one of the restuarants on the journey the FAO rep travelling with them told the restuarant owner that the 3-4 Japanese teachers with them were Korean!

[Mr Nobody]

I think there is real substance to the Chinese hatred of Japanese, and i think they are even entitled to it to a degree, based on long term hostilities. I also try to point out periodically that the majority of those who did these crimes are dead, and the living have no guilt. It doesn't seem to sit very well with anyone i have tried that on, even though often they agree. (they agree, BUT . . . .)

Several of my HK friends are still resentful over the japanese ww 2 occupation of HK which made them miss out on several years of schooling, and they feel it put their lives behind schedule, making them and HK less successful than it could have been. They are all retired now. Long memories. Also humiliation of being 17 in a class for 14 year olds, I would guess.

My gf cried at monument to Japanese slaughter of a village near Nanning that happened before her parents were born, i think.

The feelings are real, and not all based on inferiority and so on. At least some of it is real, but I agree that the other factors must play a role in it too. There is also the political factor. And of course the 5000 years of history and pride, and 1000 years of japanese conflict.

I think the Chinese haven't forgiven the Japanese for costing them that invasion fleet to the kamikaze, way way back, when it was first named.

[Shane]

A Chinese student posted the following message on another BBS, and I had to mention it, as it shows an amazing level of self opinion and level headed thinking for a student:

Well,an old topic I think.

It seems that the Japanese are cruel and unfriendly to us.

But at the same time,more and more Japanese who used to like China and Chinese go the opposite way,especially after they saw what we Chinese did to their football players last year.

If we calm down and think about it,we will see that the Japanese are not that "bad" from the very begenning and there is now serious misundertanding between us.

Politicians in Japan always speak ill of China(mainly because they fear that China will develop fast and become a threat to them),we know,and this affects the masses much.However,just because the people couldn't see any sign of the "Chinese unfriendliness",they didn't believe the politicians,who had no ways to prove their theory.

Now,they've got it and unfortunately it was we Chinese people that helped them.More and more Japanese see unfriendly Chinese appearing on the screen and they get to believe the politicians' words.

Chinese people,especially the youth,tend to speak ill of Japan to show they "love their motherland".However their doing this actually does great harm to China.Moreover,they affect others and make others hate Japan and follow them.And the media often does the same to attract the audience,making the problem more serious.

In this way,the misunderstanding gets out of control and it gets harder to solve this problem.

��

I still hope,more Chinese people will get to know what they are doing and finally sober up.

It's nice to see someone *not* saying the same thing as everyone else, word-for-word.

[George61]

A mate of mine recieved an email from a former student. Seems the school organized a relly at which the students signed a pledge to boycott Japanese products. The student noted in the email thet the News cameraman was using a Sony camera!

[Shane]

Someone on a local BBS here noted that if every Chinese person stopped buying Japanese products for one year, the Japanese economy would collapse. What they forgot to mention was that most people here in Dalian would also lose their jobs, when all the Japanese companies shut down. This is probably why there hasn't been a hint of anger here - the locals aren't stupid; upsetting the Japanese would have a seriously detrimental effect on Dalian's economy.

[Hamish]

The protests are, IMHO, contrived and led by central party hacks. The two genuine issues are Taiwan and offshore oil drilling. Only one of those, Taiwan, is explicable to the street.

The issue of the textbooks is truly bogus. The books in question are enjoying VERY limited distribution in Japan, being used in less than 1% of the Japanese schools. History teachers all over Japan are refusing to use them BECAUSE the books are not forthright about the activities of Japanese forces during WWII.

This entire episode is cleverly contrived to take people's minds off the state of the environment and the progressive accumulation of wealth by a diminishing percentage of the Chinese population. There was an article in China Daily just a few days ago that expressed concern about the growing gap between the richest 20% and the poorest 20% in Beijing.

Many of the educated Chinese I talk to here worry that China is shortly in for some very bad times indeed.

As “leaders” are discovering, once people start marching in the street and one does not shoot them, they begin to think the street belongs to them. When they come to that realization, there are plenty of things to complain about.

[Steiner]

It's a good thing China and Japan are separated by the Sea of Japan, North Korea, and South Korea (although Koreans don't like the Japanese any more than the Chinese do).

Rwanda, anyone?

[MK]

Meanwhile, in a small town in Zhejiang....

A bloody revolt in a tiny village challenges the rulers of China

[Newbs]

At dawn on this day in 1915 soldiers from Australia and New Zealand (the ANZACs) landed at the Dardenelles in Turkey, as one of the campaigns of World War 1. After 8 months of fighting they were evacuated. Military experts believe that one of the main reasons for the defeat of the ANZACs was the brilliant leadership of the Turkish general Kemal Ataturk, who went on to become the first president of modern Turkey. Many years later he had this to say, and it is considered by many to be one of the most gracious statements by a victorious leader.

THOSE HEROES THAT SHED THEIR BLOOD
AND LOST THEIR LIVES... YOU ARE
NOW LYING IN THE SOIL OF A FRIENDLY
COUNTRY. THEREFORE REST IN PEACE.
THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE
JOHNNIES AND MEHMETS TO US
WHERE THEY LIE SIDE BY SIDE HERE IN
THIS COUNTRY OF OURS... YOU, THE
MOTHERS, WHO SENT THEIR SONS FROM
FARAWAY COUNTRIES WIPE AWAY YOUR
TEARS; YOUR SONS ARE NOW LYING IN
OUR BOSOM AND ARE IN PEACE. AFTER
HAVING LOST THEIR LIVES ON THIS LAND
THEY HAVE BECOME OUR SONS AS WELL.'

KEMAL ATATURK

More details can be found at:
www.skp.com.au/memorials/pages/00012.htm
Surely this must be one of the few memorials in the world erected by a country to the opposition, victorious general.

Furthermore Australian and Turkish soldiers are going to commemorate the event together in Adelaide, later today.
www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200504/s1349256.htm

I’m not saying that my country always gets it right and the other guy always gets in wrong. After all the first positive move came not from an Australian but from a Turk. But to the best of my knowledge, the youth of Turkey, New Zealand and Australia don’t go marching down the streets of their cities, demanding justice, revenge or an settling of the score for events that occurred long before any of them were born.

I don’t know what this has got to do with modern day China.

[Mr Nobody]

Way cool, Newbs. Nothing else to say.

[Wolf]

I remember having to pussy-foot around this issue a lot. In my earlier version of this post, I said I had no sympathy for a point of view built on hatred. That's not quite true. I have sympathy for the avrerage Li who has no access to other opinions.

But I have precious little sympathy for the perpetuators of any form of hatred. When does the Chinese government plan on apologizing to the people of China? Given their great (greater?) share of culpability in the history of the suffering of the Chinese, they could set a great precedent by fessing up.

The intense inward looking character still prevelant in Japanese society doesn't help matters along very much. No matter what textbook gets used, what is taught in the classroom is often forgotten by young adulthood anyway (or at least my years of teaching teens and young adults here has led me to believe.) The Chinese, so it seemed to me, are often just as insular and inward focused. I spent the last few weeks reading Norse and Anglo Saxon stories, and I learned that the word for "complete outcast," vargr, means "Wolf." I didn't know that when I chose the handle but it fits all too aptly.

The point of that aside? As long as either society rejects outisders, this will be one symptom of the issue.

History has not been kind, but no good will ever come of the hatred.

I'm tired just thinking about it.

[Mr Nobody]

Cattle die, kindred die, every man is mortal
But one thing that will never die is the glory of the great dead.

Cattle die, kindred die, every man is mortal
Another thing that will never die is the name of one who has done well.

From the Havamal, by Odin. One of my favourite poems of all time.

Wolves are beloved of Odin. This is not necessarily a comfort.

[Wolf]

Ooh. Hollander's translation. Did you lug that with you to Midard?

I was always partial to

One's home is best though a hut it be:
There he is master and lord;
His heart does bleed who has to beg
The meat for his every meal.

Odin did like wolves and ravens, as they were associated with the battlefield (being scavangers.) Odin gets eaten by the wolf Fenrir, though.

[Mr Nobody]

Sorry, that is the only version I know bits of off by heart. No idea who did it. (I actually got it off the net, maybe 7 years ago or so.) I learned it after learning the rites in Denmark for the Summer Solstice. I thought it the best translation of the tree scene (trying to stretch my memory, lousy thing for quotes) :

Wounded I hung on a wind swept gallows, for nine long days and nights
Speared as a sacrifice: offered myself to myself.
No-one knows from where springs this ancient rood.

and all that.

Well, Fenrir isn't a exactly wolf, but a monster son of Loki and that Giant, wossername. Maybe that makes all the difference.

But I like the opening verses.

Damn, can't find my copy. It is at my kung fu school. I will post them later. I will give the feel, though, I hope.

The ones about how on a lonely road he met a man, and that made him rich, for man rejoices in man.
then how he hung his clothes on a stake, and how that made it hero, and naked he was noboby (Hey!)

Your quote is one of my favourite passages as well.

Full of wisdom, albeit much of it is a little harsh for our softer times. And fine poetry. Chanted, in Danish, it was very fine.

When I do return to China in a few months, I am bringing over 1000 ebooks- will try to get it to 2000 by then. I will include the havamal, and the rubaiyat and other great works. That should get me through any bad times.

Just checked. I don't think mine is Hollanders, since it opens differently. The Hollander version, depending on who quotes it, eithers starts midway, or with the Voluspr (they spell it Voluspa?) And the order is different. Or my memory is dodgy?

And, errr, didn't the search turn up a lot of right-wing fascist racist loonies. And I had forgotten all about the Asatru. New Age Odinism, indeed.

[Wolf]

Yeah. Hollander opens his with the Vol-whatsit.

1000 ebooks? That's the way to go. In retrospect I wish now that I had done the same.

Asatru? People who still worship Odin? Um ... Odin required the occasional human sacrifice. I'd think the neighbors would complain about that one.

Fenrir was a monster; brother to the Midgard Serpent. But he did have the shape of a wolf, at least according to Snorri Struluson's Edda.

I've never heard any of them in Danish; but I have recently tried reading bits of Beowulf in Anglo-Saxon. ;D

[Mr Nobody]

Fenrir Loki's Get is the full name, along with Jormangundr Loki's Get and one other i can't recall, spawned on a giantess whose name escapes me.

Um, yes, human sacrifice once a year or so. Hung on a windswept gallows. 12 beasts, one of each kind, including one human.

The asatru resemble the original like the modern druids resembles the original, although they admitted have better material to work with. They are lame, trying to interpret that good old time religion into modern terms. It is very dodgy neopaganism that aparently now has links to white supremacists, which it didn't do when I looked at it many years ago. Back then it was just another bunch of new agers. Harmless, just silly. Even sweet in some ways, with the nice versions of their interpretations. These new neofascists are worrying though. Those are the types who WOULD consider human sacrifice.

If I knew how to send the books to you I would. I got them all via two sources, a foundation that does this, I will post the website when I get my computer back, and via p2p called limewire. Maybe once i get it organized, i can produce a few disks and send them. I think they end up pretty small.

[Wolf]

Thanks for the offer, but I don't own a net-capapble computer anymore (which is why I have a high post count but have hardly posted in a year or so.) I use the computer at my school. While the average wage for EFL teachers in China doesn't amount to much by internaional standards, the average wage for EFL teachers in Japan doesn't amount to much by Japanese standards (especially once MA fees get subtracted.)

Yummy. White supremicist neo-paganism. And here I read the Eddas and a good chunk of the Sagas just to enjoy a good story or two.

[Mr Nobody]

Wolf: My favourite saga is Njal's Saga. Great story, apparently much of it being sort of true. It certainly ties in with real historical events. If you haven't read it, I highly recommend it. I have lost my copy, and haven't managed an ebook of it yet.

I guess I could always put these things onto a cd or two, and mail them via the real world. It would probably only be a cd or two, it is all pdf, word etc files. not huge. I get my own computer back in a few days. It has suffered the deadly blow-up-all-the-capacitors-on-the-motherboard syndrome, a common illness due to leaving it on all the time. But after that I could see.

Let me know if you want something like that. I gotta say it is mostly science fiction with a few classics thrown in. It is a pretty indiscriminate list. Some business, philosphy, other random things. I didn't exactly choose it but downloaded anything that might be interesting. In fact, maybe I should offer it to all the regulars. It sounds like books are one thing in short supply.

Anyone? Send a few cds, each can distribute to others in need?

[Lotus Eater]

Do you read them on screen or print them off? For me half the joy of reading a good book is curling up in bed with a glass or red and said book and reading, or having a long deep hot bath with said red and book, or taking it out into the garden and sitting under a shady tree. Sitting in front of a computer hasn't got the same appeal.

[Mr Nobody]

I pefer the bed or leafy bough thing also, but these are real books, and it would be a forest. I read them off the screen. They are intended as a source of reference, and desperation for a lit-fix to feed my habit (hobbit?).

[Newbs]

For me half the joy of reading a good book is curling up in bed with a glass or red and said book and reading

Copy that Lotus.

Congratulations on 1000 posts, from a guy whose about to reach 200.