Pro-China, Anti-Japan Protests - Page 103

On September 24 2012 21:06 m4inbrain wrote:
They should put some people on these islands (both parties), and give them souvereignty. Maybe call it Chipan. Or Jana. Whatever.

Obviously not possible, but that would be a decision that i could feel respect for.

On September 24 2012 22:02 ExceeD_DreaM wrote:
Unfortunately I don't have time to quote responses here so I will reply to what I remember here.

Prime-Minister/King issue
Yes, Japanese king is just a symbolic role. But again as I said, the leader at the time of the war was technically the king, regardless of his role in the war. It is much more meaningful and symbolic if the spiritual leader of the country apologizes. It also doesn't help when prime-ministers comments are fluctuating left and right. Making a public apology and then attending Yasukuni Shrine to worship the war criminals that ordered invasion, slavery, and massacre is just irony. Just based on that fact, all the apologies made holds no sympathy. I say KING not Emperor because it is just an emperor to Japan. Try saying 천황 (Japanese Emperor) in Korea, and see yourself out the door.

Imperialism Flag
Why do Japanese still use this flag? This is a symbol of imperialism and of everything that happened under it. Do you see Germans flashing Nazi flags at international soccer games? No. Do you see them making national uniform with Nazi symbols in it? No. So why does Japan do it? Doesn't this show that Japan still cannot forget their 'Glory days' of Imperial Japan? Why do you guys keep worshiping the war criminals at Yasukuni Shrine? All of these should be common sense.

Military
Japanese military spending is 6th in the world according to several lots beloved Wikipedia source. They spend twice more on military than S.Korea. Japan with no army? Technically yes. Will Japan be ready when they get caught in the war? Hell yes.

Compensation regarding comfort women and 근로정신대
The word 근로정신대 is a TERRIBLE term to use. If you translate that directly, they are 'Voluntary Work force'. No, they were not voluntary. No women in the colonization era worked for the Japanese voluntarily. Why would they? They were equally murdered, tortured, extorted, and raped, but by different people. Comfort women suffered under the military while these ladies suffered under corporation. Go search about 99 yen issue, I am not lying about it. That decision by the court was peppering salt on their wounds.

King Akihito recently stated he wanted to visit Korea himself and make an apology. Japanese Gov't said there is no plan for such a thing. Koreans know there are Japanese people out there including the king that wants to apologize truthfully. (Track record of Akihito shows that he is quite consistent with his comments as he apologized to China as well). I disagree at claims saying that comfort women, or 'Sex Slave' women issue is blown out of proportion. No they are not. Almost all of them are dead, they have not gotten a proper apology, and time is ticking. If true apology wants to be made, let the leader visit to Korea, visit these women in person, and make an apology. These women aren't trying to rip money off Japan. Again, they said they will donate whatever money they receive to help the cause in Congo, Africa. All they want is a true apology before they pass away.

Name calling and saying I'm a moron despite me trying to have a conversation doesn't really help your cause either. If you want to discuss, do it in a civilized manner.

On September 24 2012 22:21 robjapan wrote:
oh and yes Japan's military spending is 6th in the world, but you need to look at it as a % of GDP which is a much more accurate figure to compare.

South Korea spends 2.7% of its GDP on it's military, whereas Japan only spends 1% of it's GDP on it's military.

Just as another figure to throw out there, South Korea has 687,000 ACTIVE troops, Japan has 230,000

China has 2.2 MILLION

China has 2 MILLION more active troops than Japan..... damn...

P.S. That's double the size of the American army

On September 24 2012 18:06 brachester wrote:
I'm pretty ignorant when it come to China-Japan's history and the current situation so correct me if I get anything wrong here:
+ The earliest record of the islands' ownership date way back to the China's Ming Dynasty in the 14th century.
+ The ownership was then shifted to Japan through the treaty of Shimonoseki as part of the defeat of China's Quing Dynasty in the First Sino-Japanese War during the 19th century.
+ The islands then came under the control of the US after Japan's defeat in WWII after the signing of the Treaty of San Fransisco (which states that Japan must relinquish control of all islands except a few islands which did not include Senkaku islands)(which creates another debate that the control should be shifted to China instead).
+ The islands then were given back to Japan in 1976(or something like that) by the US with the Okinawa Reversion Treaty.
+ So legally, the islands belong to Japan?

Talking from the ethical side, Japan did commit terrible war crimes during WWII, but didn't they compensate approximately $300 billion to the involved countries? I agree that the apologies they made didn't sound most sincere and the fact that they still pray for past war criminals (for some reason I don't know) doesn't help. But all these anti-Japan from the Chinese seems to be uncalled for because imo the current generation shouldn't have to pay for what their ancestor did. But then again, knowing how the chinese people react to dispute between countries (e.g. paracel islands with vietnam), I'm leaning toward that the fault are at the chinese goverment and their media for "inspiring"/"brainwashing" (poor choice of word, I know) their people with biased informations.

On September 25 2012 00:15 TheKwas wrote:
The british still fly their imperial flag, and their imperial crimes can probably give Japan a run for their money (granted, over a MUCH longer time period). Also, the Japanese flag is a pretty big issue in Japan and many people DO feel guilty about it's past role.

And, the Shrine thing has been explained a millions times already. The war criminals were not enshrined by the government, and according to the shinto religion the temple only enshrines souls--which are not held accountable or responsible for their life actions. Furthermore, the Shrine houses the souls of over 2 million people. I understand that China and Korea are upset, but do you really want the Japanese people to change their spiritual beliefs and culture for the sake of not offending China and Korea? How is that realistic or fair to modern Japanese?


There are lots of reasons to give the Japanese government grief, but those two are probably two of the most trivial issues to bring up.

In additional, it is my understanding that Japan doesn't teach their younger generation about invasion in China nor Nanjing massacre (Correct me if I am wrong). Is that brainwash too?

On September 25 2012 00:25 TheKwas wrote:

From Wiki: Despite the efforts of the nationalist textbook reformers, by the late 1990s the most common Japanese schoolbooks contained references to, for instance, the Nanking Massacre, Unit 731, and the comfort women of World War II,[2] all historical issues which have faced challenges from ultranationalists in the past.[3] The most recent of the controversial textbooks, the New History Textbook, published in 2000, was shunned by "nearly all of Japan's school districts".[2]

The vast majority of Japanese students learn about Japanese war crimes. Ultraright wing factions often try to push textbooks that don't contain such information, but almost all school districts reject the use of those textbooks.

On September 25 2012 00:24 ddrddrddrddr wrote:
Guess we're lucky that we didn't know whether Hitler prayed for forgiveness before death. Christians are absolved of sins when they ask for it too. So every person we've considered evil in history are as kosher as everybody else as long as as far as we know, they prayed for forgiveness. Is that how the world works?

On September 25 2012 00:15 TheKwas wrote:
The british still fly their imperial flag, and their imperial crimes can probably give Japan a run for their money (granted, over a MUCH longer time period). Also, the Japanese flag is a pretty big issue in Japan and many people DO feel guilty about it's past role.

And, the Shrine thing has been explained a millions times already. The war criminals were not enshrined by the government, and according to the shinto religion the temple only enshrines souls--which are not held accountable or responsible for their life actions. Furthermore, the Shrine houses the souls of over 2 million people. I understand that China and Korea are upset, but do you really want the Japanese people to change their spiritual beliefs and culture for the sake of not offending China and Korea? How is that realistic or fair to modern Japanese?


There are lots of reasons to give the Japanese government grief, but those two are probably two of the most trivial issues to bring up.

On September 25 2012 00:31 TheKwas wrote:

What? How did that go through your brain. It's not equivalent in the slightest.

When people honour military souls at a Shinto Shrine, they are NOT honoring their acts during life. They aren't even honouring their lives. They are only honouring their souls. You can argue that the religion is stupid (I think all religions are crock), but you can't honestly expect all Japanese to reject their religion/spirituality because it offends you.

If hitler did pray for sincere forgiveness, then by most christian sects his soul WOULD be able to go to heaven. However, Christians don't pray or give honour to souls so there's no analogy to really be made.

On September 25 2012 00:25 TheKwas wrote:

From Wiki: Despite the efforts of the nationalist textbook reformers, by the late 1990s the most common Japanese schoolbooks contained references to, for instance, the Nanking Massacre, Unit 731, and the comfort women of World War II,[2] all historical issues which have faced challenges from ultranationalists in the past.[3] The most recent of the controversial textbooks, the New History Textbook, published in 2000, was shunned by "nearly all of Japan's school districts".[2]

The vast majority of Japanese students learn about Japanese war crimes. Ultraright wing factions often try to push textbooks that don't contain such information, but almost all school districts reject the use of those textbooks.