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Screenshot taken from Mrs. Green Apple's YouTube channel shows a clip of the band's withdrawn video for the song "Columbus." Image: Mrs. Green Apple YouTube
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Japan pop band's video withdrawn over colonialism, slavery imagery

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The woke bores are taking over in Japan too, I see.

-3 ( +32 / -35 )

"I took a hard look at" the criticism that the video's imagery can be seen as reflecting specific historical events, he said.

That is some sad pc malarky.

10 ( +28 / -18 )

Lord Dartmouth Today  04:49 pm JST

The woke bores are taking over in Japan too, I see.

Yup. It was only a matter of time, unfortunately.

-5 ( +24 / -29 )

for imagery that seems to conjure justifications of colonialism

This seems to imply that colonialism was a bad thing.

It wasn't. It was one of the best things that has ever happened to the world as a whole.

The world would be a much worse place right now if colonialism had never happened.

Think of all the cannibalism, human sacrifice, and yes, even slavery that would have continued on unabated if not for colonialism.

That's why Christianity was such an easy thing to "sell" during colonization. "Love your neighbor as yourself" is far more appealing than "lie him down spread-eagle on a table and cut his heart out in a pagan ritual," don't you think???

We don't need to conjure up justifications for something that meant massive progress for the world, especially for the societies whose lands were colonized.

Colonialism's undeniable benefits speak for themselves -- which is why those who bellyache the most about colonialism don't seem to mind partaking of its societal and material advantages.

-14 ( +13 / -27 )

The woke bores are taking over in Japan too, I see.

The downvotes this statement received shows the JT wokeists are out in force. They love wokery.

-19 ( +13 / -32 )

“Woke” is the most overused meaningless word.

13 ( +31 / -18 )

We don't need any more of this PC and woke nonsense! It's pure insanity!

-9 ( +19 / -28 )

Did the band show any taping or pillaging?

If no, then why the ban?

-6 ( +10 / -16 )

So, Christopher Columbus has been cancelled now as an evil colonialist? This is PC gone mad, just like the silly hand-wringing over "Blackface" a few years back.

Universal Music LLC said in a statement that the video for the song written by the three-man band Mrs. Green Apple "contains expressions that lack an understanding of history and cultural context,

Universal is a US Company. Might pay for this up and coming young band Mrs. Green Apple to switch to a Japanese music company such as Sony.

-7 ( +13 / -20 )

Hark at the old men failing to comprehend a world in which we cannot be nasty any more.

-22 ( +11 / -33 )

That's why Christianity was such an easy thing to "sell" during colonization.

"Sold" at the point of a sword or muzzle of a blunderbuss.

Fundamentalist ahistorical revisionism.

https://www.pioneer.org/blogs/compass-stories/the-great-evil-christianity-the-bible-and-the-native-american-genocide/

Columbus should be studied but there should be no return to this whitewashed view from the 50's and earlier.

In fact, if you want some alt-history, if the Romans had been more committed and thorough at extirpating Christianity and heading off a Dark Age we might have colonized the solar system by now.

7 ( +16 / -9 )

Looks like they replaced all that other stuff with an egg.

...?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1XUt-ZcOf4

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

not knee that Colombus brutally enslaved many natives in the carribean and contributed to their extermination is ignorance on par with Japans revisionist cronies

Hmmm, And Ghengis Khan sacked Baghdad and slaughtered over a million of the local population - to add to the millions more innocents he slaughtered. But you’d never pull down his statue, or signal your virtue by attacking him. You save it all up for those white people, eh. Theres a word for people like you.

-8 ( +11 / -19 )

When Columbus and his shipmates landed at a small Caribbean island, the first thing they did was slaughtering its natives who were unarmed and posed no threat to the Europeans. Columbus was a genocidal murderer. He didn’t even discover America. The Vikings found America in the 10th century, well before Columbus.

7 ( +17 / -10 )

BertieWoosterToday  05:26 pm JST

We don't need any more of this PC and woke nonsense! It's pure insanity!

Describe 'woke' in this context?

What does 'woke' mean to you?

TobleroneToday  04:50 pm JST

"I took a hard look at" the criticism that the video's imagery can be seen as reflecting specific historical events, he said.

That is some sad pc malarky.

Descibe PC in this context.

wallaceToday  05:23 pm JST

“Woke” is the most overused meaningless word.

Smart

-12 ( +11 / -23 )

Leave it out, sonny Jim,

Its a “looky here” stunt.

The Sex Pistols "1970 something", Malcolm McLaren nailed shock culture.

The rest is just a shallow cynical fake imitation

-11 ( +3 / -14 )

This up-and-coming band Mr. Green Apple will definitely receive widespread international publicity due to this. Publicity on a scale money simply cannot buy. Good for them.

I will give them a listen on Spotify tonight.

-3 ( +8 / -11 )

They are shown interacting with anthropoids, presumably native to the island, who are depicted as primitive and servile...

To be fair, at least partially correct historically. Europe was far more technologically advanced at the time of Columbus than the natives of the Americas.

-7 ( +8 / -15 )

he intended to depict a fictitious world in which beings from different eras could throw a house party.

hwever,

They are shown interacting with anthropoids, presumably native to the island, who are depicted as primitive and servile. 

basically men in ape suits. Didn't someone at Coca-Cola think this was a bad idea?

10 ( +14 / -4 )

Mr KiplingToday  06:41 pm JST

They are shown interacting with anthropoids, presumably native to the island, who are depicted as primitive and servile...

To be fair, at least partially correct historically. Europe was far more technologically advanced at the time of Columbus than the natives of the Americas.

How is it fair to depict Native Americans as apes in this context?

-6 ( +10 / -16 )

mallace, this whole cynical exercise is to sell a product,

These foolish imprudent mannequins, never for the moment thought to question the logic.

They just like lemmings, jumping of a cliff, dim-witted following suit.

Like monkeys at a tea party

-3 ( +5 / -8 )

Seeing that photo I thought they got sued by the producers of Planet of the Apes.

-5 ( +4 / -9 )

Reminds me of this old Rowan Atkinson sketch:

https://www.facebook.com/TheSingleHilarity/videos/gerald-the-gorilla-not-the-nine-oclock-news-s2-e25-1980/376026277668056/

-5 ( +4 / -9 )

mallace....

How is it fair to depict Native Americans as apes in this context?

Just stating facts. European tech at the time was light years ahead of that available to the natives.

I haven't seen the video so cannot comment on the ape suits.

-3 ( +5 / -8 )

I think 95% of the comments on this article were made with the Daily Mail Headline Generator.

3 ( +8 / -5 )

Japan proved in the last five years to act without logic and in a xenophobic way without granting basic rights.

What do you guys expect from a government that during the Covid denied the re-entry of permanent visa holders just for the non scientific fact that Gaijin can carry the disease but allowed their nationals to travel everywhere.

The government of Japan sadly has a deeply routed xenophobia which is magnified these days by the in capability of their country to self sustain without the help of foreign people.

-11 ( +4 / -15 )

Japan is becoming woke, please no!!

-7 ( +5 / -12 )

The use of the word "woke" has become tedious.

0 ( +8 / -8 )

Ewr, is call history, history is there to learn from it.

And do I agree, Colonialism do more good thant bad.

Many people write colonialism off as racism and white supremacy. There is no denying the fact that there were atrocities committed against natives people in places like Latin america and the Belgian Congo. But people fail to talk about the many things brought to the world by western colonialism such as modern farming techniques, fair legal systems, western medicine, and many more things we take for granted. if we take Africa for example, before colonialism Africa was a lawless landscape divided by hostile tribes that were constantly at war and disease ridden. European powers brought stability when they landed. That tribal way of life would have continued into the 21st century if it never happened. It just seems that besides some atrocities and discrimination colonialism did more good than bad.

-7 ( +5 / -12 )

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