kenjiooi comments

I would take my hat off to Australian PM Abot for the way he made himself very clear that Australia believes in giving an equi-distant treatement to both China nad Japan instead of getting more out of one at the expense of the other, hammering out the political philosophy that every country shouls take a common-sense approach toward diplomacy, which presupposes that we should agree to disagree. This is where China should emulate Australia in order to rise above jingoistic naionalism. The portion of the article where Abot honored the courage of Japanedse submarines during WW2 would strike me as being in the "wrong" taste; in the light of what Abe has recently done at home to re-interpret the war-renouncing constitution, giving a deaf ear to a strong opposition from the people, Abot's speech might have been taken as indicating more than giving lip service to Abe. I hope it did not give the japanese a swollen head.

Given the fact that the posting was taken down after the formal protest from the japanese consular in Chongqing, I would feel justified in thinking that the posting o the map of Japan with mushroom clouds above Hirosima and Nagasaki had nohing to do with the instructions from the central communist government. As someone from the audience of this newssite said, Japan would be better off leaving it at that.I have got the feeling that the patriotism-imbued history education in China has been paying off in a negative way, to my regret, that it goes a long way toward getting people's attention diverted from problems they have to tackle at home by making an enemy of japan to stoke the feeling of nationalism. I do hope the same phenomenon does not happen thanks to a change to the secondary history education conducted from the perspective of th rivisionist take on the last war.

"Suga said China's attempt to dredge up the wartime history and turn it into an international issue was unnecessary and was not helpful in building peace and cooperation in the region." Japan is a nation that puts the past behind it and does not give any absolute value to anything that goes beyond everyday experiences, living the permanent "now" , which would translate into a collective sense of amnesia, coming from the fact that a build-up of past experiences, which would be anchored firmly in the cosciousness of the people, does not function as a source of judegment to go with in making a value judgement on anything going on in the public realm of politics. The first thing that crosses the minds of the Japanese when they think of July 7 is "Star Festival" Chinese in origin. What segment of the Japanese population would t go out of their ways to think of the Marco Polo Incident in conjunction with the date? The Japanese could be likened to those who live from hand to mouth, from day to day in spirit, living the permanent "now", leading the Japanese to react to a reaction emotionally only in terms of whether they like it or not. Japan is an emotional, asopposed to intellectual, society. That is why Mr. Suga said dredging up the wartime history was unnecessary.

"Suga said China's attempt to dredge up the wartime history and turn it into an international issue was unnecessary and not helpful in building peace and cooperation in the region".

"Tepco warned i may have to consider boosing electricity rates in early autumn if it could not restart Kashiwazaki" I would take the above as indicating Tepco is giving itself up to engaging the scare tactics to blackmail the people into accepting the restart Kashiwazaki. They are giving us the "Damned if you do,damned if you don't" worst of both worlds. The 3:11 triple disaster was unprecedented in that it was a once- in -a -thousand- years huge earthquake, triggering the killer tunami and the nuclear power plant accident and that in a FIRST-WORLD country in broad daylight and was rellayed live almost simalteniously, giving almost anyone living anywhere pause to giving second thoughts to work on nature and get the most out of it to improve our living. Japan has ended up soiling the atomsphere, the soil and the occean, which is common property belonging to all mankind. Japan should be under moral obligation to give up nuclear power generation on a phase-out basis if not right away to show the rest of the world that the country has learned a lesson the hard way. Going about it in a "business asusual way" should not be OKed. Getting down to the reality, the money spent importing fossil fuels should be put to better use with renewable energy getting a fairer go. Thus we can have it two ways or three ways, giving the "made in Japan" renewable enrgy technology a better chance, getting the centralized way of power generation and distribution, regional monopoly-based, giving idled rice paddy fields a chance to work again, leading to the reinvigorate the rural economy, etc.

"A small but vocal cache of the political right, including Mr.Abe, continues to cast doubt ,cl aiming that the brothels were staffed by professinal prostitutes." I have got a sense that it would be closer to truth to say that a majority of the Japanese people on the street are influenced by or leaning toward the rivisionist take on the last war-- a witness to the shift to the political right re-enforced with Mr. Abe coming to power, which I would put down to their ignorance/lack of the accurate knowledge of the past history going more than 100 years when Japan annexed Korea. This is where the textbook inspection system put in place since the end of the war should come in. There is the course of study for every subject area for primary and secondary education set forth by the Education Ministry, according to which the textbook inspection is carried out. I have gotb the feeling that the course of study for history is not entirely free from the rivisionist perspective of whitewashing the unpleasant aspects of the past history involving Japan's relations with China, Korea, and other Asian countries. Now that the Abe Administration is determined to delete the"neighbouring -countries clause from the course of study that requires that Japan's past relations with the countries be taken into account in putting together a history text book, I am afaraid there is no way young Japanese can develop the right historical conscipusness vis-a vis Asian countries.

June 30,2014 3:50pm=FerdimnandoUchiyama."There are a dozen of positive reasons to change the interpretation and one or two not to change it."< You remind me of a remark made by the former Prime Min ister of Singapore Lee Kan Yu to the effect that "Japan is a special country.Get this through your head that Japan can not be a "normal country." The big rush Mr. Abe has been in for the past few weeks to allow Japan to exercise the right to collective self-defence is so that Japan can go to war. Regardless of how they change the interpretation of argticle 9, let me remind you for your information that the latter half of the same article goes," The right of belligerency will not be recognized." How can Japan go about defending other countries under military attack or go to war to defend them?" All the fuss in the past would bear witness to the lack of logic-mindedness on the part of the coalition government.

june 29,2014 5:00pm--regading power harrasment< Japan is an emtional, as oppsed to intellecgtual,society, where the most ideal type of personality is one dominated by the emotional side of the personality such as giving weight to maintaining the harmony of the group you belong to, rather than to rocking the boat . It is a society where the "who knows whom?" approach works better than the intellectual approach in getting the job done. Japa is so much human redlations values-oriented. Whether your immediateb boss feels you have the right chemistry with him or her might make the diffrence between the absence or the presence of on-the-job bullying. For another, they are cutting corners on labor cost resulting in too much being done by too few and for third the decline in union membership might translate into this, that it is everyone for himself or herself and on his or her own responsibility with none at worksite to turn to for help.

I would have nothing against amending or rivising the constitution in any way a government in office sees fit as long as the majority of the Japanese people want it under one condition; Japan must come to terms with the past history of aggression againt China, Korea, and other Asian countries. Now that things have come to such a pretty pass, there is no doubt that the current government under Mr. Abe has no intention to set the past wrongs right. What he is doing would be to turn the principle of constitutionalism on its head, transforming the people , with whom sovereignty rests, into those who would be at the beck and call of the government, a topsy turvy democracy reminiscent of the 1984 world. The 1952 Tokyo District Court verdict handed down on the Sunagawa Incident declaring the presence of the US forces in Japan a breach of article 9 and the 1972 statement issued based on the cabinet dicision banning Japan from exercising the right to collective self defense were mangled , taken out of the context to distort the message in such a way as to fit their way of thinking. LDP and CGP got into a series of closed-door negotiations to come up with the feel-good conclusion on the reinterpretation to drive home the false message that what they have agreed upon is not a deviation from the 1972 statement, while they are going to get their" honne " true intention out into the open in the expected Diet deliverations that will contradict the two-party agreement, which is the result of weeks of talks. The closed-door negotoations were designned to serve as a gimmmic to give the voters something else to worry about. We should not get this out of our minds, we should not put this humiliation, their betrayal behind us. In another two years we will have the Lower House elections. We must get the most out of that opportunity to vote LDP out of office.

The March 11th, 2011 made clear beyond doubt that geologically speaking Japan is the worst location for nuclear power generation and that Japa does not have what it takes to operate nuclear plants safely. This is the lesson Japan learned the hard way. Hoping against hope that nuclear plants will get the nod for getting back online under the pro-nuclear Abe administration, the power companies have been spending an enormouse amount of money importing fossil fuel to the point that they have been chalking up deficits for three years on end. Now is the time to turn the nation's energy policy around to get out of nuclear power on a phase-out basis and put to better use the money that goes for imported fuel , giving renewable energy a fair go right away. We have seen through the myth that nuclear power is safe and cheap.Instead of restarting idled nuclear plants we shoud give top priority to developing and nurturing technology needed to get the decommissioning of old plants building upon the painful experience from the Fukushima plant in a spirit of sharing new thcnology thus developed with the reat of the world. That will be more in keeping with the horrible history of being atomic-bombed not once , not twice, but four times. That is the moral price for Japan to pay for damaging the air, the occean, and the ground, which are a common property belonging to mankind.

June 26, 2014

I would not be surprised if she had given voice to her doubt about the target Mr.Abe laid out on the female ratio of the workers promoted to the management position. Japan is an emotional, as opposed to ideological(intellectual), society where the ideal type of personality is one dominated by the emotional side of personality such as shade of meaning, nuances, the opposite of what non-Japanese would do in trying to get at the truth by getting everything debated and out into the open, believing that out of a conflict of opinion emerges a new truth. As legend has it, Japan goes with this quasi-theory that words have a spirit of their own, which would translate into this" agree in principle but disagree in details" mindset, implying a nuanced opposition to the plan itself. Now that Mr, Abe has given voice to the principle of more women participation in the work force, I hope he does not leave the matter at that, expecting the situation will take its natural course. Instead, he will flesh out the plan to make sure that he delivers the goods.

bowweevil=Japan's wish to have the letters of theb kamikaze pilots submitted as an incentive for peace is also equally twisted.

I think I am more or less on the same page as you, The logic behind the notion of giving UNESCO Heritage recognition to the letters and wills would strike me as twisted as the idea of Japan being allowed to "go to war" to promote peace. , which I would take as indicating a mindset at work in some Japanese who are not aware of this fact that there are two aspects to Japn's wartime experiences as the victimizer and the vicmized. or who selectively give a blind eye to the victimizer aspet to the equation.

Mr. Prfect "Wih the greatest effort of any Japanese administration to mend its ties with its Asian neighbours, I just for the life of me can't imagine why China would do such a thing.

No matter how I look at the way the greatest effort has been made by any past Japanese administration to mend its ties with the Asian neighbours, I can't give credence to what you say, particularly when I put into perspective the latest political developments related to the effort put into trying to virtually get rid of the no-war clause of the constitution to exercise the right to collective self-defense .with the diplomatic effort to mend its relations with China and Korea put on the back burner. Speaking for myself, I would not be surprised if China worked hard to have the Nanjin Massacre on the NESCO Hertiage list of memories. Japan under the Abe administration does not have what it takes to respond proactivedly on its own to set the past records straight unless they are forced to react to a reaction from outside.

No matter what Mr. Abe says on the "pull at their heartstrings"emotional tone--religeous cereminy at the end of the season to pray for the repose of the spirits of the killed animals-- to justify whale-hunting ,I would presume it won't get anywhere in his effort to get the international=anti-whaling western countries around to the Japanese way of thinking that whaling is part of the Japanese food culture.They have the hierachial order about animal kingdom with horses and dogs at the top as far as terrestial animals are concerned, and with whales and dolphins given the utmost importance as far as marine animals go. Given the choice between going with the western values or sticking to the " whaling is part of the Japanese culture" What should Japan choose to do? To live up to the "Japan is a law-abiding country( implying as compared with China)", Japan would have no other choice but to comply, which should translate into a shift in our view vis-a vis whales from killing the animals toward a coexistence-oriented mode of utilizing the resouces, say, through whale-watching.

Berstie Wooster June 7 I would go wholeheartedly along with what you put together. I do wish Japan would develop the emotional maturity to go beyond jingoistic nationalism and enact Japan's version of "Laws agains Holocaust Denial". The problem we have to face in Japan is despite a siries of apologies issued in the past, we have ultra-conservative politicians with the rivisionist take on the past history making statements that undercut the issued apology, intended only for domestic consumption.

<><>Jessenstein June 1st Your remark- China's unbriddled aggression will give Japan the supoport it needs to unshackle its military without much uproar from its neighbouring countries-is what Mr. Abe has been taking advantage of to manipulate public opinion in the direction for accepting the excersing of the right to collective self-defence. Whatever message he hammers out vis-a-vis East Asis in an effort to justify resrting to the right, he will have his work cut out for him; what he is after is to re-interpret the No-War clause of the constitution in such a way as to allow Japan to exercise the right to collective self-defence and that with one dicision to approve of it at a Cabinet meeting, giving away his mind-set that now that he has won two-thirds of the seats in the Lower House, he can pull the majarity numbers game on the opposition and get everything his own way. He was made to realize the difficulty of amending the constitution by going the way of constitutionalism. What he is trying to do is to hijack the constitution.