Does Japan have most beautiful women in East Asia? ---from Chinese site

I am not sure what this Chinese site 百度 is like. Probably it is like 2ch in Japan.
The conversation is so crap that it deserves reading.
And it is also interesting to know there is moronic talking on the Internet in every country.

via 日本の評判

1 Does Japan have most beautiful women in East Asia?

3 The sum number of beautiful women
China ＞........＞Japan＞Taiwan＞Hon Kong＞North Korea＞Mongol＞South Korea

4 #4 is radically china-centered guy.
He is obviously biased.
If you are not racisit, it is obvious that the sum number of beautiful women is propotional to the populaton. The rate of the pouplation of beautiful women are more or less the same in every country.

6
＞＞４
But South Korean women are ugly. Besides they get plastic surgery.

8 >>6
That is obviously bias. ....Many Chinese have the sense of superiority over Koreans to the bone.
Historically that might be true, but now a small country is equal to a big country.


43
There are only three countries in East Asia that have beautiful women.
1China
2China
3China

94
It is true Japan have less beautiful women than China. Japan is insular so the gene is limited. The same hold true for Korea.
But Japanese women make up pretty well.....
I have seen only one beautiful Japanese women. After making up, she is better than
Chinese women. But the rest of Japanese women were ugly, they are below the Chinese middle level.

96 Japanese men are handsome. .....

98 Korean men are handsome too. 60% of Chinese women wantto marry Japanese, and 40 % want to visit Korea

100
Right. The competition will be harder. In the future, we have to import women from Vietnam .
101
Don't worry. It only costs us only 200gen to buy Vietnamese women. I researched it before.

106
North Korean women are prettier than South Korean women.

107
With a bag of rice, you can buy North Korean women, so I heard.

108
There is no medicine for a fool.

120
羅格、魔王、松前,(names) why don't we visit Korea to buy women. It helps our brother country.
I am Marx, 羅格 is Engels, 松前 is Lenin 魔王 is Mao pig. Let's save our brother of socialist country.

China's strong arm diplomacy

China tells the EU to dump on Taiwan. The EU asks “How hard?”/Jul 12th 2007 | BRUSSELS
From The Economist
Seems nobody can resist China.
Better be the tail of lions than the head of foxes. (寄らば大樹の陰）
Why not ?

Philippine-American War

The rise of the Republic worsened relations with America. The Filipinos resented the American treachery in depriving them of entering Manila after its capture. For their part, the Americans used another incident to hasten their annexation of the Philippines.
On Saturday night , February 4. 1899, an American soldier named Private Robert W. Grayson shot and killed a Filipino soldier who was crossing San Juan bridge. By firing the first, unprovoked shot, the Americans ignited the War of Philippine Independence. To add insult to injury, the Americans called the war a Filipino "insurrection"
News of the outbreak of hostilities was telegraphed to President Aguinaldo in Malolos. Immediately he declared was on America, whose forces had drawn the first blood. page 124

The result of the war
The superior arms of Uncle Sam crushed the short-lived First Philippine Republic, the same arms which, strangely enough, helped to establish the Cuban Republic. In forcing her sovereignty upon Filipino people, the United States crossed 7000 miles of ocean, using 126,468 men, of whom 4,234 died she spent vast sum of $600,000,000 and engaged in 2,811 recorded fights. On the other hand, the Filipinos, in the defense of their independence, suffered great loss 16,000 died in action, 2000,000 civilians perished from famine and pestilence, and untold millions of person worth of property were destroyed.....
In their desperation, the American soldiers turned arsonists burning whole town in order to force the guerrillas to the open. One such infamous case of extreme barbarity occurred in the town of Balangiga, Samar, in 1901-1902. Balangiga was a peaceful little port off the southern tip of Samar, but, it was garrisoned by Americans who could not pinpoint the nerve-center of guerrilla activities in the town. ...The American soldiers were busy one morning, taking their breakfast when suddenly they were attacked by Filipinos in their employ. The Church bells rang, and soon about 180 Filipinos fell upon the Americans, many of whom were killed instantly. ...The news of the guerrilla attack gave rise to pained cried throughout the United States and so president Roosevelt gave orders to pacify Samar Assigned to the task was General "Jake" Smith. "I want no prisoners," he said firmly. "I wish you to kill and burn; the more you burn and kill the better it will please me."Forthwith he ordered that Samar by transformed into "howling wilderness" Orders were also issued to shoot down anybody capable of carrying arms. By "capable of carrying arms, "General Smith meant to include even boys ten years old, for the latter could carry rifles and swing bolos. In six months, Balangiga became "a howling wilderness"....Smith was court-martialed and retired from the service.

The U.S. is lucky that she has not been demanded to issue several apologies after apologies as Japan apologized and compensated to Korea. She is also lucky that the representative of the the third party country does not demand apology from her, blaming that the U.S. has not apologized .

But at least do American people remember it?

Viewed as pivotal historical event in most Filipino textbooks, this war is hardly mentioned in U.S. history textbooks. According to U.S. texts, the Philippine insurrection as it was previously known , lasted from 1899 to 1902, when President Theodore Roosevelt declared an end to the fighting. Filipino texts, in contrast, argue that the war actually endured for months, if not years, after the formal declaration from Roosevelt, owing to Filipino resistance in the southern islands.( History lessons Dana Lindaman and Hyle Ward page 123)

[High school American history textbooks] see our policies as part of a morality play in which the United State typically acts on behalf of human rights, democracy, and "the American way". When Americans have done wrong , according to this view, it has been because others misunderstood us, or perhaps because we misunderstood the situation. But always our motives were good. This approach might be called the "international good guy" view. (page 217 Lies my teacher told me" James W. Loewen.)

The U.S is also lucky that she has such critics as Loewen.
As a Japanese I can not feel happier that Japan has also such critics in Japan and abroad and some some malice propagandists in China, Korea and some ethnic groups in the U.S. who constantly tell Japan to learn from the past.

Open door policy and Roosevelt Corollary(2)

Roosevelt-corollary and open door policy (1)

with the United State becoming a colonial power in the Pacific after its victory in the Spanish American war, many American imperialists desired to extend U.S. economic expansion to China. America textbooks point out that the United States was recovering from one of the worst depressions when the opportunity to go after the elusive "China trade" became a reality. U.S. economic imperialism was nearly thwarted, the text add by the "great power"(i.e.,Western Europe and Japan) who had already carved into their own "sphere of influence". Coveting the China trade, the American Secretary of State circulated his "Open Door Notes" to the great power (
page 126 History Lessons: Teaching, Learning, and Testing in U.S. High School Classrooms S. G. Grant )

Monroe Doctrine and Roosevelt Corollary in the eye of Latin America

Brazil
The consolidation of the capitalist regime after the civil was also favored the US imperialist expansionism throughout the American continent and Asia. The Monroe Doctrine and the theory of Manifest Destiny formed the ideological basis for the US to assume the guardianship of the entire American continent......
Cuba, in 1898, was a Spanish colony and it was fighting for its independence under the leadership of Jose Marti. Under the pretext of protecting North American properties and lives, the US intervened in the region, combating the Spanish army and winning Cuba's independence. In this war, the US obtained for itself the annexation of Puerto Rico in the Caribbean and the Philippines in the Pacific Ocean.
The Cuban Constitution of 1901 included, by US imposition, the Platt Amendment, which gave the right to the US to intervene in the country, in addition to the concession of an area of 117 Km. Guantanamo Base(still today , an American military base on Cuban territory). The intervention in Cuba lasted until 1959, when Fidel Castro assume the government f the island and installed a socialist regime.
In 1903, the US encourage the Panamanian separatists' movement in Colombia. In exchange, the US received from the newly formed Panamanian government the right to finish the construction of a canal, linking the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. That work started in 1881 by France. Later ,the US also obtained from the Panamanian government the right to control the Canal Zone indefinitely. But During the 70's , a nationalist campaign promoted by the Panamanian government denounced that agreement and the US agreed to turn the canal back to Panama at the end of the 20 the century.
The US also intervened in Nicaragua in 1909, and occupied its territory until 1933 aiming to stabilize the region which was in a near constant state of rebellion. During the period of occupation there were insurrections against the American military presence in the country. ....
Through its many military interventions, the US ended up exerting complete economic guardianship in the region. page 135

Costa Rica
The foreign companies were developing in those territories that controlled an economy in parallel with that of the host country, where in general , US laws governed both contracts and workers and dollars were used an currency. ...
The necessities of US consumers determined the type of Latin American production. For example, the expansion of the automotive industry in the United States favored the exploitation of rubber in the Amazon basin and in the growing boom of petroleum in Venezuela, Colombia, Peru, and Mexico.
While the Caribbean specialized in the cultivation of sugar cane, the United Fruit Company dominated vast plantations of bananas in all of Central America, Venezuela and Colombia. The economies of Brazil and Costa Rica also depended to a high degree on their coffee production and the demand for their product in Europe and in the United States. page 136

There are also descriptions by Cuba ,Nicaragua and Caribbeans but I'll stop here for now. But note that all of Latin American countries characterize the US as Imperialist.
And it is interesting to see how Japan emulated Monroe doctrine and applied it to Asia.
It is no exaggeration that Japan , more or less, mirrored the U.S. But Alas there was an intersection Japanese Imperialist and the U.S. Imperialists were destined to meet, and collide---their interests conflicted over China.　(It is ironical that Truman was later blamed for having lost China.)

It might be offensive for Americans to hear that Japan mirrored the U.S.
But it seems that is exactly what Japanese were in mind.

We have learned many things from America ----especially in dealing with neighboring unstable government, and when we put the lesson into practice, we are severely criticized by our teacher -- -Inazo Nitobe(Address at Institute of Politics, Williams town, Massachusetts,1932)

Haven't you heard of Perry? Don't you know anything your country's history?....Tokugawa Japan believed in isolation; it didn't want to have anything to do with other countries and had its doors locked tightly. then along came Perry from your country in his black ships to open those doors; he aimed his big guns at Japan and warned, "If you don't deal with us, look out for these;open your doors, and negotiate with other countries too." And then when Japan did open its doors and tried dealing with other countries, it learned that all those countries were a fearfully aggressive lot. And so for its own defense it took your country as its teacher and set about learning how to be aggressive. You might say we became your disciples. Why don't you subpoena Perry from the other world and try him as a war criminal?---- General Ishiwara Kanji, at the Tokyo war-crime trials in May 1946.( page 173 the tragedy of Great power politics. John J. mearsheimer)

.....................................................................................
*
Under Wilson, the United States intervened in Latin America more often than at any other time in our history. We landed troops in Mexico in 1914, Haiti in 1915, the Dominican Republic in 1916, Mexico again in 1916 (and nine more times before the end of Wilson's presidency), Cuba in 1917 and Panama in 1918. Throughout his administration Wilson maintained forces in Nicaragua, using them to determine Nicaragua's president and to force passage of a treaty preferential to the United States.
In 1917 Woodrow Wilson took on a major power when he started sending secret monetary aid to the "White" side of the Russian civil war. In the summer of 1918 he authorized a naval blockade of the Soviet Union....(page 23) Not one of the the twelve American history textbooks in my sample even mention it. .....Textbooks might (but don't ) cal Wilson's Latin American action a "Bad neighbor Policy....Some textbooks blame the invasion on the the countries invaded:"Necessity was the mother of armed Cari bean intervention.....(page 24).........
All twelve of the textbooks I surveyed mention Wilson's 1914 invasion of Mexico, but they posit that the intervention was not Wilson's fault.
(Lies My teacher told me James W. Loewen


Roosevelt mixed conciliation with firmness in dealing with Japan's evident new power. On the one hand, he sanctioned agreement with japan that mutually recoginized U.S. interests in the Philippines and Japanese in terests in North Asia. At home, when the San Francisco School Boad angered Japan with its order to establish a separate school for "Oriental" children, Roosevelt summoned school officials to the White House to resolve the issue. On the other hand , he also dispatched the U.S. fleet on a world tour to demonstrate American power and resoluve to the Japanese. It was at this time that both the U.S. and Japanese navies began to regard each other as primiary hypothetical enemies. page 95 Japan rising,Kenneth B. Pyle

The lawyer who works for the abudctee v Zainichi Korean political scientist

Kang Sang-jung is rather a popular professor we see on TV.

Kang Sang-jung (Hangul: 강상중, Hanja: 姜尚中, born 1950) is a Zainichi Korean political scientist. He is a professor at Tokyo University.

He is one of the most outspoken critics of Japanese nationalism and United States Imperialism , and some people regard him as a North Korean nationalist in Japan.(wiki)

Kawahito is one of the such critics of Kang. He is a lawyer who works for human rights domestically and abroad, and he accuses Kang in his book"Kim Jong-il and Japanese intellectual" for supporting Kim Jong-il .
He even says Kang is a a sophist who works for Kim's regime by the dictator, of the dictator, for the dictator.
Is Kawahito rightist? Not at all. He is a known as a lawyer who worked for the family of the workers who died of the overworking, he is a supporter of comfort women abroad. He has worked for the human right of Zainichi.

Kang claims that

(1)the abduction issue should not prevent Japan from normalization with North Korea.
The normalization is the least risky way to settle the issue .

(2)we should not internationalize the issue because it will increase the threat of North Korea (by provoking Kim)

(3)the rapid collapse of the Kim regime is not desirable because we can not predict what will happen to the nuclear weapon North Korea.

(4)Japan should stop negative campaign against North Korea.

(5)If we had to choose between justice without peace and peace without justice, peace without justice would be preferable. (And since bringing the issue on the table of UN human right committee might violate the peace), we should not or don't have to send the abduction issue to the UN human right committee.

(6)Introduction of market economy will bring Kim's regime to the gradual end.

(7)Japan should face the issue of comfort women under Japanese rule rather than talking about a handful of abductions by North Korea.

Kawahito counter-argues that

(1)the normalization means paying compensation in substance, which will only benifit Kim. Before or after normalization, Kim will resist by any means the possibility of weakling the status.

(2)we can push Kim's regime into the corner by internationalizing the issue of abduction in Japan and abroad by North Korea, the massive violation of human right in North Korea, the drug trafficking by North Korea. What we need to do is to help and support North Korea people who escape from North Korea.

(3)No nuclear accident happened after Soviet Union collapsed.

(4)there is no reason we should not talk about the brutality of repatriation project,
the massive violations of human right under North Korea;people who repatriated from Japan had been severely oppressed under the regime.

(5)peace deserve protection because it will realize human right. As it is under Kim's regime, people are treated like animals: what we seek is peach with justice.

(6)China introduced market economy but the regime hasn't changed.

(7)Trying to justify the abduction by bringing up the comfort women issue is just like the way Kim deals with the issue.

Kawahito adds that between 1960's and 1980's it is well known that North Korean spies were influencing Zainich Koreans, and Koreans in Europe, especially in Germany. Kang was studying in German from the late 70's to 80's.

In one respect, the controversy looks just the reflection over the difference of opinions regarding how to settle the abduction issue.
But in another respect I also share the sentiment with him;Why do people who criticize, for instance, the repatriation project to North Korea by Japan would not criticize the brutal situation of the people who repatriated from Japan in Korea. Why do people who oppose the so-called negative campaign against North Korea in Japan would not oppose cruel situation of North Korea?

Kawahito is against attacking North Korea militarily; he believes the international pressure can bring about the change in North Korea just as it brought about the change in East Europe. He is supporting the refugees from North Korea. He has worked with Zainichi Koreans. Through the corporation with them, he realized that some of them were threaten to do illegal acts by North Korea agents:their relatives are in North Korea. Against the allegation that he is demonizing North Korea, he says he is just against Kim's regime;he is working to help the oppressed North Koreans, which is in stark contrast with Kang, who just speaks out in a safety zone. He concludes that Kim regime is the trickiest nation ever; she would do anything nobody consider plausible.He warns the young lawyers who will work for North Korea- related organization to be very careful in handling the matter. For instance, every time criticisms mount against North Korea, the incidents happen such that North Korean students in Japan are ripped off the clothes. No one is arrested despite the investigation. Zainich Korean journalist investigating the case died for a mysterious reason. Some victims were not wearing a traditional Korean clothes....... He warns that the lawyer dealing with the case should not believe the story at the face value but carefully handle the matter..

I am not sure if Kang is somehow connected with North Korea. I am not the type of the person who believe in a conspiracy theory. But in case of North Korea, I want to keep open the possibility of its conspiracy because I also feel biased trend among some Japanese intellectuals and because Kawahito's record as a honest human right activist makes him sound reliable enough.

BTW
He also says the abductees so far officially recognized by the government are just the tip of the iceberg. He criticises Japanese government,saying that the government criteria for the abducted is too strict. The victims should be designated as the abducted if
(1) there is material evidence(photographs, letters etc.) to show the victims are in North Korea
(2) there is a testimony that she witnessed the victim in North Korea
(3) there is a testimony of the abductor and his aider and abettor.
(4) the victims disappeared in a similar situation in case of the other abductees.
(5) there is a situation to maneuver to conceal the crime by the abductor.

Japanese nationalism

Japan ranks the lowest of 17 rich countries in the number of people willing to fight for their country. Only 23 percent of Japanese are willing, as opposed to 90 percent of Norwegians and Swedes. Perhaps, it has something to do with the 36 percent of Japanese who are not proud of their nationality. Only 2 percent of Irish feel ashamed of theirs.Beautiful Japan 美しい日本

The blogger relates this statistics with Japanese nationalism or the lack of it. I am not sure if this can be direct poof of that, but it surely supports Pyle's judgement that there is no significant nationalist movement in Japan.

Love and reason

love is a particular mode of caring. It is an involuntary, non- utilitarian rigidly focused, and ...self-affirming concern for the existence and the good of what is loved. The object of love can be almost anything---a life, a quality of experience, a person, a group, a moral ideal, a non-moral ideal, a tradition. whatever. The lover's concern is rigidly focused in that there can be no equivalent substitute for its object....His concern is non-utilitarian in that he cares about his beloved for its own sake, rather than only as a means to some other goal....he benefits when his beloved flourishes; and he suffers when it is harmed. ...lover identifies himself with what he loves. The consists in the lover accepting the interest of his beloved as his own......Moreover, because the beloved may be entirely unaware of the love,...loving entails no special obligation to the beloved.......Love is ...involuntary, in that it is not under the immediate control of the will. page 41

Parents do not ordinary love their children so much, for example , because they perceive that their children possess exceptional value. In fact, it is the other way around: the children seem to the parents to be valuable, and they are valuable to the parents, only because the parents love them. Parents have been known to love----quite genuinely---children that they themselves recognize as lacking any particular inherent merit.

the lover does not depend for his loving upon reasons of any kind. Love is not a conclusion It is not an outcome of reasoning, or a consequence of reasons. It creates reasons.page 25

(Taking ourselves seriously Getting it right. Harry G. Frankfurt)

This is powerful notion of love and Franfurt attempts to locate the meaning of a personal life in the activities of loving in his book.

Not all reasons for action are desire dependent nor are they future-oriented.

The system of political status functions works at least in par because recognized deontic powers provides desire-independent reasons for action....page 101 If my Chairman asks me to sere on a committee then , If recognize his position as Charmian, I have a reason for doing so, even if committees are boring and there are no penalties for my refusal. page 102 (John R Searl/Freedom & Neurobiology)

Why are you driving to Doncaster?
Because I'm taking my uncles ashes to where he wants them to be scattered.(Future)
Why are you doing that?
Because I promised him I would.(Past)
But he is dead, so why do you feel the need to honour that promise? He'll never know.
Because it's important to me that I'm the kind of person who keeps his word. (present)
(page 27 what's it all about" Julian Baggini)

But love in Frankfurt's sense is the central force that drives your life and action to go on.

A restoration of the Korea pride?

Vehicles were forced to drive on the left in this country by Imperial Japan in 1921 . But at 松坡 province in Seoul they have restored the rule to drive on the right for the first time for 86 years!!!
Naver(Korean)魚拓

via 散歩道

How many cars were there before Japan forced Korea to drive on the left?

Nationality Clause

There are people who want to abolish nationality clause in hiring people in public office.
But it seems clear that it is unreasonable for, say, a Japanese　national to demand to
be granted the right to be president of the United States.
There was a famous case where a Korean woman was rejected to be promoted in a public service. The case was suggestive; all she had to do was she became a naturalized a Japanese citizen like her elder brother*1 who is a professor in a public university.
And these days 99% applicants are accepted.
That said, in case of a Brazialian whom The Shizuoka Probation Office recommended to become a probation officer, I think the ministry of justice was too formalistic.
From legal point of view, there is a supreme court decision to the effect that nationality clause is not unconstitutional, so the ministry of Justice 's interpretation might be correct, but there should be some measures to deal with this kind of case.

BTW, the article is via Debito.
I think we need somebody like him to represent the minority. His basic message is simple and correct;Racism is wrong. But it is unfortunate that his presentation of the case is often too simple and sometimes distorted.





................................................................................
*1

ニューズウイーク日本版の２００５年２月１６日号で、「妹よ、日本国籍を取れ」
　ずいぶん過激な内容だと思ったが、他人事のようなことは言っていられない。原告は私の妹である。それにしても、なんという皮肉だろう。私は今まで、韓国･朝鱗籍をもちながら本国への帰属意識に欠ける二世やご.世の在日コリアンは、早く日本国籍を取得して日本社会のフルメンバーとして生きるべきだと主張してきた。一方で私の妹は、自らを抑圧や差別の「生き証人」と位置付けて行動している。帰化などというのは、彼女にとっては敗北を意味するにちがいない。
　朝日新聞は、「生まれ育った日本で、日本人と岡じように地方公務員の管躍職の試験を受けたいという在日韓国人の訴えは司法に退けられた」と書いた。妹を無垢な存在として扱うような話も聞かれる。だが彼女や支持者たちの闘いはもっと政治的なものであり、日本の否定的な一面を印象づけることを目的としていたのだと思う。私が妹や在日に伝えたかったのは、被害者としてのアイデンティティーにとらわれ、そこに人生の動機を見いだすのは賢明な生き方ではないというメッセージだ。だが妹には、兄の言葉より在白たちの「闘いの伝統」のほうが魅力的であったらしい。

　妹の裁判闘争に私が批判的だったのは、何よりもそれが「在日の不透明性」を永続化させると考えたからである。現在の在日は、韓国･朝鮮籍をもちながら本国への帰属意識に欠け、また外岡籍をもちながら外国人意識にも欠けているようにみえる。
　外国籍を維持したまま内国人との平等をめざす妹たちの運動は、在日のアイデンティティーと帰属(国籍)の間にあるズレを永続化させてしまう。いわゆる在日一世が朝鮮半島から内地に来たのは１930年代だ。その子孫である二世や三世は日本語を母語とし、東京を中心にして世界を眺め、白分を眺めてきた。そのような人々が、外国籍のまま生きているのは不自然である。二世の親は、子供から「なんで自分は日本で生まれたのに日木人ではないの」と聞かれたとき、それに答えられるのだろうか。
ニューズウイーク日本版の２００５年２月１６日号P３５より引用

Love and maurity

One of my other students recently told me that her perfect future mate would be a foreign husband because she felt foreign men were more aware of women's needs and treated them better. She said that she felt Japanese men were selfish and put themselves first all of the time. While I've never been in a relationship with a Japanese man, I can say that my experiences teaching them do reveal a great deal of self-centeredness.My so-called Japanese life

Probably this is over-generalization. My mother was just a house-wife, but my father used to help doing dishes, and laundry and above all he worked hard for family: he was born during WWⅡ.
I remember a Japanese woman who married to an American man; she complained that her husband often asked if she loved him in the evening though she told so in the morning.
I don't know how American spouse develop love. The Japanese young woman above might have a romantic fantasy about western men because she does not know what the relation is like--I might be wrong---I might be saying out of jealousy.
In any case, I guess love evolves between a man and a woman in any culture if the relation is to continue.

He sat behind me, where I could not see him, but everywhere--in the half darkness of the room , in every sound , in myself--I felt his presence

I began to feel lonely, that life was repeating itself, that there was nothing new wither in him or in myself. He began to give more time business which kept him away from me and I began to feel that there was a special department of his mind into which he was unwilling to admit me.

That day ended the romance of our marriage;the old feeling became a precious, irrecoverable remembrance; but a new feeling of love for my children and the father of my children laid the foundation of a new life and quite different happiness;and that that life and happiness have lasted to the present time.
(Family Happiness Tolstoy)

...We come to inhabit a different perspective upon life:we no longer think that it is possible----if only we were sweeter, if only our partner were more understanding or more passionate---to sustain the delights of the opening stage of the relationship. Once we have accepted this....we can come back to the business of getting on with life, of appreciating whatever good things we have actually managed (despite ourselves) to amass. Marsha has a pleasant home, two healthy children, a good natured intelligent husband. ..These things are not exciting but when seen with an appreciative eye, the are adequate for happy life....page 152

...if a relationship is to last, if love is to survive and develop over an extended period , we need to bring to the relationship a set of of qualities quite different from those which took us into it in the first place. ....Love craves closeness, and closeness always brings us face to face with something other than we expected...page 153 Thus it would be mature to accept a certain plainness in one's partner if they possess more important qualities such as a sweet temper of reliability....

("conditions of love" John Armstrong)

Moral relativism (2) Rights from wrongs.

Moral relativism(1)
Alan Dershowitz'Rights from wrongs" is provocative, his scope extends to Rawls and Dworkins.

It is more realistic to try to build a theory of rights on the agreed upon wrongs of the past that we want to avoid repeating, than try to build a theory of rights idealized conceptions of the perfect society about which we will never agree. page 7

Where does rights come from? Or , put more concretely: What are the sources of our right?
This question is crucial because in the absence of an authoritative source of rights, such as God, or nature, it is easy to argue that man-made needs of the majority in a democracy. page 5

Rights do not come from God, because God does not speak to human beings in a single voice, and right should exist even if there is no God.
Rights do not come from nature, because nature is value-neutral.
Right do not come from logic, because there is little consensus about the a priori premises from which right may be deduced.
Right do not come from the law alone, because if they did, there would be no basis on which to judge a given legal system.
Rights come from human experience, particularly experience with injustice. We learn from the mistakes of history that a right-based system and certain fundamental rights...are essential to avoid repetition of the grievous injustices of the past. ...
In a word, rights come from wrong. page 8

Dworking's core principle is that government must treat all their citizens with equal concern and respect. This principle is fundamental "postulate of political morality" to which all reasonable people must adhere. page 43

I agree that human equality should be an important foundation stone for any theory of rights, but I would argue that it is an invention rather than a discovery.
A more persuasive argument for the right to equal treatment would be built on our collective negative experience with the wrongs of unequal treatment during slavery, the Holocaust , the Inquisition, and other disastrous human epochs. page 44

Even the claims of some natural rights advocates rest---at least to some degree---on the implicit consequentialist assumption ...A particular right can only be justified as a trump on majority preferences ....if non-recognition of that right will make people worse off(which is my preferred negative reformulation of Jremy Bentaham's "great happiness of the greatest number" postulate. ....
it could be argued that ...tampering with any particular right may endanger the entire package and make people worse off...But it still judges morality by its impact on people---in my favorite formulation , by its impact on preventing the recurrence of wrongs. page 46

"Rights from Wrongs" Alan Dershowitz
So after all it seems he is consequentialist which appeals to historical experiences.

What is interesting is he seems to hold moral relativism; rights are backed up with negative experiences in history of the society. His theory is very attractive. But can he tackle the criticism against relativism?

I think Objectivism or Relaitivism, the point is whatever the authority---- God, human nature, objective moral principle , moral reality independent of people, social agreement , collective negative experience---is, it seems it does not follow the authority necessiates one and only one choice, that it is often possible that two conflicting views are permissible.

Relativism faces troubles when faced with the question why the authority in question is right, what authorise the authority---isn't it the case that the authority is authority because it is backed up with objective truth?
Objectivism faces troubles when pushed in the same way. Why the hell is the authority in absolute sense, or in objective sense right?.
It is often the case that there are cases where there are two conflicting and yet permissible case based on the objective principle. But that is not the only problem. To answer the question, either she has to say because it is objective, which is tautology:she can not say where and how she discovered it(---oracle?) or she needs to appeal to the authority in a relative sense；

This is my ongoing thought. I think I need to get deeper understanding.
...................................................................................

A regulative ideal is one which is reasonably founded in an understanding of human nature. Justice and freedom are similarly ideals. Even though perfect justice may be impossible in the world, our assessment of whether something is just or not is guided by reference to a rational account of what justice is Regulative ideals don't seek to describe how things actually are: instead they refer us to a point of view from which we can access ourselves and the world. page 136 conditions of love john Armstrong.

From JoongAng Dailly

The country that is nor yours sometimes has news that is strange, hard to understand.
Today, I've found several news articles that is a little bit difficult to understand from JoongAng Daily.

The government unveiled a revised version of the pledge of allegiance last week, which it said sounds less compulsory, and would encourage people to voluntarily express their loyalty to the country.
However, some human rights groups oppose not just the revision but the pledge itself, which they say forces the people to be subservient to the country. They plan to hold rallies against it this week.
Under a presidential decree dating to 1972, Koreans are required to recite the pledge of allegiance at public gatherings and at the start of each week of classes from elementary through high school: “I pledge, in front of proud Taegeukgi [Korea’s national flag], allegiance to my mother country, to devote my body and soul to the eternal glory of the country and the people.”...“We changed some parts of the pledge of allegiance as they were outdated and sounded a bit oppressive,” said Jung Hyun-kyu, a director at the ministry.
“We inserted ‘liberty’ and ‘justice’ in the new version, as they are the priority values we say we are pursuing in the Constitution. ‘The Republic of Korea’ also sounds less oppressive than ‘mother country.’”Joong Ang Daily July 09, 2007

(Emphasis mine)

Wowwww, Ishihara will feel ecstasy even at the revised law.

A dog’s life just got a little better in Korea.......Animals, including dogs, must be knocked out before slaughter, and all animal owners are required to give a proper amount of food and fresh water to their charges......Dogs are not technically considered food here, even though there are many places where dog meat is served.JoongAng Dailly/July 09, 2007

So how do dogs used to be slaughtered?

JoongAng Daily (Japanese)2007.06.29

More than 3000 workers of sex industry demonstrated, demanding to repealthe special act concerning sex trading.

What is the background of the story? Why are they protesting?

Korean Netizens are furious about the foreigner's youtube video in which
the foreigners say, "strip off Korean women.We'll be excused if we say we mistook the woman for Japanese". A netizen said, "a fundamental measures should be taken not to damage the image of Korea."
JoongAng Daily 2007.07.08

A Korean American blogger took it up, and asked if it was newsworthy.

A candidate for President from Hannara party is rumored that his father is the member of Chongryon (the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan) and his mother is Japanese . He responded, "we are living in the times when this kind of rumor has an influence."JoongAngDaily2007.07.07

Why and how does such a rumor have a influence?

Alan Watts' Self

Nothing fails like success---because the self-imposed task of our society and all its members is a contradiction----to force things to happen which are acceptable only when they happen without force.* This in turn, arises from the definition of man as an independent agent ----in the universe but not of it---saddled with the job of bending the world to his will. page 75

The individual may be understood neither as an isolated person nor as an expendable humanoid working machine. He may be seen, instead , as one particular focal point at which the whole universe express itself---as an incarnation of the Self, of the Godhead, or whatever one may choose to call IT (page 78)

. in the Nootka language, a church is "housing religiously a shop is "housing tradingly....Does t really explain to say that a man is running? On the contrary, the only explanation would be a description of the field or situation in which "a manning goes with running " as distinct from a manning goeswith sitting......"the cause" of the behavior is the situation as a whole, the organization/environment...(page 95)

Here is someone who has never seen a cat. He is looking through a narrow slit in a fence, and on the other side, a cat walks by. he sees first the head, then ...then tail. ....The cat turns round and walks back...This sequence begins to look like something regular and reliable. .Thereupon he reasons that the event head is the invariable and necessary cause of the event tail, which is the head's effect. page 31

...not all the features of a total situation have to appear at the same time the existence of a man implies patents, even though they may be long since dead, ..Total situations are, therefore, patterns in time as much as pattern in space. (page 96)

There is no fate unless there is someone or something to be fated. ....when the line between myself and what happens to me is dissolved and there is no strong-hold left for an ego even as a passive witness, I find not in a world but as a world which is neither compulsive nor arbitrary.(page 124)

...the universe in general and playing in particular are, in a special sense, "meaningless"; that is, they do not --like words and symbols---signify or point to something beyond themselves...page 128

...all experience is just that....it is nothing more than the mysterious utterance of the old man of Spithead, who op end the window and said;

Fill jomble, fill jumble,
Fill rumble-come-tumble

page 130

The only real "you" is the one that comes and goes, manifests and withdraws itself eternally in and as every conscious being. For "you" is the universe looking at itself from billions of points of view, points that come and go so that the vision is forever new. page 130

"The Book" Alan Watts
.................................................................................

*page 73 The soical double-mind game can be phrased in several ways.....Control yourself but be natural....Essentially, this game is a demand for spontaneous behavior of certain kinds.

Future of Japan and China(Korea) relation.

Anpontan posted the insightful article on Japan -China/Korea realation. It is a must read artcle.

In this regard, I think the following Japanese article also proves his point.

Korean charismatic housewife is having a talk show at Tokyo big site.
Chon dayon, who succeeded in losing 21 kg for 5 years, is having a talk show at Tokyo big site in commemoration of her popular book.....She advised to constantly exercise just for 5 minutes rather than calculating calorie meticulously....Asked about Billy Blanks, she said, "he is a missionary of the health, just like me, he is a friend rather than a rival"
Nikkan sports

Believe it or not, she is not asked about Korean illegal occupatoin of Dokdo, Yasukuni--- a shrine of a specific religion, Korean distorting history textbook, and yet she is welcomed.


韓国のカリスマ主婦がトークショー



　５年間で２１キロの減量に成功した韓国のカリスマ主婦、チョン・ダヨン（４０）が８日、東京ビッグサイトで開催中の「東京国際ブックフェア」にゲスト出席した。独自に編み出したエクササイズを紹介する著書「モムチャンダイエット」の好評な売れ行きを記念してトークショーを開催。「カロリー計算とか、あまりストイックに取り組みすぎても良くない。無理をせず、１日５分でいいからコツコツ運動することが大事です」とアドバイスした。

　７日間集中ダイエットプログラム「ビリーズブートキャンプ」で爆発的人気を誇る米インストラクター、ビリー・ブランクス（５１）について聞かれると「私と彼は同じ健康の伝道師。ライバルというより仲間という感覚」と話していた。

［2007年7月8日

Korean imagination---Hateful and provoking Japan

July 4 (Bloomberg) -- Sochi, the Russian Black Sea resort where President Vladimir Putin has a vacation home, will host the 2014 Winter Olympics after beating South Korea's Pyeongchang and Austria's Salzburg in a vote by International Olympic Committee members.

Sochi defeated Pyeongchang by 51 votes to 47 after Salzburg was eliminated in the first round of voting today in Guatemala City. Pyeongchang had lost by three votes to Vancouver for the 2010 hosting rights.

Several Japanese bloggers have taken notice of the Korean news article about it.

hateful/provoking Japan....Sochi defeated Pyeongcn for 2014 winter Olympic host, Japan, one of the same Aisan, welcomed it......because it works better for Japan to host 2016 Tokyo Olympic. .....The governor Ishihara said, "I want to say 'Congratulations!! Sochi'" While Korea is still in the middle of the shocks at the defeats for the second times, Japan shows no hesitation to say things for their benefit , inattentive to its neighbor.Korean /魚拓

Korean imagination is great. I just want to know the technical term in psychoanalysis to describe it

...................................................................................

江原道の平昌(ﾋﾟｮﾝﾁｬﾝ)がロシアのソチに敗れて2014年冬期オリンピック誘致に失敗したが、同じアジア大陸の日本は、むしろソチを歓迎する様子を見せた。

日本が推進中の2016年夏期オリンピック誘致には、アジア地域の平昌よりもヨーロッパ地域のソチでの冬季五輪開催が有利だからだ。

共同通信は５日の東京発の記事で、東京オリンピック誘致委員会関係者らが「オリンピック開催は『大陸別循環』の慣行があるため、平昌よりもソチになった方が東京の夏期オリンピック誘致には有利だ」と述べたと伝えた。

東京オリンピックの誘致委員会委員長を兼ねる石原東京都知事も、「ソチに心からおめでとうと言いたい」と言及した。

韓国の江原道平昌が２回連続で冬期オリンピック誘致に失敗した衝撃からまだ脱せていない状況で、早くも自国の利益のためには隣国は眼中にも無いような発言を躊躇しないのが日本だ。

Japan-as-victim mantra!!

This Japan-as-victim mantra is so often repeatedTPR

via Debito

I am getting sick and tired of this kind of stereotypical characterization.
Sure I myself did admit on another post that Japanese tends to emphasize the victim aspect. I myself claimed that the opposing party was exploiting Kyuma's statement.
But do these people know hundreds of Japanese books by Japanese that accuse Japan's invasion of Asia?

To the same degree, by the same token, the U.S.-as-innocent mantra is so often repeated, but is that it?

Do these people read at least several books on Atomic bombs?---I doubt it.

Kyuma's statement was generally in line with historians.
Let's take a look at, for instance, "The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb"

Historian Alperovitz argues that America's use of the atomic bomb on Japan was motivated by politics rather than by military necessity.

(From Publishers Weekly)
It is in line with Kyuma's statement.
But let's take a look at the reviews.

If you are a person that believes that the bomb saved "500,000 to a million American casualties and ended the war" and are willing to learn that this may not be true, read this book. Be warned though, it is very unsettling when one has believed this all ones life. I know I have been somewhat shocked.

Because Japan by July 1945-as expert opinion shows-was defeated.American land ,naval forces few hundred miles away from home islands.Situation was desperate; Tokyo initiated diplomatic moves to end the war.With Emperor's blessings Foreign minister Shigemitsu Togo tried to find out through Japan's ambassador in Moscow whether Russia was willing to help Japan bring about peace.Thanks to intelligence derived from Purple decrypts Americans knew japan's plight.However they were few stumbling blocks.One was Tokyo's desire to preserve Emperor.

If President Truman had clarified the proposition that unconditional surrender he meant Japanese military and not Japanese royalty Tokyo would have capitulated.Such course of action apart from ensuring Japan's surrender would have stopped Soviet entry into Far Eastern war on its tracks.This makes ridiculous official claim that nuclear bombing was essential to hasten Japan's surrender.

Paradoxically [after nuclear bombing ]US allowed Japan to retain their emperor.If only President Truman guaranteed the safety of the Emperor while issuing Potsdam declaration this terrible human tragedy could have been averted.Unfortunately coming under the baneful influence of his Secretary of state Byrnes he botched it.
Concomitantly it also implies despite nuclear bombing Tokyo would have continued to resist to the bitter end if Americans were to dissolve the Imperial House.So the theory that atomic bombing precipitated japan's surrender is a myth.Rather it had more to do with American tussle with Soviet Union for the control of postwar Eastern Europe.By bombing Japan US wanted to send Moscow a strong lesson.

This is in line with the author's view, and it is consistent with Kyuma's veiw.

Probably for them, the reviewers said , to borrow the phrase, "something reasonable, if disagreeable. It could have been insensitive, though. More important, it violated" the U.S-as-innocent image----Is that it?

The opposing party has exploited Kyuma statmet in one direction, and these bloggers have exploited his statement in another direction.


Most of people who work for "no more Hiroshima" is not accusing the U.S. not playing the victim card but working for anti-war, anti-nuclear weapon.
I disagree with them because they tend to think they can get peace by Japan completely demilitarizing. But I know they are not playing victims, they were victims
of the war. Some might be accusing Japan, others might be accusing the U.S. But on the whole, they are accusing the absurdity of the war, stupidity of human beings. (incidentally that makes contrast with Chinese and Korean nationalistic attitude toward the War and the colonization---I think. )They want to show what it is like to get nuked for the future generation. They are not trying to violate "the US as innocent " image.

There are Japanese people who try to give the impression that for instance, there was no Nanjing massacre.
Ironically, some bloggers look just like them.

Note in passing that the authors and the reviewers of the book are (probably) Americans. That means there are many self-critical Americans.

Sure, there is a controversy on, for instance, what really ended the war, but it is rare there is no controversy over historical events.
When Japan counters, for instance, on the issue of comfort women, she is a denier, when the U.S. counters, she is faithful to history---is that it?
I can not help but feel an insensitive attitude, if not a colonial attitude, in those who are uncritically just repeating this Japan-is-whitewashing-mantra .

In this regard, I think Anpontan's
post is much more nuanced, balanced, and sophisticated.
UPDATE
Anpontan has wrtiten another excellent article.

Japanese War Memories

Japanese War Memories at ASPAC/井の中の蛙via Japan probe

Japan's war memories, so often misrepresentedviaAnpontan

Another perspectivesPacific War etc.

Did FDR Provoke Pearl Harbor? Mirror
for Americans

pacific war

douglas-macarthur-testified

Economic background

remember-flying-tigers

Tokyo airraid

Japan's aggressive history

Secretary Of Defense admits Japan didnt need to be nuked/you tube

Japanese POWs in Russia and China

Hull note

Revisionist's veiw on Peal Harbor attack

criminals-after-tokyo-tribunal

Roosevel corollary and open door policy

Open door policy and Roosevelt Corollary

assessment-of-invasion-to-manshu

fugu plan/Sugihara

War without Mercy

war propaganda-half truth, disillusion, madness

the
war in China before and during WWⅡ

Japanese POW

comfort-women-in-japan-under-occupation_for GIs

collateral damage

Among the dead cities

Japanese war responsibilty

forced labor and Mitsubishi

Japanese war crimes record

foreingn dispatch /Britain's Kenyan Crimes

Bengal famine

The U.S. Realism and Idealism toward Pacific War

1919 racial equality clause

Hirohihito

Japanese War memories

Japan as victim mantra

Japanese War memories

Philippine-Ameridan war

the US realism on the decision to use the atomic bomb

How
the commanders untried would have been judged

On the road to atomic bombing of Hiroshima

62nd niversary

the immigration Act of 1924

Tojou's last will

Fukuzawa and Konoe

Another 　aspect of Japan's invasion of Manshuria


Human Smoke: The Beginnings of World War II, the End of Civilization/
Nicholson Baker (

Walt's take on the U.S. attacks on Japanese civilians during WWⅡ


Clash between USA and Japan as for China

kamikaze The secret plan that would have prevented the attack on Pearl Harbor 日米交渉 休戦申し出 Firebombing of Tokyo Friday, January 19, 2018 The war in the Pacific had ended by January of 1945

Some random notes on beauty and art.

You don't need aesthetics to be impressed by beauty and an artwork. But I am the kind of person who stumbles on a small question and can not go on. There are many books on the subject that are boring and/or hard to understand . But the followings are some quotes that has helped me to go on.

On beauty

Plotinus can be taken as enunciating the things which are most important to him and erecting them into a description of the universe. It seems clear that he was moved by a deep yearning for completeness and harmony in himself---perfect condition in which, he believed , he would become most fully himself. Beauty is the imitation of this most-longed-for state. ....When we find something beautiful, Plotinus suggests, we don't just want to keep it or own it. Rather, we want it to take possession of us.(page 76)

The beauty of a physical object embodies purity , perfection, harmony and order. And these, precisely, the qualities that the soul strives to attain in itself. (page 72)

When we consider the notion of an 'ideal' of of 'perfection' we frequently think of something rather cold and inhuman. But this must be error. For in so imagining we don't actually think that this is perfect or deal. The coldness and the inhumanity would obviously themselves be imperfection. (page 76)

This reminds me of "wabi" in which you find beauty in the imperfection.
(the secret power of beauty john armstrong)

On Art
definition

Art is 'a continuous examination of our perceptual awareness and continuous awareness of the world around us.(Robert Irwin)(page 138 Art theory Cynthia Freeland)

the value of the art

The more imaginative a photographer is , the more he or she is likely to select a point of view from which, left to our own devices, we would never seen the landscape. The photographer's imagination chooses a point of view and the photograph directs our perception to see what we would not otherwise have seen accordingly (page 64)

...photographers, poets and painters can direct the mind but the point of their direction does not make reference to anything beyond the work.

The sitters (the object of the paint--zero) are dead and gone, and we can not check the likeness for our self.

(page 66)

War and Peace is wrongly regarded as a record of the impact the Napoleonic Wars had on Russia, but not wrongly regarded as in par an image of the impact war in general.(page67)

Scientific understanding has an object-the natural world or physical universe. ...what is the object (of artistic understanding)?...human nature , human condition.....the human condition is made up of elements at least some of which affect all human beings----susceptibility to cold, hunger and disease, the nature of childbirth, the existence of pain, illness, bereavement and mortality---and the concept 'human nature' can be confined to such things as interests in sexual relations , humor, sorrow, anger , pride, and so on. All of these provide the recurrent them of songs, story telling and depiction in every culture.

(philosophy of the arts Gordon Graham)

Interpreting the artwork

Artists use symbols to represent and express feelings, opinions, thoughts and ideas. Artists communicate to an audience, which in turn must interpret the artworks(page 116 Art theory /Cynthia Freeland)

Thus, to locate art is to situate it in its various context. Art includes, in its development that is envelopment;

the primal holon or original intent of the maker....both conscious and unconscious...

the artwork holons itself, the public work materialized, in both its form and content.

the history of reception and response(the numerous views holons) that in important ways are constitutive of the overall work

the wider contexts in the world at large, economic and technical and linguistic and cultural contexts, without which specific meanings could not be generated in the first place. (page 121 The Eye of Spirit Ken Wilber)

Myth share a lot of characteristics with artworks.
Myth

The neanderthal grave tell us five important tings about myth. First it is nearly always rooted in the experience of death and the fear of extinction. Second, the animal bones indicated the burial was accompanied by a sacrifice. ...Many myths make no sense outside a liturgical drama that brings them to life and are incomprehensible in a profane setting. Third, the Neanderthal myth was in some way recalled besides a grave, at the the limit of human life. ...There are moments when we all, in one way or another, have to go to a place that we have never seen, and do what we have never done before...Fourth, Myth is not a story told for its own sake, It shows us how we should behave.....Finally all mythology speaks of another plane that exists alongside our own world, and that in some sense supports it....They told them how the gods behaved, not out of idle curiosity ....but to enable men and women to imitate these powerful beings and experience divinity. (page3-5 A short history of myth/Karen Armstrong)

Comfort women: Evidence, testimoy,

I echoes with Sisaku when he describes Abe as

The half-smile on the face of a man who had never had to fight for a single thing in his entire life--who had had everything handed to him by others -Shisaku

But I don't think some people are doing justice to his statement on the comfort women.
I think it all started with the misquoatioan by Onishi of NYT
PM Abe misquoted in English/Occidentalism

Surely you can not underestimate the testimonies just because we don't know who they are, just because some of them testimonies are inconsitent.
But let's judge the matter in calm and objective manner.

In particular I would like to ask American people who accuse Japan of whitewashing history if they make fuss about the following cases as much as they do to Japan.

The next reasonably well-documented instance of germ warfare occurred during the Korean War, in February 1952, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the People's Republic of China charged that U.S. pilots had dropped "germ bombs" on North Korea. They offered as evidence the testimony of captured U.S. Air Force officers and intelligence agents, and Koreans who told of finding large quantities of fleas and other insect pests shortly after U.S. planes had flown over their areas. The U.S. Government strenuously denied the charge, but a respected group of scientists believed the evidence was convincing proof that the United States had employed biological weapons.
"The International Scientific Commission for the Investigation of the Facts Concerning Bacteriological Warfare in Korea and China" included scientists from Great Britain, France, Italy, Sweden, Brazil, and the Soviet Union. One of the most renowned scientists of the 20th century, Joseph Needham of England, sat on the commission. Its 700 page report described a whole array of germ weapons: feathers infected with anthrax; lice, fleas, and mosquitoes dosed with plague and yellow fever; diseased rodents; and various implements contaminated with deadly microbes - toilet paper, envelopes, and the ink in fountain pensexcerpts from the book Bioterror Manufacturing Wars the American Way Edited by Ellen Ray and Willam H. Schaap Ocean Press, 2003魚拓

(emphasis mine)

And

No Gun-ri Misreporting ContinuesRok drops魚拓

Let's listen to the both sides of the story.
Examing
History
comfort women testimoy
Nanjing
Massacre and the U.S.

Chinese comfort women break silence

See also Chinese organization behind the scene
Chinese comfort women have started breaking silence in the midst of the controversy over resolution 121.
The emphasis mine.

Chinese study identifies 'comfort women'

....Some Japanese soldiers were incorporated into China's Kuomintang Army after the end of the war and continued using one brothel in Taiyuan, the capital of Shanxi province, until 1947, the report said. Soldiers also used temples as brothels, it said.....The groups did not say why the study was carried out now. The All-China Lawyers Association is the national umbrella group for government-sanctioned lawyers' groups......By ANITA CHANG, Associated Press Writer
Tue Jul 3, 4:06 AM ET

BEIJING -

link魚拓

Chinese woman breaks silence on sex slavery horror
Mon Jun 25, 2007By Royston Chan

RUGAO, China (Reuters)

When Zhou was 22, Japanese soldiers came to her village in eastern China, grabbed her and her sister-in-law and carted them off to a military brothel, she says......


"I hid with my husband's sister under a millstone. Later, the Japanese soldiers discovered us and pulled us out by our legs. They tied us both to their vehicle. Later they used more ropes to tie and secure us and drove us away," she told Reuters in her home village in Jiangsu province.

"They then took us to the 'comfort woman lodge'. There was nothing good there," she said, speaking through a local government official who struggled to translate her thick dialect into Mandarin.

"For four to five hours a day, it was torture. They gave us food afterwards, but every day we cried and we just did not want to eat it," Zhou added, sitting in her sparsely decorated home.

The Chinese government says Japan has yet to atone properly for its war crimes, which it says included massacres and forcing people to work as virtual slaves in factories or as prostitutes.

In 2005, a push by Japan for a permanent U.N. Security Council seat sparked sometimes violent anti-Japanese street protests in cities across China, with demonstrators denouncing Tokyo and demanding compensation and an apology for the war.

"OF COURSE I HATE THEM"

Zhou -- neatly dressed in a dark blue traditional Chinese shirt, her graying hair combed back into a bun -- avoided saying what had happened to her in the brothel, except that she was there with at least 20 other Chinese women.

But her son, Jiang Weixun, 62, said she had told him they were repeatedly raped by Japanese soldiers on a daily basis.

Zhou said she had served as a "comfort woman" for two months before a local town official rescued her by paying off the Japanese.

She went back to her husband of 10 years, Ni Jincheng, who later died fighting the Japanese.

Zhou remarried and lives with her son, Jiang, from her second marriage.

Jiang said his mother had been moved to tell her story after learning of the death of Lei Guiying, a well-known former Chinese comfort womanlink

Why act morally ?and the meaning of life--Does it matter?

Nagel

Because if you admit that you would resent it if someone else did to you what you are now doing to him, you are admitting that you think he would have a reason not do it to you, .....there is nothing so special about you....if it's reason anyone would have not do hurt anyone else in this way, then it is reason you have not to hurt someone else in this way(since anyone means everyone(page 66)

The basis of morality is a belief that good and harm to particular people (or animals) is good or bad not just from their point view, but form a more general point of view(page 67)

Singer
page202

These are questions within ethics. They presuppose the ethical point of view. "Why should I act morally? is on another level. It is not a question within ethics, but a question about ethics.

page 204

... ....Why should I act morally ? is a question which may properly asked by anyone wondering whether to act only on grounds that could be acceptable from this universal point of view. The question asks for reasons for going beyond this personal basis of action....

But

Every rational egoistic activity of other rational agents is rationally justifiable

For instance,
page 217

...psychopaths are egocentric to an extreme:neither other people, nor worldly success, nor anything really matters to them But why is their own enjoyment of life not sufficient to give meaning to their lives?

Singer is negative about phchopaths, but as Singer admits(p204) there are people who enjoy life without thinking of anything but their own interest.

Rationality by itself is not directed at any good for humans or anything. This is what Hume meant when he wrote, "Tis not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the world to the scratching of my finger. page182 Baggini

Because we are used to thinking o meaning and morality in life as being linked, it may sound odd to say the Gestapo officer can have a meaningful but immoral life. However, there is nothing contradictory....about doing so. page 170 Baggani

So after all there is no compelling reason why we should hold the moral point of view.
(Note also that Nagel admits his argument does not "tell us how much we should care about people in other countries in comparison with our fellow citizens. page 68)


page 218

If we are looking for a purpose broader than our own interests, something will allow us to see our lives as possessing significance beyond the narrow confines of our own conscious state.......

But taking the moral point views can contribute to the meaning of life. For some people, yes, but is it for everyone?

Baggini
page 166

..the attempt to argue that the whole idea of 'a meaning of life" is incoherent (like the color of a symphony is literally meaningless--zero) stumbles when it comes to the meaning of meaning which concerns the importance something has, as in 'it means a lot to me'. ....it does not have meaning in itself, from neutral perspective. But it means something to us....The question is thus one about why life is of value to us, why we think it is important and worth living.

The perspective on the meaning of life differ from a person to a person.

Nagel

page 100

the trick is to keep your eyes on what's in front of you and allow justifications to come to an end inside your life, and inside the lives of others to whom you are connected.

page98

About the types of meaning that depends on relation to other people, ...If one's life has point as a part of something larger, it is still possible to ask about that larger thing, what the point of it?

page 97

But does it matter that it does not matter?"So what you might say.

page 101

....Even if life as a whole is meaningless, perhaps that's nothing to worry about. ....Part of the problem is that some of us have an incurable tendency to take ourselves seriously. We want to matter to ourselves "from the outside".....Many human efforts...get some of their energy from a sense of importance----a sense that what you are doing is not just important to you, but important in some larger sense; important....if ..the grave is its goal , perhaps it's ridiculous to take our self so seriously. ...if we can't help taking ourselves so seriously....Life may be not only meaningless but absurd.

But does it matter? Life is like that.

Baggini
page 158

My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I am happy. (Charles Sshulz Cartoonist)

....here is meaning of life. ...Well it's nothing very special. Try and be nice to people avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations.(Monthy Python's the meaning of life) page 185 Baggani

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What does it all means? Thomas Nagel
Pracrial Ethics Peter Singer
What's it all about? Julian Baggini

Assesment of Hirohito

Some of you might have read "Hirohito and the making of modern Japan" by Herbert P . Bix, winner of the purizer prize.
I like the book, but I always want to see different perspectives.

Here are some quotes of some interest for you.

page 218 Japan's love-hate relationship with the West / Sukehiro Hirakawa.

Hirohito was ready to assume responsibility. At his first meeting with MacArthur, on 27 September 194, he told the American general, according to the letter's report:

I come to you , General MacArthur, to offer myself to the judgement of the powers you represent, as the one to bear sole responsibility for every political and military decision made and action taken by my people in the conduct of war

MacArthur's reaction was:

A tremendous impression swept me. This courageous assumption of a responsibility implicit with death, a responsibility clearly belied by facts which I was full aware of, moved to the marrow of my bones. He was an Emperor by inherent birth,, but in that instant I knew I faced the First Gentleman of Japan in his own right.page 218

page 191 Enigma of the emperors : sacred subservience in Japanese history / Ben-Ami

Herbert Bix has claimed that Hirohito was the real war leader of Japan . His claim is based on the vast powers that the emperor wielded , the aggressive orders that he issued, and the militaristic persons whom he appointed. But the emperor's powers were theoretical , the appointments had been decided in advance by his advisers and the edicts had been formulated by the government and the military. Bix points out that on certain occasions Hirohito tried, behind the scenes, to manipulate development at home and on the front, but this only proves that he was not a war leader. Hitler, Starlin or Roosevelt did not need to work behind the scenes to make their will prevail. Curiously, Bix seems to embrace the theory of the pre-war Japanese nationalists, tht the emperor was the main mover of modern Japanese history, but whereas the Japanese nationalists credited the emperor with all the surceases, Bix blames him for the failures.

I don't claim nothing is conlusive in history. But I claim history is more nuanced than the way it is often dealt with politically. That is one reason why I don't like the idea of politicizing history.

Korea learns from Japan?

Japanese TV reports how Korea is "learning" from Japan.
link 1
link 2
(it seems that it was aired on July 1st and that it is the same program that reported how China copied Disney Land.)

1) A Japanese staff tried to interview manufacturers. They rejected the interviews except one company on condition it answered anonymously;"It is not exact to say it is a copy;many companies produce a smilier whisky or a beer, it is like that."

2) There was a case Japanese company sued a Korean company---the Korean company won the case, because a Japanese company failed to register the trademark rights in Korea

3)A commenter noted that Japan used to imitates things abroad and ended with the comment to the effect that she hopes Korea would develop the products unique to Korea too.

Shit stopped a train

The stool was spread out on the rapid train of JR Koube line, It was scattered over five cars. It was cleared but the smell remained so badly that the train had to stop for a while at Koube station. It affected about 4000 people. Despite the fact 1200 passengers were on the train, there was no witness. The police concluded that this was not the case of a crime. It is most likely that a person could not help it on the way to the restroom of the rear vehicle. According to JR Koube, it was exceptional case that a train was stopped running by the stool.

電車内に大便散乱、におい消えず運行休止

　ＪＲ神戸線の新快速電車車内で１日朝、５両にわたって床に大便が散乱しているのが見つかった。ＪＲ西日本は途中駅で片付けたが、においは消えず、神戸駅で急きょ運転を休止。後続の電車を含め約４０００人の足に影響が出た。約１２００人が乗車していたにもかかわらず、目撃情報はなく、同社は事件性はないと判断。後部車両のトイレに向かった乗客が途中で我慢できなくなり、立ち去った可能性が高い。同社によると、大便が原因の運休は極めて異例という。2007年7月2日Nikkan sport

1919 racial equality clause

Japanese perspective

In the First World War, Japan joined the Allied powers, but played only a minor role in fighting German colonial forces in East Asia. At the following Paris Peace Conference of 1919, Japan's proposal of amending a "racial equality clause" to the covenant of the League of Nations was rejected by the United States, Britain and Australia. Arrogance and racial discrimination towards the Japanese had plagued Japanese-Western relations since the forced opening of the country in the 1800s, and were again a major factor for the deterioration of relations in the decades preceeding World War 2. In 1924, for example, the US Congress passed the Exclusion Act that prohibited further immigration from Japan.Japan guide com

A series of coercive acts, insults, and provocations by Western imperialist countries from the 1850s to the 1930s caused great anger to fester among the Japanese people. Japan's signing of unequal treaties with America, France, Holland, and Russia in 1858 placed restrictions on Japan's national sovereignty, such as extraterritoriality, which meant that foreigners in Japan had immunity from the jurisdiction of the Japanese legal system. The 1921-22 Washington Conference naval treaties forced on Japan an unfavorable battleship ratio of 5:5:3 for the US, Britain, and Japan respectively, and the Western powers at the London Naval Conference of 1930 coerced Japan to accept the same ratio for its heavy cruisers.

Strong racial prejudice by Westerners toward Japanese, in addition to Chinese and other Asians, led to several severely insulting incidents for the Japanese people. In 1919 at the Paris Peace Conference, Western countries rejected the simple Japanese request to have a racial equality clause included in the League of Nations Covenant. In 1905, California passed anti-Japanese legislation. In the following year, the school board in San Francisco ordered Japanese and other Asian children to attend segregated schools. In 1924, America passed the Japanese Exclusion Act to shut off Japanese immigration into the US. This series of international affronts to Japanese pride and status provided fuel to the militaristic and imperialist sentiments of Japanese government leaders and ultranationalists.Japan's March Toward Militarism Bill Gordon March 2000

But that is not the whole story.

League of Nations and Racial Equality

An interesting chapter in the book “Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World” is related to Japan. Japan was on the Allied side in World War I, though it hadn’t done much fighting. The Japanese had three goals for the Paris Peace Conference after the war:
to get a clause on racial equality written into the covenant of the League of Nations, to control the north Pacific islands (the Marshalls, the Marianas and the Carolines), and to keep the German concessions in Shantung, China.(emphasis mine)

In the end, they got 2 out of their 3 aims. It says something about the major powers of the time that they didn’t get the most legitimate of their goals.

The racial equality clause was born out of the discrimination and humiliation that the Japanese faced in the West. When the Japanese made their intentions known about introducing this clause, the most vehement opposition came form Australia, which was part of the British empire delegation. Here is the British Foregin Secretary Lord Balfour about the clause:

The notion that all men were created equal was an interesting one, he found, but he did not believe it. You could scarcely say that a man in Central Africa was equal to a European.

The Japanese delegation in the Commission on the League of Nations introduced the clause as an amendment to the “religious liberty” clause. Their original version read:

The equality of nations being a basic principle of the League of Nations, the High Contracting Parties agree to accord, as soon as possible, to all alien nationals of States members of the League equal and just treatment in every respect, making no distinction, either in law or in fact, on account of their race or nationality.

This went nowhere in the Commission. However, the Japanese pressed on.

It was an issue that was very popular in Japan and very unpopular in some other places, for example, the western states of the US. Also, President Wilson wasn’t exactly an enlightened person when it came to race. An example of US conduct is that African American troops were put under French command for the Great War.

The greatest opposition, however, was from Australian Prime Minister Billy Hughes who was mortified about the future of “White Australia” if the clause was accepted. He refused all compromise attempts by the US delegate Edward House. The Prime Minister of New Zealand, William Massey, agreed with Hughes. After British efforts to reach a compromise, Hughes put a condition that he might accept the racial equality clause if it had a proviso exempting national immigration policies. The Japanese balked at that.

Finally, the Japanese delegation introduced a watered-down version which simply asked for “the principle of equality of nations and just treatment of their nationals.”

Delegates from Greece, Italy, China, France and Czechoslovakia spoke in favor of the Japanese amendment to the League Covenent. The British delegation opposed it. US President Woodrow Wilson was worried that the League of Nations Covenent might not get the support of US senators from the western states if it included the racial equality provision. (Remember that the western states had put in a lot of restrictions on Japanese immigrants at the time.) He asked the Japanese to withdraw their amendment, but the Japanese insisted on a vote.

What do you think happened next? Well, the majority of the delegates voted for the Japanese amendment. But Wilson announced that the amendment could not carry because there were strong objections to it.

See also Analyzing Japanese Imperialism　NHK


Australian perspective


The 1919 Paris Peace Conference And The Racial Equality Clause

On the April 11, in a meeting chaired by Woodrow Wilson, the Japanese delegation forced a vote. Seventeen of the eleven nations voted in favour of the racial equality provision. However, the vote was declared lost because it was not unanimous. Hughes had won. He returned to Australia triumphant.

"The White Australia is yours. You may do with it what you please, but at any rate, the soldiers have achieved the victory and my colleagues and I have brought that great principle back to you from the conference, as safe as it was on the day when it was first adopted."Immigration And Nation Building - Places

American perspective

While he did prevent the adoption of a racial equality clause for the League of Nations by requiring that all nations agree on the issue (a simple majority was needed for the rest of the covenant), he did this at the request of the Australian prime minister Billy Hughes and it was Australia that blocked its adoption (by refusing to agree to it). See: The White Australia PolicyLies My Teacher Told Me

African-American perspective
African American Views of the Japanese

A blogger supporting for Aso on the controversy over the resolution 121

A Japanese blog, Let's Blow! , has some interesting points to say about the controversy of the resolution 121 on the issue of comfort women.(Keep in mind, this blogger is a supporter of Aso,who is rumored to be next prime minister.)

1, He criticizes the blog that blames the Ad on Wapo, saying (1)it provided the English source to refer to in English for the first time , and (2)it was significant in that it asked the U.S why she had to be involved in the periodical skirmishes between Japan and China/Korea. In particular, (3)it showed Japan's determination to fight against the U.S. on history issue if necessary.

As for (3), the blogger criticizes the US congressional report, at the same time, he takes notes of the part in it.

This possibility opens up a number of uncertainties, including the potential for Japanese to counter by demanding official U.S. compensation for the U.S. napalm bombings of Japanese cities in 1945 (beginning with the massive Tokyo fire raid of March 9, 1945, which killed an estimated 80,000 or more Japanese) and the atomic bombings of August 1945CRS

That means that the U.S is aware that Japan is ready to
counterattack on the historical issue if necessary.

2 He criticizes Asahi newspaper's reaction to the committee's resolution.
Asahi says we should take it seriously on the one hand, but it forgets to mention the fact that the committee issued other resolution against China.For instance, the committee passed the resolution to allow Taiwan official to visit the U.S, to support the the Uighur human activist to release the detainee.

Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the Government of the People's Republic of China should immediately release from custody the children of Rebiya Kadeer and Canadian citizen Huseyin Celil and should refrain from further engaging in acts of cultural, linguistic, and religious suppression directed against the Uyghur people;

He asks why the hell Asahi failed to mention it while claiming that we should take the resolution seriously.

3 He also criticizes Sankei's allegation that China is in control of Honda and Lantos.
Honda and Lantos are for the resolution against China

Kyuma: Atomic bomb ended the war

UPDATE 2 It is getting more exciting. Kyuma aplogized
for his statement, Abe still defends him, but Ozawa, the leader of the opposing party,demands Abe that Abe should have a meeting with the U.S., asking her to apologize for the indiscriminate bombings on Japan. Abe refuted it in anger.
I hope no skirmishes with the U.S. will happen.

UPDATE It seems the opposing parties will be exploiting his statement to the full. And Abe is defending him-----That make it highly likely that LDP will lose the election and that will be the end of Abe. Abe should have fired him earlier.

TOKYO - Japan's defense minister said the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan during World War II "couldn't be helped," a news report said Saturday.

"The bombing ended the war, and I think that couldn't be helped," Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma was quoted as saying in a speech by Kyodo News agency.

Japan is the only nation to have suffered a nuclear attack, when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki near the end of World War II.AP

As I wrote elsewhere I don't like this guy, but I don't think the article conveys what he is saying.

中日新聞

　久間章生防衛相は３０日、千葉県柏市の麗沢大で講演し、先の大戦での米国の原爆投下について「長崎に落とされ悲惨な目に遭ったが、あれで戦争が終わったんだという頭の整理で、しょうがないなと思っている。それに対して米国を恨むつもりはない」と述べた。

　米国が旧ソ連の日本への参戦を食い止めるため原爆を投下した側面があるとの見方を示し「日本が負けると分かっているのにあえて原爆を広島と長崎に落とし、終戦になった。幸い北海道が占領されずに済んだが、間違うと北海道がソ連に取られてしまった」と指摘。

　また「勝ち戦と分かっている時に原爆まで使う必要があったのかどうかという思いは今でもしているが、国際情勢、戦後の占領状態などからすると、そういうことも選択としてはあり得るということも頭に入れながら考えなければいけない」と述べた。
（共同）

"Atomic bombing on Nagasaki was tragic but the war ended with it---that is the perception one must hold in my opinion. I have no grudge against the U.S.

Pointing out the fact there is an aspect that the atomic bombs were used to stop Soviet invasion, " The U.S. dropped the bombs, knowing that Japan would be surely defeated (without them), and the war ended. Fortunately Hokkaido was not occupied; In the worst case Soviet would haven stolen Hokkaido.

I still have a doubt if it was necessary to drop the bombs when the victory (for the allies) was obvious, but we need to take into account the fact that it was one of the plausible optoins, considering then international reality and the state of the post-war occupation.

In my reading, he is not saying his histroical view on whether atomic bombs ended the war, but he is expressing his veiw on how to think about it, how the attitude toward it should be in order not to hold grudge against the U.S.

His thought is confused. You don't need to hold grudge against the U.S. granted that the atomic bombs were strategecally unnecessary and morally wrong.
Rather my guess is that some of his generation has a complex sentiments against the U.S.and so he had to reason confusedly when it comes to the topic that is still hurting him.