The "J word" Discussion (1 Viewer)

[marco55]

In the US the term "black" at least where I live is used to describe people of African decent,no one else.The people of African decent that I know call themselves black not African just like I don't call myself European but white.
Mark

 

[The Military Workshop]

So if a group isn't represented here, we can call them anything we want? Do we have African American members? If not, do we start using the "N word"? I am just bot buying this argument. What the Japanese did to the allies and to the Chinese is unspeakable, but those who participated in those actions are not the majority - they weren't then and certainly aren't now. What the Germans did to the Jews, gypsies, etc is equally awful, but I for one have zero issues with modern day Germany and it's citizens and don't call them derogatory names due to what their ancestors did.


This also never made sense to me - if you personally don't like the discussion or don't want to participate, it sure is easy not to. Discussions are what makes the world go round. Just because a topic is controversial or makes people uncomfortable doesn't mean it should be ignored and doesn't mean we should just move on and not discuss them. This is not a PC issue - it's a matter if respect and what is proper and what is not. I am not saying there is a 100% right answer...which is why we discuss

Could you please focus.

It is only you, Brad and Bradley who keep raising the issue of insulting modern Japanese. As has been repeatedly said by me and others none of this discussion has anything to do with post war Japanese. If you and others want to take offense, over one word, on behalf of others who do not appear to be here that is fine. I repeat, nobody has insulted modern day Japanese here. As I see it the context is in relation to WW2 Japanese and I think we can safely say none of that era is likely to be here either.

If you want to refer to WW2 Japanese as Japanese that is fine. However is it really necessary to have the issue of racism raised because somebody used the word Jap. I think it is an over reaction.

However just to make sure you understand my position. I consider the Japanese army in 1930's China and throughout Asia during WW2 to have been totally without honour as an organisation. They engaged in mass murder, rape of hundreds of thousands of civilians, horrendous torture of POWS, bayonetting of nurses, barbaric medical experiments etc. This is not a matter of not being PC or lack of respect. I totally have zero respect for their reputation during that period. And you and others are offended by the use of the word Jap !

Please also understand it is not a matter of not liking the discussion or being made uncomfortable. My issue is with thought police telling me or others we can't call WW2 Japanese "Japs". Now if it is OK with you and Brad and Bradley, if I or others choose to use the word Jap as a short form (even without a capital J), as a generic WW2 term, or even in a derogatory manner (towards the WW2 soldiers) can we not have a lecture on appropriate behaviour every time it happens whether with intent or not. It is PC to the extreme.

 

[The Military Workshop]

Not so. The term was current in Western usage long before WWII, going back to the West's earliest contacts with Japan, and its context was always racist in nature, a denigration of "the yellow race". Japanese residents here in the US, including American citizens of Japanese ancestry, were called "Japs" long before Japan went to war with us.

In a historical context, I have no problem with the term, or any other, as for example in a quote of a conversation between Marines in the Pacific during the war. But if you have a model of a Zero and you post, "Here's my Jap Zero", it's as if you posted a model of an Israeli Merkava and said, "Here's my kike tank." That kind of use is a gratuitous insult that has no place in reasoned discussion, whatever personal experience one may have had.

I think it is all in the context of how it is used. If I am talking about the Japanese in WW2 then probably the context is not positive.

Some may recall a few years ago an Aussie forum member used the word "Pom". I think it was in a cricket thread. Somebody reported it and the moderator deleted it and left the reason as rude or insulting.

I have been in Australia for 19 years and am considered a "Pom" (ie. from UK). I have never taken it as an insult because in any conversation where it has been used it was not in a manner I considered insulting. I actually wrote to the Mods to express my shock that it had been considered an insult. I thought the person who reported it was being a bit "precious". I have however seen it used online towards me, by a moron, when it was clearly intended as an insult.

I am getting the feeling Americans are much more sensitive over these issues than perhaps Australians and Brits are. If I heard "Here's my Jap Zero" at a modelling show it would not raise an eyebrow. It would be regarded as short form. I doubt an Australian could have come up with the word kike or something similarly derogatory towards an Israeli or Jew. Other than movies and rap songs on the radio the N word just does not come up in my world. Not many African Americans or Jews in Brisbane and even if there were would not be using those terms.

I just looked back and noted the four people who used the word Jap were two from UK and two from Oz. I suggest you Americans lighten up and forgive us colonials as you guys live with this sensitivity far more than we do.

 

[bradleyl30]

It looks like I missed a lot in the last 12 hours, but Tom hit the nail on the head for me. I brought this topic up as a question, "Should we...?"

For me, self-awareness is an imperative. I need to stop and ask myself hard questions on a regular basis. I respect this forum and its members, and that is why I brought it up as a question.

I choose not to use it, but totally understand those who do and why they do. As said, we has humans must evolve and asking difficult questions and having difficult discussions is part of the process.

Respectfully yours,

Larry

Guys,

I think if more people on a whole would have discussions about hard topics in a productive manner, we would all benefit.

TD

 

[bradleyl30]

I think anyone who is involved in the study of history has to be able to separate past events from the present. My grandfather hated a lot of people for a variety of reasons. He hated the Russians/Ukrainians because he lived through the pogroms, he hated the Turks because they tried to prevent his family from fleeing the pogroms, he hated the Germans because they killed so many of our people, he hated the Japanese because he fought them in the Pacific, and, in his old age, he disliked other groups because he was a bit racist. I grew up with real hate for Germany and the other groups that hurt (or tried to hurt) my family. It took a while, but in 10th grade, I convinced my family to host a German exchange student, and I later spent some time with him in Germany. I guess you just have to realize that being German is not what made the Nazis do what they did. In fact, anyone could do the same, given the right circumstances. That is why we all have to do our best to resist hate within ourselves. If that means refraining from using certain words, so be it. If that means trying not to hate those who use those words, I think that does a lot of good, too.

Great post.

 

[Terp152]

A retired USN vet, told me this week, that anyone joining the SeaBees used to be required to watch the John Wayne movie "The Fighting Seabees. Not anymore, not PC enough. Those offended by use of the word Jap probably applaud that action. Chris

 

[theBaron]

Could you please focus.

It is only you, Brad and Bradley who keep raising the issue of insulting modern Japanese...

I am focusing, and I invite you to focus on my post. I said nothing about referring to contemporary Japanese or to Japanese from the Thirties. My point is that "Jap" is inappropriate in anything but a historical context, and I also gave an example to illustrate that even when talking about a historical subject, it can be used inappropriately. I don't think your example of Pommies is a valid counterargument, because that doesn't have the same strength behind it. It's equivalent to calling Americans Yanks, Canadians Canucks, Frenchmen Frenchies. Or equivalent to the German "Amis" for Americans. And as far as the generation that fought WWII goes, yes, we understand if they choose to use the term, but that doesn't make it any more appropriate for use in reasoned discourse, such as in this forum.

 

[marco55]

Just had my DNA done by Ancestry.com.Don't really know how accurate it is but I did it for fun, it said I was as follows;
Great Britain 46%
Ireland 15%
Western Europe 23%
Scandanavia 2%
Iberian Peninsula 2%
Italian/Greek 11%
Middle East 1%
pretty diverse,the Italian/Greek really surprised me
My cousin also did it and she was more diverse than me having Eastern European Jewish,Caucasus mtns,North African.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that were all pretty diverse and better watch who we insult as it might be ourselves.
Mark

 

[zblang]

Be curious to know how many here who are on the side that "Jap" is ok are part of a minority. Overall, it makes no difference, but just curious

 

[Napoleon1er]

The word Nanking says it all for me, far more than Jap".

I completely understand your point here: it still angers me that japan has not apologized for its horrible crimes against humanity. That said, I do not to hold this against the vast majority of Japanese people, most of whom were born long after the war.

Here is a test. You are a WW2 American pilot and are going to survive a crash landing in Germany or Japan. Who would you choose to be captured by ?

Japan. Do you know what they did to Jewish POWs?

 

[zblang]

Comparing who is worse, Nazis or Japanese seem insane to me!

Like Sandor alluded to - the Germans made it clear that any Jewish service man or woman would be captured and killed (and many times worse)

 

[Go for Broke]

Great thread guys. After reading all this, it seems to me, the most villainous people is picked based on one's history with these bad guys. After all, the world has had many, many really bad people, Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, Mao, Tojo, etc. and that's just recent history.
My parents were born in the territory of Hawaii. My uncles fought the Germans in Italy and France during WWII. Other uncles fought in Korea and Vietnam. I am very patriotic to the USA, as American as apple pie, except I have slanty eyes.
Maybe, because people look or sound different, we have a mistrust about them.

Chris, nothing wrong with the Fighting SeaBees movie. One of my favorites growing up.

 

[lancer]

I completely understand your point here: it still angers me that japan has not apologized for its horrible crimes against humanity. That said, I do not to hold this against the vast majority of Japanese people, most of whom were born long after the war.



Japan. Do you know what they did to Jewish POWs?

An American or British PoW had a much better chance of survival in German hands as opposed to being in Japanese hands. Of Americans captured by the Japanese, 33% died (some sources state as high as 40%), of British, 25%. As prisoners of the Germans, 3.5% of British prisoners died. American % is even lower. Obviously, the Japanese were much harder on Americans and British prisoners than the Germans ever were. -- Al

 

[bradleyl30]

A retired USN vet, told me this week, that anyone joining the SeaBees used to be required to watch the John Wayne movie "The Fighting Seabees. Not anymore, not PC enough. Those offended by use of the word Jap probably applaud that action. Chris

I am a big fan of the Duke and most of his movies. Some of the quotes in the 70s that recently surfaced did make me cringe, but again there is time context. I have had some views that I later regretted, for sure.

I do not have any context of how the Fighting SeaBees movie was used, or why it was dropped so it is hard to have a strong opinion about it. I did try google searching for a story about it, but came up empty. I like the movie.

 

[ivanmoe]

Some WW2-era "Germans:"

Anyone having trouble picking "the kraut" out of the lineup? I certainly wouldn't believe so. In fact, reducing one or all of the other three to a "kraut" could be considered a slander of sorts. It certainly wouldn't address the behavior or associations of the individuals appropriately. In fact, it would be completely misleading.

When it comes to the "no-goodskie," however, the term can actually be fairly useful. It suggests, at very least, that the gentlemen is worthy of further scrutiny. At that point, if an honest broker wants to suggest that he's just another "German soldier following orders"' so be it. For the less astute observer, however, a rhetorical head's up, again, had/has a role to serve in delineating friends from a possible foe.

Finally, lets consider a contemporaneous figure:

So, you're having lunch in an upscale, Los Angeles restaurant. In glides Heidi Klum. Your lunch companion notices her first, and comments, "hey, look, it's the kraut supermodel!" Your brow furrows, and you think to yourself, "that's not a very useful characterization." You'd likely not give it a great deal more thought, excepting the possibility that your chum needs to broaden his vocabulary. You see, Heidi is simply too far removed from the no-goodskie, above, to be considered in the same thought, or, by extension, through utterance. Oh, and thank God that Heidi didn't hear what your friend called her!

-Moe

It wasn't easy to find a pic of Ms Klum's upper quarter, BTW, so go easy on my selection!

 

[nysoldiers]

Thanks for the lively discussion....
Takes my mind off the pathetic and embarrassing presidential campaigns!!!

 

[LTC PaulN]

... I came to talk about Naps. Can we still talk about them without hurting anybody's feelings??!!??

 

[jazzeum]

Thanks for the lively discussion....
Takes my mind off the pathetic and embarrassing presidential campaigns!!!

This trumps that campaign for sure ^&grin

 

[bradleyl30]

... I came to talk about Naps. Can we still talk about them without hurting anybody's feelings??!!??

Hahahaha! Just not this thread! Start your own!

 

[Colonel RNZIR]

I think it is all in the context of how it is used. If I am talking about the Japanese in WW2 then probably the context is not positive.

Some may recall a few years ago an Aussie forum member used the word "Pom". I think it was in a cricket thread. Somebody reported it and the moderator deleted it and left the reason as rude or insulting.

I have been in Australia for 19 years and am considered a "Pom" (ie. from UK). I have never taken it as an insult because in any conversation where it has been used it was not in a manner I considered insulting. I actually wrote to the Mods to express my shock that it had been considered an insult. I thought the person who reported it was being a bit "precious". I have however seen it used online towards me, by a moron, when it was clearly intended as an insult.

I am getting the feeling Americans are much more sensitive over these issues than perhaps Australians and Brits are. If I heard "Here's my Jap Zero" at a modelling show it would not raise an eyebrow. It would be regarded as short form. I doubt an Australian could have come up with the word kike or something similarly derogatory towards an Israeli or Jew. Other than movies and rap songs on the radio the N word just does not come up in my world. Not many African Americans or Jews in Brisbane and even if there were would not be using those terms.

I just looked back and noted the four people who used the word Jap were two from UK and two from Oz. I suggest you Americans lighten up and forgive us colonials as you guys live with this sensitivity far more than we do.

Well said Brett,
As a recently retired combat soldier, I haven't heard much twaddle in years.
When we were out in the desert, it was the Americans who use to call the insurgents, the R word.
I am an eight generation New Zealander, we have been here since 1798.
I am also very proud to be 1/8th Maori, it doesn't bother me if I get called, black.
There appear to be a few chaps on here that would do well in the United Nations, all talk and never accomplish anything,
and I speak with experience on that, Bosnia 1996, I was there.
Who will be upset next.