Imperialism

I have always been a fan of Japan. I have been there four times, including on my honeymoon. I even had the pleasure of living for a year in Kyoto working at Kyoto University. It is, in many ways, a wonderful place and I do hope to go back when time and money permit. I even am teaching my son what little Japanese language I still remember.

But there are always strange undercurrents in Japan. Korean and Chinese friends of mine cannot understand why I ever would visit Japan. They have an anger towards Japan that Americans have a hard time understanding. The presence of the yakuza (Japanese mafia) in Japan is omnipresent, once you are aware of it, which seems strange for an otherwise so law abiding nation. When World War II comes up in conversation, many Japanese still think Japan was justified in its imperialism and that America should apologize for the nuclear bombings and for the occupation. It is a constant source of scandal that Japanese leaders frequently downplay and misrepresent Japanese imperialism in Asia. I was amazed at how unresolved WW II seems in Japan and in Asia.

Originally Posted on Citizen Orange

I was excited to find out over the weekend that David Neiwart, through his own blog and a cross-post on Firedoglake linked to me and others in the pro-migrant blogosphere in the last post of his three-part series on immigration:

The blogosphere can have a role in this change as well. There is a wealth of blogs out there dealing with immigration and Latino issues on a regular basis, and many of them feature not just important perspectives that need to be part of the conversation, but compelling and powerful writing as well.

A sampling: Migra Matters, Latina Lista, Matt Ortega,Immigration Prof Blog, The Silence of our Friends, Citizen Orange, The Unapologetic Mexican ... well, the list is long, and this one is certainly incomplete. But you get the idea. [ Source :David Neiwart]

I encourage you to use my blogroll on the right to complete that list, but now that he's finished his series I thought I'd use it as an opportunity to insert my own commentary, and hopefully build or hone on what was a massive and ambitious undertaking for Neiwart. Neiwart wrote three posts. One introducing his series, a second debunking a lot of the anti-migrant myths that exist, and a third with proposals about how to move forward.

While the first two posts were informative, I'm going to spend my time on Dave's third post, "Immigration: Looking Forward". This post is the second major migrant manifesto to emerge out of the blogosphere, coming after Duke's post that garnered a front-page spot on Daily Kos. In his post, Neiwart outlines what a "liberal program for comprehensive immigration reform" would contain:

Australia Says Sorry to Stolen Generation

Apology Speech by Kevin Rudd 13th February 2008 to the Stolen Generation.

Part 1. A little History
Part 2. Personal Interviews
Part 3. Footage from Australian supporters
Part 4. Apology Speech by Kevin Rudd

The Stolen Generation is a term used to describe the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, who were removed from their families by Australian government agencies and church missions, under various state acts of parliament, denying the rights of parents and making all Aboriginal children wards of the state, between approximately 1869 and 1969. The policy typically involved the removal of children into internment camps, orphanages and other institutions.

I have been moved to tears by the incredible gesture of Australia's Parliament under their new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd.

Eleven years ago a study was published under the title Bringing Them Home | "Report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families". The study was the height of a coalition of Aboriginal groups and human rights organizations who had fought for years to force the Australian government to blow the lid off the years of its genocidal policy against Aboriginal Australians.

It is an organization clothed in power. From its ranks comes a disproportionate share of the United States establishment – Presidents, cabinet secretaries, ambassadors, captains of industry, generals, professors, princes of the earth. Its real estate holdings are worth billions, its buildings are conspicuous in the choicest districts of great cities and small towns. Its art collection is beyond price. Its leaders sit in the councils of state, of war, of finance, and of culture, direct armies, order their global affairs to their liking; their counsel is sought, their word is heeded. It has been powerful for centuries, and owes its ultimate allegiance to the British Crown.

On the other side of the equation are the sworn enemies of this powerful entity. Emancipated, but only just, from discarded colonialism, they are black and brown, fighters for freedom in some of the most downtrodden and exploited backwaters of empires gone by. They are poor, desperately so, and still they feed the hungry, bless the lonely, comfort the lepers. And today, they have risen in revolt against the imperialist dominance of this metropolitan entity in defense of their own values and their own way of life. This revolt is complicated, because these black and brown defenders of their own culture depend on a constant stream of money from the American center to fund themselves. Indeed, they are willing to cut off the stream of money that keeps them in bondage to alien ideas perilous to their indigenous way of life.