How BAD Should Japan Feel For It's War Crimes?

A recent discovery has re-sparked a debate about whether Japan should feel more guilty about the atrocities committed by Imperial Japan during World War II. And David, the internet is going crazy. Yeah man, you want to talk about a silly to serious, more serious topic. Chinese archaeologists have uncovered an underground horror bunker that was purportedly used by Japanese scientists to conduct experiments on human subjects during World War II. Andrew, this made the comment section on Instagram, you know, various forums, Reddit, just go crazy with so many different opinions. Because apparently, Japan, they don't really teach about the atrocities that Imperial Japan committed during World War II. And a lot of people still feel some type of way about it affecting relations in Asia, potentially even amongst Asian Americans. Yeah, we're going to talk about it. Please hit that like button. Check out other episodes of the Hot Pop Boys. David, before we get into the comment section, I will say, I think that this is more of an Asia matter than it is Asian American. I'm not saying that Asian Americans don't feel some type of way, especially like depending on your age. Right, right. The 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90-year-olds, for sure, they feel it more viscerally and less every generation, right? Exactly. I would say for me growing up, because I didn't have any family that was directly involved, our family was out of China at that time. They're not from Nanjing or- Exactly, right, out of those zones that really got hit hard. And I would say like, I would joke and rip on Japanese kids and Japanese kids would say stuff back. And so it was kind of a roast, but I wouldn't say I got super serious, but that's just my experience. And I think that other families obviously have a range. Right. And I mean, I guess the younger kids, Andrew, the more and more generations you get removed from like horrible incidents in World War II, it seems like people still know about it, but they joke about it because it didn't impact them, right? And this is really more of a divisive issue in Asia with Asia relations, like between China and Japan. But I do think that even Asian America hasn't fully decided how to talk about this, to be honest. Yeah, yeah, I would say so. Yeah. So anyway, guys, like I said, we're not historians. I never studied this formally. I do know some things. We don't always bat a thousand. But here is a chart of all the countries that Japan invaded during World War II. Andrew, when I went on the NextShark comments section, there was so many personal stories from Filipinos whose grandparents were mayors of Filipino cities who got murdered by the Imperial Japanese, Chinese people whose families, they said, oh, my grandpa lost everything. Korean people who said my grandpa was in prison for 10, 20, 30 years. Somebody said it's a hopper whose white grandfather fought against the Japanese in Tarawa, which is an island in Micronesia. I mean, there are so many personal stories that popped up and you can never tell people how to feel about it, right? Like, how can you tell people how to process these things if it happened to somebody directly in their family? Yeah, for sure. And I like I said, every family is different. For example, Andrew, our dad growing up had a friend from Hubei, China, and his brother was killed in bombings by Imperial Japan. And I'll tell you this, Andrew, that guy, he did not like Japanese people. No, he wouldn't even buy Toyotas or Hondas. Somebody said, look at all these things happen. Yet people question why these Asian groups such as Chinese, Korean, Filipinos bear so much resentment towards them. Basically, this is where there was a lot of arguments started. Yeah, I do think it's really your generation and how directly your family was impacted. But a lot of families were impacted by civil war, whether that was in China or Vietnam, right? So your family could have been harmed even by your own people, right? So I'm not here to tell people not to feel that type of way. But obviously, I do think, yeah, it also depends on how you feel when you visit Japan. Because I'll be honest, when you go to Japan, you don't feel like they committed a bunch of atrocities. Right, right, right. As much as it's messed up that they don't teach the students about it, they also don't teach them that the attempted colonization of Asia in the 1930s was a good thing. Right. And they also like people in Japan generally are very nice, right? So maybe you can say that they're nice is trying to mask something deep down. But I'm just saying on a practical level, if you ask most people, they're like, oh, I enjoyed my time in Japan. Right, right, right. And I think that that's what complicates it. And we're going to get into that later. Somebody said, all this stuff happened 80 to 100 years ago. That generation is pretty much 99% all gone. The new generation has nothing to do with it. Why do we keep thinking about it as Asians? So here's a question. Does history repeat itself? And do you have to know history in order not to repeat itself? So the question is, if you don't teach Japanese citizens and students about this type of stuff, is there a chance that they're still going to feel superior to other Asians? And then they'll also want to look down and be condescending and then possibly do something horrible in the future. Right. And that goes back to the rearming of Japan as a military structure and everything like that. And these threads are like 10,000 comments deep. But they go way more into like niche stuff that, to be honest, I'm just not that interested in reading myself personally. Somebody said, man, it was the older generation. Let it go. And someone says, but how come the older generation still holds it against people for the Holocaust? And they educate about that. But Japan doesn't educate about their, I guess, Asia Holocaust. Right. Exactly. So it's like, I don't know. Also in America, does that mean like young white, like you can't say anything about white people? You know what I mean? So that's the whole debate, I guess. And you know what it does? It does because this is a World War II thing. And that happened like within this century. It's, I guess you can relate it to things that have happened in America. Yeah, because some people, you know, there are still some people alive who went through this history, like more personally, right? Somebody said they have to educate people like the way Germans did. Germany was still able to move forward and be an advanced and polite and good country. And they were able to apologize. Why does Japan act like apologizing and feeling guilt for all the bad stuff they did during World War II will make, will set them back? That's a pretty good perspective. I would say that Germany still has a very strong economy. It doesn't seem like that them apologizing. Obviously, I'm not. They are culturally different. I think Western people deal with with shame and embarrassment differently. Yeah, yeah, I guess so. I'm not sure. But there was, David, that one Japanese AV star, a porn star who came out a few years ago and was offering like sex to Chinese students to pay back for the atrocities. And I don't know if that was just for publicity. But let me tell you this. The Chinese Internet love the idea of it. Yeah, like we said, guys, the younger generation, man, they're a lot more playful with things and I don't think that's wrong either, because, dude, everybody, it's like got a different perspective in a different they went through different things in life. Somebody said, what's worse that Japan did these horrible atrocities and all this like virus and like toxic testing on people? Or is it even worse that America offered pardons to the Japanese scientists and war criminals for the results in shared info? Yeah, you know, stuff like this. I'm not happy about any of it. But it's also like this war, like military geopolitical stuff that I understand. I don't fully understand that. It's kind of like above my head. You know what I mean? All we can act is is act based on what we've experienced, how we feel like we want to represent our family's lineage and how we want to act in the moment. Some old white guy said, come on, guys, let's not act like that. That would not be a practical desire of any country to want the info for the future. All countries are the same. Trying to gain an advantage in warfare. I mean, there's some logic to what I think. I think war is ugly. Every aspect of war is ugly and it doesn't always make sense to a citizen. Yo, you know what the crazy thing is? And like, listen, guys, I don't want to get too brutal. The some of the base research in the 1930s that came out of Japan for LASIK, the base research came on very brutal torture and experimentation on Chinese bodies. But then it was crazy because some Chinese scientists ended up getting a lot of LASIK patents in the future. I'm just saying, guys, history is really, really complicated. And you know, when you know weird stuff like this. So anyway, Andrew, let us get into some bigger arguments. I do not want to get caught in the weeds of all these horrific things of Unit 731. You guys can look into it if you want. I'm not saying it's invalid. I'm just saying I personally don't spend a ton of time myself looking into those grotesque, grotesque details. Somebody said Asia would have a lot more unity in 2023 if Japan would have apologized and then we all could have moved forward as friends and started sharing information and we could have more of a, you know, a better society with more unity instead of beating at each other's throats all the time. Yeah, I do think again, I think this is drawing a rift between more governments and especially China that's very proud and coming up and more powerful than Japan at this moment. And they're saying like, oh, Japan doesn't even want to acknowledge this. Like, yeah, Japan, you don't want to admit that you did all these bad things. Well, guess what? We can only be this level of friends unless you do. Is that fair for a government to demand that? Right, right, right. Because Chinese government, the Chinese government, they do look back at history. Like, they're not forgetful. Right, right, right. It's a very historical centric society. Somebody said all those PlayStations, Pokemon and animes were paid for with the blood of their Asian neighbors. I don't know. I think they were doing like kind of anime like cartoons already. Yeah, I'm not going to lie. If you do take a look at the artwork from Japan, even like 300, 400 years ago, it was looking different than the rest of Asia. What was really weird was like I saw a video of of 1930s Japan, like one of the first like, you know, videos of it. And from the videos, it looked very similar to how like Japan is nowadays. So I just think there might have been a humongous disconnect between what the imperial army was doing and what the emperor wanted versus just what the citizens were doing. Yeah, we never know, guys. Like we said, we're not historians. I don't bat a thousand, guys. You know, I don't think anybody does. I just, you know, do the research that I can. Somebody said Imperial Japan was inspired by Western European colonization and the westward expansion in the USA, the manifest destiny to push westward. I don't know. I think that's true. I actually think that's true. I've read that before. Like I said, guys, I'm not an expert on this topic. Somebody said, listen, guys, there was a separation between the government, the citizens, the citizens that are controlled by the government and turn into soldiers, the citizens who are just living their village lives at home, just very compartmentalized. Each of these sectors is different. How can we blame an entire people for anything? Yeah, that's true. I mean, you can apply this to everything. China, COVID, everything. You know what I mean? Somebody said, well, Japan has changed and changed pretty quickly after losing the war. Honestly, there's a whole Dave Chappelle joke about this, about how the USA nuclear bombed the samurai into Hello Kitty. Yeah. I mean, I think that, like I said, going back to my point is like we even when you're a non-Japanese person and you visit Japan and maybe I didn't live there. And, you know, we do have family. They actually grew up in Japan. Yeah. But but I didn't like try to become Japanese. But from what I've heard, you don't face it's not like uncomfortable being there. Like you might face some discrimination because you're just like different than everybody else and you're not fully Japanese. But it's like a very pleasant place to go. And then also, I think all the Asians hating on Japan. I don't think that's really I don't think in a way it's that bad because I don't really think it's turned or manifested into anything negative. So so while I mean, is that while you at home might be like, man, I hate Japanese people, man, I'm Korean, I hate Japanese, but I'm Chinese. I hate Japanese people. But it's like but like there's no like crimes against Japanese people. You know what I mean? Right. I mean, listen, guys, this is a super complicated subject. And like I said, it matters how old you are, what your family went through, how they communicated those stories to you, how they told you to feel about those stories that happened within your family. Let's get into the takeaways. Andrew, like I said, this is such a complicated topic to talk about. David, David, let's answer the question. Should Japan teach their students about the atrocities, which will end up making a lot of the students feel guilty in some way? Yeah. Should they do it? Okay. Moralistically, they should have been teaching the students about the atrocities of Imperial Japan. But now that they haven't, I do not see any realistic pathway forward for them to start doing it. So I think the rest of Asia, whether that's Asian America, and you're just joking about it, or Asians in Asia that rightfully so take this way more serious should operate off the prediction that they're not going to. Oh, so just operate, move forward, like Japan is not going to do it. And maybe even if they do apologize, send out like, let's say they send out an official apology, right? Right. Like, in a way, what is that fully going to do? I'm not saying it won't show some face, because I'm sure China would appreciate it. And the Chinese would appreciate it. I'm sure the Philippines would appreciate it. Yeah. And they probably should. They should. Yeah. I mean, I think some of these historical questions that people get fired up about, and like we said, there's a variance, right? Some people get fired up. Some people, like you said, when you were in middle school, just joked about it. It's very, very tough to answer some of these questions, because there's a lot of bad history between a lot of groups of people. However, even though human nature is greedy and self-interested and tribal, it is true that some groups, Andrew, were way more effective at executing on their evil plans against each other. Yeah. And I think one of the things that kind of makes people still feel a type of way towards Japanese people or towards that period of Japan, obviously, is that Japan ended up being this very strong, advanced economy and having all these cool things that everybody loves. Right. Like, everybody loves the anime and all the cartoon style and the mixture of between East and West that they have there post-World War II and things. And not every country ended up going all the way up like Japan did. Like, not every other country ended up on an equal playing field as Japan. So they feel, and I guess it's just human nature to feel like, yo, I'm still mad about that, partially also because I'm not in as good of a situation as Japan is. Right. Now, I think that there's a lot of reasons why that is. Do you think it's possible that they took the energy from their superiority complex at that time, and instead of focusing it outwards and brutalizing other countries, they just internalized it to try to make Japan internally really cool? Oh, you mean after World War II, they said, oh, yeah, so like, we caused some trouble, but we are going to take that energy and look inward. Yeah. Type thing. Yeah. I mean, I think so. I do still think a lot of people, a lot of older Japanese people, low key, still have a superiority complex. I think that, to be honest, I got this crazy story, Andrew. We used to have a worker for us whose grandfather was in Nanjing. And to be honest, I don't know what he did. I don't want to accuse him of anything, but I'm sure he was at least around from some horrific, horrific things. And I'll tell you this, this Japanese worker was so Japanese because he was from Hawaii, Andrew. He was still kind of proud that Japan almost took over China. But you have to understand the implications of that, how many people were killed in that and how many more people would have been killed. But I at that point had a moment, like a fork in the road of how I was going to react. Right. And I had a moment of pause. And then I realized, listen, guys, the past is the past. I can't control what you were taught by your grandfather. And it's not fully relevant to the Asian Americans struggle, you know, because we're all going to be thrown in one pot. So I kind of was the bigger man and just decided to move forward in that and really not to think too much of it. Yeah, I think that's why you need to have common bonds that can supersede these type of histories, because if you only base things on the horrific history, then you can't be friends with a lot of people. Right. Then you're even friends with yourself, right? Like you're going to be like, oh, the North versus the South. Yeah, I can't. We can't be friends with Taiwanese people or like Southern Vietnamese can't be friends with the Northern Vietnamese. Like, you know, I'm saying if you look at history that way, I'm not saying forget about history, but at some point you have to bond over something more current and more relevant to your personal life. Yeah, I would say for all the people who enjoy listing off all the atrocities that the Japanese did, which I think are totally valid, you're valid to know, look into the depth of those things to a 10 out of 10 level. Some people I think minimum should know it to a three or four out of 10 level is that you should also be trying to build people up and unify people and share things and how we could learn from each other to make everybody stronger or better as well. Yeah, but you can't just have the negative divisive side and not have the belief in maybe some shared common values or something. Yeah. Also, I mean, you know, if Japan, if you perceive like Japan to have been such a successful, but also like evil country at a time, what made them successful? And then maybe look at that and be influenced by that rather than the evil things that they did. I guess what I'm saying is don't forget, but don't forget to forgive and move forward to or at least move forward. Even if forgive, I could totally, you know, like I said, it's family to family, country to country. It depends. I guess I could see if forgiveness is not in you, but we got to move forward. All right, everybody, let us know in the comments down below what you think about all this guys. I know it can be complicated again. I think it mostly comes down to your family and how directly affected they were. If you had a grandparent or grandfather that personally went through it, I can understand, you know, but I think for a lot of people, there's other things that we can look at that can make us better and not divide us in this sense. Yeah, I mean, I just take a look at America right now. And, you know, there's always been, let's be honest, a rift between white and black people. A lot of people say rightfully so. But sometimes you would like to say, you know, and it's not that you can ever undo what happened, but like, how do we move forward? I don't know. Like I said, guys, let us know in the comments section below. I think it's really complicated. Until next time, we're the Hopper Boys. We out. Peace.