Sokar wrote:While I acknowledge that the Japanese as a society have yet to properly deal with their wartime history, much the same could be said for any number of nations the US included. We have a number of shameful incidents sprinkled throughout our history that rival any of the atrocities committed by Japan during the war.
Something similar to the Rape of Nanking? Similar to the systematic genocide of Chinese and Koreans? A death toll in World War II double that of Hitler's concentration camps? The US maybe (very slight maybe) killed that many Native Americans over the course of the settlement of the continent, but certainly not in 7 years. The Spanish Inquisition (a particular favorite around here) had maybe one-one hundredth of a percent of the deaths in three centuries as Japan did in 7 years.
This does not absolve them, nor us, of our lapse, but I don't think you should condem a truly important work of cinema just out of spite for the land that created it. GotF has a powerful message in it, one more people need to see and understand so that we don't keep repeating thoes self same 'shameful incidents' that bring about so much pain and suffering for our fellow men.
I'll admit I'm not sure what's being talked about here, but Japan does have a shocking capacity to ignore its past atrocities, going so far as to claim that the only significant part of World War II was the dropping of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs, ignoring the invasion of Machukuo, the war with the Kuonmintang, Pearl Harbor, Nanking, the Phillippines, and the entire rest of the war.
Sorry to bring this back up, but it's a somewhat touchy subject for me.
