Saturday, April 23, 2005
An excerpt from an article in the Washington Post by editor Fred Hiatt about the current hoo-haa over history textbooks:
"Some Japanese demonstrate against politicians who won't go to Yasukuni Shrine - where Japan's war dead, including some who were judged war criminals, are honoured - while other Japanese demonstrate against politicians who do go.
Compare this to the situation in Premier Wen's China. There is only one acceptable version of history, at least at any given time; history often changes, but only when the Communist Party decides to change it.
For example, according to a report by Howard W. French in The New York Times last December, many textbooks don't mention that anyone died at what the outside world knows as the 1989 massacre of student demonstrators near Tiananmen Square. One 1998 text notes only that 'the Central Committee took action in time and restored calm'. Anyone who challenges the official fiction is subject to harsh punishment, including beatings, house arrest or imprisonment.
And if the 300,000 victims of the Nanjing Massacre are slighted in some Japanese textbooks, what of the 30 million Chinese who died in famines created by Mao Zedong's lunatic Great Leap Forward between 1958 and 1962? No mention in Chinese texts; didn't happen.
Well, you might say, how a nation treats its internal history is less relevant to its qualifications for the Security Council than whether it teaches its children honestly about its wars with other nations.
A dubious proposition, but no matter; as the Times found in its review of textbooks, Chinese children do not learn of their nation's invasion of Tibet (1950) or aggression against Vietnam (1979). And they are taught that Japan was defeated in World War II by Chinese communist guerillas; Pearl Harbor, Iwo Jima and Midway don't figure.
'Facing up to history squarely' isn't easy for any country. Americans don't agree on how to remember the Confederacy. Russia can't yet admit to Soviet depredations in the Baltic republics. And yes, Japan too often sees itself purely as a victim of World War II."
Compare this to the situation in Premier Wen's China. There is only one acceptable version of history, at least at any given time; history often changes, but only when the Communist Party decides to change it.
For example, according to a report by Howard W. French in The New York Times last December, many textbooks don't mention that anyone died at what the outside world knows as the 1989 massacre of student demonstrators near Tiananmen Square. One 1998 text notes only that 'the Central Committee took action in time and restored calm'. Anyone who challenges the official fiction is subject to harsh punishment, including beatings, house arrest or imprisonment.
And if the 300,000 victims of the Nanjing Massacre are slighted in some Japanese textbooks, what of the 30 million Chinese who died in famines created by Mao Zedong's lunatic Great Leap Forward between 1958 and 1962? No mention in Chinese texts; didn't happen.
Well, you might say, how a nation treats its internal history is less relevant to its qualifications for the Security Council than whether it teaches its children honestly about its wars with other nations.
A dubious proposition, but no matter; as the Times found in its review of textbooks, Chinese children do not learn of their nation's invasion of Tibet (1950) or aggression against Vietnam (1979). And they are taught that Japan was defeated in World War II by Chinese communist guerillas; Pearl Harbor, Iwo Jima and Midway don't figure.
'Facing up to history squarely' isn't easy for any country. Americans don't agree on how to remember the Confederacy. Russia can't yet admit to Soviet depredations in the Baltic republics. And yes, Japan too often sees itself purely as a victim of World War II."
'Nuff said.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in the quoted article is solely of the writer and not of the owner of this blog.
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It's like I can be in self denial that I tortured myself or was mean to myself but I cannot tolerate someone else's denial that they ever tortured me.
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