Topic: WW2: California Sorry for Japanese American Camps - too little too late? - page 3. (Read 403 times)

No demonization, right. Seriously.

I was going to reply with a list of Trump's tweets about Mexican rapists, and some stats from here about the Muslim travel ban... but I really can't be bothered.
No demonization? Seriously? You've heard he's building a wall to keep the Mexicans out, right?

I am not suggesting anything of the sort, rather asking questions to ascertain public opinion about the subject.

It is true as you pointed out the governments of the past have apologised even though they were not involved in nor stood by but what exactly does the apology of the state assembly of California mean and why did they do it at this moment in time?

It's not too late. Descendants of those who were hurt by some man or woman in the past, can sue the descendants and their estates for harm or damage, under common law, in Federal District Court (not United States district Court). If there is proper evidence, there can be wins in this court. But, it has to be a suit man-to-man, not attorney-to-attorney... and with a jury.

So I have ancestors who were known as Druids. You know anything about them?

I'm waiting for my apologies...

Waiting...

Waiting...

Stop it. There is no demonization of Muslims nor of Mexicans. There was no Muslim travel ban. How can any thinking person think that it was a "Muslim" travel ban.  The "banned" countries were: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. Now let's see what are the most populous Muslim majority countries:

Indonesia
Pakistan
India
Bangladesh
Nigeria
Egypt

AND THEN Iran.

As anyone can see it wasn't a Muslim travel ban. 

Re Mexico - you must be conflating LEGAL immigration with ILLEGAL immigration. The people of the United States, as with any country, can decide who does or who does not come in. The US accepts over 1,000,000 LEGAL immigrants per year. This is not the sign of an anti-immigrant or anti-Mexican population. This does not mean that ANYONE can enter at their discretion. This ought not be a difficult concept to grasp.

This is the most disgusting part to me to be honest. If you are to put people in cages, that's horrible and that's one thing. But while they're gone, you're not just allowed to take their land -- or say they're not paying their taxes and seize their land.

They're not paying their fucking taxes cause you put them into a cage, so that's god damn despicable and that is why repatriations should've been done on a case by cases basis. But what's done is done, nothing more this generation can do then apologize and try to compensate the estates (and with that, their next of kin).

They did not allow Germans or Italians to have a ham radio.

They did not jail them.

Having some Italian ancestors I am pretty sure of this to be a fact.

Japanese owned some good pieces of land in California some of it was stolen. So it was a land grab more than anything.

What an excellent read that was about Frank S. Emi. Sadly what happened to him shows things went well beyond only mass incarcerations, the injustices were multi-faceted.

When you see what people such as current day political leaders are doing to create division between its citizens you can clearly deduce they have not learned any lessons from their history which makes it an even more shocking situation.

I mean I don't know what else you want the government to do? They've lost major lawsuits relating to the topic, and they've paid out major reparations to those that are still alive and to the families of those that suffered. They've apologized time and time again for what was done.

But they're apologizing for something that none of them were involved in, and none of them stood by. What more do you want these people to do? As you cant change the past. What would be enough?

Thank you for the reply.

Do you think survivors or their next of kins hearing and receiving an apology softens the blow of tragic wrongdoing the victims suffered?

Well, now. "Life is now officially unfair, isn't it?"

In a sense, yes, but 'too little too late' implies that there were actions the US could have taken that would have constituted sufficient reparation, when that's actually not the case. When people have suffered psychological and physical torment, had their livelihoods and reputations destroyed, been separated from their families, when people have died... there is no sufficient reparation. Throwing money at it or saying sorry does nothing except perhaps alleviate the weight of guilt on the conscience of the perpetrators. What needs to happen is that lessons need to be learned so that nothing similar happens in the future. The current demonisation of muslims and - thanks to Trump - those evil Mexicans, suggests that lessons have not been learned at all.

As an aside, you might be interested in reading about the life of Frank Emi, who was one of the people incarcerated, and a key member of the Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee, who fought the draft. That's right - those Japanese Americans who were imprisoned as potential traitors were in 1943 forced to take a loyalty questionnaire and then drafted into military service, and expected to fight and die for the country that had treated them as traitors and stripped away their rights! This makes the fact that Emi was forced to sell his family business at around 6c to the dollar at the time of internment seem relatively inconsequential...

Did they also made German camps, and Italian camps? Surely the other axis countries would have supporters in American soil wouldn't they? Or was is something especially racist against Japanese?

Definitely too late, the victims of the State segregation are mostly gone by now...

Approximately 120,000 Japanese Americans were forced in to prison camps during World War 2 under the Executive Order of Franklin D Roosevelt which was backed by California State.

Executive Order #9066 was signed on 2nd February 1942 because there were fears the Japanese American population would help Japan during the war. Those incarcerated were forced to live in one of the 10 camps which were ringed by barbed wire and had armed guards. Many victims died because of medical negligence, many died at the hands of the guards that were supposed to ensure nobody escaped.

In 1976 the then US President Gerald Ford issued an apology for those camps and in 1983 the Commission of Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians (CWRIC) came to the conclusion the camps were not "military necessity" but were effectively driven by "racial prejudice, wartime hysteria and a failure of political leadership". They also stated "A grave injustice was done to American citizens and resident aliens of Japanese ancestry who, without individual review or any probative evidence against them"

5 years later in 1988 the Civil Liberties Act came in to force and Congress backed reparation payments of $20,000 to each living survivor (or next of kin) along with a signed apology from the then US President Ronald Reagan. A total of around 82,000 people received payments.

The Federal government has apologised on several occasions and now the State Assembly of California has apologised too. Even though reparations have been made and the issues date back to the second world war but has this move on part the state of California opened old wounds rather than heal them? Is it too little too late?

How do you think the average American would feel about this? And how would that compare to the feelings of survivors and families of those camps?