
Censored Photographs of FDR’s Japanese Concentration Camps - jhull
https://anchoreditions.com/blog/dorothea-lange-censored-photographs
======
hkt
Just another example of the extreme moral ambiguity of the West. We regularly
ignore our own standards around giving people a fair trial when it suits the
executive of the day or when some stupid condition applies ("race" in this
case, geography and citizenship for eg Guantanamo bay). Not to mention
"strategic" alliances with dictators down the years that have usually proven
to be murderous. It is sad to think that the myth of our moral superiority has
never been anything else.

Great photography, though.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
> It is sad to think that the myth of our moral superiority has never been
> anything else.

No, it's real, just not as real as we like to think. Between "imprison people
of Japanese ancestry for the rest of the war, then free them" and "imprison
people of Jewish ancestry, then kill them", there is a real moral difference.
They are both wrong, but they are not equal.

~~~
petulanta
So just because we didn't cause the Holocaust, we are morally superior? That's
a pretty low bar and a ridiculous argument, but it says a lot about the
American mindset.

~~~
dang
I'm uncomfortable with some of the arguments being made here, too, but your
first sentence is a rather uncharitable spin and your second one reads like a
slur (though I'm sure you didn't mean it that way). Please don't comment like
this here.

Instead, please post civilly and substantively, and make your comments _more_
civil and substantive on divisive topics, not less. That's the only way we can
stave off a downward spiral in this place.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
petulanta
Please name one other way you can logically interpret that statement because I
certainly see no other meaning whatsoever.

~~~
dang
"Please name", followed by an invitation to a pointless meta argument, is a
troll trope. That, plus that you didn't acknowledge the civility issue here,
makes me worry that you're not interested in using this site in good faith.
Please review the links I mentioned.

Edit: Actually, since there's evidence that you've violated the rules of this
site many times previously, I'm banning your account until we get some
indication that you'll stop doing this.

------
clarkmoody
One of the many reasons to oppose war.

Others include:

\+ Control of the economy, price controls, rationing, shortages

\+ Suspension of most (all?) of the Bill of Rights

\+ Wholesale slaughter of civilian populations abroad (so much for "all men
are created equal ... with unalienable rights")

But perhaps the most nefarious is the idea that "we all pulled together and
sacrificed to defeat the enemy." The government schools teach the children the
greatness of our national effort, priming them to accept the destruction of
liberty again when the next war comes. The state forever uses a victory in war
to foster national pride and patriotism, as if the society made those choices
to sacrifice _willingly_.

Speak out against the war? Prison. Fail to comply with economic controls?
Prison. Don't want to fight after being drafted? Execution. Have friends who
just happen to belong to the enemy country? You're a spy.

And then the icing on the cake is when the government steals the money to pay
for the war through inflation and currency devaluation through the subsequent
years.

~~~
nanistheonlyist
We did not choose war willingly, the japanese govt made the choice for us when
they attacked pearl harbor.

~~~
djsumdog
After the US et. al. cut off fuel and oil trade. They don't teach you that
part in school.

The saddest thing about WWII is that the people who started the war, by
funding it, were never brought up on charges at Nuremberg. Prescott Bush and
Standard Oil made millions off selling fuel to both sides. IBM made the punch-
card based catalogue service for the Nazis. Henry Ford's company made tank
treads for both allied and Nazi tanks and even built the rails leading to
Auschwitz.

The reality is that there were entire industries that actively did everything
they could to get that war going, in order to profit from it. People look at
Hitler and forget that wars need to be funded.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour was a strategic preëmptive strike,
because they knew the US would come after their empire at some point.

I don't think Japanese imperialism can really be defended.

Of course, Japanese imperialism was very much inspired by European imperialism
in… well, everything. But that doesn't make it right either, merely just as
bad.

~~~
knz
> because they knew the US would come after their empire at some point.

This makes it sound as if the US only acted to end competition against another
Empire. Japan invaded numerous territories for access to resources and
committed horrible atrocities while doing so.

The attack on Pearl Harbour may have been preemptive but the only reason for
Japan to fear attack from others was due to actions of the Japanese.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
> This makes it sound as if the US only acted to end competition against
> another Empire.

Well, that might well have been the case. While World War Ⅱ did put a stop to
some horrible things, I don't know if that was because they were horrible or
merely because their perpetrators were a threat. I suspect the latter.

------
katkattac
"The very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date is a disturbing and
confirming indication that such action will be taken." — General John L.
DeWitt, head of the U.S. Army’s Western Defense Command

Insane reasoning.

~~~
yabatopia
I came back after reading/seeing the photographs to post the same quote. My
jaw dropped when I read it. Unbelievable, yet so topical.

------
kofejnik
This was appalling and obviously sucked a lot for people who underwent such
treatment; however as someone born in USSR I'd say that it was surprisingly
humane (hot water not always available) compared to how people were treated in
the USSR around the same period.

Case in point: Ukrainian Holodomor (genocide by famine)
[http://www.rferl.org/a/holodomor-
ukraine/25174454.html](http://www.rferl.org/a/holodomor-ukraine/25174454.html)

Edit: also, Chechen and Krimean Tatar deportations, and many many others

~~~
semiel
Since these countries (in some form or other) still exist, it's tempting to
start making moral comparisons and trying to figure out "which side you should
be on". But that's not the most interesting approach, in my opinion. Future
historians won't be picking sides, they'll be trying to put it in context,
understand the conditions that led to these behaviors, and draw out trends in
the period.

I can imagine a section in a future history textbook that went something like
this:

"A distinctive feature of the Second World War was the widespread use of
'concentration camps'. These camps allowed belligerents to separate and
control groups (usually racially defined) that were considered potentially
subversive. In many cases, those interned were put to forced labor in support
of the war effort, but in others they were simply kept under military control.

Conditions in these camps were generally poor, but they varied greatly both
between and within countries. The Japanese in American concentration camps
were subject to undernourishment and forced labor, but relatively few were
killed. Things were worse in the Soviet Union, where even the process of
transportation to the camps was deadly to large numbers of Volga Germans. The
most infamous camps were in German-controlled territory, where millions of
Jews and other undesirables were systematically executed, in an event later
known as 'the Holocaust'."

~~~
ars
I know you are trying to be objective and disinterested, but reading you
combine the German and American camps as somehow comparable is utterly
horrifying.

You make it sound like they were both more or less the same, just some people
were killed in the German ones.

The goal of the German camps was to torture and kill, the American camps was
to segregate.

The "camps" part is an unimportant detail - yet you write as if it's the main
thing.

~~~
semiel
They are comparable, though, and that's exactly my point. They're not the
_same_ by any stretch of the imagination, but it's just a weaker reading of
history to refuse to consider themes that were common to the time period.

The Nazi camps were started for the same reason as the American camps: to
contain and control a population believed to be subversive. They were indeed
later used as part of an organized genocide, which is very important and makes
them far more horrifying on a moral/human level, but it's willful blindness to
ignore the deep similarities between a policy of containing and suppressing a
racial group, and a policy of containing, suppressing, and exterminating a
racial group.

~~~
ars
These are not "themes that were common to the time period". These are themes
that are common to human history, this type of camp was not invented then.

For example if you check
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment#History_of_internme...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment#History_of_internment_and_the_term_.22Concentration_camp.22)

you will find examples going back more than 300 years, and I'm sure a
historian can find even earlier examples.

Internment camps of various kinds happen by EVERY war, not just this one.

> it's willful blindness to ignore the deep similarities between a policy of
> containing and suppressing a racial group, and a policy of containing,
> suppressing, and exterminating a racial group.

No, it's willful blindness to think this was unique in any way to WW2. "Camps"
is NOT the important or interesting thing about that war, it is an almost
trivial detail.

Your framing it that way makes it as if it was something specially important.
But in actuality it is a minor footnote compared to what they DID in those
camps.

It's like saying "An important note about the 21st century is that humans
lived in houses. People in both apartments and individual homes had wide
access to cellphones."

You are focusing on the wrong thing.

------
mgkimsal
"The very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date is a disturbing and
confirming indication that such action will be taken."

 _THAT_ is disturbing "logic".

~~~
fasteddie31003
There was the Niihau Incident
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niihau_incident](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niihau_incident)
where Hawaiians of Japanese descent helped a crashed Japanese pilot. But then
ended up killing the pilot.

~~~
SerLava
I'm pretty sure 2 native Hawaiians killed the pilot. The husband and wife. The
Japanese locals ran off.

------
openasocket
The most absurd thing I read on here was that _they were still subjected to
the draft_. So that Japanese couldn't be trusted to live in the United States
without armed guards, but we can totally give them guns and send them off to
fight the enemy?!

~~~
akhilcacharya
They were disallowed from fighting in the Pacific theatre, so they all fought
in Europe.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/442nd_Infantry_Regiment_(Unite...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/442nd_Infantry_Regiment_\(United_States\))

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Inouye#Medal_of_Honor_c...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Inouye#Medal_of_Honor_citation)

~~~
MaxfordAndSons
Interesting to note, this went both ways: my grandfather was a naturalized
German immigrant, and was sent to the Pacific when drafted because he was
disallowed from fighting in Europe.

But of course, for some reason, German Americans weren't interned...

~~~
leurfete
Germans and Italians were also interned.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_German_Americans](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_German_Americans)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Italian_American...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Italian_Americans)

~~~
MaxfordAndSons
Yea, learned this today. Seems to be that it was of a significantly smaller
percentage than of Japanese Americans though.

------
datalus
I wonder if there is any connection between the internment camps for Japanese
people living in the US & the CO camps. Were they both run by the Selective
Service? I know, at least, the CO camps were. The government had really
botched handling COs in WWI, to the point that it created a lobby group that
when WWII broke out they eventually were able to successfully pass the Burke-
Wadsworth Bill with a section that created the Civilian Public Service.

As an aside, WWI conscientious objectors were sent to federal prisons. There
they were starved, put into solitary, or physically abused, resulting in some
ending up dead. WWII COs were instead sent to camps to do things like farm,
fight forest fires, build equipment, etc. in place of service.

------
okreallywtf
I would be interested to hear the perspective of some of the MP's that had to
guard these camps. It would seem like such a waste, not least of which because
with the labor shortages and so many other young men serving overseas, to not
only be stuck guarding a camp but to be guarding camps full of people who
would otherwise be helping to fill those huge labor shortages and support the
war effort.

I just finished reading The Girls of Atomic City[1] and its a really
conflicting story because (totally discounting the moral implications of the
atomic bomb) on the one hand it is an amazing story of ingenuity and hard work
and everyone coming together with a common purpose (even if most people did
not know what that purpose was), but then you find out about how the black
workers were treated compared to the white workers and how they weren't even
able to serve their country as equals.

If you have a selective memory or perception you can look back and be proud of
a lot in our history but I think you have to fully appreciate our highs and
lows to really know what kind of country we have.

------
ekianjo
For a country standing for Freedom and Human Rights, this kind of action is
appalling. The quotes in the article from officials and three letters agencies
stink of utter racism (even though no sabotage operations was ever
undertaken).

~~~
jdavis703
As someone whose family ancestors were kidnapped to the US and forced to
engage in unpaid labor I have to say this country never cared about freedom
and human rights. It's all part of the national story designed to make the
occupants of this country view themselves as better than the rest of the
world.

~~~
droopyEyelids
Distorted exaggeration disrespects everyone. This country has struggled with
issues of freedom and human rights, but it has made significant strides, and
we should use them as an example of what to work for and what can be achieved.

~~~
alexhawdon
They aren't really 'human rights' until they are applied to all humans.
They're merely 'American Rights'.

------
ComputerGuru
I did not know the ACLU fought against the Japanese internment camps. Donation
forthcoming.

~~~
okreallywtf
Given the climate of the US right now recurring donations to the ACLU and SPLC
(among others) would be be appropriate, I've been encouraging as many people
as I can to do so. The SPLC has been a little more directed at hate-groups and
racism but I groups that have fought internment and the KKK to be very well
funded.

------
hornbaker
Most of them were Japanese Americans, born in America. One wonders why German
Americans weren't given similar treatment.

~~~
randcraw
Because Japanese Americans look different from "the average American", while
German Americans don't.

Also, Germans had been immigrating into the US since the year 1700 and
intermarried widely with other groups. So it would be very hard to decide
where to draw a line and say someone is "sufficiently German" to be interned.

~~~
krapp
This is entirely supposition on my part, from someone far too young to have
lived through any of it, but I suspect it's less that Japanese Americans
looked different, and more that Japan was a non-Christian culture, which made
it easier to dehumanize people of Japanese descent.

The Nazis might have been evil but at least they were "like us" in that they
shared a common heritage, religion and linguistic root with Americans. Japan,
meanwhile, was portrayed in American propaganda as an inscrutable hivemind run
by a primitive death-cult.

You can see the same strange mistrust of non-Christian culture applied to
Muslims in America today - even though the vast majority in the world are not
violent terrorists, many Americans suspect that Islam taints and "radicalizes"
the mind with evil in a way that Christianity doesn't.

~~~
anon1094
Do you really believe that it was because Japan is dominantly a non-Christian
culture and not because they look different? No, it was because they weren't
white. And America has, for a very long time and even now, been painted as a
mostly white and african american culture.

Even in modern Japan itself ironically enough, it's hard for some people to
really picture non-white and non-african Americans as Americans. The word 外国人
(gaikokujin) really only applies to foreigners of European and African
ancestry. I believe it's hard for them to picture those Americans as Americans
simply because of the image that has been painted of the country.

Sincerely, A non-asian non-african non-white American interested in Japanese
culture

~~~
krapp
>Do you really believe that it was because Japan is dominantly a non-Christian
culture and not because they look different?

I believe it was both - they're two sides of the same coin. Look at the
propaganda of the time - the Japanese were portrayed as being fundamentally
inhuman in a way that Europeans weren't. The myth of the "inscrutable
Oriental" has been around in the West for a very long time, the Japanese mind
and morality were considered to be incomprehensible.

That Japanese Americans looked different probably made this xenophobia easier
to act upon, though.

------
caio1982
Thank you for posting this, for real, all of these photographs are truly
beautiful in their own way. That is, they remind me a lot about Sebastião
Salgado's work on portraying human beings in such emotionally harsh conditions
[1] (which in fact was quite possibly inspired by people like Dorothea). I
don't know what is most disturbing in that page though, the stories behind the
photos or the quotes... man, the quotes... :-(

[1] I cannot recommend
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Salt_of_the_Earth_(2014_fi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Salt_of_the_Earth_\(2014_film\))
enough if you are interested in this

------
king_magic
For anyone that doubts that America is capable of truly awful, horrifying
things, well, guess what, we are.

------
emmelaich
Australia also interned Japanese as well as Germans and Italians during the
wars.

[http://www.naa.gov.au/collection/snapshots/internment-
camps/...](http://www.naa.gov.au/collection/snapshots/internment-
camps/introduction.aspx#section2)

The museum at Berrima is a good visit for people interested in war history.

[http://www.migrationheritage.nsw.gov.au/exhibition/enemyatho...](http://www.migrationheritage.nsw.gov.au/exhibition/enemyathome/berrima-
internmentcamp/)

------
cooper12
> “They got to a point where they said, ‘Okay, we’re going to take you out.’
> And it was obvious that he was going before a firing squad with MPs ready
> with rifles. He was asked if he wanted a cigarette; he said no.… You want a
> blindfold?… No. They said, ‘Stand up here,’ and they went as far as saying,
> ‘Ready, aim, fire,’ and pulling the trigger, but the rifles had no bullets.
> They just went click.” — Ben Takeshita, recounting his older brother’s
> ordeal at Tule Lake Relocation Center, where he was segregated for causing
> trouble

Jesus...

------
susan_hall
Regarding Muslims in the USA, I worry about those in government who might
revive this line of thinking:

"The very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date is a disturbing and
confirming indication that such action will be taken."

— General John L. DeWitt, head of the U.S. Army’s Western Defense Command

------
coldcode
“A viper is nonetheless a viper wherever the egg is hatched—so a Japanese-
American, born of Japanese parents—grows up to be a Japanese, not an
American.” — Los Angeles Times, February 2, 1942

Depressing to think this is going to happen again, in some way.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
The sentiment of that quote is already here, unfortunately. It just hasn't
been fully institutionalised yet.

------
altendo
The recent speculation about a national registry for Muslims - and what that
may look like - makes this even more poignant. The times may have changed, but
fear and ignorance have not.

~~~
sbierwagen
If you recall, we already had a Muslim registry, from 2002 to 2011:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Entry-
Exit_R...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Entry-
Exit_Registration_System)

~~~
altendo
I do recall that. Still scary that we even had that in place.

------
djschnei
Yay FDR! (And this guy still blesses the "Occupy Democrats" facebook page
profile pic...)

------
DVassallo
The Nuremberg trials determined that "deportations and persecutions on racial
grounds" were crimes against humanity [1]. I don't understand how FDR's
executive order to deport Japanese-Americans to internment camps allowed the
Nuremberg judges to punish Nazi members on this charge.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_principles#Principle...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_principles#Principle_VI)

~~~
saalweachter
At the end of the day, the problem with hypocrisy are the parts you do _wrong_
, not the parts you do _right_.

America has done a lot of hypocritical things, but we shouldn't have held back
from doing the right thing -- intervening in other countries to stop
atrocities -- just because we were also guilty as sin. In an ideal world we'd
actually be the pure, benevolent world police we imagine ourselves, but in the
real world, confronting atrocities abroad has also made us better at home.
Maybe we still have a long way to go, but a lot more Americans would have a
problem with interment camps today, after making stopping the Holocaust such
an important part of our national identity, than did in the 1940s.

------
Animats
If you want the book from 2006, it's available on Amazon.[1] Most of this
material is available on line, from the National Archives or the University of
California.[2][3] It's not new.

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/Impounded-Dorothea-Censored-
Japanese-...](https://www.amazon.com/Impounded-Dorothea-Censored-Japanese-
Internment/dp/0393330907) [2]
[https://www.archives.gov/research/alic/reference/military/ja...](https://www.archives.gov/research/alic/reference/military/japanese-
internment.html) [3]
[https://calisphere.org/exhibitions/t11/jarda/](https://calisphere.org/exhibitions/t11/jarda/)

------
lottin
It may seem frivolous, but the first thing that strikes me when looking at
these photos is how well dressed the ordinary people were back then, compared
with nowadays when apparently everybody dresses in rags. I can't help but
think at some point something went very wrong.

------
theptip
"The very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date is a disturbing and
confirming indication that such action will be taken.”

Orwellian logic. I always found this suspension of rationality particularly
disturbing when reading about the internment camps.

------
johndunne
With today's political climate I can't help but think that something like this
could happen again.

~~~
yincrash
OT: I believe my reply was modded for the same reason
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13139991](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13139991)
was flagged?

However, I provided citations (which I thought made the bar for
substantiveness) and believed I was civil. Was I inciting flames by backing up
the parent's comment?

------
blackbagboys
Putting the obligatory moral condemnation of our deluded and evil forbears to
one side for a moment, one can't help but notice that our darkest and most
shameful national mistakes are nevertheless vastly more humane and benign than
those of comparable societies. I would hope that episodes such as this inspire
in modern Americans, beyond pure disgust, a desire to identify and nurture the
national characteristics that enforced such comparative restraint.

~~~
BeingIncubated
I'm not sure I'd call the genocide of indigenous Americans "vastly more
humane" than what other societies have done.

------
csomar
You know what is really disturbing? We don't know if such a thing can happen
again _today_. It seems that the new US president got wiser, but what if he
was real with his _threats_ to people who believes in a particular religion.

I'm not too immersed in US politics, but how likely is such a move? How are
they going to determine them (possible suspicion?) and what kind of reaction
will the civil society have?

------
mordant
The interments didn't happen in a vacuum:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niihau_incident](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niihau_incident)

It's also interesting to note that J. Edgar Hoover was opposed to the
interments, but FDR overruled him.

------
Koshkin
It is somewhat interesting that the term 'internment camps' is never used in
the original quotes, it is rather 'concentration camps'. (It is possible that
the latter term may have been used specifically in reference to the places of
internment of the Japanese.)

~~~
LyndsySimon
I think that's because the term "concentration camp" is so heavily associated
with the Nazi extermination programs. Likewise, there were Nazi concentration
camps that were not designed to kill their occupants, and they're sometimes
referred to as "labor camps".

~~~
lambertsimnel
My understanding is that the extermination camps were typically not part of
the concentration camp system. Auschwitz was a notable exception.

From [http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n18/thomas-laqueur/devoted-to-
terro...](http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n18/thomas-laqueur/devoted-to-terror)

"Auschwitz seems to overshadow all the other camps. It also captures our
attention because we know a great deal about it. ...It was the only death camp
(Auschwitz II) that was also a large slave labour camp (Auschwitz I), with the
result that tens of thousands of slave labourers, having endured selections,
random violence and the death marches, survived to bear witness to genocide."

"Most of those killed in the Holocaust were not inmates in concentration
camps."

"Much of what we have come to see as the particular moral debasement of the
concentration camps was absent in the death camps."

"[Extermination] camps were grotesquely efficient: Sobibor murdered about a
quarter of a million people, a quarter as many as Auschwitz-Birkenau in one
three-hundredth of the space and half the time. Precisely because of this
efficiency, we know relatively little about the dead. There are only three
survivors’ accounts from Belzec, where, between 17 March and late December
1942, 434,500 Jews were murdered. As Primo Levi said, we know little of those
who were truly at the bottom."

"Conversely, much of the story of the concentration camps does not overlap
with that of the Holocaust. The camp system was a latecomer to the project of
genocide. There was no representative of the KL [concentration camps] at the
Wannsee Conference [which organised the Final Solution]. It was only after the
conference that Himmler decided the camps could play a big role, not primarily
as sites of immediate extermination but as reservoirs of Jewish slave labour.
Only towards the end of the war, as Wachsmann points out, did the majority of
Jews find themselves in camps and only for a few weeks in 1938 were they the
majority of registered inmates."

------
relieferator
If this kind of crap has to be done it should be done right. Provide adequate
housing, food, transportation. Treat humans as humans, not animals.

~~~
diyorgasms
This kind of shit should never happen. Period.

It is the duty of every decent human to fight this sort of tyranny by any
means necessary.

------
flexie
Great to see that the HN week of censoring politics is over.

~~~
krapp
Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war!

------
FrancoDiaz
The politics ban is lifted, and as usual, a complete degradation into the
usual rhetoric.

People write a comment and think somebody's mind will be changed. Nope, not
gonna happen. Just look at comments and replies.

It's just delusional thinking to think that HN is somehow above the fray when
it comes to this stuff.

~~~
grzm
I share your frustration with the inflammatory discussion we can sometimes see
here at HN. If this is something you care about, there are things you can do.
Participate in discussions constructively and charitably. You're right about
writing a comment and expecting someone's mind is going to be changed. I try
to keep in mind that it's not necessarily about "changing people's minds",
it's at least partly about understanding and making yourself understood first.
Encourage good comments by up-voting them. Gently and neutrally point out
behavior that's not acceptable on HN. Flag and down vote inappropriate
behavior. For particularly egregious behavior, email the mods. That's part of
being part of the community.

~~~
FrancoDiaz
_Participate in discussions constructively and charitably_

The problem is that invariably the amount of destruction and uncharitable
discussion outweighs the constructive and charitable discussion in these
threads.

It's always a net loss on these types of threads.

These types of threads always put a stain on the reputation of HN as a place
of intelligent conversation. There's some really immoral and despicable lines
of thought in this thread.

~~~
grzm
Yeah, actually engaging in the discussion can be difficult and problematic. I
don't think it's _always_ a net loss, though I agree that it often can be.

If you choose not to, the other options listed above are all still valid and
valuable ways of participating and contributing to the community. I hope you
do!

------
brilliantcode
The Japanese pre-Cold War were treated unfairly but this pales in comparison
to the many hell the Asian region have suffered under Japanese Imperialism.

At least they didn't get gassed like the Jews did. At least they didn't get
bayonetted like the Chinese in Nanjing _en masse_ in graves or a military unit
performing live surgery on them or forcing hundreds of thousands of young
Korean women to sexual slavery.

It didn't help that there was heavy animosity towards Japanese from _Chinese &
Korean_ Americans who felt compelled and directly/indirectly suffered as a
result of Imperial Japan. There was probably deep desire for schadenfreude
that contributed to Japanese Americans downfall.

But all that aside is clearly a small drop in the bucket. The view of Japanese
and Asian Americans were explicitly _racist_. Nazi Germany was bad but the
same elements of racial white superiority is a continuing theme even until the
late 60s, where African American celebrities were forced to sleep in trailer
parks while their white co-actors would lounge in swanky hotels (particularly
angering Frank Sinatra).

There has been a miniscule effort from Reagan handing out 20k and an apology
for the immense inter-generational trauma directly caused by the USG. There's
little apology for Hiroshima and Nagasaki victims. This suggests to me a
serious lack of reflection and it's evidenced by the fact that Muslim
Americans today are facing a similar treatment.

I love the US but shit like this makes me pause for a bit. However, it still
is _nowhere near_ the atrocities committed by Imperial Japan & Nazi Germany.
But it's curious to see the stark difference in the way Japanese and German
Americans were treated. German Americans weren't sent to interment camps and
had their assets seized in the same manner as the Japanese Americans.

All in all, a tragedy and showing that a melting pot we-are-all-americans is a
flawed policy-where everyone is American but some less American than others.
Canada is no better off as they also had Japanese interment camps and showed
little remorse.

Sometimes I wonder as Asian Canadian, are we truly accepted by the mainstream
North American society? It makes me question what the Canadian/American dream.
I think about just how much easier it is when your skin color matches the
mainstream crowd and you don't stand out or have any biases held against you.
The Japanese interment camp is just one of those many items that raises
existential questions of being in North America, and it's not all that clear
whether it's in the rearview mirror seeing how Muslim Americans are being
treated today in the West.

I still do think North America is relatively a very accepting and open place.
It's hard to fathom such level of integration in Europe or Asia.

~~~
adewinter
"However, it still is nowhere near the atrocities committed by Imperial Japan
& Nazi Germany."

The only question I have is: So?

Why do you feel the need to compare what the US did to other atrocities? You
can always find something worse to compare a bad act to.

Nothing you said changes the fact that what the US did here was just plain
wrong, it definitely shouldn't have happened, and we should do everything in
our power to ensure it doesn't happen again. If you feel the need to make what
the US did look slightly "less bad" by comparing it to other heinous events in
the world, it might be worth reflecting on why you feel that need.

~~~
brilliantcode
I'm not trying to minimize or say what the US did was less wrong but I'm
arguing against people that use this as a crutch to support their what
aboutism that attempts to paint the US in the same light as Nazi Germany or
Imperial Japan. Clearly is night and day difference.

~~~
tptacek
In fact, the exact opposite is the case: attempting to compare one of our
national disgraces to the actions of Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan is itself
an appeal to whataboutism --- the article we're commenting on is about the
internment of Japanese-Americans, not about the Nazis.

~~~
brilliantcode
yes I'm aware of the article's topic my point was a response comparing Nazi
Germany's holocaust to internment of Japanese Americans. That isn't
whataboutism, it's a fact. Japanese Americans weren't gassed or killed en
masse by USG and that changes the equation. You are attempting to hijack the
conversation into a circular argument by simply negating what I'm saying
without considering the stark difference between _genocide_ and _politically
motivated discrimination_.

Very different things. Neither are good but it's pretty clear which countries
were the worse at offenses.

~~~
tptacek
It's hard to understand where you're coming from, given that the topic of the
article is Japanese-American internment.

------
golemotron
I thought this was no politics week.

~~~
cooper12
It was ended early:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13131251](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13131251)
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13133855](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13133855)

------
mgkimsal
expected the 'notice' signs to be in japanese... ?

YES - I know that most of the folks were american-born-english speaking. But
the paranoia _against_ them was that they were all working for the Japanese
govt and all secret agents and whatnot. Would have made more sense to try to
present info in their "own language".

Stating that you couldn't read the Japanese writing would be _PROOF_ that you
are, in fact, a Japanese spy.

~~~
waterphone
The occupants of Japanese internment camps in the U.S. were Japanese American.

~~~
ComputerGuru
Which makes it all the more ridiculous of a paranoid, senseless, knee-jerk
internment.

------
kmeade
_FDR 's_ Japanese Concentration Camps? FDR's?

That's a blatant attempt to simplify a historical event and manipulate the
modern reader.

Please spare me another rehash of how mean we became during the GOD-DAMN
SECOND WORLD WAR, when our country and culture were under REAL threat. Please
spend that energy examining our modern forms of prejudice and crazy
fearfulness.

Also -- Why does no one ever want to rehash the post-war US-Japan
relationship? In just a few years we transitioned from vicious, no-holds-
barred warfare to a cordial relationship that became delightfully friendly.
It's an amazingly positive story that belies the sort of institutionalized
racism that some people feel the need to believe in.

~~~
sushid
Yes, FDR's Japanese Internment (aka Concentration) camps. Yes, really, FDR's.

If you give FDR credit for things like the New Deal (which were of course
advocated by him but passed by the Congress), give him a bit of credit for his
executive orders.

> [The internment of Japanese Americans] were ordered by President Franklin D.
> Roosevelt shortly after Imperial Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.[0]

> Executive Order 9066 was a United States presidential executive order signed
> and issued during World War II by the United States President Franklin D.
> Roosevelt on February 19, 1942. This order authorized the Secretary of War
> to prescribe certain areas as military zones, clearing the way for the
> deportation of Japanese Americans and Italian-Americans to internment camps.
> [1]

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_America...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_Americans)

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_9066](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_9066)

~~~
kmeade
Saying "FDR's ... Camps" is like saying "Harry Truman's Victory over Hitler"
or "Ronald Reagan's Space Shuttle." Again, it is an extreme simplification and
an attempt to manipulate the reader into associating the act with the
individual.

I'm amazed that many (presumably young) people want to wallow in this crap,
apparently feeling superior to people who have been dead for decades. You have
no reason to feel superior to the generation (and the individuals) who
sacrificed so much to confront and defeat Fascism. Quite the opposite. Look
around yourself.

~~~
sushid
That's interesting because we learn to associate positive policies and refer
to them as FDR's New Deal (bills passed by Congress/signed by FDR), JFK's
Peace Corp, Nixon's EPA, etc.

It's true that these policies are not made by one individual. But when we're
crediting the presidents who merely signed bills passed by the Congress,
should we not at least be give the same weight when they sign an executive
order?

And I'm amazing that you're here generalizing what "presumably young people"
do/think. It's not a matter of trying to feel superior.

Presidents are not good or bad, but rather, commit an array of decisions that
lie in the spectrum. The decision to intern innocent US citizens (further
regrettably by abusing data handed over by the US Census), unfortunately, lies
in the spectrum of bad.

To only revere his positive actions and downplay the bad decisions made during
his presidency (the Judicial Procedures Reform Bill of 1937 is another one)
would be doing disservice to those interested in learning about US history (or
history for that matter).

~~~
kmeade
Thank-you for your replies and patience with me. (really)

"we learn to associate..." is a bit of a sad phrase. What we have done is
experience a great deal of sloppy or propagandized reporting.

FDR's New Deal is a bit of an exception because, in addition to a set of
programs, I believe it was purposely coined as a campaign slogan -- as was
LBJ's New Society. When the verbiage was specifically created by someone in
association with their own efforts it seems reasonable to include the name if
it suits the writer's purpose.

Here's a challenge for your Google skills: Can you find a reference to the
title "FDR’s Japanese Concentration Camps" anywhere in a historical record? I
see plenty of references to the linked article, but nothing older, much less
anything from the war or post-war eras.

By the way, I am less bothered by the use here of "Concentration Camps",
although I believe that's also propagandistic revisionism. Historically, they
were called "Internment Camps." But they were evil and I'm not going defend
the camps because they absolutely don't deserve to be defended.

It's ironic to note that photographer Dorothea Lange did much of her work as
part of New Deal programs. It would be interesting to hear her opinion on her
work being associated with a smearing of FDR.

in/re your amazement -- There's no question that we're talking about what
"young people" think. The old people are mostly dead and mostly not commenting
on HN. I'm not (or don't intend to be) generalizing about young people as a
whole -- I'm generalizing about these Internet discussions, which are frequent
and essentially identical.

The near-endless criticism of the way people behaved during those desperate
times is graceless and smug. I believe that it IS a matter of trying to feel
superior. I think it's impossible for someone born after the War to put all of
this into a realistic perspective. We should try to learn, be humble and
grateful for the incredible sacrifices of those who went before us.

Having said that, it's certainly legitimate to examine the historical period -
to consider the mistakes. What could the US have done to allay fear and
preserve security, and also respect the rights of ALL US citizens and
residents? That's a big question - that should be approached with respect and
seriousness. To start out by blaming FDR for the situation is unproductive and
silly.

~~~
sushid
Thanks for taking your time as well. :)

To be honest, I do understand what you mean. It was a different time (and a
time that's difficult for younger people like me to fathom) back then. The US
was in a turning point of the century and fear, uncertainty, and doubt
affected the decision that led to the internment of Japanese Americans.

I apologize if my criticism is coming off as smug or graceless. I certainly
don't intend to, but I do dislike how we in the US tend to gloss over those
we've wronged in the past because "times were different." It's fair to say
they had their reasons for making those decisions in the past, but also fair
to criticize the practice.

As for smearing the legacy of FDR, that is not my goal either. He was clearly
an effective president and is consistently ranked as being one of the best US
presidents of all time. But all too often we try and frame someone as being
categorically good or bad, rather than being somewhere in the middle, which is
what most people are.

Trust me, I dislike those who snidely point out MLK's infidelity, Jefferson
and Sally Hemings, etc. But we should openly point out these facts and let
them be judged as a whole, as a positive influence in US history DESPITE their
misgivings, not because they technically didn't have any.

------
wehadfun
It seems uncomfortable, but how does it compare to how the Japanese treated
the Chinese during the war?

Its easy to look back now and think America was terrible but lets not forget
that World War Freaking 2 was happening at the time. If your beloved son just
got killed at Perl Harbor you probably would have no issue with this at all.
Hell you probably feel like it is not bad enough.

Its just like all these self righteous people who want to call Bush an idiot
for the wars. If your Wife, kids, friends were under a pile of cement in
downtown Manhattan on 9/11 you would probably have no issue with bombing the f
__* out of who ever you were told was responsible.

~~~
colmvp
As a Chinese person, I recognize the Japanese did a lot of shitty things in
the war and haven't acknowledge much of it, but comparing what they did to
what the U.S. did to what the German's did to what the Russian's did is a
meaningless exercise in relative privation. I'd hope that a country's
conviction is not solely based on what others do and instead based on the
principles that they stand for.

Secondly, by your justification of Japanese Internment, we could say that we
should intern all Muslims in the United States because of 9/11, declaration of
war by ISIL, and domestic terrorist acts. Or that all German's and Italian's
should've been interned by the United States because of American soldiers
killed by Axis countries. We should be very aware of the difference between
people who come to the U.S. and build a life from themselves versus those who
are actively participating in a foreign country. Aside from
ethnicity/religion, they are not one in the same.

Also most people recognize Afghanistan as a justified retaliation especially
when you consider the number of allies who decided to join in. But Bush was
wrong for the Iraq War as it was justified on the flimsiest of 'evidence' and
the nation building that happened afterwards was nothing short of a disaster
(and that's based on testimonies from people who worked on that project over
in Iraq).

~~~
wehadfun
Comparing what the Gernams did to what the Russians did sure relative
privation:

Comparing what the Japanese did to China to what the Japanese could to the
U.S. I do not think is relative privation but I could be wrong

------
godson_drafty
Whenever looking at these pictures, it's worthwhile to consider how white (or
any other color) Americans living in Japan were treated after war was
declared.

Oh, that's right. There weren't any! The American government had some unique
challenges in maximizing their chances of winning the war against a zealous
and absolutely ruthless enemy (Japan). It would have been extremely
irresponsible not to at least attempt to neutralize the threat posed by the
population of first-generation citizens.

American authorities acted within their rights in making a reasonable effort
to neutralize domestic saboteurs or collaborators by interning these people.
Of course it's sad that it happened, but remember that battles such as Midway
were won through superior intelligence and code-breaking. A single Japanese
acting as a spy might have overturned that. It would have been very bad for
east Asia had Japan won. They were committing numerous, documented war crimes
and would have continued to do so.

~~~
tptacek
It is in fact not worthwhile to consider how "white Americans living in Japan"
were treated, because Japanese-Americans are American citizens, simultaneously
not answerable to the crimes of Imperial Japan _and_ owed a basic obligation
of the defense of their liberty by their fellow American citizens.

The internment of Japanese-Americans is a national disgrace because it harmed
the fabric of the entire country, and every citizen living in it: that
citizenship being in part defined by the duties and obligations we share to
each other, as established by the Founders.

It was a betrayal of our founding principals, which is why every American
schoolchild is taught about it.

~~~
adrienne
If only that latter thing were true. It's not. It's especially not after years
of the Republicans gutting public education and pushing expurgated,
jingoistic, pro-American-exceptionalism textbooks through school boards
everywhere.

