Are Asians Perennial Adolescents? 3

After World War II, the US helped to rebuild the Japanese economy. After all, Fascism had been destroyed in Germany and Japan. The new enemy was Communism. US needed West Germany and Japan as allies.

Japan's near religious patriotism was gradually turned into cultural narcissism. Even now, this is evident in Japan's version of "political correctness" in which if anyone says anything bad about Japan, a Japanese person completely turns that around to mean something good. People who continually say negative things about Japan can be demonized, ostracized or just made irrelevant. Perhaps the situation has changed with the stagnation of the Japanese economy.

Japan has also repeatedly asked the US to apologize for the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. They, on the other hand, have given only lukewarm apologies to China for the mass extermination of millions and millions of Chinese soldiers and civilians during World War II. Again, lukewarm apologies for all the Chinese, Korean, Taiwanese, and other Asian women they used as sex slaves during the same war. They have given no apologies for Pearl Harbor. Emperor Herohito was about to apologize to MacArthur but he was rebuffed. They've had plenty of time to apologize since then but have not. Lastly, Japan actually enshrined 1068 of its War criminals in Yasukuni, including the their worst Fascist military leaders (Tojo, etc.).

That is not that to say that Japan is an awful place. Japanese people have great synergy. They have great drive and strength. They are very courteous and polite. There is a sense of community in Japan that I deeply envy. There are a thousand other good things I could say about Japan... but the question I am asking is, are they a mature society?

Yes, it is true that the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima was a horrific, modern event. In terms of sheer numbers though, not more than 300,000 people died as a result of the nuclear blast. There were, of course, future health problems that were caused by the radiation left after the nuclear explosion. In contrast, at least 2,000,000 Chinese persons died in World War II. Many of these Chinese were raped, experimented on as live subjects, or tortured. Can the devastation from these two events be compared? I am, by the way, using the highest estimates for Hiroshima and Nagasaki deaths and the lowest for Chinese deaths during World War II.

As Korea, China, Taiwan, Australia, and other nations become stronger, Japan's lukeworm apologies have somehow become more eloquent. At first, there was "deep regret" then there is "heartfelt sorrow," and then an acknowledgement of "suffering" caused by Japanese people. In one, there is an even an acknowledgement of "psycholgical" distress, etc. After 2000, the apologizes pretty much become standard "regret" and "heartfelt sorrow." In one sense, I think that Japan figures that once these countries become wealthy enough, they won't need reparations. Some reparations have been made to Korea for comfort women (p.c. for sex slaves)but these reparations have been very little to say the least.

So is Japan mature? One gets the sense that the
Japanese people think that they are inherently better than others. They don't have to issue sincere apologies to China and Korea, but the US or other people who have offended the Japanese must apologize to them.

Japan may be worried about the reparations that may come with a sincere apology. Of course, in the past, the Japanese blamed Western Imperialism for their own imperialist behavior. They were passing the buck.

An Adult accepts responsibility for his behavior.

One wonders whether Japan's near religious patriotism was displaced into cultural narcissism, whether their titanic pride is not masked by politeness and courteousness.

Was Japan's imperialistic drive transferred to its capitalistic drive to dominate the world economy?