Okay, this get’s my goat. Recently Japan suffered an 8.8 magnitude earthquake, (the scale is out of ten if I recollect) which is the biggest earthquake to ever hit the island. Adding to that difficulty is that it was off shore and caused a Tsunami (aka a big fucking tidal wave) to rush inland and create even more devastation. Currently as of the last time I saw an update on the News the Japanese government was working it’s ass off attempting to cool down three nuclear power plant to prevent melt down from occurring. Think Chernobyl Ukraine as far as meltdown goes. So not only were they ravaged by Earthquake and Tsunami, they have imminent nuclear meltdown x3 looming in the distance.
Here’s the first issue, somewhat minor in scope compared to the second, but still. Many people some I know and lots that I don’t are ‘horrified’ and ‘taken aback’ by what occurred and they’re pouring out sympathies via twitter, facebook and whatever other means they have at their disposal. The problem with this is two fold, firstly unless you have friends or family on your twitter or facebook accounts odds are no one in Japan is very likely to see your emotional outpouring. The second thing is that your noble exhortations, condolences, and the like do nothing for those that are digging out of the shit as it were. It’s like witnessing a horrific car crash and yelling at the people in the burning cars that you’re very sorry that they were in that crash just now, than standing back to see what happens. If you really feel so sorry for the people of Japan, do something, I’m not saying book a flight and jump into the fray, but there are plenty of ways of assisting. The most useful I’ve seen yet is to donate money to the Red Cross who will be doing everything they can to assist. You can follow this link to go to the Red Cross site and donate there, of call them toll free to donate. http://www.redcross.ca/article.asp?id=38375&tid=001
Here’s my second issue with the disaster. There are a group of people, not a majority I hope, but perhaps an uneducated few that believe Japan “had it coming because of Pearl Harbor.” Now excuse me if I’m wrong but the abridged story of what occurred in the Pacific in WW2 is as follows. The Japanese launch a surprise attack on an unprepared (perhaps overconfident) Pearl Harbor bludgeoning the Americans. In the end there were 2,402 men killed and 1,282 wounded. Approximately 3.5 years later the war in the Pacific came to a close after the American’s dropped two nuclear devices on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima (August 6, 1945) and Nagasaki (August 9, 1945). Within the first two to four months of the bombings, the acute effects killed 90,000–166,000 people in Hiroshima and 60,000–80,000 in Nagasaki with most of the dead in both cities being civilians. Now maybe I’ve done my math incorrectly but I would say that the Japanese got many times their ‘just desserts’ for Pearl Harbor with those two attacks alone, and that’s without factoring deaths occurring after those first few months, as well as whatever other health problems came as a result of the effects of having two nuclear bombs dropped on your country. To date Japan is the only country in the world that has had Nuclear devices used on it in a time of war. So to the simple minded, ignorant people that think that this earthquake and the resulting damages from Tsunami and potential meltdown are Japan getting what they deserve for the 2,402 casualties and 1,282 wounded from Pearl Harbor... All I can say is I can think of the ghosts of 150,000+ dead Japanese from Hiroshima and Nagasaki that would love to beg to differ with you. That’s not to exclude people like myself who think you’re being childish and ignorant, there are others out there that would agree with me. I would argue that you people that think this is some sort of ‘payback’ would be those crying loudest if some form of natural disaster was to strike your homeland (I’m going to assume it’s the United States). I would also venture to say, the Japanese wouldn’t be sitting at home thinking “HAH! That’s what they get for Hiroshima and Nagasaki!”
Anyways </rant> That was my Sunday evening in a nutshell, I hope I find all of you doing well. Gokouun o inorimasu (Good Luck)
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