Three cheers for US history!

The section from Takaki that hit me the hardest came from the section describing the internment of the Japanese during World War II. Takaki talks about the daily lives of internees, going onto the children he says, “After eating breakfast in a cafeteria, the children went to school, where they began the day by saluting the flag of the United States and then singing “My country, ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty.” Looking beyond the flagpole, they saw the barbed wire, the watchtowers, and the armed guards” (Takaki 895-6). This page in Takaki I have kept flagged with a sticky note since I read it. The passage highlights the criminality and stark hypocrisy that E.O. 9066 gave the United States. To force not only American citizens, but children, into concentration camps is by itself absurd, ludicrous and unjustifiable, but to then force them to pay homage to the flag that put them in bondage and sing songs of what America boasts and denies them, that is beyond me.

I cannot imagine what rage being put in that situation would bring up in me. The scene is straight out of a dystopian society novel. Outside of fiction, it gives me a terrible taste in my mouth. How could the United States act with integrity after that? How could the United States pretend to fight for lofty goals it obviously didn’t believe in? Or was it that the Nazi party were concentrating and killing white Europeans that made the act of mass imprisonment and violation of human rights and human will so unacceptable.

I am impressed by the fortitude and resilience of the Japanese Americans during that time. I am impressed by their continuing faith in the United States after such an experience. I am impressed by their insight and understanding. I’m not sure I would have been.