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It’s ok to praise FDR for the New Deal and also recognise that sending all Japanese people (and not German or Italian people) to internment camps was a bigoted,

It’s ok to praise FDR for the New Deal and also recognise that sending all Japanese people (and not German or Italian people) to internment camps was a bigoted, evil thing to do. What do you want? For us to say “ah well, that’s just how it was back in the day”? You’re the one incapable of nuance if you want to put everything FDR did into one bucket or the other.

slibhb 3y ago
People can praise or criticize FDR for whatever they like. I'm objecting to the name-calling, not the idea that the internment of Japanese Americans was wrong.
- BaseballPhysics 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - slibhb 3y ago
    No, the idea that almost everyone born before 1980 was an evil bigot is stupid
    - BaseballPhysics 3y ago
      Then it's a good thing no one said that. You should probably take a break from the internet. There's enough things to get offended about. There's really no reason to start making up new ones.
      - slibhb 3y ago
        If you extend your "calling a spade a spade" logic, it will to lead to some ridiculous premise like "everyone born before x year was an evil bigot" where x keeps marching forward year after year.
    - jjulius 3y ago
      Where did OP call "everyone born before 1980 ... an evil bigot"? Where did OP single out FDR as a reactionary bigot? Yes, it was done under his watch, but there were, in point of fact, plenty of genuinely reactionary bigots who supported it at the time. You're lambasting OP for the words you've put into their mouth. Stop.
    - nindalf 3y ago
      Not everyone. Just the guy who ordered Japanese Americans be sent to internment camps.
- jakelazaroff 3y ago
  Would you not describe the internment of Japanese Americans as reactionary or as bigotry? Which label do you actually disagree with? OP wasn't just mindlessly adding invectives; they used those words for a reason.
dQw4w9WgXcQ 3y ago
[flagged]
- endisneigh 3y ago
  if you know what a kamikazi is, then you know the ones who did that were not the ones sent to the camps. could you say anything more stupid? lol
- krapp 3y ago
  > You know what's also bigoted and evil? Kamikazi-ing planes into Pearl Harbor. Yeah, that didn't happen. Japan didn't start using kamikaze attacks until the end of the war, as an act of desperation. It wasn't just, like, a thing they did.
- mc32 3y ago
  I would say Bataan and PoW camps in SEAsia as well as treatment of mainland Chinese, Korean laborers, etc., are "better" examples of Japanese bigotry and cruelty --at the time. Japan has come a long way since then. 1 in 3 PoWs in Japanese labor camps would die during WWII: https://www.historyonthenet.com/world-war-two-japanese-pow-camps https://www.historyonthenet.com/world-war-two-japanese-pow-c...
- tech_ken 3y ago
  Setting aside the historical veracity of this nonsense, are you suggesting that it was appropriate for US citizens to pay the price of that decision because of their ancestry? What is wrong with you?
mc32 3y ago
Japanese, Italians and Germans were declared Enemy Aliens: https://www.thc.texas.gov/preserve/projects-and-programs/military-history/texas-world-war-ii/japanese-german-and-italian https://www.thc.texas.gov/preserve/projects-and-programs/mil...
George83728 3y ago
I believe that the only reason most German-Americans were not interned is because they were too large a portion of the population to intern without seriously negatively effecting the war effort. My evidence for this belief is the fact that Japanese-Americans represented a third of people living in Hawaii, more than 150k of them, yet in Hawaii only ~1800 Japanese-Americans were interned. About 1%. This, despite the fact that Hawaii was closer to the war than the rest of America, and despite the fact that the Niihau incident occurred in Hawaii. Interning a third of the population of Hawaii simply wasn't practical, so in Hawaii they had to exercise much more discretion. Furthermore, some people believe that Executive Order 8802, which forbade ethnic and racial discrimination in defense industries, was intended more to prevent discrimination against German-Americans and Italian-Americans than against African-Americans. Supposing that is true, it evidences the perception of FDR's administration that discrimination against German-Americans, despite their skin color, was a plausible scenario and would harm the war effort if permitted. Further evidence for the plausibility of ethnic discrimination against Germans, despite their skin color, is easy to find during WWI. Across America and the UK, German families (including the Royal Family..) changed their names to conceal their German origins. Schools stop teaching German, businesses were renamed, sauerkraut became "liberty cabbage" (freedom fries, anyone?) The Red Cross even forbade people with German last names from joining. tl;dr: The federal government recognized the potential appetite for discrimination against German-Americans, but forbade this because German-Americans were a very large portion of the population and excluding them would harm the war effort. At the same time the federal government perpetrated discrimination against Japanese-Americans, except they exercised more discretion in Hawaii where Japanese-Americans were a very large segment of the population.
- justin66 3y ago
  > Interning a third of the population of Hawaii simply wasn't practical > At the same time the federal government perpetrated discrimination against Japanese-Americans, except they exercised more discretion in Hawaii where Japanese-Americans were a very large segment of the population. Hawaii, not a US state at the time, was largely occupied by the US military prior to Pearl Harbor. After Pearl Harbor its residents were subject to martial law and their civil rights were suspended. The situation there was not analogous to the situation on the mainland, so I wouldn't use it to draw any conclusions. > the only reason Your thesis isn't wildly off-base, but how often is anything done by humans done for one single, solitary reason?

slibhb 3y ago

People can praise or criticize FDR for whatever they like. I'm objecting to the name-calling, not the idea that the internment of Japanese Americans was wrong.

BaseballPhysics 3y ago
[flagged]
- slibhb 3y ago
  No, the idea that almost everyone born before 1980 was an evil bigot is stupid
  - BaseballPhysics 3y ago
    Then it's a good thing no one said that. You should probably take a break from the internet. There's enough things to get offended about. There's really no reason to start making up new ones.
    - slibhb 3y ago
      If you extend your "calling a spade a spade" logic, it will to lead to some ridiculous premise like "everyone born before x year was an evil bigot" where x keeps marching forward year after year.
  - jjulius 3y ago
    Where did OP call "everyone born before 1980 ... an evil bigot"? Where did OP single out FDR as a reactionary bigot? Yes, it was done under his watch, but there were, in point of fact, plenty of genuinely reactionary bigots who supported it at the time. You're lambasting OP for the words you've put into their mouth. Stop.
  - nindalf 3y ago
    Not everyone. Just the guy who ordered Japanese Americans be sent to internment camps.
jakelazaroff 3y ago
Would you not describe the internment of Japanese Americans as reactionary or as bigotry? Which label do you actually disagree with? OP wasn't just mindlessly adding invectives; they used those words for a reason.

dQw4w9WgXcQ 3y ago

[flagged]

endisneigh 3y ago
if you know what a kamikazi is, then you know the ones who did that were not the ones sent to the camps. could you say anything more stupid? lol
krapp 3y ago
> You know what's also bigoted and evil? Kamikazi-ing planes into Pearl Harbor. Yeah, that didn't happen. Japan didn't start using kamikaze attacks until the end of the war, as an act of desperation. It wasn't just, like, a thing they did.
mc32 3y ago
I would say Bataan and PoW camps in SEAsia as well as treatment of mainland Chinese, Korean laborers, etc., are "better" examples of Japanese bigotry and cruelty --at the time. Japan has come a long way since then. 1 in 3 PoWs in Japanese labor camps would die during WWII: https://www.historyonthenet.com/world-war-two-japanese-pow-camps https://www.historyonthenet.com/world-war-two-japanese-pow-c...
tech_ken 3y ago
Setting aside the historical veracity of this nonsense, are you suggesting that it was appropriate for US citizens to pay the price of that decision because of their ancestry? What is wrong with you?

mc32 3y ago

Japanese, Italians and Germans were declared Enemy Aliens: https://www.thc.texas.gov/preserve/projects-and-programs/military-history/texas-world-war-ii/japanese-german-and-italian https://www.thc.texas.gov/preserve/projects-and-programs/mil...

George83728 3y ago

I believe that the only reason most German-Americans were not interned is because they were too large a portion of the population to intern without seriously negatively effecting the war effort. My evidence for this belief is the fact that Japanese-Americans represented a third of people living in Hawaii, more than 150k of them, yet in Hawaii only ~1800 Japanese-Americans were interned. About 1%. This, despite the fact that Hawaii was closer to the war than the rest of America, and despite the fact that the Niihau incident occurred in Hawaii. Interning a third of the population of Hawaii simply wasn't practical, so in Hawaii they had to exercise much more discretion. Furthermore, some people believe that Executive Order 8802, which forbade ethnic and racial discrimination in defense industries, was intended more to prevent discrimination against German-Americans and Italian-Americans than against African-Americans. Supposing that is true, it evidences the perception of FDR's administration that discrimination against German-Americans, despite their skin color, was a plausible scenario and would harm the war effort if permitted. Further evidence for the plausibility of ethnic discrimination against Germans, despite their skin color, is easy to find during WWI. Across America and the UK, German families (including the Royal Family..) changed their names to conceal their German origins. Schools stop teaching German, businesses were renamed, sauerkraut became "liberty cabbage" (freedom fries, anyone?) The Red Cross even forbade people with German last names from joining. tl;dr: The federal government recognized the potential appetite for discrimination against German-Americans, but forbade this because German-Americans were a very large portion of the population and excluding them would harm the war effort. At the same time the federal government perpetrated discrimination against Japanese-Americans, except they exercised more discretion in Hawaii where Japanese-Americans were a very large segment of the population.

justin66 3y ago
> Interning a third of the population of Hawaii simply wasn't practical > At the same time the federal government perpetrated discrimination against Japanese-Americans, except they exercised more discretion in Hawaii where Japanese-Americans were a very large segment of the population. Hawaii, not a US state at the time, was largely occupied by the US military prior to Pearl Harbor. After Pearl Harbor its residents were subject to martial law and their civil rights were suspended. The situation there was not analogous to the situation on the mainland, so I wouldn't use it to draw any conclusions. > the only reason Your thesis isn't wildly off-base, but how often is anything done by humans done for one single, solitary reason?