"Who knows better about surprise than Japan? Ok, why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor?"
"You believe in surprise, much more so than us."
"Who knows better about surprise than Japan? Ok, why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor?"
"You believe in surprise, much more so than us."
53 Comments
redlemace@lemmy.world · 75 pts · 157d
Once again he missed the basics
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 21 pts · 157d
Not only is this... perhaps one of the most insulting things you could possibly say, so insulting that ... basically every extremely formally well-mannered Japanese politician or attache in that room actually completely lost their composure...
Why Donald, WHY WAS IT that Japan did a sneak attack on Pearl Harbor?
Was it maybe because, I don't fucking know... they didn't have sufficient access to oil resources?!
I want to beat Trump to death with a phone book.
God fucking damnit.
... This unimaginable shitstain needs to be fed his own teeth, through his nose.
I've met an ex-Yakuza once.
Had an interesting night at a bar once, we bonded over martial arts.
... I can only imagine his reaction to this.
HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 157d
Wait wait I thought I was the only person on here who knew about the oil embargo
yakko@feddit.uk · 9 pts · 157d
No I remembered. It'll be really funny if it turns out America's oil-motivated sneak attack is how the giant ultimately goes back to sleep. I could see this disaster unfolding with the winding down of the military industrial complex following a massive economic collapse and the loss of status as world reserve currency, so it's not the silliest hypothetical I can cook up.
ipd@universeodon.com · 2 pts · 157d
@HeyThisIsntTheYMCA @sp3ctr4l
What embargo?
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 5 pts · 156d
https://cimsec.org/pearl-harbor-1941-the-first-energy-war/
phutatorius@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 155d
All of that implies Japan sas the victim and ignores the fact that Japan was a military dictatorship enslaving and massacring people in Manchuria and attempting to also subjugate a larger part of China.
And why did Japan need all that oil? To power its army and its fleet. "To ensure her national security" by further imperialism. Ambassador Grew was parroting the self-serving Japanese position.
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 155d
No, it doesn't.
It implies that GeoPolitics is complicated.
Causal chain of events != Whether or not those events were justified.
Would you believe there are entire academic fields dedicated to studying this kind of stuff, trying to learn from the past, to prevent making the same.or similar mistakes in the future?
You're interpretation implies that you're not capable of objectivity, while strategizing.
That, itself, is actually a very large contributor to conflict and conflict escalation in general.
ipd@universeodon.com · 2 pts · 156d
@sp3ctr4l
thx, something I didn't know.
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 155d
=D
HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 156d
paragraph 3 of this long as fuck wikipedia page mentions competing embargos between [japan and china] and [united states and japan]. It's a small detail on that page but in our discussions in the history department in college [i bounced between a lot of majors] it seemed much larger.
W98BSoD@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 155d
Wait, I don’t remember making this alt account…/s
starik@lemmy.zip · 11 pts · 157d
They’re also not idiots, and they understand when they’re interacting with someone from a another country that their counterpart isn’t always going to follow their local social norms. They also know Trump is a buffoon. I doubt anyone Japanese was truly insulted; all US citizens should be embarrassed though.
tigeruppercut@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 157d
"Showing respect in all aspects of daily life" sounds like a bit of orientalism. People aren't exactly bowing to each other when they pick up a beer from a convenience store.
SuspciousCarrot78@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 157d
tigeruppercut@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 156d
You usually get the welcoming phrases, but that's not unique to Japan. The goodbye phrase is less common I think, to the point where I'm not sure which one you're talking about--maybe "mata yoroshiku onegaishimasu"? Bows aren't super common either, or it could be because I live in the countryside. Maybe they're more polite in Tokyo or something.
On an overall average I'd agree that society operates on a more considerate level, like you'd never have someone playing music on their phone on the train or something like that. So maybe it's just the phrasing that bothered me. "Respect (how much?) in ALL aspects of daily (down to the most mundane) life" just makes it sound like "honorable citizens would never dream of showing an ounce of dishonor!"
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 4 pts · 156d
Its really not, if you're broadly comparing Japanese culture to American culture.
I was a karateka for over a decade, met a fair number of Japanese people, Japanese karatekas.
Even the Japanese karatekas, who are... largely considered to be more rude and care less about politeness, be more brash than the typical Japanese non karateka... they were generally much more polite, less crass, more likely to avoid an unintentional insult, and be very embarassed than the American karatekas I knew, than the typical American.
Like I actually remember a Japanese karateka explaining to me the difference between ... what kinds of situations call for a 15-30 degree bow, a 30-45 degree bow, and basically a 90 degree bow.
There is a literal physical language and ettiquette to showing the proper amount of respect: If you do a very deep bow for something that only calls for a minor one, you're basicslly acting like a kiss-ass, being overly dramatic. If you do a minor bow for a situation that calls for a deep bow, you're being flippant, insulting, not taking things seriously.
The only exception to that pattern I've personally experienced was when, years later, I happened across an apparent ex-Yakuza at a bar.
Yeah. Yeah that guy was significantly less well-mannered lol.
But also extremely skilled at martial arts.
tigeruppercut@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 156d
Yeah, talking cultures broadly I agree, but the phrasing of how respect permeates "all aspects of daily life" sticks in my craw.
This isn't really unique to Japan, except maybe for the fact that it manifests itself as a bow. If you owe someone a really big apology and you say "Yeah, oops" you'll come off as flippant. If you minorly inconvenience someone and you say "I'm so deeply sorry for the grave harm I've done to you!" you sound insincere.
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 156d
I mean, my point in saying its a literal physical form of etiquette that is systemitized is to ... differentiate it from many other cultures, where its mostly just linguistic.
Not too many other cultures have a whole system of physical manuevers that also comprise part of how respect is culturally conveyed.
Microexpressions? Nah, this is a macroexpression.
Tons of broader Japanese culture also has systemitized, physical rituals... essentially, complex dances, that either accompany or just literally are an actual ancient tradition.
There is an extreme amount of emphasis on physical control of your own body, compared to other cultures I have interacted with, have studied.
Of course, not everyone takes all of that so seriously, is so formal... culture changes over time and is never totally homogenous... Japan is also rather famous for its extremely expressive and distinctive fashion/lifestyle sub cultures.
There is differentiation, but its... its sort of like the Overton window for etiquette is in a significantly different position as for many other cultures, if that makes sense.
blattrules@lemmy.world · 44 pts · 157d
George Bush threw up on their prime minister and this is far, far worse.
LaunchesKayaks@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 157d
Holy fuck which Bush? Is there video of it?
tigeruppercut@lemmy.zip · 23 pts · 157d
The first one. The second choked on a pretzel but he wasn't with other county leaders.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_H._W._Bush_vomiting_incident
Krauerking@lemy.lol · 11 pts · 157d
That is new to me too.
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · 42 pts · 157d
*sighs, wearily reaches for megaphone*
. . . HE’S DEMENTED
Steve@communick.news · 22 pts · 157d
And not in the colloquial sense.
He's literally suffering from cognitive decline. Possibly full on dementia.
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 156d
Definitely dementia.
Tylerdurdon@lemmy.world · 23 pts · 157d
It's so embarrassing living through these administrations.
Krauerking@lemy.lol · 8 pts · 157d
The sound the press pool makes when he says it makes me want to curl into a ball. I don't get how the cringe people feel about this doesnt make them just need to stop.
Undvik@fedia.io · 22 pts · 157d
How is this a joke? Am I the only one that doesn't get Trump's "jokes"? To me it just looks like a demented idiot with a foot in his mouth
Bronzebeard@lemmy.zip · 17 pts · 156d
All of right wing humor is just verbally shitting on someone/group of people. There's never a punchline. It's just cruel, which they find amusing.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 3 pts · 156d
Yeah he doesn't joke.
Gork@sopuli.xyz · 18 pts · 157d
In terms of diplomatic faux paux, this is certainly up there.
Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 157d
We're dealing with fascist secret police kidnapping legal citizens, starting a war to distract from a global network of pedophiles, and government agencies in the process of creating legal mandates to spy on every human on the planet if they can.
We're well beyond social faux paux.
phutatorius@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 155d
Well, that's one reason, but driving up the oil price to bail out Putin and enrich the other fossil-fuel companies is a bigger one (the same objective that's behind the attacks on environmental laws and renewable energy).
northernlights@lemmy.today · 5 pts · 157d
*faux-pas
phutatorius@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 155d
Fox paws.
RockBottom@feddit.org · 14 pts · 157d
International conservative relations.
quick_snail@feddit.nl · 13 pts · 157d
Wouldn't it be worse if they made a Perl harbor joke?
Or if Trump made a Hiroshima joke?
slowtrain33@lemmy.ml · 31 pts · 157d
The question he was answering was “why didn’t you tell your allies (like Japan) before attacking Iran?”
So his sarcastic answer of “why didn’t you tell the US before attacking us in WWII?” is dumb, tone deaf, and offensive.
Dumb because Japan and the US were enemies when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor… so why tf would the tell us beforehand? The question was “Why didn’t you tell your allies you were going to attack Iran,” not “Why didn’t you tell Iran you were going to attack Iran?”.
Tone deaf because he’s trying to making a joke in response to a serious question about war, and bringing up a sensitive topic between our two countries.
And offensive because he’s making it sound like Japan were the only ones who did awful things when we fought in WWII. Hot take probably, but the US did far more heinous things to Japan in WWII than they did to the US.
hitmyspot@aussie.zone · 5 pts · 156d
You mean like dropping nukes on cities?
Spacehooks@reddthat.com · 4 pts · 157d
Thanks for the clarification. I was legit confused on context which is on brand for the current regime.
quick_snail@feddit.nl · 2 pts · 156d
OK but also China.
phutatorius@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 155d
Those who fought in the South Pacific would beg to differ. And the Japanese were also committing genocide and enslaving populations in the countries they occupied. The fact that they didn't do more damage to the US was because the US successfully prevented them from doing so, not because they were decent people.
I'm not trying to excuse Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but let's also not pretend Tojo and his gang were anything but murderous power-mad scum.
caseyweederman@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 156d
I know you're not deliberately minimizing the atrocities Japan committed back then...
phutatorius@lemmy.zip · 4 pts · 155d
I'm frankly surprised that he didn't. Maybe he couldn't remember the name of Hiroshima.
synae@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 154d
Why does anyone have to make a joke?
Korkki@lemmy.ml · 12 pts · 157d
I was half expecting for him to end with remarks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki as other examples of surprises.
taiyang@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 157d
Imagine, you're a conservative PM, self described Iron Lady, meeting your ideological ally and he says something so insanely offensive and stupid, you change your whole worldview for the better.
I can dream, but we know she already knows whose company she's in and she's secretly fine with it as long as the world order shifts right.
Reverendender@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 157d
She is definitely some sort of undead ghoul, right?
Archangel1313@lemmy.ca · 8 pts · 157d
This is just his way of being a "breath of fresh air". You know, compared to all those other stuffy politicians that "act like adults".
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 8 pts · 156d
Yeah, Trump really dropped a bomb on Japan, twice.
TerdFerguson@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 156d
Because of course he did.
The stupidity is genuine.
xc2215x@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 157d
Man this guy is just too much.
Lushed_Lungfish@lemmy.ca · 3 pts · 156d
Remind me who lost that war? I don't think it was the ones that launched the surprise attack...