The disaster of the earthquake and the following tsunami in Japanwas horrific in any language.
What impressed me was the stoicism and the unity of the people.
They organised themselves for this seemingly impossible task and everybody is confident the damage will be repaired and that country will rise again soon.
Contrast the lack of looting, the organisation and the order prevailing there with the looting in New Orleans after Katrina.
Contrast it also with Haiti which also has an earthquake but no tsunami and a year later little has been done in the way of reconstruction and murder and theft are commonplace.
What conclusions can we draw from these examples.
First, Japan is a homogenous society which has avoided the enrichment and division of the Western countries, a bit like we were in WW2. Countries like this have people who relate to each other and pull together and their united efforts can overcome seemingly insuperable obsticles.
Second Japanese people are intelligent and hard working. Contrast that with Haiti which has endemic poverty but which is also fairly homogenous but the population is African in origin.
A year after the earthquake they are still sitting around waiting for others to dig them out of their problems.
It will be said correctly that Japan is a modern state and has the resources to cope. But then disaster strikes Japan with frightening frequencies, and still they rise above them.
Also they have a low birthrate and an ageing population giving the lie to those who say we need immigrants to look after their old people.
But Haiti was the first Carribean state to be freed from slavery when the Japanese were also a peasant society.
While the Japanese had the brains to embrace modern technology Haiti adopted a government of corruption and its people embraced voodoo and plundered its rich vegetation.
Haiti has a better climate than Japan and neither has much in the way of natural resources but yet Japan prospers while Haiti was more or less a wasteland even before the earthquake.
They both had the same chances at the same time but with very different outcomes.
Meanwhile we import people of African origin who have shown themselves in every country they rule to be incapable of doing so efficiently and who dilute our national unity and even here most only achieve anything as a result of racist anti British discrimination in their favour.
And I have not even mentioned our tsunami, that of muslim immigration and breeding.
If a natural disaster strikes our country do you think we could cope as have the Japs?
No way, we are too divided with uneducated aliens in our midst, many who do not like the hand that at present feeds them.
We would have no chance.
The" Blitz spirit"of a united Britain?
Forget it.
5 comments:
Yes ... nothing really to add to that.
I told my brother once that if ever I won the lottery and decided to live abroad, then it would be Japan (not Australia)... the only foreign country I would feel safe in as a foreigner there. And that is despite their regular natural catastrophes.
I must wonder why, in the early 20th century we didn't ally ourselves with Japan; with their army and our navy, and given our respective geographical locations (Islands off the north west coast of, and south east coast of, the eurasian landmass), and, at that time homogenuous populations, we would still dominate the world to this day without too much trouble.
We are both ingenious peoples.
The Japanese have reacted in an admirable fashion to the challenge of the recent disaster and enjoy an enviable national cohesion. As you so rightly point out, the Japanese have built a highly advanced society through intelligence and collective national effort, despite the paucity of natural resources in the Japanese archipelago.
The example of Haiti is instructive, for it has enjoyed independence for over two centuries and yet it is still one of the poorest places on the planet. It is worth highlighting that latter fact whenever we encounter foolish assertions about the roots of poverty in certain countries as lying in 'Western imperialism'. Canada only became a dominion of the British Empire in 1867 and didn't become fully independent until the last century. Inperialism doesn’t appear to have harmed Canada, does it? There does appear to be something about the human and cultural capital of Japan and Canada that set them apart from countries such as Haiti.
And talking of the Japanese climate - yes, not as good as Haiti's. Indeed, it gets quite nippy in winter.
I suppose it depends on your definition of a good climate. Personally i'd miss having proper distinct seasons. Which is why, if I ever did decide to leave Britain, I'd choose a country like Canada or New Zealand. The Japanese have been very effective in their handling of this crisis so far, and I expected nothing less. As for modern British politicians who talk about the 'blitz spirit' in a bid to appeal to traditional voters while systematically destroying everything that contributed to that mindset. They make me sick.
Oh, I would never of been a Japanese until well after their war for dominance of the pacific. Preferred Hong Kong myself. China is the new Japan but its the tigers paw. soft and sweet....... treated gently.
Pre-WW2 the Japanese were a different people. Culturally, Economically and socially with their belief system imposed upon them by their media. They were a tiny peoples before because of abject poverty and diet. After the war, they did not wish to suffer again so they worked and they worked. Dominance came economically.
Japanese stocks might be tumbling now but watch the Yen rise as their money is repatriated in the Trillions to rebuild.
Once they get shut of those terror device on the seaside.
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