I think my hypocrisy meter just exploded after reading some of these posts. Let’s see, which is better?
A). A group of re-enactors with possibly questionable tactics and some off weapons and uniform parts, hanging around at a show and doing a cheesy tactical re-enactment with no cover on open ground with no supporting arms?
-OR-
B). Two former WW2 airplanes with really questionable markings from opposite sides (maybe even marked for different theaters of operation, like a 8th AF Mustang going after a Zero), “dogfighting” at distances ridiculously close, not even simulated gunfire of any kind, and right afterwards the two planes form up and fly around.
Seems like many people here are just fine with the latter but have awful problems with the former. To me, they’re in the exact same category, only that one cost a lot more to put on than the other…
Pogmusic wrote:
Well, then I guess we have to rewrite historical context then don't we? I'm sorry if it offends your friends wife. I don't use the phrase except when used in historical context.
I have several family members, one uncle who died at Pearl Harbor, and friends who fought in the Japanese co-prosperity theater, who are greatly offended at having lost their youth and friends to the Japanese. What about the Filipino's who lived & died under their rule for years. What about the Koreans who serviced the Japanese? What about the Chinese for Gods sake? What about the Allied POWs forced to serve as slave labor, chemical and biological experiments and also starved to death -- nearly as bad as the German death camps. I'm sure that they're offended by the Japanese and what they did.
I have to say, it’s odd that there seems to be little ramifications over us characterizing the German people (most of whom weren’t even born before 1945) as “Krauts” or “Nazis” in the WW2 context, when we must tap dance around the Japanese issue. We can make fun of Nazi Germany in that way not just because of the inherent evil, but that they were Caucasians. The thing that made it oh so easy for 1940s America to hate the Japanese (the fact that looked so different from Caucasians) is making us now deny that aspect of history. Personally, I’m from the South, a region where slavery was legal and I had direct ancestors who fought for the Confederacy. None of them owned slaves and probably didn’t know anyone who did (they were all dirt poor), but I have no issues with people bringing this up in a historical context of the 1860s. In that context, all my relatives were “crackers,” “greybacks” or whatever derisive words they had at the time. But I think this is a self-imposed thing for Caucasians anyway. I dated a Japanese girl years ago and nobody in her family had issues with it. Her father knew I was a WW2 re-enactor as a hobby and said, “Hey, I know you don’t carry that hatred in your heart, but you’re representing those who did - and for good reason. In the context of WW2, that’s how people thought.”
But, there’ll always be those with infinitely thin skin, no matter what color it is.
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