Japan bashing
Japan bashing refers to the intense criticism and negative sentiment directed towards Japan and its people, a phenomenon that has occurred particularly throughout the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This trend has often had serious ramifications, especially for Japanese Americans, who faced discrimination and violence during these periods. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, anti-Japanese sentiment led to restrictive immigration laws and land ownership barriers on the West Coast of the United States. The vilification of Japanese individuals intensified during World War II, culminating in the internment of Japanese Americans.
In the 1970s and 1980s, as Japan's automotive industry rose to prominence, resentment grew in the U.S. due to job losses in the American car manufacturing sector. This tension tragically contributed to violent incidents, such as the murder of Vincent Chin in 1982, who was mistakenly targeted due to his perceived Japanese heritage. Furthermore, as Japan's economy thrived, American politicians and media often accused it of unfair trade practices and lack of originality, perpetuating negative stereotypes that affected perceptions of Japanese Americans. By the mid-1990s, as trade relations improved, overt expressions of these prejudices diminished, marking a gradual shift in U.S.-Japan relations towards collaboration.
Japan bashing
Japan bashing, or extremely negative criticism of Japan and its people, occurred a number of times in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, often creating problems for Japanese Americans. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, dislike for the Japanese eventually led to anti-Japanese land and immigration laws on the West Coast. During World War II, the Japanese were vilified as purveyors of international destruction. This distrust, combined with other factors, resulted in Japanese Americans being confined to internment camps for most of the war. In the 1970s and 1980s, in response to higher gasoline prices, Americans began to buy fuel-efficient compact cars made in Japan, causing a decline in the demand for large American cars and a subsequent decline in the US automobile industry. Many autoworkers lost their jobs, and resentment against the Japanese grew. In 1982, two Detroit men, one of whom was a laid-off autoworker, bludgeoned to death Vincent Chin, a Chinese American whom they mistakenly believed was Japanese.
In the latter part of the 1980s and early 1990s, when the Japanese economy was very strong, many US politicians and journalists accused the Japanese government of being protectionist and unfairly excluding American-made goods. They suggested that the Japanese lacked creativity and had gained economic success by producing cheap copies of American products or slight improvements on American ideas. They claimed that Japan had an unfair advantage regarding production standards because its people sacrificed their personal lives and health to keep the nation’s economy strong. The Japanese school system was said to place so much pressure on children that they regularly committed suicide over their failure to succeed.
In fact, karoshi (death from overwork, usually due to heart attacks, strokes, or suicides) was confirmed in only a few cases in Japan, and the suicide rate among people aged fifteen to twenty-four had been lower in Japan than in the United States since 1981. However, all of the accusations, subtle and not-so-subtle, hurled against the Japanese by American politicians and journalists negatively affected many Japanese Americans. Many other Americans seemed to believe that Japanese Americans shared the negative characteristics that politicians and journalists accused the Japanese of having. By the mid-1990s, the acrimonious trade disputes between Japan and the United States largely ended. The countries aligned on many trade, economic, and global political issues in the following decades. As the political turmoil dissipated, acts of hate became less overt.
Bibliography
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Hatamiya, Leslie T. Righting a Wrong: Japanese Americans and the Passage of the Civil Liberties Act of 1988. Stanford UP, 1994.
Howard, John. Concentration Camps on the Home Front: Japanese Americans in the House of Jim Crow. U of Chicago P, 2008.
Mead, Walter. "Japan-Bashing, an Ugly American Tradition." L. A. Times, 1989, www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-06-04-op-2358-story.html
Petersen, William. Japanese Americans: Oppression and Success. Random, 1971.
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