true

No one ever said we were equal? I'm just saying that no one came away squeaky clean after WW2, both sides committed atrocities.

You're better than that reply. I know that much.

The only thing I've really stated repeatedly in this thread is that you can't assign traits that don't exist (like evil) to a whole nation of people.

It'd be like claiming everyone from France is a pervert because they're French or everyone from Norway is a psychopath because they're from Norway. I don't understand why you would believe in that logic.

again you keep nit picking about the WHOLE nation, as if you can't talk about countries unless you account for every single individual....

You are so adverse to generalizations. Which is fair enough, i agree generalizations are obnoxious. but you can't have discussions about large issues without using some generalizations.

You are shutting down the conversation by using the exceptions and the outliers, how do you have a conversations about large groups of people and nations if you don't use generalizations though?

By making a qualifying statement like "many ___ are this" or "during World War II, a lot of ____ did that" - instead of just writing off an entire group of people with an offensive label like "they're all evil" or whatever the case may be.

as an American i'm used to being generalized about, and guess what, all of the generalizations, although not true for ME, still have some truth to them and most of the topics are to do with things that are worth having conversations aout in america...

American stereotypes... obesity, gun laws, foreign policy, all things that are worth talking about. there are ways of talking about things in a general sense in a respectful way,. just because every American doesn't own a gun doesn't mean that we can't tok about America's gun laws.

I could just shut down every conversation by saying,. NOT ALL AMERICANS OWN GUNS! i don't own a gun, i've never seen someone use a gun or threaten anyone with a gun, but i can still have a conversation with someone about gun laws in America without immediately shutting them down screaming about how dare you generalize about me!

IT's okay to talk about issues and use generalizations if you do it in a respectful way/

Because people have repeatedly labelled whole nations in this thread as possessing characteristics it's impossible to have.

That doesn't make it impossible to discuss, it means you have to try harder if I can shut down your main argument by pointing out one absolutely obvious flaw in your logic.

Having discussions about large groups of people is really easy, as long as the starting point isn't those little ****ing Japs with their anger issues and penchant for torture. Unless you're joking of course, then if that's the case - **** the little kamikaze bastards.

If you feel that does restrict your ability to discuss these things, then personally, I would start with examining my own logic (or lack thereof) prior to attacking someone else's point which has been expressed simply and clearly, and backed up by others.

There's a huge difference between generalising about mindsets ("Japanese people are evil") and actual issues ("America has a problem with obesity/guns") - do you not see the difference? Are you the same as every other American? No, you're you and everybody else is everybody else. There might be some aspects of your personality and outlook on life that are shaped by your nationality, which would in this case explain why so many Japanese soldiers committed acts of cruelty in WWII, but that doesn't mean all Japanese people are uninitiated psychopaths just waiting for an unfortunate Westerner to turn their back so they can torture them... And especially to judge a country based on something that happened 70+ years ago is a bit ridiculous; are all Germans Nazis right now in 2014? No. The world has moved on, it's a very different country now. Were all Germans ever Nazis? No, the Nazis were a political party, they had supporters and they had people who disagreed with them.

Who said Japanese people were evil? Say their name, because it would be racist to say that and you should report anyone who said that. No one said that. There's a difference between saying Japan's actions in ww2 were evil vs. Japanese people are evil.

You(not only you) are the one manipulating everything said about Japan's actions and behaviors as a nation, into personalized attacks on Japanese people, and it's obnoxious.

How did this get flipped round onto me when I've been the one saying it's not fair to generalise people exactly? I'm saying it's wrong to generalise an entire nation of people and claim they all think the same way or believe the same things because of their nationality.

but you are one of the people making it seem like anything that anyone says about Japan, is some sort of attack on Japanese people. You are not being fair to the people who have made legitimate comments about Japan as a nation during that time period.

That's not my aim whatsoever nor what I've even been discussing? We've lost sight of the point (was there ever one? :laugh:) - dropping nuclear bombs has never and will never be a positive course of action, in my opinion. As Japan is the only country in the world to have been the victim of a nuclear bombing (on two occasions) I can see why you think that means I'm defending the Japanese people, but I'm not really, I'd think it was wrong if they were dropped on any country's territory in an act of aggression. It was an unnecessarily overwhelming course of action that sought to destroy Japan, not beat it into submission, but destroy it. The US government was ruthless in its approach and showed no regard for the Japanese people. I find that wrong. That doesn't mean I therefore think it was okay that the Japanese people committed atrocities in the war, there isn't always a right and wrong perspective in every situation. Japan did some ****ty things and the USA responded with two almighty ****tier things that have destroyed Japanese lives and land for generations to come. I hope that the world has learned from this lesson and we'll never see that repeated ever again.

well i disagree with you, I think Japan did some ****ty things, and US was more than compassionate to Japan during that war. I think the USA did was we thought was the best for Japan and the world, and i think history has proved the USA's actions were the right actions.

Japan is a strong and free nation today. The USA could have turned Japan into a waste land if we wanted, but instead we supported them after the war, and did everything we could to make them a stronger, better, free'er country. I don't think you can fault the USA in our treatment of Japan post ww2. and i think you could say the same for Germany and all of western Europe.

The USA could have been like the Soviet Union after the war, and just proclaimed countries to be our territory like Russia did to eastern Europe (and if not for the bomb, i think russia would also have started to move to Asia), but we didn't. Instead we helped them rebuild themselves and encouraged them to be free democratic countries. i really don't think you can fault the USA after WW2. I think we did things very right.

I agree with you about the post war stuff; but the USA financially gained from those situations let us not forget, this wasn't an exercise in charity, it was about making profits and creating a sphere of influence - the difference between the USA and the USSR in their approach is that the USA was all about positive encouragement and growth whereas the USSR treated its sphere of influence with negative oppression and drastic 5 year plans that pushed its people to the limit. This is not a criticism of the USA, it's just that that's how the USA partly managed to consolidate its position as a global superpower.

Clearly we'll never agree on the issue of the rights and wrongs of using nuclear technology in a weaponised form so there's not much point going back and forth on it anymore with you.

America paid in blood with thousands of young boy's lives. Our children. That blood was absolutely charity. How dare you imply that we lost our sons for profit.

You have such a cynical and twisted view of things, and i can't help but notice it's against the US mostly. It's still upsetting to me how Europeans need to justify America saving you by thinking America only did it for profit. It's so twisted and unfair. Shame on you.

Europe is still not properly grateful to America for what we did to save you.

If you want to be fastidious modern day Americans decend from Europeans I guess.
Anyhow.... Is what our government is doing to denigrate the 'underclass' in this country an example of the
Stanford prison experiment?
'Them' and 'us'... divide and conquer, old..infirm, incompetant, incapacitated = drain on resources surplus to requirements.

Who are you talking to?