I've been watching the series on DVD and this thought just occurred to me. I loved it as a kid (as I know many did), but I never thought about the fact that someone could have gone around giving Asian-Americans a hard time because of a TV show (of course, the show is not to blame for the actions of an ignorant person).
shareI haven't heard of any harrassment directly spawned from this TV series. I have a question for you. Have you heard anything about 2nd Vol of this TV series? I really like the show and don't understand what the fuss is about. This series wasn't intended as a factual account. Besides, unless someone is holding a gun to their head and making them watch it, they can always change the channel and watch something else. Example: M.A.S.H it also wasn't a factual account of the M.A.S.H units in Korea. M.A.S.H units are far too critical to have Drs. and Nurses fooling around in such manner of antics but this show was a big hit and lasted longer than the Conflict. Anyway I'd appreciate a heads up if you hear anything about the 2nd Vol of this series. Contact me at this email address. [email protected] Again thanx, tim
shareif that as the case i would think that the asian-americans would get more problems from the 100's of movies about the war more than this one show.
JOHN WAYNE: "You look more like a black-eyed Susan to me.
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Jeez Mitgarand! Revisionist- poor Japan . Who raped Nanking? Who attacked Pearl harbor? Ever here of the Bataan death march, Singapore, etc etc???? evil empire if there ever was one! Oh, yes- just what exactly did the USA, England, etc do to any of the Japanese on that scale? Cornered into WW2 and their documented atrocities? I don't think so!
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While there are is some bias in the prevailing historical representation of 1930-1945 Japan (not just American, but Dutch, British, and Chinese attitudes, too), it isn't very extreme. I think the most notable bias you'll find is the shift in attitudes about fire-bombing by the Allies. Dresden is considered a tragedy and Harris is villified for it but Tokyo was just the fortunes of war and Lemay is a hero. Compared to such things as Unit 731, Nanking, Bataan, and current Japanese revisionist attitudes about the war, any Allied "atrocities" don't survive scrutiny. Allied attitudes toward the Japanese were often racist and simplistic but Japanese attitudes were much worse.
shareAs I recall, whenever they showed any Japanese characters, they were never really portrayed as evil. They were shown to be the enemy, but not as the evil sadists that World War II propaganda films made them out to be.
From what I can recall there was one episode where Boyington was up against a Japanese ace who was shown as his counterpart on the other side. At the end of the episode they're both shot down on an uninhabited island. As they sit and wait to be rescued. They talk and show that each respects the other as a skilled pilot and worthy opponent.
If I remember, Pappy shared a chocolate bar he had, and "Rice Ball" shared some Saki he had...
shareWhat about the one where that Japanese pilot is shot down over the base, and it turns out that he spent a lot of time in America? He winds up bonding with the Black Sheep (and the audience), winning a large amount of money for them (gambling over a ping-pong tournament), and then stealing a Corsair and trying to escape, forcing Pappy to go after him and shoot him down. Again, not a bad guy or a war criminal, just a man doing his duty. Totally unrealistic plot, but that was one of the best episodes emotionally.
shareRead Pappy's book. He goes into a lot of detail about his imprisonment, it was harsh, but everybody but the officers in charge did many things to aid and comfort him, Pappy had a lot of good things to say about his captors, actually. And that story was probably the basis for this episode.
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You are not getting politically correct as you grow older, are you?
shareFunny to answer a question after three years, but anyways. I was watching this show in 1976 as a kid living in the US, but it never made my life any harder.
Japan in 1976 USA was a very low profile existence compared to today (made-in-Japan still stood for poor quality) and the fact that the show featured the Japanese, even as villains, every week, felt sort of nice. A lot of kids then were into building plastic models and because of the show, some of my friends built Zeros and I showed them my Japanese Zero books and we had a good time!
I still build model airplanes. The kits are so much better today. I've built several Zeros as well, learned a lot about the plane and I've learned there was so much more to the Japanese Naval and Army Air forces than just the Zeke. I've seen people call ANY Japanese plane a Zeke.
Your response reminded me of one Black Sheep episode: the new threat was a heavily-armored Zero... but there never was such a plane. In fact, Zekes had no protective armor, hence their speed and maneouverability. The only real variences in the plane were the sub-types (eg. A6M3 Model 22; A6M5 52c; etc.)
If your're interested, here's a couple of my favorite modeling sites:
www.hyperscale.com
www.arcair.com
From around the same period (circa 1976), there was a rather irritating Calgon clothes detergent commercial that ends with "Ancient Chinese secret, huh?"
Those of you old enough would remember it. I'd imagine more Asian-Americans got harassed at school (possibly at work) due to this commercial than Baa Baa Blacksheep could ever have caused.
edit: meant to put this at the end of the thread
I remember that commercial. People ask him how he gets things so clean and he tells them it's an ancient Chinese secret, but he always gets busted and the joke is on him. I don't think it's all that bad as far as racism goes, but I don't think anyone would appreciate it today.
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I'm just expressing my opinion.
You may all go to hell, and I will go to Texas.
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AWWWWW, Poor japs, GET OVER IT !!!!! They attacked us.
shareWhen the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I was not a Jew.
When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
What? Not unless you lived in some backwater racist swamp. I had a few Japanese friends in my school during the run of this show, and they were never hassled over WWII for any reason.
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