ka (02/27/83)
The New York Times decided that the report to congress on the imprisonment of Japanese during WW2 rated a front page story. I read the article, and as nearly as I could tell the commission had nothing new to say about the subject. This left me wondering why this was such important news. So my question is: For all of you who studied WW2 in history classes, how was the internment of the Jpanese dealt with? Was it described as a major violation of civil liberties? Or was it portrayed as a "military necessity?" Or was all mention of it simply suppressed? As usual, responses mailed to me will be summarized to the net. Kenneth Almquist
ka (03/08/83)
I recieved three responses to my query as to how the WW2 Japanese internment camps were dealt with in history classes. Everybody had heard of them before this. David Simen learned about the camps in junior high: "We were expected to be shocked and, as well as I can remember, we all were." This is close to my own experience. However, Judith Schrier did not hear anything about the camps in any history courses she took: "The most striking thing I remember is when my Sophomore Physics lab partner, a Nisei, told me about his own ex- periences in a camp. They were sent to an old army camp in (I don't remember exactly which state, but Nevada or Colorado, maybe) during the winter. The buildings were not heated or insulated, and there were not sufficient blankets. His grandmother died during the first few weeks there." Unm-ivax!collier didn't respond to my question, but described a wartime three stooges short that "dealt openly and rather degrad- ingly with a squinty eyed and very buck toothed mass of 'escaped Japs from the internment camp'." As he points out, the camps were not particularly secret--in the wartime environment few peo- ple (other than the Japanese) were bothered by them. Kenneth Almquist