Sorry about that, I was trying to point out that actors are actually addressing the major issues that plague us and not the people who should be. Anyway, way to go Tom Hanks.

[edit on 17-3-2010 by jackflap]

Go Tom Hanks - hits the nail on the head, and .. wonder of wonders .. the controlled media attack him.

Every time someone famous and as well liked as Hanks flips the oligarchs the bird - the closer we come to really challenging the system in a meaningful way.

Go Tom.

Hanks was pointing out the obvious...in war, the people in the trenches are racist
This is necessary, its a survival instinct...you must feel superior to the ones your fighting for several reasons...first being confidence in your superiority, and second to dehumanize someone so you can actually kill them. Most people cannot kill a equal, they must see someone as beneath them, beneath humans in general, then its just hunting and exterminating..like pest control.

My father fought in Vietnam. he has a number of notches in his gun. He is not a racist man and even is friends with his vietnamese neighbor whom was a soldier also (other side obviously). They laughed and cry together now.

Ask my father about a war story and when he is getting "into the moment", he will talk vividly about things, about happenings, and he starts using racial terms like "gook" and "charlies"...his brain is still trained to think that those particular people were not humans but just these mutant monsters.

in WW2, same thing, Japs, Krouts, etc...subhumans.

Believe it or not, its actually *not* natural for humans to kill humans...that has to be coded in and reinforced, and the only way to truely do that is to seperate the opposition from humanity...else your just insane.

I have no issue with what Hanks says...no true soldier that has seen combat has issues with what he said, the front lines of war is not politically correct...and if they think our troops now are somehow not racist, then that is almost insulting to the troops...its saying they dont have survival instinct or they are all freaking insane.

He has a point. Think about it. Would the Iraq war had the huge conservative support if the Iraqis were white Christians? It's a lot easier to support killing others when they aren't like your neighbors and friends.

Besides, I really don't think he was attacking soldiers or even attacking the country. What he said applies equally to both parties in the conflict. That like Americans, those fighting us in the middle east do so in part due to our differences.

Whats really going on here, is that many people refuse to admit that some of the support for such actions is based on racist and religious views and simply not completely based on security issues. So, they attack anyone that brings up the issue as being anti-American.

"Back in World War II, we viewed the Japanese as 'yellow, slant-eyed dogs' that believed in different gods," he said. "They were out to kill us because our way of living was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different."

Back in WWII, we were also fighting against the blond hair, blue eyed Christian Germans.

Originally posted by AshleyD

Back in WWII, we were also fighting against the blond hair, blue eyed Christian Germans.

So?

That somehow implies that anti-Japanese sentiment was not racially motivated at all?











Hmmmmm...


Seems eerily familiar...

Originally posted by AshleyD

"Back in World War II, we viewed the Japanese as 'yellow, slant-eyed dogs' that believed in different gods," he said. "They were out to kill us because our way of living was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different."

Back in WWII, we were also fighting against the blond hair, blue eyed Christian Germans.

I just heard a good description of the differences in fighting in the European theater and the Pacific theater in World War II.

The European war was a war to see which side could force the other to surrender, while the Pacific war was one of annihilation with the japanese knowing they couldn't win, but just wanting to take as many Americans as they could down with them - which may explain what seems like racist overtones today.

I also always caution people against applying today's moral standards against the actions of people who lived in the past. We weren't there (most of us anyway), and don't know what it was like to have lived back then.

[edit on 3/17/2010 by centurion1211]

I fail to see how his comments were racist..

He almost quoted word for word what Americans and other nations were calling the Japanese during the Pacific Theater. Really he was giving a history lesson.

If people are too blind to see the similarities between what is occuring then, and what is occuring now, taking propaganda into account, then it's their loss.

Go Tom, you've hit the nail on the head once again. Those who speak truth are often labeled as something they are not.

Good straw man argument Conservatives...

~Keeper

Originally posted by centurion1211
I also always caution people against applying today's moral standards against the actions of people who lived in the past. We weren't there (most of us anyway), and don't know what it was like to have lived back then.

wow
I didn't know that ethics was time-dependant
is this something you would teach your son?

"Son, this is what is right and what is wrong but don't quote me on that i'm from another generation"

Originally posted by centurion1211

I also always caution people against applying today's moral standards against the actions of people who lived in the past. We weren't there (most of us anyway), and don't know what it was like to have lived back then.

[edit on 3/17/2010 by centurion1211]

some of us have family or know people who has seen what happend in those days, who pass on the stories which then can be compared to this day and age.

Have to ask, weren't the japanese also racist towards their enemies in World War II, or was this only something the "big, bad, Americans engaged in?

Hanks played in one world War II movie and suddenly became an "expert". Now he thinks he can tell it like it was on all subjects regarding World War II.

Right, Tom ...