Nationalism, not always a good thing

Since I have been in Japan, I have noticed a very disturbing trend over the years...the rise in ultra-nationalism (in both Japan and China). Before you get the wrong idea, I think nationalism is for the most part, a good thing...that is, until it becomes ultra-nationalism.

Both Chinese and Japanese are at fault here. At this rate things will only get worse and future friction can be expected. PM Koizumi has no idea what economic, historical, and diplomatic repercussions lie ahead of Japan because of his 'innocent' visit to the shrine.

Last year in China, major riots broke out and Chinese rightwingers attacked innocent Japanese businessmen, travellers, and even businesses. It was not a pretty sight and some of my students had to cancel tours to China because of it.

On the other hand, most recently in Japan a crazy 60-something-year old man torched politician Kato's mother's home because Kato voiced opposition to Prime Minister Koizumi's latest (August 15th) visit to the Yasukuni Shrine. Kato made mention of his growing concern over rising 'unhealthy' nationalism in Japan.

To be fair, recently I checked out some literature challenging the existence of the Nanjing Massacre. I must say, there is not much merit to their right-wing propoganda argument(s). I am not saying that China does not kill hundreds of thousand of its own people, as you should know, uncountable Chinese citizens were slaughtered by China during the Cultural Revolution years.

Interesting thing - I checked on Amazon for books related to the Nanjing topic and found a particularly curious reviewer, Hiromi, who seemed to give very biased reviews of books. (makes you even wonder if she even read them) See it here for yourself - have a good laugh. Like I said before - my stance on the Nanjing subject is that it indeed happened but as for what capacity, I have no idea...whether 300,000 or 100,000 were slaughtered is beyond me. I am no historian (nor was I a witness to the event) in no position to assert what 'really' happened.