Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Statement of Endorsement: "Support Fukushima/Remember Hiroshima & Nagasaki" event in LA


Eclipse Rising endorses the event held in Los Angeles on August 8, 2018 called "Support Fukushima/Remember Hiroshima & Nagasaki."

This event was sponsored by the San Fernando Valley Chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League and Fukushima Support Committee.



Below is our statement of endorsement that was read during the event, which focused on remembering the Korean victims and survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

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Memories of the past are shaped as much by the present moment. As Zainichi Koreans, or the descendants of postcolonial Korean migrants and exiles in and from Japan, we rise  in solidarity with all the victims and survivors of the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, regardless of their heritage. We also remember that not all the victims have received the equal attention in the stories of these atrocities. We remember our Korean ancestors who came to Japan during the colonization and struggled for survival in the face of harsh poverty and discrimination, only to perish in the atomic bombings. Those who survived have continued to suffer from the after effects of the radiation, as well as the lack of public recognition and support. After all, the atomic bombings also functioned as medical experimentation, and Korean survivors significantly lacked access to immediate and long-term medical care due to racism and poverty. Some of them have since returned to their homeland, which then became divided into North and South by imperialist powers. Hibakusha who resided in Japan received some survivor compensation from the Japanese government, but those Korean hibakusha who returned to South Korea have only received partial compensation, while nothing has been done to the hibakusha in North Korea. There are also Japanese American survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The dominant narrative goes that the Japanese are the only people who have been victimized by atomic bombings, but the victims actually include not only Koreans but also people in Marshall islands who have had 67 times of nuclear tests between 1946 And 1958. Native Americans like the Navajo people also suffer from uranium mining that supplied for these tests. We caution against such a nationalizing narrative of victimhood that erases, flattens, and reduces historical complexities and geopolitical nuances.

More than seven decades have passed since the end of the World War II. We must critically interrogate what we choose to forget or remember, and how we negotiate our collective memories. Relationships among people of East Asian descent remain contentious, and as diasporic folks we, too, are haunted by the trauma of colonialism, warfare, and unspeakable violence accentuated by displacement and migration. Without overriding Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and without nationalizing the suffering of the victims and survivors, we must also juxtapose the painful memories of the hundreds of thousands of women and girls who were systematically coerced into sexual slavery by the Japanese Imperial Army. In the context of the competition and collusion between Japanese imperialism and US imperialism, we must also never forget the racist internment of Japanese Americans. We must also learn from the way in which Okinawa became a racialized battlefield on which the Japanese and US forces have fought against each other to the detriment of Okinawan people's sovereignty and cultural survival. The politics of scapegoating and the politics of victimhood are intertwined for the profit of those in power.

Less than 10 years ago, Fukushima became another focal point of a nuclear disaster and subsequent erasure of non-Japanese and immigrant survivors as well as workers involved in the cleanup process. The 3/11 disasters reminded us of the painful history of the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquakes, in the aftermath of which many Koreans, Okinawans, and communists were massacred. Today, we face the resurgence of ultraconservative sentiments across the globe, exacerbated by neoliberal social structure that turns racialized bodies into even more disposable labor. It seems that fear and historical amnesia fuel each other, driving us further toward alienation. The Abe administration is propagating neoliberal rhetorics of sexism, queerphobia, racism, and xenophobia, tacitly endorsing the rise of hate speech in Japan. Mayor of Osaka, a city with a long history of Zainichi Korean livelihood, has been consistently demanding the city of San Francisco to reject the “Comfort Women" memorial, which Eclipse Rising helped establish last year in multi-ethnic solidarity with the victims and survivors. In the US, as we know, the Trump administration has been enbolding and enabling dangerous white supremacists, who threaten the safety of immigrants, women, people of color, indigenous peoples, disabled and sick people, Muslim communities, and queer and trans people. Now is the time to renew our commitment to remembrance and to educating the younger generation about the historical truths. Whether atrocious history of the 20th century would repeat itself relies entirely on our effort to confront the past and the ongoing legacies of colonialism and imperialism. Memories of the past are shaped as much by the present moment, and they can also shape our future. We are the sacred generation tasked with remembering who we are and reimagining what it means to be a human. We must cultivate the courage and patience to remember what we may want to forget, so that we can keep struggling for justice and collective healing.

August 8, 2018
Eclipse Rising

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