World War II: A very large turning point in the battle against racial exclusion. In the short-term however, did one race lose while another gained? Most certainly. The Japanese lost while the Filipinos gained; interment camps vs. "brotherhood" forged in war. Because of this, in the short-term, can the events of World War II really be considered an improvement? Not really.
The fact that many Filipino soldiers were refused service while they were dressed in US Army uniform shows that many Americans did not feel near as much of an impact from the attack on Bataan, and thus could not have easily sympathized with the Filipino-American soldiers. This is why they still faced discrimination even while in uniform. I theorize that it is because there was little connection between White Americans and Filipino Americans that the age-old issue of racial rejection was still prevalent in the face of what the Filipino-American soldiers had done for the U.S.
Segregation in the types of service performed by Filipino soldiers. Takaki mentions how they "operated behind enemy lines, engaging in sabotage." Could this have been exploitation on the part of some officers of their eagerness and willingness to serve, getting them to do perhaps more dangerous work? Did their facial simmilarity to the Japanese simply offer up certain advantages in performing covert operations? Is there really any facial similarity?
Korean enthusiasm was of course bittersweet: even with their newfound excitement at the U.S.'s declaration of war against Japan, there were still the instances where they would be confused as Japanese. I can imagine that it probably made some of them very upset. Especially after the 1940 Alien Registration Act.
This chapter is packed full of stuff, and it is so LONG. If I were to continue live reflections much further, it would start looking more like a dissertation. Perhaps to make up for it, I'll write my end-of-term essay on a topic discussed later on in this chapter.
No comments:
Post a Comment