Germany doesn’t have Panzers presented as a cool memorial. This image is taken at the shrine, which also has a museum. Half of the museum is a shrine to people who fought for Japan in World War 2 and many of those people are recognized war criminals.
To me, at least, starting off the museum with a refurbished plane that was used to commit war crimes was, in itself, shocking. Also the gift shop was, uhhhhh…
Like, can you imagine the same in Germany? Little Nazi flags for the kids?
I’d show you pictures of the sketchy exhibits but you’re not allowed to take photos in them.
That’s gross, and I didn’t know that. That’s certainly not something I saw at the Holocaust memorial or in Dachau. It’s widely reported, however, that German schooling teaches the Holocaust thouroughly while Japan ignores the Asian Holocaust entirely. I can’t speak for the German tank museum in particular, but every museum I’ve been to in Germany made it clear that the 1928-1945 period of German History was unequivocally evil.
The article I linked in the OP mentions how this has caused persistent political divisions between Japan and it’s formerly occupied neighbors.
I thought more about this and realized the Us presents the Enola Gay without context and that’s gross too.. Though the US does have museums on the genocide of Native Americans, Japanese internment camps during world war 2, a national slavery museum and memorial, and there’s been a lot of public controversy around racist statues, so that also feels categorically different than enshrining war criminals as saints in your imperial shrine.
Germany doesn’t have Panzers presented as a cool memorial. This image is taken at the shrine, which also has a museum. Half of the museum is a shrine to people who fought for Japan in World War 2 and many of those people are recognized war criminals.
To me, at least, starting off the museum with a refurbished plane that was used to commit war crimes was, in itself, shocking. Also the gift shop was, uhhhhh…
Like, can you imagine the same in Germany? Little Nazi flags for the kids?
I’d show you pictures of the sketchy exhibits but you’re not allowed to take photos in them.
Germany has a tank musuem that shows off panzers, wtf are you talking about?
That’s gross, and I didn’t know that. That’s certainly not something I saw at the Holocaust memorial or in Dachau. It’s widely reported, however, that German schooling teaches the Holocaust thouroughly while Japan ignores the Asian Holocaust entirely. I can’t speak for the German tank museum in particular, but every museum I’ve been to in Germany made it clear that the 1928-1945 period of German History was unequivocally evil.
The article I linked in the OP mentions how this has caused persistent political divisions between Japan and it’s formerly occupied neighbors.
I thought more about this and realized the Us presents the Enola Gay without context and that’s gross too.. Though the US does have museums on the genocide of Native Americans, Japanese internment camps during world war 2, a national slavery museum and memorial, and there’s been a lot of public controversy around racist statues, so that also feels categorically different than enshrining war criminals as saints in your imperial shrine.