Real life is far scarier than anything Hollywood concocts... "Nanking Massacre"

[Neil]

I'd heard of it, but didn't really not any of the details... How brutal humanity can be, is just about as scary as it can get - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanking_Massacre

[paulannett]

I'll have a read of this when I head home, but I've heard some horrible stories about what Japanese soldiers did to the Chinese. Hopefully I remember this right, but one story was that a squad of soldiers gave a father two options: 1) Have his daughter gang raped and both of them tortured and brutally murdered or 2) The father can rape his own daughter and both of them would be killed quickly and relatively painless. Like you said, very scary.

[Neil]

I'll have a read of this when I head home, but I've heard some horrible stories about what Japanese soldiers did to the Chinese. Hopefully I remember this right, but one story was that a squad of soldiers gave a father two options: 1) Have his daughter gang raped and both of them tortured and brutally murdered or 2) The father can rape his own daughter and both of them would be killed quickly and relatively painless. Like you said, very scary. ...Yeh, some stuff sort of like that! Read the article carefully... And remember, this isn't yeh-old times, it's all within living memory!

[AcesandEights]

The rape of Nanking, babies on bayonets...all things that approach being unspeakably horrific...I think initial instances of mass murder and rape committed by the Japanese IA on surrendering civilians ranks right up there with the Chinese Biowarfare experimentation, Un. 731 etc., if not in numbers (bio warfare & experimentation killed something on the order of half a million people in China over the course of the war, iirc) then in sheer barbarity and willful ignorance of the value of human life. And that's not even getting into the massive forced prostitution of women in occupied territories as so-called 'comfort women'.

[bassman]

Holy ****! This is the first i've heard of this incident and I really don't want to read too much about it. Absolutely horrible.

[darth los]

When given the opportunity this is how humans have always behaved. We fancy ourselves more civilized than that but this is not biblical times, like the webmaster said, this is all within living memory.

[blind2d]

Man...... what can I say? Maybe we're not worth saving after all... I have to go cry now, excuse me...

[JDFP]

As absolutely unforgivable an event as Nanking was, it's absolutely pebbles in the sand compared to the millions of Ukrainians/Russians murdered during the Holodomor and Stalin's work-plans. Twenty million, rough estimate, starved to death or worked to death. Then of course there was that little thing known as the Holocaust as well which managed to do about 25% of the damage of the Holodomor/Stalin's work-plan's but is still much better documented. ... And then comes along one of the greatest mass-murderers of history with Chairman Mao who proved that Chinese were better about murdering their own citizens as opposed to another country (Japan) doing it for them. Mao the murderer single-handedly managed to starve unconclusive millions (well more than the Holocaust murdered) as well as working millions more to death. Stalin and Mao, what a proud tradition of wholesale slaughter and destruction. It just goes to prove the disgust and filth present within the greatest evil the world has ever known: Communism. j.p.

[AcesandEights]

Let's pretend this is the Oscars and play overly simplistic political statements off by way of a grand sweep of classically-inspired music.

[mista_mo]

It just goes to prove the disgust and filth present within the greatest evil the world has ever known: Communism. Yea, okay then.

[darth los]

As absolutely unforgivable an event as Nanking was, it's absolutely pebbles in the sand compared to the millions of Ukrainians/Russians murdered during the Holodomor and Stalin's work-plans. Twenty million, rough estimate, starved to death or worked to death. Then of course there was that little thing known as the Holocaust as well which managed to do about 25% of the damage of the Holodomor/Stalin's work-plan's but is still much better documented. ... And then comes along one of the greatest mass-murderers of history with Chairman Mao who proved that Chinese were better about murdering their own citizens as opposed to another country (Japan) doing it for them. Mao the murderer single-handedly managed to starve unconclusive millions (well more than the Holocaust murdered) as well as working millions more to death. Stalin and Mao, what a proud tradition of wholesale slaughter and destruction. It just goes to prove the disgust and filth present within the greatest evil the world has ever known: Communism. j.p. Then again, no sytem of gov't can get it's power if the people don't allow it. The problem is once it's in place a gov't is nearly impossible to topple.

[JDFP]

Then again, no sytem of gov't can get it's power if the people don't allow it. The problem is once it's in place a gov't is nearly impossible to topple. Touche. j.p.

[darth los]

Yea, okay then. That is dangerous rhetoric indeed considering that al qaeda says the same things about us infedel capitalists. Evil is in the eye of the beholder. And for the record they think theyy're the good guys. They believe it so much they're willing to die for it which is more than i can say for the fat, lazy, dumb sheep in this country.

[JDFP]

Evil is in the eye of the beholder. And for the record they think theyy're the good guys. They believe it so much they're willing to die for it which is more than i can say for the fat, lazy, dumb sheep in this country. Perspective is in the eye of the beholder, evil is evil (then again, I'm a modernist and I think postmodernism is absolute BS). Mass genocide, murder, and ethnic "cleansing"/"purifying" can be said to be a perspective from a society as to whether they consider it to be such things or not, but the carrying out of such activities is evil. Truth is greater than "truths" that are held by individuals and individual societies. The fact that they (Al Qaeda) are willing to die in murdering people proves their evil and evil intent. If we were to be rolling through the streets of Iraq and Afghanistan just randomly picking people off with a rifle we would, as well, be equally evil. From our perspective we may not consider this as evil, but that doesn't mean that it is not evil just because we do not consider it as so. Truth is greater (objective) than our perspective (subjective) of it. Again, I don't buy into postmodernism and won't as it's philosophically a weak argument... j.p.

[BillyRay]

Again, I don't buy into postmodernism and won't as it's philosophically a weak argument... JP, Could you explain what you mean by Postmodernism as a political/ethical philosophy? I'm only familiar with Postmodernism as a design concept in painting/film/architecture. (I doubt you're talking about Robert Longo.)