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I hate Those Dirty Japs and Those Krauts Too
by James Glaser
It happens every year if you spend the Memorial Day weekend watching all the patriotic war movies on television. By Monday night you can build up a real hate for the Japanese and Germans. Of course that is what these movies were made to do. Propaganda works, and when the American Soldier, Marine, or Sailor is portrayed as the hero, those they are fighting have to be made out as the villain. Here is a sampling of the titles of the movies on this past weekend: "To the Shores of Tripoli" "Back to Bataan" "Wake Island" "Flying Tigers" "Flying Leathernecks" "Wing and a Prayer" "Command Decision" "They Were Expendable" "Battle Hymn" "Guadalcanal Diary" "Glory" "Objective Burma" "The Enemy Below" "From Here to Eternity" "Action in the North Atlantic" "Sink the Bismark" and who could forget "The Halls of Montezuma" This is by no means the whole list, and really I couldn't sit through any of them, but one thing I noticed, and that was in almost every movie some American committed suicide in some way or another, either saving his buddy, or attacking the enemy. Back when these movies were made suicide in war time was patriotic. Today we think the suicide bombers who attacked us on 9/11 or those attacking us in Iraq are fanatics. These movies don't really honor our troops, but they do show us how the German and Japanese people are really very evil. Americans play by the "rules," but those Japs and Krauts use every underhanded trick in the book, and they are a blood thirsty lot. Americans good, enemy bad! That is the way every war is painted, we are the good guys, saving the world from evil. That is why George Bush used the "Axis of Evil" line to describe those countries he wants us to attack. If television kept putting on this type of movie, America would get behind George's war. It worked in WW II, and it works today. I say lets take Japan on right now! |
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