Jello wrote:
] ] TOKYO, Japan (Reuters) -- A Japanese publisher will
] ] suspend a comic series in its popular weekly magazine
] ] after receiving angry protests over its characterization
] ] of the 1937 "Rape of Nanjing," in which Japanese soldiers
] ] brutally massacred Chinese civilians.

This has been an area that just slipped by the history books. I had never heard of the Rape of Nanjing in high school history classes. It didn't come up in college during my World History 1500-Present class, either. I first learned about this issue when an idiotic hotel manager and tour company owner booked 200-300 Japanese men on a trip to Nanjing for a weekend of prostitution... on the anniversary weekend of the Rape of Nanjing. The organizers were sentenced to life in prison for pandering and promotion of prostitution. This is in China, where prostitution laws are never enforced - hence the popularity of Karaoke bars. I then read several books on the subject and the photographs printed from Japanese newspapers are compelling enough to convince one that it happened. Two Japanese officers had a beheading competition during the week of siege on Nanjing (the former capitol city of China, for those who don't know the significance) that the Japanese newspapers kept running numbers on, along with pictures of the beheadings.

Anyway, I think it's good that a comic/manga publisher IN JAPAN finally wanted to educate people about their past. It's ridiculous that the local politicians still want to keep it under the rug and claim that it never happened.

Dolemite

RE: CNN.com - 'Rape of Nanjing' comic draws ire - Oct 14, 2004