Years of Poems and Spirits

Since Junichiro Koizumi became Japan’s prime minister in 2001, he’s visited the Yasukuni shrine every year and his possible successors all vowed to continue the practice. His latest visit provoked not only strong diplomatic reactions from China and ROK but triggered a few violent anti-Japan protests in China.

Chinese government is widely ridiculed for manipulating nationalistic sentiment. In the West, you can almost hear a collective sigh: when will those two ever grow up?

However, is this type of hair pulling so typical of Asia? Has history become so remote as there is no need to make a judgement? Is there no justification of the strong reactions from China?

Summary of counter points:
Japan first did not place the names of the war criminals into the shrine right after WWII. But they were sneaked in around60s, 70s. There has been calls to remove them from the Shine again but did not generate much momentum (class notes, Prof. Bachman, UW JSIS)

Austria: traditional conservative forces/The People’s Party (OVP, Karl Lueger) - The Age of Empire/The Freedom Party (OVP long time partner)

Jorg Haider: Populism/Far-right/Nazi Sympathy:
“Haider has made statements that seemed to imply support for some ideas of National Socialism (nothing relating to praise for the Racial policies), and has associated with Waffen-SS veterans publicly, including attending a major rememberance ceremony. ” (again from Wiki, need support)

U.S. and World Reaction: “The FPO had gained support because of populist tactics, and many feared it would represent right wing extremism. As a result, the European Union (EU) imposed a series of sanctions on Austria. The U.S. and Israel, as well as various other countries, also reduced contacts with the Austrian Government. After a period of close observation, the EU lifted sanctions, and the U.S. revised its contacts policy. Following 2002 elections, the OVP in February 2003 renewed its coalition with the FPO. ” (from a State Department source)

I was wandering around the Net and, some how, entered the website of IDU: International Democratic Union. It is an international coalition of social conservative parties (”The haves and the have-mores”), founded by an older generation of leaders close to the end of the Cold War.

There is a link on the website says “Members only”, I clicked and, to my bewilderment, it asks for password only. No membership ID or anything. Just password—could it be that all conservatives of the world share the same password?

That is so wild! The organization should rename itself to “Conservatism Internationale”!

Not only that, see the stern warning after I typed in the wrong (of course) password:
“Your IP address and the word you typed have been logged (if you have just typed it wrong this needn’t concern you overly…)”
—Sounds just like a security guard at a country club, isn’t it?

Just read an interesting posting on the Net. Some one compiled a listing of how much a life is worth in China today (from accident compensations). It is from WenXueCity, so again, there was no poster’s identity or the sources. However, I think the data is still seemingly reliable as the guy didn’t appear as a zealot. Plus, I figured given the data is fairly recent, it is relatively easy to verify later.

I did not see anything extraordinary in it, given all other craziness going on in China. I just think from social anthropological pov, this is an interesting set of data.