Viewers are divided over whether the film should have shown Japanese victims of the weapon created by physicist Robert Oppenheimer. Experts say it’s complicated.
Viewers are divided over whether the film should have shown Japanese victims of the weapon created by physicist Robert Oppenheimer. Experts say it’s complicated.
US schools teach that the atom bombs were used as an alternative to an invasion of Japan. The numbers said millions would die on both sides if the Allies staged an invasion. Instead, the largest estimated loss ended up being 226,000 Japanese.
The second bomb was dropped because the military leadership in Japan couldn’t believe the destruction from one bomb wasn’t just another night raid that was super effective and refused to surrender. Then the second bomb dropped, and immediate unconditional surrender was issued
And this is how it is discussed among students?
Because that is not the truth of the events, which is what my comment was drawing attention to. You aren’t learning about it if you’re learning a revisionist history instead.
But it’s hard to make this point when the people repeating the propaganda dismiss anything but propaganda so readily:
This shuts down the critique of Americans not having an accurate understanding of their history, at least for the American side. There is no attempt to critically engage with or to understand the perspectives of non-Americans.
I tried to engage politely by not calling out the disinformation directly, but by proposing a question that makes sense from the consensus view of history. That question did not match the user’s own view of history, and people sharing their viewpoint downvoted me without engaging and taking the risk of having to reconcile a non-American viewpoint.
And so I called it out directly in my edit, trying to make the case as to how my (still unanswered) question cuts through the false assertion that Americans learn about the real events and share the international perspective of what happened, and why this is so problematic for non-Americans.
I thank you for taking the time to respond, and to respond politely. However I’m actually well-acquainted with what US schools teach about it in multiple states - it’s just as you described. That’s why I know right where to point to show that the US is still lying to itself. But I felt doing so right from the start would have been disrespectful to the person I was replying to. I felt that I would have liked a chance to explain my own view, so I offered an opening for them to do so before I started getting very critical.