On Thu, 30 Nov 1995 10:57 -0800 (PST), 
Edward Vanance  <evanance@sd71.bc.ca> wrote:

>>
>>  Greetings,
>>
>>       Yesterday, a secret group here at Texas Tech known only as the 
>>Swastika Seven posted a number of really disgusting anti-"other cultures" 
>>flyers around Bledsoe Residence Hall.  
>
><Rest of disturbing story snipped>
>
>I think that racism, or any prejudice in general has no place ANYWHERE in a
>democracy. These "people", and I use the term loosely, should be drug out
>into the street and shot, after being forced to hear "Let's go to the
>forest" by Kodachi!! If idiots like this are allowed to get away with that
>kind of thing, there is something VERY wrong!! In my school, we have a
>racism problem as well as a homophobia problem. It is a sad thing to hear
>and see. I hope those $#%^ Nazis are caught, and given a suitable punishment. 
>

   If it were me I wouldn't even dignify such behavior with any response 
beyond removal of the offending postings from university property (the 
postings, I presume, were not approved by the school) and the customary 
disciplinary action, if any, for defacing university property in such a 
fashion.
   In a free society (as opposed to a democracy where the majority 
usually end up tyrannizing everybody else) we cannot tolerate any violence 
or coercion beyond that needed to maintain the law. What we can do is 
ensure that these fools are not permitted to act on their hatred of 
anything foreign. (I personally believe the best way to do that is to 
enforce laws against violent acts, racially motivated or not, and limit 
government power, as the state has historically been a powerful tool for 
the carrying out of racial violence, as in Germany or--for that matter- 
-Japan.)
   I submit that's the best we can do in the framework of a truly free 
society against those people. Posting anti-liberal propaganda, however 
offensive, is not an act of violence or coercion. There will always, I 
think, be anti-liberal elements in even the freest societies; the only way 
to eliminate them completely would be through force, negating the very 
freedom we were trying to protect.
   I do agree that anti-immigrant sentiment in general, and anti-Japanese 
sentiment in particular, is a real problem in America now; indeed, as 
anti-semitism has lost its respectability anti-Japanism has become more and 
more respectable, perhaps because the Japanese are now the world's bankers. 
I've encountered anti-immigrant sentiment myself. I would dismiss it as 
merely an irritant, however, if it were not the case that people with these 
same anti-foreign sentiments were not increasingly influential in high 
places, devising new and more effective ways to keep "dem dam for'ners" out 
of America and making life difficult for those already there, peaceful and 
productive though they may be, on the one hand, and stopping American 
consumers from buying fuel-efficient cars so as to stop the "Japs" from 
from taking "'Merican" money and "'Merican jobs" and thus becoming more 
powerful than 'Merica, for, it is believed, the true intent of the "Japs" 
is to dominate the world economically first, and militarily second.
   Anti-foreign government policy, as opposed to mere anti-foreign feeling, 
is what we should worry about. We are all in this ML, I take it, 
cosmopolitan, liberal individuals (whether politically libertarian or 
otherwise); we should be the last people to indulge in intolerance against 
those who do not, for whatever reason, appreciate other cultures. (An 
American's appreciation of anime, believe, is a sure sign that he no longer 
identifies his nation as the source of everything good--even freedom. 
Liberalism, afer all, transcends national boundaries. Obviously _those_ 
people have not gotten that far yet; but one of the reasons one goes to 
college at all is to broaden one's perpective. They have a long way to 
go before becoming liberals, as, I believe, the best Americans 
always are.
   (On a related note: I should add here that Japan is not the most liberal 
society on God's good earth either; in many ways it is much less liberal 
than ours. [It's the only properous nation I know of where anti-semitism is 
still respectable.] The zany, absurd humor we see in _Ranma 1/2_ [for 
instance] is typical of hierarchial, regimented societies like Japan or 
[historically] the Soviet bloc, where life did seem farcical and not quite 
real to the thoughtful. [Go read any of the plays Vaclav Havel wrote when 
the Communists still ruled Czechoslovakia and you'll see...] Manga artists, 
like artists in all societes, tend to have notions counter to those of the 
rulers, to be discontent with regimentation, and so eventually to see 
through their society's worldview. I like manga, but I am personally 
repulsed by the regimentation of the real Japan. I prefer freedom. [I 
personally suspect that Rumiko Takahashi is more liberal than the typical 
Japanese, but that perhaps says more about the libertarian immigrant 
writing this than it does about her.])
   Ryoga (or rather Nathan; I seem to recall your at one point saying that 
was your name), don't do anything rash. The violence betweeen fascists and 
"anti-fascists" at Ann Arbor Chae An described shocked him and shocked me 
when I read about it. That's not the way to go. Don't encourage or 
vindicate them. What you can do is not be seen to lend any support to those 
who would use direct private or state violence or harassment towards 
non-Americans, and do what you can to oppose them (within the limits of the 
law and common sense, of course) whenever you can. 

>
>
>Edward Vanance (Tendou Nabiki no innazuke, now and forever)
>High Priest, Church of Nabiki                       
>http://sd71.bc.ca/edw02695/edpage.html                
>
>Quoth Tendo Nabiki---> Would _I_ do a thing like that?

(I humbly submit that she would not, Edward...she's as non-violent and 
liberal as _R1/2_ characters get. Devious, but not violent. 
   Not like Kodachi, for instance. I tend to identify the Kunos with the 
spirit of the even more hierarchial Japan of before the Meiji Restoration 
[in the case of Tatewaki] and with the highly regimented and unspeakably 
coercive fascist Japan, little better than Nazi Germany, of the 1930's [in 
the case of Kodachi; she's a bit more Western and modern than her brother, 
and even less scrupulous], as I identify Nabiki with liberalism [she's the 
quintessential capitalist, after all] in general and the more liberal Japan 
of our own day in particular. But that's another thread. Suffice to say 
that the old Japan is _not_ represented in a good light in _Ranma 1/2_.
   I do submit though that "Let's Go to the Forest" rocks too hard for it 
to be wasted on the ignorant...)