#84: For Non-Divisive Diversity (PART 6)

【National Interest】
In many ways, when it comes to wars and conflicts, nationality and its borders are exploited to the ugliest degree of divisiveness fueled by inborn privilege.
 
As a matter of fact, wars and conflicts are most often waged at a national level. It’s because the existing military system around the world is designed on a single-nation basis, with each country in control of its own armed forces.
 
Under this system, nations deploy their troops proclaiming to Protect the lives of our own citizens. And humans continue to repeat the senseless history of war for several thousand years because this system is prone to exploitation--to selfishly advance national interests at the expense of others.
 
To maintain this system, nations fan the flames of patriotism.  And when push comes to shove, killing fellow humans becomes an honorable deed, and refusing to kill becomes a criminal act. With a blind pledge of allegiance to the flag, the military won’t hesitate to take away freedom, livelihood, dignity, happiness, and life of not only its enemy but also its own citizens.
 
In this way, our sense of patriotism is abused and the emotion of fear is heightened to force us to kill and praise killers. It’s a classic example of a nation’s propaganda to ensure that we glorify war, so we can wage a war at the whim of government. Regrettably, we witness this pattern in many countries across the globe.
 
Naturally, love for one’s homeland is heartening, but it’s important to keep it within reason--away from violence and hatred. For instance, it’s fine to cheer for our home team in soccer, but don’t let it run out of whack by inciting violence or hateful words.
 
Similarly, it’s fine to rave about American hamburgers as “the best in the world!” but if we begin to shout “America-First!” then the people of other countries will start to do likewise, and we’ll end up inciting more division than unity around the globe. If everyone demanded As long as it’s good for my country, then it’s fine for the other countries to suffer, then the world will be mired in cruelty and hatred.
 
Even then, My-Country-First policies tend to gain populist traction because the existing global system of nationality allows only the citizens to vote in elections. When only the beneficiaries of those policies are allowed to vote, the election results won’t budge a bit no matter how hard the non-citizens who stand to lose from those same policies oppose them.
 
It’s a classic example of inborn privilege and division. Indeed, the politicians who selfishly advance national interests are convenient tools for those who choose to ride the wave of privilege and division.
 
We cannot overlook this fact because selfish advancement of national interests breeds irreversible consequences like the ongoing Russian military’s abhorrent invasion of Ukraine. Putin administration’s gruesome mass murder is the result of years of support by the corrupt Oligarchs and many Russian citizens who, knowingly or not, chose to ride the wave of privilege and division.
 
“It's false to call our military operations in Ukraine a war or an invasion. Journalists who call it as such will be jailed up to 15 years.” Lies and threats have now become the law of the land in Russia as Putin signed it in March.
 
Also in March, after 8 hours of being held at a police station in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk, a Russian woman named Vera Kotova became one of the firsts to be found guilty under a new law that charges anyone deemed to have discredited the Russian military. Her crime: writing No to war with a heart mark in the snow.
 
What’s more, since February, sexual violence of Ukrainian women by Russian soldiers have grown grimly widespread. A woman raped repeatedly by a Russian soldier after her husband was killed outside Kyiv. A mother of four gang raped by Russian soldiers in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson.
 
These atrocities evoke memories from the 1900s Japanese military’s invasion of many Asian nations including China and Korea. It reminds us of the Japanese military abusing its own citizens who opposed the gruesome war, calling them a Traitor, ripping their families apart, jailing, and torturing.
 
It reminds us of Japanese soldiers raping women in the Asian villages, laughing and killing their families, and burning the whole house down to destroy evidence. And we cannot forget the estimated 50 thousand to 200 thousand women from at least 11 countries coerced into sexual slavery by Militarist Japan. [See #22]
 
This heinous crime cannot be reasonably denied as troves of factual evidence have been unearthed from the public documents made available by the governments including Japan, US, Netherlands, and Australia; numerous studies carried out by scholars from around the world; and testimonies, memoirs, and wartime diaries of Japanese veterans, physicians who were stationed in war zones, and politicians.
 
Despite such abundant evidence worldwide, from former-Prime Ministers Shinzo Abe to Taro Aso to Yoshihide Suga, and to the current Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, the vast majority of the central figures of ruling Liberal Democratic Party are members of Japan Conference (Nippon Kaigi) who insists that “Japan’s wars weren’t invasions.”
 
Japan Conference bends the facts by promoting lies that “there were no sex slaves” or “Nanjing Massacre never happened.” To make things worse, Japan Innovation Party (Nippon Ishin), now the third-largest party in the National Diet after gaining populist votes in recent elections, promotes similar lies.
 
These actions and words remind us of Putin administration. And like many Russian citizens, many Japanese citizens, knowingly or not, are also choosing to ride the wave of privilege and division by supporting these political parties.
 
Truth be told, when it comes to wars and conflicts, nationality and its borders are exploited as a divisive tool to pit nations against nations, citizens against citizens.

Read Next: For Non-Divisive Diversity (7)【Hypocrisy】
Read Previous: For Non-Divisive Diversity (5)【Citizenship】
 
Complete Series: For Non-Divisive Diversity (1)～(7)
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Read Theme: Inclusive Diversity