Here we are again in the darkness of the human psyche that is murder and the assorted mayhem that goes along with it. Today’s journey into the darkness is Japan. Our killer of the week is Hiroshi Maeue better known in pop culture as “The Suicide Website Murderer” from Osaka while his body count by serial killer standards was low,his crimes are notorious in how he trolled for his victims through a suicide help website. By suicide help I mean a website devoted to helping people complete the act.

What makes this the murderer of the week is not how he committed his crimes,but,where it makes unusual is the connection to a social website albeit a website devoted to how to kill oneself. Which is a sad social commentary on how social media is used for a number of ways and in this case someone to push another person further into the rabbit hole of madness that is suicide. Adding to that is the exotic location,by Western standards, of Japan with its long history of ritual suicide just adds to the mystery and the obsession of the media of the accused along with where the victims were found. By this obsession the victims become forgotten in the media feeding frenzy instead the details of where the victims were found are far more interesting to the reading public. And indeed Japan has a long history with things that are dark,forbidden and otherwise underground. These things are not discussed in the polite company that is Japan rather it is discussed in the highways and byways that is the web.

Why then is a culture that is revered the world over for its politeness,respect of elders,love its culture and people so obsessed then with murders when they happen in Japan however rare? Perhaps it again goes to the very nature of a suicide website or perhaps it is the fact there was a sexual component to the murders which again is not something discussed in polite company. Any one of these things could be the case,but, the fact remains that in Japanese pop culture themes of sex,violence,bondage and other imagery are there.  It is an interesting dichotomy which remains to be studied fully,however, with Hiroshi Maeue ;comics, biopics, hours of news media were created to feed this frenzy.

The end result of Maeue’s crimes were the website promoting how to end ones life was shut down hopefully with those on that website getting the help that they need. As for Maesue himself? Before his appeals were exhausted , he accepted the judgement of the courts of Japan despite what his defense team said and accepted that he would pay the ultimate price for his crimes. It is of a final and interesting note to mention that he was considered a lust killer with auto-erotic tendencies. The media ate that up as did the public til the next crime,the next killer or the next public scandal of the week.

1/21/14

• Monkey Majik- Aishiteru
• No class Friday.
• You can combine texts/media in your writing posts.
• Get creative with the posts.
  • Rock posts, insert music I listen to?
  • Paper posts: Reaction GIFs
  • Scissors: eh, just be make sure to be substantial.
  • Make sure to have all seven posts for the week in by midnight on Monday/Tuesday.
  • Make sure to site your sources.
  • Popular culture- A battleground of different visions of what the world is about.

1986 Challenger explosion

I’ve never read much into what happened on this day, watched any videos or view many pictures, let alone realized how many people lost their lives that day. Seven individuals were being sent on what I would call the adventure or a lifetime but within minutes the whole story changed sending the ship up into flames.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Paull [sic] Shin

Senator Paull Shin is stepping down from his place of senate as of January 7th, he continues to tell us that Alzheimer’s plays a roll in this decision. Shin is 78 years old, elected into the senate in 1998 and was adopted by an American soldiers after his life as an orphan on the streets of Korea.

Heres his statement after giving notice as well as the link listed right after leading to the article and a picture of Shin.

Sen. Shin announces immediate retirement
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Jan. 7, 2014
Sen. Paull Shin, D-Edmonds, today announced his retirement from the Washington State Senate, effective immediately, in the attached letter sent to the Governor, his legislative colleagues and his constituents.
“It is with the deepest regret that I resign from the Senate,” said Shin, who had served honorably in the Senate since his election in 1999. “I have loved this place and the work we do here on behalf of the people of Washington. Unfortunately, I have determined with the assistance of my family that recent health problems and a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease make it impossible for me to represent my constituents in the manner they deserve.”
Shin grew up as an orphan in South Korea during the Korean War and was adopted by an American soldier and brought to America. Shin received a GED and eventually a Ph.D. from the University of Washington and taught for 31 years in Washington’s higher education system. Sen. Shin was elected to the Washington State Senate in 1999. Prior to that, he served in the House of Representatives from 1993 to 1994. He is the Senate’s Vice President Pro Tempore, which presides over floor action in the absence of the Lieutenant Governor and President Pro Tempore.
During Shin’s legislative career, he has championed higher education, support for the developmentally disabled and other vulnerable members of our communities, and expanding trade with foreign countries.
“I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you for your help and support over the years,” said Shin. “It has been a tremendous privilege to be a member of the State Senate and work with such wonderful colleagues. I am grateful for the camaraderie, the work we accomplished, and the valuable lessons learned. I would also like to thank my wife and children for their love, support, and shared belief in the importance of service. Most of all, I would like to express my thanks to the citizens of the 21st Legislative District, who placed their trust in my stewardship for all of these years; it has been my honor and privilege to serve them for the past 17 years. I look forward to assisting the Senate in making this transition as smooth as possible.” http://blogs.seattletimes.com/politicsnorthwest/2014/01/07/state-sen-paull-shin-resigns-citing-alzheimers-as-factor/

World War 2 Stragglers

http://www.mercurynews.com/obituaries/ci_24962199/onoda-japans-last-imperial-soldier-dead-at-91

Mr. Hiroo Onoda is the last World War 2 straggler to pass away at 91 years old on January 21, 2014. Mr. Onoda ‘emerged from hiding in a jungle in the philippines and surrender, 29 years after the end of World War 2, has died.” He passed away at a hospital in Tokyo that day. Onoda was an officer in the military and in 1945 he was given order to stay behind in order to spy on American troops. Onoda was the son of a teacher, and he himself worked for a aJapanese trade firm in Shanghai after he finished high school, thats when he was drafter into the military. He seems to me like a true hero, someone with great loyalty to his country and someone that should be recognized and known, honestly without being told to look up stragglers I never would have known or hear about it most likely, which saddens me. Its like we forget so many veterans of so many wars.

HIMYM (How I met your mother)

http://www.tv.com/shows/how-i-met-your-mother/slapsgiving-3-slappointment-in-slapmarra-2991996/

Overall this episode is intact offensive in multiple ways. Why couldn’t they have gotten and actor that was an asian girl instead of using a white girl and apparently putting on dark eye makeup and bright red lipstick with a kimono makes her an asian. Secondly, making up lines like the slap of a million exploding suns, its all offensive and as someone who is japanese takes it as racism.

In chapter two “The Coolie and the Making of the White Working Class”, the one thing that kept popping out at me was the term “John Chinaman”. The term represented a Chinese immigrant or sojourner working in America during the 1800s. They were typically looked down upon because of their docile nature and the numbers they came in, taking almost all the open job positions that paid less than minimum wage. This generated an envy and despise for the Chinese. When they tried to become Americans, they were unaccepted because of their skin color. They were also compared to the Irish immigrants, via John Chinaman versus “Paddy” the Irish worker. Americans back then found the Irish just as untamed as the Chinese, but accepted them over the Chinese because of their “whiteness”. Regarding marriage, any white woman who pursued a Chinese man was immediately on the same level as him and could not recover after such choice, even if she tried hard to be accepted by white American society again.

“The Third Sex” was an unusual chapter for me. I never really thought of Asians being something of “immoral desires”. I’ve heard Asians being referred to as exotic, but not as something as such as this. The whole chapter reminded me of a psychology lecture that I kept getting lost in. They reinforce Asians as a dark lust with the mentioning of the Chinese and Japanese women being coerced to work as prostitutes overseas and away from their homelands. In fictionalized writing, the Chinese woman was a counterpart to “John Cinaman” with the identity of “China Mary”, who was docile but also mostly passive. Two writings, “The Haunted Valley” and “Poor Ah Toy”, talk about the different roles Chinese played as a love interest regarding their genders. Although I’m not entirely sure, in “The Haunted Valley” the character, Ah Wee, is first thought of to be a male, but is later to be revealed to be a female. She is the interest between Gopher and Dunpher, which results in Dunpher being poisoned by Gopher after Dunpher accidentally killed her, and Gopher going insane after the whole predicament. Ah Wee’s role represented how a foreign love interest would destabilize a white American’s life. In “Poor Ah Toy”, the protagonists, Ah Toy, is hired to work for Fanny and her sister-in-law’s husband and children. He is able to work well, but becomes disheartend after the death of his mom. Feeling sympathy, Fanny cares for him and this develops into a mother-and-son kind of relationship. Ah Toy begins developing feelings for her, but is unable to for another man has walked into Fanny’s life. In an attempt to win her, Ah Toy tries kisses her hand, only to be met with shock and shame since he was not only a servant, but not white. He kills himself, but asks to be buried on Fanny’s property so that he will always be with her. The thing this chapter seems to tell me is that interracial relationships back then were suspected to always end in misery for one party or both. The stories did not really degrade the Chinese in them, but made it clear that any attempts to be with them will result in a not-so-happy ending.

Chapter 4′s “Inner Dikes and Barred Zones” refers to plenty of information I heard from last quarter. The one thing that immediately struck me as familiar was the actor Sessue Hayakawa, a Japanese actor who we learned about in Japanese American History in the Pacific Northwest. The role he plays in the movie The Cheat is one that tries to alter the white woman’s life, but is stopped by the white male lead. Aside from that, I finally found the origin of the term “Fu Manchu” in this reading. For a great while I’ve heard the term in some places I can’t remember, but I remembered the name because of how simple it sounded. Now that I know it represents the “oppressive and evil” Asian, it kind of reminds me of something else too.

Yeah, this happened.

I found it interesting how they depicted the Chinese in Broken Blossoms. Cheng Huan was seen as this caring and humble Chinese man who took it upon himself to take care of Lucy Barrows after she is abused by her father, Battling Barrows. The two form a bond, but it’s short lived when Battling takes back Lucy and proceeds to beat her death. Hoping to save her, Cheng tries to rescue her, but she is already dead. Cheng confronts Battling and overcomes him through the use of a handgun. Unable to live with the dead Lucy, Cheng kills himself afterwards in front of his altar. It’s probably one of the few films this book has told about that try to show a different message that not all Chinese are of the “Yellow Peril” that was soon to come forth.

Finally the last chapter “The Cold War Origins of the Model Myth Minority” tells about plenty of cases that were explored in last quarter’s reading, such as the case of Gordon Hirabayashi and his stand against the military curfews on Japanese Americans. There was also the mention on how to tell the difference between the Chinese and Japanese. While it did not include the visuals, the physical descriptions remind me of the the pictures we saw last quarter. The Cold War “scare” of the Red Menace was mentioned, along with the apparent rise of Communism. The fact that America could have rounded up all the Chinese Americans just because they originated from nation that’s now Communist kind of says that it takes awhile to learn from history, but then again they didn’t officially redress the interned Japanese Americans until much later. The reference to the “model minority” always seems to amaze me. Science and math were never my forte’, but English and reading I found pretty good. Anything above Pre-Calculus to me is a real nightmare.  I’d rather be good at drawing doodles than forming equations. That stuff just could never sit in my head for too long.

Richard Sherman. Sehawk cornerbackl. 5th round pick up in the NFL draft

Richard Sherman commentary after seahawk vs. 49er game

Click here to view the embedded video.

After seeing this right after the game with the San Francisco 49ers vs. Seattle Seahawks the determining of who will compete in the super bowl. Of course I can understand that at this point in time Sherman is really pumping a lot of adrenalin and I feel as though theres really no time to take composure of himself and think of what will be said. Also the fact that it seems nobody was really expecting that outburst from him especially when the interviewer has to question again and ask who he is referring to, than Sherman continues too pause and thing, but I could be wrong and it could’ve been planned.

Richard Sherman vs. Skip Bayless

Click here to view the embedded video.

This interview is one of the ones that i analyzed closely than others. Skip Bayless is known to go after athletes that are more so conceded with themselves. A couple things that really stood out to me are the beginning of the interview when the first question is asked and Richard behind speaking with sort of a fake yawn (thats how it comes off to me) I can’t completely explain how that portrays in my own mind, but I can say that it does not make him look good. Also in minute 2:32 Stephen A has a facial expression that just sort of explain it all, as well as right than he goes on to say something along the lines of will you guys stop. All in all I would feel that this is an indication that the situation has been taken too far, even for media..but than you continue into the question of what is too far for media?

The posting below is my own personal opinions I have regarding Sherman and shared with people on my Facebook profile and thought it would be a good addition to this posting for my blog. I’m a Seahawks fan and have been ever since I was little, but all in all I don’t like some of the aggressive comments he’s made in some of the interviews i’ve seen and I believe if could’ve found another way to go about sharing some of his thoughts, but I can agree with him being great at what he does and he’s also a caring and genuine guy from other blogs, articles etc. i’ve read that offer positive comments, thoughts and facts on Sherman.

I was always really into football and have enjoyed watching it. BUT this year i’ve gained a better insight on the game as well as I feel more accurate on my thoughts regarding some of the different things i’ve been analyzing an observing in the NFL. As i work on a bit of hw that is based on Richard Sherman and his actions last weekend and a few more interviews from over time etc specifically i’m analyzing the interview between skip bayless and and sherman back in may. i’ve lost SOO much respect for Sherman, at least at this moment in time. As an individual he has a lot of great accomplishments that I respect like graduating stanford with a awesome GPA and great GPA graduating high school, he was a 5th round draft pick up which i believe he should’ve been higher etc, but I am appalled by Sherman as well as Seahawk fans this year. As a Seahawk fan and discussing these things w my friends who are fans of rival teams etc. they’ve pointed out these exact things to me, BUT at that moment in time when they told me, as a fan I want to protect my team (hawks) and have comebacks, shit talk or whatever because well hey who likes when your team gets bashed on, and its all in the fun of football. BUTTT I must say this years been a complete disgrace in my own opinion from some of the actions i’ve seen out of our fans and after watching these interviews. i’ve seen a whole different side of Sherman as well as the fans. SERIOUSLY seattle your going to throw food and such at an injured player, thats some serious poor sportsmanship and it somewhat makes me feel embarrassed to be a fan, at least at that moment in time, than to go to Sherman and some of the comments he has made in media recently, the two that stand out and lead me to want to post my thoughts an opinions so far are his interview with Skip Bayless and how he goes about that interview, as well as the commentary that was made instantly after Seattles win last Sunday against the 49ers, its all a bit was shocking. I understand that a player has a rush of adrenalin at the moment and is excited to be advancing to the Super Bowl but WHY is seattle taking this awesome season as an excuse to talk so much shit and showing these poor acts of sportsmanship instead of being humble and happy for our team, were making history. All in all I still say go hawks and i hope we win the bowl!

All in all I don’t absolutely hate Richard Sherman, I see him as a great athlete, he has accomplished a lot in his life as well as this season and previous ones but at this time i’m not his biggest fan after some of the actions i’ve seen from him, specifically this season.

I’ll be uploading some of my class notes when I have the chance to get to a scanner.

The Japanese airline ad that we watched in class brought up a few concerns. The concept of reversed racism. The ad was obviously characterizing the white face. Practically, how can it still be racism if its reversed? If something is reversed it means the opposite. If you believe reversed racism is an actual thing, this seems to imply that there is something that is naturally apart of the term racism that suggests that the perpetrators have to be white.

Moreover, Katy Perry dressed like a Geisha in her performance, she is slammed because it was thought of as a racist act. Additionally, the article claims that she is mixing Japanese and Chinese cultures together with the designing of the Japanese Kimono and/or Chinese Cheongsam itself. However, could this also be looked at as just an act in appreciation of one of the cultures or both? What was her purpose with the design and the performance? I see both sides, however I would like to see what her response was to these critics to be able to make a fair statement. It all depends on how you view it. The fact that the design appears to be a mix of both the Japanese and Chinese cultures could be insulting to both cultures as well.

http://kotaku.com/katy-perrys-geisha-act-being-called-racist-1470995646

To finish, Richard Sherman (“monkey” and “thug”-coded language) racial slurs towards blacks related to the film King Kong because the film depicts an interracial relationship between a huge gorilla and white woman. The stereotype related Richard Sherman as a thug just because he is a young black outspoken male. The key point was that there are issues that cannot be separated from history. This made me think of the internalized oppression that many face today because of not being able to escape a historical past that is so deep that will always continue to be an ongoing issue.

Lee, Orientals: Asian  Americans in Popular Culture (1999)

• Culture: “The integrated pattern of human behavior that includes thought, speech, action, and artifacts and depends upon man’s capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge to succeeding generations; the customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religions, or social group.” (Webster)
• Popular culture (John Storey, Cultural Theory and Popular Culture- 2006)

1. “culture which is widely favoured or well liked by many people” (4)
2. “culture which is left over after we have decided what is high culture” (5)
3. “mass culture” (6)
4. “culture which originates from ‘the people’” (7)
5. “culture rooted in exchange and negotiation between [dominant and subordinate groups]” (8)
6. “[in a postmodern terrain], culture which no longer recognizes distinctions” (9)

• Eurocentrism: concepts of this include- yellowface is a derogatory term used for Asians that is replicated from blackface of African Americans as an attempt to justify the institution of slavery