A Geek History of Time - Episode 19- Giant Robots and Hiroshima

Episode Date: July 6, 2019

On the way to describing the roots of the Giant Robot genre, Ed explains why "Grave of the Fireflies" is a must-watch anime, and why it's a "must-watch once" anime. Damian reveals an ill-conceived Allied battle plan involving redheads.

And we begin with good day, sir! Geeks come in all shapes and sizes, and that they come into all kinds of things that they've got. I was thinking more about the satanic panic. Buy the scholar Gary Guy-Gak's. Well, wait, hold on. I said good day, sir. Not defending Roman slavery by any stretch. No, but that's bad.

Let him vote. Fuck off. When historians, especially British historians, want to get cute, it's in there. It is not worth the journey. No. This is a geek history of time. Where we connect NERGARY to the real world. My name is Ed Blalock. I am a world history of time. Where we connect NERDRE to the real world. My name is Ed Blalock.

I am a world history teacher at the seventh grade level. I'm also the father of a geekling in training. He's just getting to the point where he's about to learn how to walk and I've already got a sword in his hand. It's wooden and he mostly likes to chew on it, but I consider it a start. How about you?

Well, I'm Damien Harmony. I'm a Latin teacher. I used to be a social science teacher. I am also a father of two. If you look behind you, Ed, you will see a bunch of the minis that my daughter has painted. Okay, hold on. Step away from the tree. Oh, you'll be talking.

Oh, yeah, and she said it's okay if we strip down the albarrer and the unicorn by the way Because she wouldn't mind taking a second chance at them now that she kind of has an idea of what she wants to do So we primed them, but she primed the unicorn with all black and I was like, hey, you should have primed that with white if you're gonna Make it white so but I am the father of two geeks. She loves to play D&D. They have decided to switch characters. They're both playing magic users. So the NPC is now a paladin. Who is a soldier? So I'm actually teaching them tactics. Which is fun. And yeah, I am not teaching children to wield swords or anything like that

But we do have a fake sword and a fake axe hanging over on the wall in case they ever get a critical hit There you go. Brilliant. Yeah, right. Hello. You've been a geek. Oh, geez. Um Six feet Thank you Sorry, I say good day We have a tradition that y'all don't know about but I am also Sorry. Thank you. Sorry, I say good day. We have a tradition that you all don't know about, but I am also a stand up comic and I run a pun tournament.

They never would have guessed. I'm not that funny. But I run a pun tournament with a colleague of mine and we've been doing it for two and a half years, this capital punishment. And I will just throw puns out there sometimes. And what I'll often do is have a long sweeping story. There'll be a huge shaggy dog. This is just these amazing, incredibly, incredibly artful,

like, like so many working parts in them, shaggy dog stories that'll end with the shittiest puns. It's just the most painful horrible puns. Terrible puns. And he puts these things up on social media and I usually respond in all caps as though I am a character in an Austin novel. Sir, I say a good day.

And always with an angry react because Jesus, they hurt. Oh, it's fun. So I'll give an example. Actually, just for kicks. So embarrassing confession. As many of you know, I love professional wrestling if you listen to previous episodes. In an effort to pull myself away from the crushing and depressing news, that is the news

lately. I treated myself to some Indian food. I went to a local bookstore to see my favorite professional wrestler of all time. Brett Hart, he is on a signing tour currently and I promised myself that I'd avail myself of the opportunity if it ever presented itself. Because back in 2000 he was on a signing tour, came through Detroit and I happened to be in Michigan for my grandfather's funeral at the time. And I didn't go to it.

Yes, so I promised myself if it ever happened again, I would do this. And you can look behind you. You see my Bret Hart bobble head. Yeah. However, the Indian food restaurant screwed up their order and kept me way later than I anticipated. So I had to bring all the food with me.

Now, it's not really a problem. I figured I could use the bowl of Indian soup as an icebreaker since he had been to India in his career. He was big in India. And it was an outdoor signing, so I figured the overwhelming smell wouldn't bother anyone. Now, this is two paragraphs into a social media post. It's a very real sound story.

It is. Well, I was in line almost right in front of me, and almost right in front of him. I had absolutely rested my food on the table near him. and it wasn't quite right in front of him, though. And a kid asked me a question, and unbeknownst to me, this kid had a friend who had brought a pet frog to introduce to Bret Hart. And the kid was probably more interested in the frog and his dad had dragged him along for the signing. The damn frog jumped out into my soup and splashed around while I had my back turned,

and while the line was moving, and by the time I was aware the frog was soaked in my soup and jumping right into Bret Hart's face. So unfortunately I didn't get to meet Bret Hart that night because as I turned around wide eyed, it was a towed doll eclipse of Bret Hart, which reliably, and hour later, I will get an angry emoji from my partner here. And sir, whom should I direct my second? It is so good. I have so many people who are just like, I just skipped to the bottom, I know better now. Yeah.

Yeah, you know, when you first started talking about an eating food, I thought it was going to be the cure was worse than the disease one. That's also fun, which hurts. Yes, which yes, so so so out Oh my god, so now that we've explained that I want to ask you a question. Yeah What do you think of giant robots like in science fiction and in as a subgenre as a

characteristic as a as a mugguffin. Sure. What do you think? Honestly, I was always more into human and human like creatures for my cartoons than it was giant robots. Okay. Transformers was okay. Okay. But I never dug on the style of anime that was Robatek and Macross Plus and Voltron Um, yeah, it was not okay. Not a huge fan. I still dug them because they were on after G.I. Joe But they were not my favorites. I had trouble connecting to them quite honestly. Okay, so giant robots not not a thing I've been that interested in but Okay, I am interested in the history of toys. Okay, so and and on on another occasion, I can I can do the research we can talk about the the toys

Angle because it is it is a big deal. It is definitely a big part of it, but I am because it is a big deal. It is definitely a big part of it. But I am huge giant robots fan. We already did an episode two episodes battle tech, which is YankeeFied giant robots. And if you throw a giant robot series at me, if I look at it and I say oh my god this is gonna be a total sack of crap. I'm still gonna watch the first two or three episodes because you never know. And it's Jang robots and like if somebody explained to me the premise of Tengen Toppa Grin Lagann before I ever saw the series, I would go, that's absolutely ridiculous, that's way too far over the top, that's stupid. But then you watch the show,

and it has this odd Japanese way of being so totally committed that it's awesome. It manages, it manages to cross the line twice and be all that. Okay. Like, it's awesome. It manages it manages to cross the line twice and be all that. Okay, like it's amazing Stupid still like the whole time you're watching it. You're like, oh, yeah, no this like there's not even suspension of disbelief But I don't care because you know, okay And then if you give me another series like Gundam or Fang of the Sandogram or Macross which Robotech is derived from right I'm an unabashed

wheeling fanboy Wow, okay. What is it about me? I keep attracting these kinds of friends to me I don't all of my friends have always been like really into these things. I don't know Yeah, it's maybe because all my friends are older than me. It could be. It could be a couple of years. Yeah. And in my case, I know that my exposure to the genre happened when I was in, you know, later elementary school.

Okay. Living in Hawaii. That'll do it. We've already talked about maybe exposed to samurai movies at an age that warped my character for her. Sure. Um, and so this genre was, was something that was this huge, impactful thing on, on my whole outlook on science fiction.

Mm-hmm. Um, you know, some of my more, uh, literary friends might think to the detriment of, you know, stuff that I've tried to write and tried to do. But I don't even consider it a guilty pleasure. I'm just like, no, no, man, I love this. I will fight you. It's a pleasure. Yeah. Yeah.

And so the interesting thing is it wasn't until I was in late high school, where it was pointed out in an article I was reading. It was above my pay grade. It was above my reading level at the time. But I don't even remember where it was. But it was a semi-scholarly bit article on Japanese media in general. And they specifically talked about the link between

the giant robot genre and the depiction of giant robots and the link to Nagasaki and Hiroshima Okay, and So when we started talking about doing this podcast This was something that I immediately went well, you know as a history geek. Yeah, really this is something I really want I remember this being one of the first topics you brought up. Yeah, yeah Might have been I think it was number two. Yeah, I'm not a bit number one, but I'm pretty sure it was number two number three I brought up poop. Yeah, well, yeah, that was number two because yeah, yeah, right. I mean the one I brought up. Oh

Yeah, you did I brought up. Yeah, and as number two on really yeah, I really would have preferred it if you hadn't, you know, flung it at the same time. But so to understand the history of all of that, I want to take you back to 1945. Okay. But pre-bombing of pre-bomb, 1945, Operation Downfall. So the plan to invade? Yes. Okay. Now, it was the allied plan for the invasion of the Japanese home island, right? It was scheduled to start in November of 45 with the invasion of Kyushu.

How much do you know about the geography of the Japanese islands? Well, I had a seventh grade teacher that taught us about Japan. So if I recall, that is the southernmost island? It is the southernmost island. There are four of them. Right. You choose the one farthest to the south. The main one nearly everybody lives on his Hanshin shells, considered like mainland Japan to the extent that an island nation can have a mainland. And there's also Hokkaido. Hokkaido is the northernmost one. Okay. And then Shik that's the smallest of them that's topped up under Han Shu. Right. My college, Japanese history professor said, if you ever just need a shorthand way of thinking about where the islands are in your head imagine a baby buggy. Okay.

Because the curve and the way they face you and they look like wheels. Shikoku were down at the bottom. Okay. So the plan was Okinawa had been invaded right and Okinawa is not really one of the home islands But it is it's it's depending on who you're talking to and what they're talking about right Okinawa Sometimes is considered one of the home islands, but it's not a main home island of Japan But strategically it was vital it was a critical to invasion because of trying to get air support, trying to get supplies, trying to find a staging area. And that Newojima, if I recall correctly, like so demoralized our troops in some ways in the victory.

Well, yeah, because it was like, it was grueling. Oh, God. Because the invasion is going to be terrible. And we're going to get to that in a second. Oh, sorry. So, well, after taking Cue, so the invasion was going to be terrible. And we're going to get to that in a second. Sorry. So after taking the invasion was going to start on Q-shoe. OK. And the idea was take the southernmost island

and use the airstrips the Japanese already had in order to provide air support, supply drops, all that kind of stuff. Sure. And they would invade directly onto the Conto Plane. Now the Conto Plane, Japan is a highly mountainous country. Right. Something like, I wanna say it's only 20% of the land mass,

I haven't gotten to this unit yet this year, so it's been a year since we talked about the geography. But something like 20% of the land mass, and it might be less, might be like 10, is flat. Wow, the other 80, 90% is mountainous terrain. Okay. So the Conto Plane is the largest concentrated area of relatively flat terrain

in the home islands. It's where Tokyo is located. Right, now I'm knowing my Roman history, if you've got a shit ton of mountains, yes, you are hard to invade. You're worried, yes, you, it's not worth the trouble. Yeah, no, it's really difficult. Yeah. So, this would have, so the idea was they were going to invade the Cantal Plain. Oh, Cantal Plain, sorry, on Hanchu, utilizing air support, coming from Q-Shoe. Mm-hmm. And this would have been the largest

amphibious invasion in history. Right. MacArthur's invasion of Korea, 10 years later, better along it was, five, five, six years later, was big, but it was a piker compared to what this plan would have been. I know that men involved the amount of material. Now just for comparison,

because a lot of people would know D-Day. Yeah. Right. And I remember because I took a history of World War II class when I was in college. I remember that one of the things that they planned for was literally, and I'm not exaggerating with this number, one million body bags were requisitioned for that invasion for Japan. Japan. Yes, D day It was not even a quarter of that. Yeah. Yeah, no it was it was and that's the it was not even 200,000 That's planning for the dead yeah never mind the amount of people not not just planning for the day Never mind the wounded right no. Yeah, that was KIA right figures were expected to be over a million So yeah when you've got D-Day, which is the largest amphibious invasion in history, six beaches,

et cetera, et cetera, this is literally more than four times that big. Yes, this would have been concentrated on one spot. Yeah, this would have been an exercise in concentration of force in college college and ROTC, there are basic principles when you're making any kind of an attack plan. There are basic principles that you need to keep in mind. One of them is concentration of force. Sherman would have said, be there first is with the most is. Throwing all the force you can at, figuring out the most important point is hitting it with all the force you can at, you know, figuring out the most important point is hitting it with all the force you can spare to hit that point, you know,

yeah, rather than, you know, having a whole bunch of stuff going on a bunch of different places. Why spears have tips? Yes, per se. And that's the reason we use that analogy to this point. Right. So, um, the Japanese looked at the map of their own country. They knew. And they knew. They were like, okay, look, they're gonna be invading

because we're refusing surrender because the sanctity of the emperor is in violet. We cannot give that up. Right. And they're demanding an unconditional surrender. We can't do that. Which by the way was unprecedented in world history up to that point.

True. And they're like, unconditional means they might take away the emperor. We cannot do that. And so we know they're going to invade. And so we know this is how they're going to do it. Still not. So the Japanese knew we were coming.

We knew the Japanese knew we were coming. And what we didn't know, or what our generals didn't know, was that the Japanese plan was, we're going to defend Q-Shoe until we are a blood white. The defensive Q-Shoe, we're throwing everything at it. There will be reserves, there will be nothing held back. We're, you know, kamikaze tactics until doomsday. Women, children, everything. And the Japanese people were given a steady diet of propaganda, indicating that when Yankee soldiers showed up, they were going to be eating babies,

raping everybody that wasn't nailed down. Nailing down everybody that didn't want to rape. You know, just, I mean, really they were characterizing what was gonna happen to civilians as being a vision out of hell. Now it should be noted that they got some of their ideas about how bad it would be from the way Japanese soldiers treated the Chinese and Koreans. Yeah, I was gonna say it's accusation through, or it's confession through accusation.

Confession through accusation, yes. And, you know, But to them that's what war was.. Confession through accusation. Yes. Um, and, you know. But to them, that's what war was. They did not belong to the Geneva Convention. No. They had a different way of... Well, and they had a different... Terrible war.

Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war.

Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. Terrible war. was an outgrowth of samurai ethos was an outgrowth, like taken straight out of feudal warfare into the modern world, in which peasants were property. Right. And we did that too, in fairness.

Like the Western world, the Occidental world did that too. Yeah, but by the officer corps being gentlemen, et cetera, et cetera. Yes, however, our military, we have from the foundation of our country held up this idea of the citizen soldier. Right. And that idea was a foreign concept to the Japanese. The common soldier was a dog whose only job was to follow orders and die for the emperor.

And that was the way they were treated by their officers almost as badly as they treated civilians in the field. I mean, the level of punishment that was used by Japanese NCOs and officers was to us, absolutely inhumane. Which goes back to, I mean, it doesn't go back to Rome, but I mean, an interesting analog would be how Crasse decimated his troops after the first fight with Spartacus. Literally, oh, you drew the white stone. All of your cohort mates have to beat you to death. Have to.

And they're your friends. And they have to. and now go back out there and do it again. Because I'm punishing all of you. Right. You're the sacrifice that acts as the punishment for them. And more importantly, you will be more afraid of me than you will of your enemy this time. Yes. So don't fail. So don't point for eggs. Right. So because of all of these aspects and you know, we didn't know that they were going to defend Q-shoes that heavily, but we knew we knew it drag on till 47 or so. So yeah, at least and we knew that the civilian population was going to

rise up with bamboo sticks with you know, pointy bits on the end of it. And whatever else they could get their hands on, that's what we expected or what our generals expected. And so again, casualty rates of our soldiers rising as high as a million. So hold on to that. Okay. It goes a little bit further back. Okay. Okay. Japan, like Germany, was subjected to massive strategic bombing attacks. Mm-hmm. Okay. Both to hit industrial targets to damage the Japanese war infrastructure and to destroy civilian homes and infrastructures part of a total war doctrine. Right. Okay. If you if you terrorize the civilians enough, they'll rise up because their government and make it stop. Yeah, except they're confusion and that's never going to go down to happen.

Japanese need don't understand the culture. But sorry. And on top of that, I'm sorry, terrorizing a civilian population has never led to shortening a war that I can know of all the way back to Troy. Indeed. So, so fire bombing, yes, was used in Germany, but it was used much more extensively as a tactic in Japan because Japanese homes were literally built out of paper. And incendiary attacks caused massive devastation and massive psychological damage because

going back to their feudal age and before fire because of what they built their houses out of any kind of city fire was the biggest thing people were afraid. Oh yeah. Tokyo got what 100,000 dead in one night or something like that. Well, I'm getting to it. Oh, I'm sorry. Not to worry. Owing to the geography that I'm talking about,

you got lots and lots of mountainous terrain, not a lot of flat land, you have really high population density. And some sections of Tokyo house people at up to 100,000 people per square mile. Just think about that density for a second. 100,000 people per square mile. That's insane. It's like, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's,

I'm thinking how far a mile is from my house. Yeah. And, they have a square. Right, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, 100,000 people per square mile. Wow. All living in traditional wood and paper structures. Wow.

Okay, the residential, you know, they, that's what they were still living in. The incendiary attacks from February to August 1945, killed over 200,000 people, and left 15 million of Japan's 72 million people homeless. 15 out of 72 is 25% Wow, okay Here in the US

We might learn about the fire bombing of Tokyo specifically in school But this campaign hit all of Japan's major cities and notable amongst them for our story is Kobe and notable amongst them for our story is Kobe. Now, I want to go back just a second. America had many plans to burn the hell out of Japanese cities, one of which was bats. Yes. They trained bats to roost, and then they'd have these timers that would go off

and it would spark fire and boom. And batshit crazy plants. Yeah, it didn't work because the bats didn't learn to roost the right way. Yeah, that's good. And one of you. A lot of people don't know this. They also had another plan.

And it was they were trying, and it didn't work because it didn't get out of the testing phase. You couldn't get the test to work right because it skewed all the data. And also, it was hard to, like, they started to realize, oh, it's hard to infiltrate. but they were basically trying to send in pairs of redheads to have sex with each other nice and that because Yeah, yeah, well because redheads don't find each other

Because because of all that sexual dynamite. Yeah, so that's why there are crop circles for instance Chernobyl was actually yeah a bunch of expats living in Kiev and they had an orgy. And now that's what that is. And that's what that is. Yeah, that's okay. Stonehenge used to be a solid wall. So, and then now.

Yeah, I got together once with a red-headed gal when I was a youngster and the next day, Halebop, Connor showed up and those people killed themselves. Yeah. And Bart went on strike. So I'm just, I'm sorry, but it happens. You don't sound like you. I'm just going to say it all.

You know, it was, the juice was not worth the squeeze as it were in terms of the effects on everyone else. All right. So yeah. Okay. But they couldn't sneak them in because the Japanese aren't red-headed. All right. So yeah. OK. But they couldn't sneak them in because the Japanese aren't redhead.

No, yeah. Yeah. So it's a model culture. Exactly. Society. Yeah, just never, never got anywhere. So Kobe was attacked eight times between February and August. OK.

The first three attacks were in Cindi area against the city itself, left 650,000 people homeless Almost seven square miles of the city were completely destroyed. Where did these people go? Did they were there camps that were set up there were there were camps or set up they which can't be better because that's that would be canvas at best So and then and then you go to a camp that's a couple of miles away, and then there's another fire bombing, right? Yeah. Nearly everything in the city was somehow damaged.

There was not an undamaged structure anywhere to be found. The later raids were, quote, precision bombing raids against industrial and military targets. Precision only by the standards of the day, they were high altitude bombing with iron sights. Even today, precision guided munitions still have a miss rate in the 10 to 20% range. Doha farms, for instance. Yeah, back then, precision bombing rate met fully 40% of the explosives we dropped hit the target.

That was, you know, precision just meant that you were aiming at a target. Yeah, you were in just a population. Yeah, yeah. And so every time this happened, there was more collateral damage going on. And basically, Kobe was flattened, just completely. If you're ever in a mood to cry yourself into a pile. Okay, I highly recommend watching. A couple of years late on that. Yeah, okay. Sorry. Sorry. I highly recommend watching Grave of the Fireflies. Okay. It is an animated film. Okay. Which means that a lot of

a lot of Westerners who are fans of anime have looked at and gone, oh hey, this looks pretty cool because we still assume that it means it means a kids film. It documents, it documents. The first-hand experiences of the writer, Akiyuki Nozaka, as a preteen boy who survived the bombing. There's another book by Kenji Kronawa, maybe. Barefoot Gen. Yes. Yes. It's a three volume series.

And Dacquat turned into an animated feature. Yes. Yes. Yes. I'm really not kidding about the crying. Okay. The hardship and the survivors guilt that comes through in every minute of the film Wow.

is literally gut wrenching. Okay. Like, like, fetal position on the floor. Wow. Sobbing. It is one of the most wonderful movies I never want to watch ever again in my life. I get that. So, it and saving private Ryan.

Okay. Masterful film. Thank you. Yeah, I'm done. I'm done. Puts that ticket. Yeah. We don't need to do it again.

But we were here to talk about giant robots. Right. So back to Manhattan we go. I'm sorry. We were just in Japan. Yeah. Well, I'm not talking about the city man hat. I'm talking about the project.

Okay. Manhattan project. Sure. You know, the gave us the nuclear bomb. Right right. Now Germany started a nuclear weapon program in 1939. Mm-hmm. Two of them actually. But one was canceled at the same time the second one started because I have the invasion of Poland. Oh okay. Bigger fish fry. Yeah well yeah, and basically the first project at the Second Project was under the control of the Vermacht directly, so it was a straight up military project. And the fear of the Nazi effort to build a fishing weapon, motivated allied efforts that were consolidated over the course of the war.

Originally there was a British program and American program Yeah, and under Manhattan that consolidation finally happened and and hadn't started in 1942 The working prototype was tested on July 16th 1945 at Trinity in New Mexico, right and detonated with the force of 20 kilotimes Which at that point was like the biggest that there was the largest explosion. Yeah, it was the largest explosion by far in history. So on July 26, 10 days later, the Potsdam Declaration called for Japan's unconditional surrender. The Japanese responded with a policy of silence. Now I've written about this extensively for a number of research projects that I've done.

The policy of silence may well have been... No, I'm sorry. I'm thinking about after the first bomb never mind never mind. Yeah No, the policy after positive sounds you're absolutely right policy of silence was we're not even we're not even gonna We're not gonna decline it. We're not we're certainly not accepting it right And the lack of response was taken as a no you're not accepting so you're declining right So remember that estimate of a million casualties. Yes, nobody liked it. Nope. Trim and didn't like it Nobody in the army staff liked it. Mm-hmm. The Brits didn't like it. They were going to be involved in the invasion. No like ever that was Ridiculous. That was that was a an inconceivable number. Yes

And so dropping the bomb on Japan became the go-to plan. There was no other secondary option considered. And Hiroshima was hit on August 6th, destroying 69% of the city's buildings and flattening 4.7 square miles at one fell swoop. Yeah and that's really the difference because I mean you had and I think it killed about 140,000 70 to 8,000 right away killed immediately another 70,000 more wounded radiation poison So you killed 70 to 80,000 immediately Instantly instant Thanos yes snap of a finger now that's that that is not as many as the hundred thousand who died in one night in Tokyo

But it's instant it's instant so it was one weapon. It's profoundly different. Yes, even though the body count is lower Well, it's still it's still the number that we can conceive of oh yeah, yeah, you know, I mean it's it's a it's a It's a number that like you can look on it look at it on a table here. Yeah, it's a pretty big number It's you don't yeah, you know, I mean, it's like an intention. It, you can look at it on a table here, yeah, it's a pretty big number. But you don't, you know, I mean, it's like an internet. It's 35 of the high school I teach at. Yes. Dead immediately.

Dead with, like, and they all fall down. Yeah. Like that dead. Oh, burned up. Not even, no, no, no, not more dead than that. Right. Like vaporized. Yes.

Like there is not even anything left of them if you close enough to ground zero Yeah, and it was and it was that level of you know an incendiary bomb Mm-hmm. You're gonna burn up. You're gonna die. You're gonna find remains. You're gonna find remains. No No, there's nothing but also an incendiary bomb. You see carpets of bombs falling. Yes all night long It's not a single thing falling. Yeah, it's not the hand of God. It's not a single thing falling. It's not the hand of God. It's yeah, exactly. It's so profoundly different. So yes.

And so the second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki on its ninth. And that I think is actually, we don't have to get into that much in this episode, but the reasoning behind that, it's a very interesting thing. Part of it was that it took Japan a day to figure out what had been dropped. And then it took them a day to convene people. And then they were getting arguments foreign against surrender.

And meanwhile, Groves, Truman basically forgot that he gave Groves a blank check. And Groves was like, well, we made it, we should use it, because it's a general, and that's what generals do. And so the... Give him a really big hammer. Yeah. You're going to drive really big handles. Look at these nails. So yeah, but it and that one was even bigger.

Well, interestingly, yeah, interestingly was even bigger, but it killed an injured fewer people. The death toll was 35 to 40,000, the injured 60,000 because fat man detonated above a valley, right, and the shock wave was contained, right, and and so it didn't it didn't have the same the same large casualty figures, it didn't destroy the same square mileage. Well, Nagasaki was not as densely populated as Hiroshima either. Yeah, correct. And so the era of the super weapon, I used this phrase, talking about fantastic four, talking about nuclear weapons, because really that's what this was.

In science fiction, earlier, Jewels Vern, HG Wells had talked about these concepts of these fantastical super weapons, biblical, biblical kind of Bhagavad Gita, about these concepts of these fantastical superweapons. Biblical, kind of, you know, Bhagavad Gita, I have become death destroyer of worlds, which is exactly what Oppenheimer thought when he saw the Trinity test. So the era of the superweapon had arrived in reality,

and now we go back to Kobe. Okay, now he's in Biblical though, because I'm thinking back to like when God raised cities and stuff. He sent angels and they carpet bombed. Yeah. Like there were pillars coming up and shit like that. It was a process. The paradigm, the paradigm was different. Yeah. It was, it was not the same level of devastation that, that, yeah. Yeah. Um, so auto mata. Okay. Humanoid, okay. Humanoid figures to Amatah. Uh, humanoid, unmade figures, Tomatown. Have been part of human myth forever.

Okay, we have the Gullum, Talos from Greek myth. Yes. Even a passage in Hindu myth contains guardian, humanoid, automaton with buzz saw hands. No kidding. Like, yeah, it's freaky. If you want to get like, I don't understand where they got the science fiction ethos back, so far in prehistory, read the biofugure, because there's stuff in it that's remarkable.

So this new super weapon, this level of devastation had a profound effect on the popular imagination of the Japanese people. They are, distinction and they will point out to you and be the only people in history to have not one but two nuclear weapons used against them. There was a guy who survived Hiroshima, fled to Nagasaki. Uh-huh. Yeah. I couldn't imagine that guy. Can you imagine feeling like you were born under a bad side? Like just like that dude like do you get to the point where like are you fucking serious?

Like you can't you can't yeah, you've got to be joking like what you know What kind of resignation you have? What did I do in a past life? Yeah? Like what screw over? There were also several people who survived the Lucidania. One of whom went on, no, who survived Titanic. One of whom went on to serve on Lucidania. It's just like, dude, like, if you survive both of those,

you do whatever you want. You go on every boat, you know. You get on every ship from here forever, yeah. Because you're unkillable. Could you imagine how obnoxious he would be if he survived, too? You know, you know, I love that story. But, but like, could you imagine being that guy survived Rochema and Nagasaki? And then what about the Indianapolis? Yeah, like, like,

okay, you know what, you're a jolt. Yeah, like, like, if you were one of the other crew on any boat, he was on, you know, no, like, okay, you know what? You're a jolted. Yeah, like if you were one of the other crew on any boat he was on, you like, no, no. Oh, I'm kicking you. I'm going A wall. I'm out. I'm out. I'm like rats are running. Yeah.

No, but just like be that guy who survived both. Yeah. And be like, you know, and like somebody burns the turkey. He's like, who cares? You know, or he's always trying to one up you. Oh, yeah. You know, like just like that was bad. Yeah. You always trying to one up you. Oh yeah. You know, like just like that was bad. Yeah.

You just think you've got it rough. Yeah. So this idea of what we would call robots. Oh yeah. I've been around forever. But this new super weapon, this level of devastation had a profound effect. Like I said, on the popular imagination

of the Japanese people, and effect. Like I said, on the popular imagination of the Japanese people, and especially important for our story, on a fifth grader named Mitsutero Yokoyama. He had been evacuated during the war and returned to the fine in his home city, utterly devastant, Kobe, like I said, completely flattened. Hiroshima and Nagasaki had similarly been decimated, but in their case, the devastation

was inflicted by a single bomb each, like we talked about. The power of that, and the power of the German V weapons, the V1, V2, the rockets. The rockets, right. Similarly designed to inflict destruction in a long distance. Honest civilian population. Honest civilian population. Honest civilian population.

But for him, it was, the implications of honest civilian population, it was a fifth grade, I was kind of lost on. Sure, sure. But he went on, it inspired him to create the manga, comic book, Tetsujin 28 Go, translated into English as Iron Man 28. manga started publication in 1956. Okay.

Tetsujin is a 60-foot tall robot developed as a Japanese super weapon prior to the end of the war. The son of the scientist who invented it controls the robot with a remote. They go on adventures, fighting crime syndicates, pirates, kidnapping and terrorist rings,

evil super scientists, submarine pirates. It's a three color comic book with a super weapon as a major maguathan, okay, controlled by a kid who also happens to be a kid detective, drives a car, carries a gun, I mean, it's kids. Yeah, it's kid fantasy. Yeah, yeah. You know what, the I mean it's it's kid fantasy. Yeah, you know what? That the Spider-Man movie it just came out. Yeah, one of the spider people in his spider-verse is a

Japanese schoolgirl who controls a robot. Yeah, wow. Mm-hmm. Okay. It has it has roots going back to yeah. This is where this is where we see this. Okay, it has it has roots going back to yeah, this is where this is where we see this the anime adaptation of the comic starting in 1963 Was imported to the United States in 1964 as the animated series Gigantor Okay, worthy of note here. It changes to the backstory The original series is set immediately post-war okay the US version happens in a distant year 2000. The original series explicitly says, Tetris in Gigantor, was invented as a Japanese super weapon. The translation simply states he was invented as a weapon, but reprogrammed to be a guardian of peace. So setting the American retread aside for a second, consider the psychological implications. A super weapon, explicitly described as a super weapon is now depicted being used for Terry and the Pirates,

for color, comic, book, comic strip, adventures, Zany Hinges, I mean, actions, Zany Hinges, not always comedy, but I'm saying. And the comic and anime were both wildly popular, like, huge, like, zitgeist, massive, and led directly to the next series in the chronology of the development of this genre, which is Mazinger Z, which took the idea of a giant robot and switched it up by having it be piloted by a person. So is the robot its own conscious being or not? No. Okay. No. The giant robot becomes a vehicle. Okay. Okay. And go to a guy, the creator of Mazinger Z, wanted to do something with the giant robot,

but he didn't want to rip off Tetsujin. And he was trying to come up with an idea. He was like, you know, what, what, how can I, because this is really awesome. I really like this idea of how do I distinguish, you know, 50-foot-all robot. What do I do to make it my own? I think I got stuck in traffic one afternoon. Can we rewind for just a second? Yeah. How tall was that first one? 60 feet.

And the second one, you said 50, but were you just throwing out a number? I was just throwing a figure. It's interesting that 60 feet is the thing. Because I was reading the physics of superheroes and That's the highest height that Ant-Man slash giant man ever got to And it's because at 60 feet The weight and the strain and I don't remember the exact size behind it But the weight and the strain of the human body would collapse on itself after 60 feet.

Okay, I can see that. I just think that's kinda interesting. I think that is interesting. That we all seem to land at. At that kind of figure. Right on there. That is an interesting parallel. Because the similar themes of power and,

right. You know, diphenian and all that stuff are tied in there as well. So, but he got stuck in this one of my favorite stories. He got stuck in a traffic jam. And I had at least thought how nice it would be to have a way to bypass the cars in front of him. And the idea of a gigantic robot just stopping over.

Yeah, it's not a very loony tins, yeah. Yeah, so it came into being. So, Mayzinger really Is the birth of the subgenre of what we call the super robot? Okay, the robot defies physics regularly as rocket propelled fist missiles as one of its main weapons Okay, you may you may you may have seen somewhere trans or Z as a kid That was the American again retread of Amazinger. Yeah, no.

And its main weapons were its fists. Fists fly off as rockets. And they would fly out and hit whatever they hit and then fly back and reattach themselves. Which, you know, think about physics that for a second. There are none. Well, you just hit rewind on animation. But you get what I'm saying.

Yeah. Yeah. It's all fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. The rules don't matter. Right. And the story is gleefully ignored in a kind of practice, concerns about power source, ammunition, etc. In favor of what awesome thing can this gigantic tool of devastation do next? All of it is done in huge bright colors. It's mostly kid-friendly. Amazing or z really is all kid-friendly.

And is kid-friendly different from culture to culture? Yeah. We're talking about a culture that survived two giant bombings. Yeah. profoundly giant bombings. Yeah. Plus a whole bunch of like carpet bombings and incendiary bombings, profoundly giant bombings, plus a whole bunch of like carpet bombings and incendiary bombings. So the boundaries for them are very different and necessarily than the boundaries for us. Yeah, so this is again, kid-friendly depictions of violence

with lots of whooshing and banging and, you know, biff pow, 60s Batman kind of stuff, and very little blood early thality. Okay. There's all kinds of explosions, there's all kinds of stuff falling down, getting smashed, all that kind of stuff. Spectacle.

Yeah, there's all the spectacle and not a lot of gore. Okay. Not a lot of actual death. I mean, there's death when it's important to the story, like, you know, when the pilot's family, you know, family member, mentor figure gets killed as part of this heroic arc, that's a big deal.

But otherwise, you know, it just happened. After May's Zinger, we have more series, Getter Robo, Compatler, then what's referred to as the Compatler Romance Trilogy, which was, as it says, a trilogy of series in a common universe. Uh-huh. Further codified the aspects of this subgenre.

So we see in an emphasis on coolness over practicality, which I've already mentioned. Of course. Involved, hot-headed, passionate heroes. Uh-huh. The, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the thing is, it is and it isn't. Okay. In social situations, in the real world, the expectation is that you are going to be, you know, you're going to follow the Confucian ideal of Lee. You're going to be well behaved. You're going to keep everything under control.

You're going to be calm and serene. Right. However, if you are involved in a contest of any kind, if there's a conflict, if there's a struggle, if there's a whatever, bonsai. Bonsai, passion. Oh, yeah.

You've got to be totally committed. The one of the central characteristics that you wind up finding, if you look at all kinds of cultural artifacts of Japanese culture, is there is this idea of whatever you're gonna do, man, you fucking commit, like a hundred percent. That's totally the geography. If you are gonna be, if you are gonna be a chef,

like there are a whole manga series devoted to becoming, you know, the protagonist trying to become a chef, and it's, they're all done in the same artistic style with the same kind of you know glints in the eyes and the right this is on dynamic poses as super hero colleagues it is you are dedicated to the path of cooking that's very commit that's that's the Odyssey it is that's be be the best swine herd you can be. Yes. Yes. That's interesting. They're both island communities. Yeah, well yeah, because you know there's a lot of other options. Well, and that's yeah, I mean that's that's the geography dictating. Yeah,

personalities always like focused into these valleys. Yeah, focused into this 10% of landmass. Yeah, so the heroes are high-headed passionate kids. It laughs muckingly in the face of physics and scale. And generally, the giant robots are created for some lofty goal, like protector from alien invasion, act as a guardian of peace. You know, these big, when you really get down to it, they're either tautologies or similarly,

it's like, well, what does that actually mean? You build a giant, this is the giant robot doesn't sound like a practical tool to do this, why are you like, you know, because it's cool, shut up, I wanna blow shit up, you know. And now the draw of this is interesting

from a Zitgeist perspective. The generation who had been born just before the war and just during the war loved the series. Okay. They have fandoms to this day that are as passionate as Star Wars fans, Star Trek fans, Dr. Who fans. Sure.

I mean, like religiously dedicated. And they were so beloved, they've spawned countless imitators, spin-offs, reboots, sequels, remakes. All of them shows about super weapons, in these cases, super weapons of awesome power purposed with lofty romantic goals. Okay. Okay.

And set in this very romantic in the sense of high romance, where all of the themes are melodramatic, all of the relationships between the characters are, still waters run deep if there are still waters. Right. Everybody is, you know, there's, you know, passion as a driving force and everything. And these are the living witnesses of the terrible devastation of total war and the world's first true life super weapon.

And so we see these super weapons becoming guardians. Oh, man. This power that they had experienced as this traumatic, horrible, terrible, again, curl up into a ball and cry or strive to death if you watch the depiction of what they went through, kind of experiences, are now being repurposed in their popular imagination and in their popular media into the thing that's going to protect them, into the thing that's going to save them, into the thing that gives them this outlet for adventure and romance and excitement and all this stuff. Sounds like America bombed the shit out of them and then occupied them and helped them rebuild

industrially, set them up as an economic power and kept them safe from anyone around them. Wow. This is why I love doing this podcast because that was an analogy that had gone completely under my radar. Are you serious? I am. I thought of it as the nation state level. I didn't even thought of it. My focus is on the individual into nation state coping with trauma level. See, what you point what you're playing out is

yeah, America. Yes. Well, even on a person-to-person level, what are these people been fed about the invasion? These people will eat you. And then they show up and they give you meat. They show up. They give you jobs. They give you a government. They give you a more representative, better, fairer, less sexist government, yes, than the one you had before and in some ways, then their own at home. Yes. Awesome.

But then they set you up as a trading partner and they really do, they, they, they, they invest and they invest billions of dollars. Yes. But also also like the American GIs were like given a coat of conduct while you're over there. Yeah, you you are our face. So so they went from from agandizing. Yeah, um, them as they will eat you and your children. You have to stab them until they stop moving to nah man. They're cool. Yeah So well and in the same time period now they bring that up of course in the same time period When did this the kid grow up the first one is in the fifth right?

He he was alive during the war right. He was a fifth grader in 45 so he heard the propaganda. Oh, yeah So by the time America leaves. Yeah, he is Barely an adult. Yeah, he's a young adult and then he starts doing this thing. Okay, so I'm sorry to interrupt. No, no, that's brilliant That's why we do this. Yes and so the the bombardment left a deep mark, like we talked about in Japanese National Character, and there was also before that, or more additionally, there was the changes that were brought by the general devastation of the war, and before the war, the militarization

of their culture that had led to it. And after the war the the new government that was installed and the people who elected that government became pacifist to the extent that nowadays in Japan joining the self-defense forces is considered a loser's job. Like there is no prestige whatsoever attached to it. It is, it is, if you're joining the self defense forces, you know, the joke has been made that, you know, do you, cop pulls a comedian over Sarah Silverman, I think. And he says to her, do you know why I pulled you over?

She says because you got season high school. That's the attitude that they have toward the military. He says to her, do you know why I pulled you over? She says because you got season high school. That's the attitude that they have toward the military. Wow. And so the new Japan, partly because of the propaganda we've had them, was in love with futurism. Like, whiz bang, dragon space, you know, if it was futuristic and new, the Japanese have always had a love of the different, always. It's always been a cultural thing. But Zenophelia has always been a part of their culture. But since World War II, especially in a couple of decades after that,

like they adopted rock and roll. Oh yeah. And they adopted, if you look at both of Zuku Biker culture. Oh yeah yeah. You know, you see American gang culture ramped up to 11 because again, if you're going to do it, fucking do it. You know, and all of these things out of our culture that got transported over there that get exaggerated and mirrored and they do it. And they're like, no, no, I'm gonna do that more and better. Well, because they don't have the organic aspect to it,

they adopt it. Yeah. So when you adopt something, you adopt the most outward signs of it quite often. Yeah. So they've got the zeal of the converted. Yeah. Without the history of the raised in it. Yeah.

You know. Yeah. So. And so they were deeply, committedly pacifists. Sure. But they also revisited their mass trauma in their new popular myths. Yeah. Godzilla.

Yes. Godzilla is the obvious example. Kaiju films are separate genre but they're related. Yeah. To the point where they're saying Meka Godzilla. Yeah. He was either awakened or created depending on which version of the story by nuclear tests in the Pacific.

Right. How more on the nose could you be? But the power in this case has been taken in the super robot genre. This power has been taken and it has, it started out being dynazian and it's been turned into being apolonian. Because I love that dichotomy, I love that. Yeah, yeah, I could totally see it.

Yeah. Okay, then, Decatur II went by, and the Super Robot genre ruled the Roost, that was what giant robot fiction was. Okay. I threw out the 60s into the 70s, and then in 1979,

there was a new seminal work with called Mobile Suit Gundam. And that was the birth of the real robot genre. The real robot. Real robot. Okay. Gundam is the first example of a giant robot that actually had to worry about things like maintenance,

reloading weapons, supply chains, all of those military science fiction, real world concerns, all of a sudden is like, no, no, this is a machine. Let's think about how this machine would have to work. And the grit factor is a lot higher in Gundam. Think of Watchman compared to the Fantastic Four. Yeah, no, I haven't got you. Think of Watchmen compared to the Fantastic Four. Yeah, no, I get you.

Do you think some of this has to do with the fact that the 70s were such a shitty time worldwide? Yes. Oh yeah. Yeah, here's the deal. The 70s saw the Cold War descend into the, you know, looming dread that we've talked about repeatedly when we talked about it. Right. The heightened tensions and fear and panic and, oh my god, you know, overblown circumstances

and turned into, well, no, we have mutually assured destruction. If anybody pulls the button, if anybody hits the button, we're all going to die. Right. And that's just bad, and that's just bad ground noise. Yeah. And sanity will save us. Yes. Yes.

And the Japanese, of course, were hosting US military bases. Yeah. So there was a chance they were going to be targeted. And they had no sayover. And they had no sayover. And they were one of the staging areas that our military used to send guys to Vietnam. Right. And four guys coming back from Vietnam. Right. And Korea too. And Korea as well, but really 1979, we're working in Vietnam. Well, we're post-Vietnam by that point.

But it had been and made into the culture. But it was that was yeah. Yeah. And so. And by this point, you'd had 30 years of occupation. Yeah. And so war plays a central role in the real robot genre. Okay. They are military science fiction with with giant robots. The robots are literal weapons.

They're not super heroic constructs, but elaborate fighter jets or tanks. Okay. Okay. They're the cutting edge of military tech, but that's exactly what they are, military tech. Armor Trooper Votoms is an example of this utilitarian idea taken to an extreme. In Mobile Suit Gundam, the mechs are more utilitarian looking, but they're still recognizably humanoid with close to humanoid proportions. Yeah, they're jets with legs and arms. And the Gundam itself is this swoopy, samurai helmeted, you know, special ace custom prototype.

Right. In armored trooper votons, the mechs are probably, I want to say they're about 12 feet tall. They're much smaller. OK. And they are ugly. They are intentionally utilitarian to the point of being ugly.

Right. Because, you know, looking at a Sherman tank, it ain't pretty. Right. Okay. And somewhere in the middle of that spectrum is Fang of the Sondogram, which I've mentioned before. The next thing that one is some of my favorite designs. A lot of the early mechs in Battle Tech were taken from Fang of the Sun Dogram.

Okay. I was initially exposed to them in Battle Tech and then I saw where they came from. Battle Tech was created in 85 right 84 85 and Warhammer 40K was created in 80 485 roughly about the same time they're they're both drawing on the same as that similar similar well the there's a lot more gothic and eldritch going on Warhammer 40K but one hammer is giant robots either yeah it's but But the same idea of the same idea of dark, gritty and metal. Yeah, everything that Sohron wanted to build. Yes, basically. And Macross, which you would recognize as Robotech, is somewhere in the metal, both tech-wise

and in terms of plot. Okay. Macross, we see, you know, we see major characters get killed, we see major characters die ugly. Uh-huh. Roy Foker, we see him... I see the one that gets, yeah. Yeah, he sees the one that's in the back. Yeah, it's in the back. And then other members of Rick Hunter's squadron,

Hikaru Hichijo and the original series die ugly and point, Hikaru, GGO, and the original series, Diagly and Pointless Mistakes, or essentially in ways that like, man, why'd you go out like a punk? Sure. And so these series showed a much greater world view with a lot more morally ambiguity, especially in Votums, which like crib the whole story arc from the Vietnam War. Oh, wow. They had serious meaningful character deaths and their depictions of violence were not loony tunes-ish. You'll never see a real robot- Two-fist fighting. Yeah. Yeah. It's never going to fire its fists off. Now this on genre,

obviously both post-A to Vietnam, in which case super weapons could not have solved the problem. In which case, superweapons could not have solved the problem. Right. And they're smaller now because tactics start to clear. And not only that, but if superweapons had been used in Vietnam, they would have made everything so much worse. Right. Because if we had used nuclear weapons to try to solve our problems in Vietnam that would have brought the Chinese and the Soviets in and we would have just come out. Mutually sure destruction. Yeah.

They're still romantic adventure kind of flavoring to these stories but it's no longer for a color comic storytelling and these stories are a harder brand of very specifically military science fiction. Okay. And now we've kind of come full circle for the purposes of our podcast because this is where Battletec comes in. Right. And these stories have now reached the United States. We've brought them over here,

and a bunch of game designers look at this and go, this is awesome. I want to take this and turn this into a game and our own universe where we're going to throw all this into the future and do all this stuff that we've talked about in the Battle Tech episode. Right. And so, and then so this stuff that we've talked about in the battle tech episode. Right. And so, and then so this,

this is genre that was born out of the shared trauma of the Japanese people in the 50s and 60s, then got adopted by a subset of geekdom as a way for us to cope with our insecurities, both Cold War and economic, because Curied are the bad guys in the Japanese are gonna eat or die. Yeah. And then in the 80 guys and the Japanese are going to eat our lunch.

Yeah. Not only in the 80s and into the 90s. So wait, let me start from the beginning really quickly. We drop atomic bombs on Japan. That leads to this genre because of the trauma of a profound super weapon. That is my thesis. Right. That then morphs and changes as the Japanese people come to terms with the fact that the very people who bombed them so profoundly are now

helping them back up. Yeah. Then it keeps going because of their partnership with that same people. Not a partnership that they chose necessarily, but it is one that they absolutely, ultimately benefited from. Then they're watching that group kind of spill its own tea all over its own crotch when it comes to the military stuff. And it informs that genre to the point where then people start to notice that

and they're like, and so it gets exported back to the same people who started this whole thing by dropping a giant bomb on them. Yeah. And it reminds me in a very funny way of how Henry David Throe inspired Gandhi who inspired MLK. Yeah. So it's like this triangulation, this bouncing back and forth

of East to West over and over again. And again, I'm painting with a very broad brush because it's time. And this is in a much more shallow way. Yeah. And it's very different. But it's so interesting to me that it's our own fault that we have it kind of thing. So, you know, culturally. So, yeah, that's cool. Yeah. So, what that's what I've got. I mean, I said that's my thesis. What, what are you other than what you just said? Right. What else have you got to take away from here? I think I blew my water on the idea of like the them the Japanese coming to grips with the fact that a people who would so profoundly hurt them was now their partner in we birth. Yeah. And and how that you know informed us. So how a super weapon became a guardian. Yeah.

Because the people who used the super weapon became guardians. Yeah. Um, I, you know, I really, I think I spent my lunch money on that But I would which I like a lot better than I blew my watch. Yeah, I'll spend a lunch money I think in the larger context as well of the toys and the fact that it was US and the fact that it was US sea rations, the metal from those were what became the toys that they turned around and exported back to the US. Right, and they were giant robot toys. And stuff like that. And so it's just so interesting to me that you have that operating on so many different levels culturally.

Your point about xenophilia. Yes. I find it fascinating because our country is currently going through a very xenophobic phase. And by currently, I mean since forever. It's always very xenophobic. Interestingly, the Japanese xenophilia, you have an island culture. And you see this in England as well, by the way. This exotacization, almost, this fetishization

of foreigners. But we don't want them breeding with us. No. Whereas over here, there's a tremendous amount of xenophobia and where is mixed is it gets in so many ways. I mean, you and I live in Sacramento, it's a very mixed, very, very, very, very, hard-to-fodged place, which to our strength. Yeah. But I think it's interesting that both are reacting to the quote, I'm going to use finger quotes here for the word threat of the foreigner in ways that are opposite of how their culture actually is built.

Okay. So a very monoculture group is very xenophilic. Yeah. A very multi-culture group is very xenophobic. And I think that's interesting. Well, I think if you're talking about the part where we're talking about our xenophobia, I think the issue that you're talking about there is the fact that we have this culture of diversity that we have. We have the fact that we are this culture of diversity that we have.

We have the fact that we are inescapably an immigrant nation. Yes. And the thing is, the xenophobia that we see in our latent, the latent xenophobia that we see in our society is born out of the quote majority culture, you know, the people in power, wanting to get something out of people coming into the country, but are afraid of the threat posed by those same people. Whereas in actual, you know, rubber meeting the road terms, we don't really fear the individual people. Right.

Do you get what I mean? Oh, he's a good one. Yeah, it is the rare individual who I've ever met. Yeah. Who actually has a genuine xenophobic... Has a practical racism? Has a practical racism? It's a practical racism. Yeah, there is the latent kind of well, you know, getting uncomfortable in, you know,

a quote unquote, bad neighborhood at night. Right. You know, clutching your personal closer in an elevator. Clutching your personal closer in an elevator. That kind of stuff. Yeah. But when people in our culture actually introduced themselves and start talking as a culture Right, we're really good at like okay. No as a person. Okay. Now. I'm gonna talk to you

And we're gonna figure it out and you're gonna be one of the good ones right and and after you've been exposed to enough of You can overcome the prejudice by going well, you know, wait a minute everyone on that is actually been a decent bloke Therefore therefore all right, I was wrong. But the initial tribalism, transplantationist, you know, threat from the outsider is something we all have to overcome. You know, it's the difference between the assimilation model of the turn of the 20th century of the melting pot. Right. And the assimilation, the modern assimilation model of the stained glass window.

Hmm, one of the mosaic. I like that. That's a lot prettier than the salad. Yeah, or the pot of velvita. Yeah, I was just saying shirts. Yeah. And so yeah, I think that's an interesting takeaway talking about Japanese culture. Well, and also I was just thinking of your previous episode talking about, you know, you

dived in or delved in a bit to how Japanese unions differ from ours. Japanese unions exist in cooperation with and in partnership with, and our unions exist as a bulwark to protect from the predations of. In direct opposition to. Yeah, to those who would snuff them out. I'm a pretty pro union guy, so I'm gonna spin it that way. But, like you said, we have a history of, no, no, come in, We need to make use of you.

We need to exploit you, but don't you dare try to climb to what we've got. Where as in Japan, it's like, oh man, you got some cool shit over there. Why don't you bring it over and show it to me? Yeah. What are you doing? No, you don't get to date my daughter.

But yeah, so it just, yeah. Stay still, that side of the Tommy. Yeah, but that's cool, cool leather jacket. Yeah, I got that. Oh, so cool. Yeah. Well, thank you. That was funny.

All right. Glad you enjoyed it. Yeah. Any books you want to talk with a read? Well, with a read. We're made of talking about Japanese culture. I have recommend the Sano Ichiro Mystery Series, which I've talked to you about before. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. It is an Agatha Christie style mystery series where they make characters a samurai in Aedo, Japan. It says a lot about Japanese culture at that time. If you study Japanese culture at that time, it gives you a really interesting window into Japanese culture ever since. Nice. So how about you? The Truth Flag by Stephen Kinzer. It's the Truth Flag, Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the birth of the American Empire. All right. And it's about, essentially, the Spanish-American War. And how it was our first step onto the world stage as a colonizer. What I like about it is I heard an interview with the author and he talked about how much

the senators had debates about, and how's it wrapped, as well. Are we going to do this or not? Are we going to step in? We just take it for granted. But they were like seriously, do we really want that role? And they quoted a lot of Rome in, in, so doing. And I was like, wow, back when people were classically trained. So, yeah, the benefits. Yeah. Look classical. Look, if you have any questions, if you want to dig deeper with Ed or me on this topic as well as many others.

Or if you've got one of our mistakes and one of our hard-baths on it. Yes, we love social media hate. Hit us up with at Geek History Time or personally you can hit me up at duh Harmony. And you can hit me up at at EH Blalock. Yes, all of this on Twitter. I'm Devin Harmony. I'm Ed Blaelock, and until next time, keep rolling 20s.