NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

Last week I wrote my column in the Guam Daily Post about the comfort women issue in South Korea and how the governments of Japan and South Korea are working towards a process of restitution over the use of South Korean women as sex slaves during World War II. The issue of the comfort women extends far beyond just South Korea, and is something that affected cultures across Asia and the Pacific. I have been talking more intensely about the comfort women issue over the past year as i nobia-hu Dr. Isa Kelley Bowman has been conducting research into it. It has been difficult for her, as the issue is one shrouded in so many different forms of silence. The lack of writing around the issue in Guam is often thought to be simply a matter of stigma and social shame, with women and their families seeking to keep the issue quiet and not be reminded of what happened. But it is far more complicated than that, and it can be frustrating, how people will accept one level of silence as being the truth

To the question of whether or not Hawai'i is an occupied nation, the answer is simple, hunggan, sen hunggan, gof annok yan ti puniyon. But this is an important reminder of how the truth does not out, how what can be proven, what can be shown to clearly provide an understanding of the contours of reality does nothing on its own. You can show people things, communicate them to them, show them the structure of violence that leads to displacement, suppression, but for their own lazy and selfish reasons, because of the way their own privilege, their own pleasure may be tied to the denial of that truth, they will resist it. They will pretend it means nothing, they will drape the islands in as many American flags as possible, as many bases as possible, as many Wal-Marts as possible in order to cover that truth up, to blot it out, the make is go away, to try to banish it. ****************** Aloha to the US: Is Hawai'i an occupied nation? By Taylor Kate Brown   BBC New

I've been in Japan for two weeks now and things have been quite busy, I haven't had as much time as I would like for blogging or writing. I have been swimming in a sea of small and large differences from my life on Guam. The things each day which strike me slowly or suddenly and remind me that I am in a different part of the world, and that my level of knowledge about Japan, barely scratches the surface of the surface for existence here. Transitioning from Guam, which is very car-centered to life here in Kobe where my life, my cognitive and temporal geography is all dictated by public transportation is a massive shift. One thing caught my eye the other day while I was riding the train. Some trains would have cars with pink signs on them such as the one in the image above. These trains would only for female users of public transportation. When I asked my friend why they had these and were these common throughout Japan, she stated that they were created in response to the fre

I am always intrigued at the way American critiques of Japan often time focus on the way that Japanese conservatives are always seeking to erase of minimize sexual slavery during World War II. The women that were forced into sexual slavery across the empire Japan was seeking to create have a tragically complex ideological function. They are on the one hand discursive means through which the nations formerly colonized by Japan reassert their national power. The bodies of those violated women become the means through which a very masculine national honor can be regained. For the Japanese themselves, they are part of their former colonial past that they struggle to both erase but also deal with. For the conservative part of Japan they are something that is tied to the masculinity of the nation. Part of the way the nation was once allowed to act. Part of the way that, for those conservative sectors, it should not have to apologize for. They do not want to erase the sins of the past, but

 A very comprehensive article about the history of the United States focusing on the way in which so many have sought to legitimize its existence even though it is clearly based on violence and lies. While for many attached to the US, this history is unimportant or irritating, for Native peoples it is essential, it cannot and should not be forgotten. It is a story of genocide and stolen sovereignty. It is the formation of a great net of lies which others use to trap you and your existence, to keep you small, to keep you away, to try to neutralize your past, present and potential future. The writer is Mark Charles, a Navajo. Link to his blog is also included below. ********************* "The Doctrine of Discovery: A Buried Apology and an Empty Chair" By Mark Charles Reflections From the Hogan 12/22/14  http://wirelesshogan.blogspot.com/2014/12/doctrine-of-discovery.html Picture a chair, an empty chair. There are dozens, even hundreds, of them sitting on the stage