Andrew Hamlin
Northwest Asia Weekly
That year was 1992. I am the editor-in-chief of the university newspaper. We somehow managed to lose the proclamation of the 50th anniversary of Executive Order 9066, an action by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt that sent over 100,000 Japanese Americans to resettlement camps during World War II.
Naturally, the newspaper’s editors had to meet with Asian American activists on campus to explain how this happened. I’m willing to admit we screwed up. Privately, though, I’m a little impatient with all the anger.
That’s just my prerogative to speak. I have no family in the camp, and I don’t know the people who were sent there. I’m not thinking about the really important aspects of the anniversary — what the order means, how it reflects in American politics, and what it continues to mean.
Thirty years later, on February 19, the 80th anniversary of the 9066 is approaching. On Feb. 12, the crowd at the Ethnic Culture Theater in Seattle watched Jon Osaki’s new documentary “Alternative Facts: The Lies of Executive Order 9066,” which appeared to be a cross-section of the Asian community. Older faces, younger faces. Lots of chatting and catching up. When people were seated, the phones came out. One man kept his texting window for most of the afternoon.
Kendall Kosai from OCA-Asia Pacific American Advocates got up to introduce in the afternoon. He reminded people of the upcoming 80th anniversary.
We waited for technical repairs after the movie started with no sound. Although the audio and image were still out of sync, it eventually got the sound back. The story Osaki had to tell, however, transcended any such concerns.
“Alternative Facts” runs for about an hour, enough to delve into the intricate history around 9066. However, all the complications are highlighted. The government lied to the public and ultimately to the Supreme Court. These lies were necessary for 9066 to quit and seem plausible to white Americans.
Osaki traces anti-Chinese sentiments back to the late 1800s to show how Asians have always faced discrimination and hatred. After Pearl Harbor, many for their own purposes fanned anti-Japanese American sentiment—especially white farmers, who saw Japanese-faced farmers as unwelcome competitors. Osaki pointed out in a question-and-answer session after the film that while there are other documentaries about 9066 out there, no one has looked so deeply into its root causes, and the suppression of the truth, that there is no evidence that Japanese-Americans were linked to spies or sabotage Activity.
After the lights came on, longtime activist and mediator John Kangwu introduced a panel discussion that included Osaki himself, Lorraine Bannai, an attorney and activist at Seattle University Law School, and Stanley Shikuma, a longtime activist and current president of the Seattle chapter of JACL.
Yasutake asked each panelist a question. When asked why he decided to make “Alternative Facts,” Osaki recalled making a pilgrimage to the former Tule Lake War Relocation Center in Northern California, where many of his family went during World War II.
He shot videos of his kids playing at Castle Rock, which gave him the whole idea of working on the 9066 as something a new generation could grab. He feels he knows more about the whole story and making the film than he suspects the vast majority of Americans know. He also received thank-you letters from high school and college students — some of whom admitted they had never even heard of camp before watching the film.
Of course, he emphasizes that his films are about “alternative facts” and “fake news” decades before those terms appeared. They are simply summaries of modern centuries of practice.
When asked about the legal implications of 9066, Professor Bannai referred to the executive order as a “blank check,” giving the military virtually unlimited power to deal with Japanese-Americans in any way. She stressed that the wording of 9066 never specifically mentioned Japanese Americans, but everyone knew who the order was referring to.
She added that we need to look closely at the Supreme Court’s inclination to side with justice issues if it thinks “national security” is involved. She said we need to pay close attention to such cases and speak up if we feel the courts are dealing with them.
When asked what we can do to prevent 9066 from happening again, Shikuma said there are three main reasons for such things: racism, wartime hysteria and failure of political leadership.
“These are always with us and we need to speak up,” he concluded. He concluded that we need to be the allies and friends that Japanese Americans needed but didn’t get this Saturday 80 years ago.
Andrew is available at info@nwasianweekly.com.
