Watch Lucy Walker's acclaimed documentary The Tsunami & The Cherry Blossom for free today at her website: http://www.lucywalkerfilm.com/TSUNAMI-THE-CHERRY-BLOSSOM
Monday, March 11, 2013
Watch Lucy Walker's acclaimed documentary The Tsunami & The Cherry Blossom for free today
Watch Lucy Walker's acclaimed documentary The Tsunami & The Cherry Blossom for free today at her website: http://www.lucywalkerfilm.com/TSUNAMI-THE-CHERRY-BLOSSOM
Saturday, March 9, 2013
Monday, March 4, 2013
ICAN: "What Nuclear Weapons Really Do to People & the Environment"
During the US military occupation of Japan, US authorities censored all media discussions of the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But by 1952, the end of the Occupation, accounts of nuclear survivors’ ongoing struggles with radiation sickness became widespread.
In 1954, 23 crew members of the Lucky Dragon Japanese fishing trawler were irradiated when the US nuclear test bombed the Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. In protest, 30 million Japanese people — over a third of the population — signed a petition demanding the end of nuclear test bombings.
The US nuclear test bombed islands in the Asia-Pacific over 100 times from 1946 to 1962. Survivors of the Bikini Atoll bombings have suffered from miscarriages, profound birth defects, and high rates of cancer. The US also nuclear test bombed the American Southwest over 1,000 times.* Washington's most recent (underground) nuclear test bombing took place in December 2012, with almost no media coverage. Hiroshima mayor Kazumi Matsui commented, “I wonder why President Obama, who said he would seek a nuclear-free world, carried out the test."
Despite the well-known health and environmental consequences of nuclear radiation, and widespread protest, France nuclear bombed Mururoa, and its sister atoll Fangataufa in French Polynesia from 1966 to 1995. Greenpeace reported that France's first nuclear (plutonium) bombing sucked all the water from the lagoon, "raining dead fish and mollusks down on the atoll", and spread radioactive contamination across the Pacific to Peru and New Zealand.
The UK nuclear test bombed Australia from 1955 to 1963, exposing Australians, especially aboriginal Australians, to nuclear radiation. The Australian government forcibly removed tribal members from their homelands; when they attempted to return, they developed radiation-related health disorders. Radioactive contamination destroyed their way of life.
Although the human costs of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings are now known, the suffering of many hundreds of thousands of other nuclear (test bombings, depleted uranium weapons, uranium mining, nuclear weapons production, nuclear waste dumping) survivors worldwide remain much less known. However their suffering reflect a globally interrelated web of nuclear violence that touches us all.
* The National Cancer Institute runs a program to help Americans identify if they were exposed to radioactive 1-131 fallout from US nuclear test bombings between 1951 and 1963; this isotope can cause thyroid disorder or cancer.
Friday, March 1, 2013
Tokyo Waka: A (cinematic) poem about a city, its people, and 20,000 crows
A meditative exploration of Tokyo and post-Bubble, post-3/11 Japan.
Thursday, February 28, 2013
New York Peace Film Festival - Saturday, March 9 - Sunday, March 10, 2013
English version of "Barefoot Gen's Hiroshima" trailer!
Showtime: Sat. March 9, 2013 @ 7:00pm.
Director, Yuko Ishida will join us from Tokyo
and we'll also connect to Hiroshima via Skype for Q and A!
Saturday, February 23, 2013
Hirotoshi Iha explains the "Heart of Okinawa"
On September 4, 1955 – exactly 40 years to the day before the 1995 gang kidnapping, beating, and rape of a 12-year old Okinawan girl – an American soldier, Sergeant Isaac Hurt, kidnapped Yumiko Nagayama as she was walking to kindergarten. Then he raped her, disemboweled her, and threw her into a military base garbage dump. Less than a week later, another US soldier raped another child.
The rape-murder of Yumiko-chan took place during "Bayonets and Bulldozers" – a period of US forced seizure and destruction of 50,000+acres of land (including entire villages), to make build military complexes across the islands. The seizures – usually at gunpoint – left 250,000 Okinawans homeless and without means of livelihood. Because the US did not allow Okinawans any real legal protections, Okinawans had no legal recourse against the US military violations of their property rights and human rights.
Okinawan mass protests, marches, and sit-ins date back to this period because the people had no legal power to resist the US use of force against them. The pattern of American soldiers taking young girls from civilian houses at gunpoint to rape (and even murder them) began during the early days of the US occupation of Okinawa and worsened during the 1950's violent period of "Bayonets and Bulldozers." At this time, the US military rape of women and children became synonymous with the rape-like taking and destruction of their land.
The 1955 murder of Yumiko-chan outraged the Okinawan public, sparking what Okinawan Moriteru ARASAKI calls the first wave of the Okinawa Struggle for human rights and property rights. Okinawan resistance culminated in the 1956 "island-wide struggle" (shimagurumi toso) challenging US military domination.
Korean American filmmaker Annabel Park's five-minute video interview of Hirotoshi Iha brings us back to 1955 by illuminating how deeply Okinawns have been injured by the pattern of US violent violations of human rights, land rights, and also why the US and Japanese governments have never been able to extinguish the Okinawan struggle for rights, self-determination, safety from US military violence, and peace.
Filmed in Takae in 2010, Mr. Iha explains why he became an activist and the deep meaning of the "Heart of Okinawa." Yumiko-chan was his cousin.
The life-long activist then explains why the majority of Okinawans don't want Futenma training base "transferred" to Henoko: "because we know the human cost of it."
The rape-murder of Yumiko-chan took place during "Bayonets and Bulldozers" – a period of US forced seizure and destruction of 50,000+acres of land (including entire villages), to make build military complexes across the islands. The seizures – usually at gunpoint – left 250,000 Okinawans homeless and without means of livelihood. Because the US did not allow Okinawans any real legal protections, Okinawans had no legal recourse against the US military violations of their property rights and human rights.
Okinawan mass protests, marches, and sit-ins date back to this period because the people had no legal power to resist the US use of force against them. The pattern of American soldiers taking young girls from civilian houses at gunpoint to rape (and even murder them) began during the early days of the US occupation of Okinawa and worsened during the 1950's violent period of "Bayonets and Bulldozers." At this time, the US military rape of women and children became synonymous with the rape-like taking and destruction of their land.
The 1955 murder of Yumiko-chan outraged the Okinawan public, sparking what Okinawan Moriteru ARASAKI calls the first wave of the Okinawa Struggle for human rights and property rights. Okinawan resistance culminated in the 1956 "island-wide struggle" (shimagurumi toso) challenging US military domination.
Korean American filmmaker Annabel Park's five-minute video interview of Hirotoshi Iha brings us back to 1955 by illuminating how deeply Okinawns have been injured by the pattern of US violent violations of human rights, land rights, and also why the US and Japanese governments have never been able to extinguish the Okinawan struggle for rights, self-determination, safety from US military violence, and peace.
Filmed in Takae in 2010, Mr. Iha explains why he became an activist and the deep meaning of the "Heart of Okinawa." Yumiko-chan was his cousin.
The life-long activist then explains why the majority of Okinawans don't want Futenma training base "transferred" to Henoko: "because we know the human cost of it."
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
3/11 Anniversary Remembrance by Beautiful Energy • 3/11 • Tokyo & Anywhere in the World
Via our friend, Jacinta Hin
下の方に簡単な日本語版があります。また編集します！
We are planning a series (day) of events on March 11 both in remembrance of the Tohoku Earthquake, Tsunami and the Fukushima Nuclear Plant disaster, and in support of the global stand for a nuclear-free world.
Please join us on this special day, either in person or remote from anywhere in the world.
Join in person, in Tokyo:
We will get together from 1.30pm in Yoyogi Park. At 2.46pm, the time that the Earthquake struck, we stand still in silence and meditation to honor those who lost their lives and everyone affected by the horrendous events of March 11.
From 6pm we will get together for an evening of candlelight, music and…being peacefully together with people who share the vision for a nuclear-free Japan and world.
簡単な日本語版です。後日また編集します。
来る3/11に、私たちは連続したイベントを計画しています！
東北震災や津波や福島の原発事故を忍び、世界中で核をもたないことに賛成している人たちに
賛同し、支持するためのイベントです。この特別な日にぜひ皆さんでご参加ください！
イベントに直接お越しいただいても、遠隔で世界中からこのイベントページに参加いただく形も
大歓迎です！
直接お越しいただける方：
3/11 13：30～ 代々木公園集合
14：26 震災が起きた時刻ちょうどに黙とうを
ささげ、震災でお亡くなりになった方や被災した方々
のために瞑想します。
18：00～ キャンドルライトや音楽などで平和をいのり、
核のない日本や世界へのビジョンをピースフルに共有します！
（場所や正確な時間は後日ＵＰします。）
Join from anywhere in the world:
We want to create a chain of 311 candles around the globe. People can join the chain anytime on March 11, preferable from 2.46pm Japan time onward. For this we will be inviting people from around the world to participate. Please help us by suggesting anyone or any groups who might be interested. Post here or facebook message or email Jacinta (jacinta.hin@embrace-transition.com).
More details will be announced shortly.
About us:
Beautiful Energy is an IMA project and movement born out of the weekly Friday anti-nuclear demonstrations in Tokyo in front of and around the Prime Minister Residence and Parliament. Through inspired, peaceful action we stand for a nuclear-free world that thrives on renewable energy. Our current, ongoing project is Candles for Peace. Every Friday, from 6-8pm Japan time, we gather in front of parliament in kokkai gijido, joining the weekly anti-nuclear protest, and create a beautiful display of candlelight to symbolize our intentions. Intrepid Model Adventures (IMA) is a nonprofit, open community of hundreds, supporting thousands, standing for positive social change. IMA members share a desire to help and strive to live their lives in such a way that they may act as a positive influence.
Visit our Facebook pages: https://www.facebook.com/BeautifulEnergyTokyo
https://www.facebook.com/groups/BeautifulEnergy/
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
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