The TedEd talk: Why I Love a Country That Once Betrayed Me given by George Takei gave personal experience on what it was like being a Japanese American during WWll. Takei speaks vividly on what exactly happened the day the soldiers came to rile up all the Japanese Americans after President Franklin Roosevelt proposed the internment camps. From the mass hysteria that spread across America, Takei and his family suffered from extreme loss once the war has ended. However, he shared a heroic action done by the Japanese Americans who fought in WWll in Europe that would happen to change everything about Takei.
Takei runs around the theme of American democracy and what it truly meant to be an American. As the hysteria grew across America this became harder for Takei to accept and understand. Takei found himself being confused and distraught in the fact that America wrote all these amazing things in their textbooks about freedom and all men were created equal when he couldn’t line up his childhood imprisonment experience. His father once told him “…our democracy is a people’s democracy, and it can be as great as the people can be, but it is also fallible as people are.” This made Takei understand a part of what it takes to be apart of that democracy how it can change and vary depending on the people so it is important to have good people apart of it. His personal experience with his past and hearing about the 442nds risking their lives just to find a place in America to be accepted turned into why he loves this country despite it turning it’s back on him.
Takei goes onto elaborate on what the 442nds mean to him as “They clung to their beliefs in the shining ideals of this country and they proved that being an American is not just for some people, that race is not how we define being an American. They expanded what it means to be an American including Japanese Americans that were feared and suspected and hated.” This quote had the most significance because Takei as a human activist believes that even with what he went through those people had given him hope and push for America where it isn’t defined by race but rather the people.
The reason I chose this text was because of how America is now with its democracy. It isn’t much better from back then but it was empowering enough that the will of strong-minded good people can get us somewhere. With the elections coming up it’s a time we need the good people the most if we truly want to protect American democracy from being ripped out away from people who worked the hardest for it, who suffered the most to come here to live for it.
Shamima, I love the connection you draw between Takei’s remarks and our own day, especially the idea that this is the moment for “good people” to embrace the democratic process rather than losing faith in it! What a great message!