Dear People of the World (formerly Dear Americans)

Two films are stories about Afro-Americans in the U.S. Both of them described hard situations that Black people had experienced in the past and maybe even now.

"The Help" was a story of Afro-American maids working for white families in Mississippi in 1960's when segregation was very common. Afro-American maids were not allowed to share bathroom with white family members. They had to always put up with white people's arrogance. A young white writer decided to write about their experience and publish that by interviewing them.

"Precious" was about a girl of the same name living in Harlem, New York, 1980's. She got two babies with her father. She was raped since she was a child. Her mother abused her because of pregnancy. Her mother and she lived on welfare. She had to stop attending middle school for pregnancy. So she had to attend special school for dropped outs.

Portrayals of Black people in the both films are kind of, from white perspective although Afro-American characters played important roles. They spoke grammatically incorrect English like "You is smart." They looked uneducated, vulgar and violent, wheras white or lighter skin characters looked elegant, educated and kind. That reflects on reality? Maybe or maybe not.

For white viewers such kind of films satisfy their supremacy and ease frustration caused by forcible integration.

Has America changed since Civil Rights Act?  

Mr. Obama is the president of the U.S. He is half-white and not descendant of slaves. If he was a pure Afro-American of slave descendant, he would have never been elected. He wasn't popular in the Southern States even among Democrats. Because he was elected, since his inauguration, number of Racist activist group has drastically increased.

Most recent survey for income gap among racial groups found Black and white gap recorded biggest since 1984 when the survey was first conducted. It was due to recession but why the burden biased to Afro-Americans? Racism? Poverty and lack of education caused by racial discrimination.

I don't like this part of America but this is reality of America.   

Biopic of former British prime minister, the only female PM in British history. Maybe she was as notable as Queen Elizabeth in pre-modern time.

She was born in a family of grocery. Her father was local mayor. She studied in Oxford.

She lived through 2nd world war, and struggled with male dominated society.

After she became prime minister, she won the war with Argentine over terriroritorital sovereignty in South Atlantic sea. At that time US was not very supportive, rather Reagan proposed peace pact with Argentine. That taught us what would happen if similar thing happens between China and Japan.

At that time, Thatcher told the U.S., what did you do when Japan attacked Pearl Harbour? Did you abondon Hawaii because it was so far away and not many people lived there? Did you propose peace pact to Tojo?

She was once about to be assassinated by IRA but survived.

This film described her being woman did not matter to what she did. She had capability of what she wants to do.

Recently I asked some British people about their reputation of Mrs. Thatcher. Surprisingly they did not like her very much. Is it because of her neo-liberal policy? She cut budget spending and privatised national businesses.

Whether that resulted in a good way or not, she had done those things with her firm determination.

Why we never had such a strong leader in our country's politics!

A young woman who lived in New York decided to write blog on her try on all of recipes wriitten on America's most famous cooking personality named Julia Child.

After she completed all the recipes, she became famous for her blog. That was a true story.

The movie itself wasn't so impressive. Kind of typical and exaggerated. Just one thing that impressed me was writing blog indeed changes your life.

Is it every blogger's dream that your own personal blog became so famous that a lot of people read it and make a fortune?

Even you can't have so many readers and make so much money by that, you can still enjoy writing blog. Sometimes you get comments which impresses you. Even small number of readers that are impressed and tell you how they feel about it, that is good enough.

I am experiencing that. It is just fun to share your life experience with other people whom you have never seen. Like Julia, when you start something new and want to complete, you should declare that on blog, then that can be the promise with other people and that can motivate you to go on, not easily giving up.

Plus, taking notes of every progress teaches you how to manage yourself regarding what you do later on.

I like blog.

Jane Fonda played as ambitious journalist who happened to witness a very serious nuclear accident, that revealed how ridiculous nuclear industry functioned seeking profit in priority to safety.

When it was first shown in public, Three Mile Island accident occurred. The film seemed to be a preview of that accident. Since then, there was no new nuclear power plant constructed in the US except military purpose.

Now the same type and even much more severe accident occurred last year in Japan, Fukushima accident. The China Syndrome-like phenomenon occurred. Nuclear fuels may have melted down to the ground and theoretically went to the opposite side of the earth. No one yet knows how serious the damage was.   

I actually watched the film several years ago on TV. At that time it was just suspense action film to me. Now I watched the film on DVD I bought. It was totally different story to me. It was no longer fiction. All the words and events occurred in the film were too much familiar to me, and other ordinary Japanese. I fully understand why water level in a reactor is important in terms of managing nuclear energy.

I also learned "No Nukes" movement existed even before Fukushima, Chernobyl and TMI.

It was very much late 1970's style film. Anti-big power type of message was in as anti-Vietnam war activist played main role and detailed and obvious description of how greedy the corporations are. Late 1970's was post-Vietnam war era, which people have become suspicous of authorities.

In fact we have to, we always had to. In reality everyone had been too much reliant on authorities, believing what they say is true.

Now we have changed such attitude since Fukushima. Less people believe what politicians, scientists say. People take actions gathering near the parliament building and prime minister's office, demanding direct voting on nuclear energy policy.

I hope this movement would be called "The Japan Syndrome."