The Rape of Nanking, an Opinion

Inhumane and barbaric; neither word can properly define the horrors experienced during the years preceding and occurring during the reign of the Second World War. Even now in print and photographs, the atrocities that transpired in those years cannot be firmly grasped by those who have not lived through it. The mind simply cannot wrap itself around the notion of a country's blatant disregard of life, nor can one understand the humor found in a lack of compassion. As I contemplate the days spent in hiding, in fear, and in trust that the preciousness of life would be held as sacred, I have only one question: how innately truculent is the soul of man?

Upon reading The Rape of Nanking, a world unknown to me opened before my eyes, one that I naively believed was of literature, or science fiction. There could not be anything as monstrous as the cruelty imagined in literature and film. Man simply was not programmed to be as such. Was he? Being of Polish decent, I had heard the stories of the holocaust, the rooms of naked bodies that believed in doing what they are told to do, only to be piled into a mass grave of lies and unfortunate ancestry. Who is the true enemy: the Germans? The Japanese? Or is it more primal than that? Are the guerilla techniques used throughout history really gorilla in nature?

I came to the end of the tragedy that is the Rape with more questions that I had no answers for, that I would probably never have answers for. I put myself in the shoes of the Japanese, and found that no matter how I tried, I could not excuse or forgive any actions taken before, during and after. I explored myself for any sense of enthusiasm over the sight of death, the enjoyment of watching another human being perish at my own hands. I searched, and even in the direst of situations, I would still have compassion and remorse. At least, I believe I would.

I then asked myself, how could a single nationality believe such lies of another nationality? What psychological hold must a single person have over the masses to have such heartless control over another person's life? What would it take to convince me that extermination of humans is appropriate? Would I value my own life over another's?

The depth of my questions continued, with me just grabbing at half-truths and assumptions. I will never know the answers to these questions, because in my meager existence, I will never have to answer them. In this fact, I consider myself incredibly lucky, and ashamed that my fellow men did indeed answer those very questions for themselves. Reading The Rape made me realize just how little I knew about the world around me and who I truly was.

In hindsight, I once wanted to scream to the prisoners in my cynical voice, don't you see you will never leave this place? In both holocausts, I was disappointed that people would willing give in than give up. Learning the events in my high school history class, the textbooks paint a grayed out version of the war. Stories were compromised to promote alliances and working relationships, and again, the victims of the war were victims of a historical whitewashing. As I read Iris Chang's work, the half-truths unfolded into actualities, and what I came to know as disappointments were revealed to be harsh realities.

The bullying of the Chinese in the years preceding World War Two only exacerbates the pacified nature of their culture. They were preyed upon by a more aggressive country and the Japanese used the only thing they could against the Chinese: their own nature. It was the same with Nazi Germany during the war. They preyed upon the passive nature of the Jews, all hidden under the guise that they were so below human that any actions taken against them were justified. For years, I wondered why no one fought back, why they lined up carefully and graciously accepted their fate. However, with this book, I see that is just what I was supposed to be taught.

Because of this book, I understand now what my high school English teacher was trying to tell me when he said: Question everything; if you question nothing, you will never know the truth. Iris Chang questioned, and found answers that haunted her until her death. Her book reminds me that all that I see isn't all that is there. Her vivid retelling of the accounts in Nanking shocked my system and left me silent in many ways. Many women did fight back, many men fought to protect their virtue. Most of Nanking was stripped of its innocence, for no particular reason other than avarice and the glories of war. People tried. They didn't go graciously, accepting their fate as whole. They hid, they ran, and they stood up for themselves. Despite the horrific outcomes of most of their stories, the one constant theme I discovered in her paragraphs was one of courage and it was one question I could answer for myself: I would fight too.

However, it is difficult for me to identify with the sentiments that the Chinese felt at the time and the subsequent years after the Japanese invasion. There will always be a piece of me that is numb to the entire event, because of the simple fact that I am not of Asian decent. The closest I will ever come to identifying would be through my own Polish ancestry, but even then, it pales in comparison. I spend hours thinking about what life would have meant to me, how I would have been affected by these moments, and I can find only one emotion: shame. I am ashamed for my fellow humans who truly believed that the Chinese were so beneath them that even animals ranked higher. I am ashamed that my own country erased the events for political alliances. I am ashamed that people suffered and no one seems to care. I am ashamed that society has become so egocentric that the plight of another nationality isn't worth ten minutes of their time. I am ashamed that I feel helpless to these atrocities, past, present, and future.

If there is one thing that I have taken from this book is that I do have the capacity to make a difference. That life is not to be taken for granted, not even the author's. I would have liked to meet Iris Chang. I would have liked to ask her questions on her research. I would have liked to have listened, heard a first person account of the journey, witness the countenance of her pain for myself. Maybe then I would understand. Maybe then I could identify. But alas, I will not have that opportunity in this life; however, I do have the opportunity to go forward with her efforts. I can join the fight to improve global relations by starting in my own community. Remind myself that we are all human, no matter what the color, or race, or nationality. I can love unconditionally, even those who commit the worst offense to life. Because of Iris Chang and her sojourn into the psyche of the beast, I see that the world is in need of more kindness. I can't change what has been done to the Chinese, or the Jews, or any group that has been persecuted before me, but I can change how I think and behave from here out. Her work makes me want to be a better person, because if I can be a better person, perhaps I can show someone that being a better person is possible and plausible. I think she would have liked that.

Her work reminds me of a poem I wrote about the European holocaust, when I thought about my family being herded up and carried away for living in the wrong country. Though it is about the holocaust, the central theme of being less of a person and the naivety that the Jews had during their imprisonment resonates with the persecution that befell the Chinese during the Rape.

This poem has new meaning for me now, as it serves as a vehicle to remind me that there was more victims then were taught to me in school. It reminds me to question, to search, to live. I'll never forget Iris Chang's work and those who had to perish at the hands of a group that resembled more the hellish beasts of Dante's Inferno than the assiduous saviors they claimed to be.

Works Cited

Chang, Iris. The Rape of Nanking. New York: Penguin Books, 1998.