When Being Lagoon By George Takei Essay

In 1941, Japan bombed Pearl Harbor. Following the devastating destruction caused by these events, the United States (U.S.) government decided that all people living in the U.S. who were of Japanese descent had to be moved to internment camps for their “safety”, and to lessen their ability to sabotage our farms, air bases and harbors. And while in some ways, this did keep Japanese Americans safe, it was also greatly dehumanizing, and they were treated very poorly and given few resources during this time beyond bare necessities. We will be comparing a video from the U.S. National Archives made by the U.S. government to tell civilians about the camps, and a graphic memoir written by George Takei. While the U.S. government at the time attempted

The Government video says, “government agencies helped in a hundred ways. They helped the evacuees find tenants for their farms.” While some Japanese Americans may have found tenants, many probably did not. “The government warned us, Japanese American farmers who didn’t maintain their crops until relocation would be treated as wartime criminals.” If Japanese Americans did not find tenants, they instead had to continue working their land, only to leave it later, when George Takei says private individuals then seized the leftover crops. Many also sold many possessions and homes, and George Takei says, “from small treasures to large estates, we were forced to sell our property for a fraction of its own.” However, the U.S. government’s video does not mention this, but rather says, “...the quick disposal of property often involved financial sacrifice for the evacuees.” This small mention of financial sacrifice gives no indication of how great this sacrifice was, nor how many had to make it to be able to get rid of their old possessions. After dealing with the things that they would be forced to leave behind, it was finally time to leave for the