"During World War II, many Okinawan people were forced to commit suicide by the Japanese Army.''
This passage was recently eliminated from Japanese history textbooks following a review by the system that approves textbooks used in all of our schools. A screening council decided that the above passage was misleading and unnecessary.
However, Okinawans, the actual war victims, immediately protested this decision, and the mass media reported that the government was trying to conceal the truth. The education minister finally suggested that textbook publishers reinstate the passage. No matter what personal opinion we may have on this issue, I think the screening process should not be so easily influenced by public opinion. Otherwise, textbooks may end up being rewritten in a wrong way.
First of all, the public is stirred up by a mass media that is far from impartial today. If the screening process is influenced by such agitated public opinion, textbooks could be rewritten by specific lobbyists who have succeeded in manipulating public opinion. For example, what if rightists demanded to rewrite textbooks to emphasize their claim that Japanese victims of World War II are also enshrined at Yasukuni Shrine?
We should not forget that history is a rigorous academic discipline. Historical issues should not be discussed without historical records. Moreover, the highly political nature of this case makes it easy for the public to participate in the controversy and make emotional criticisms without access to actual data.
This does not mean I am entirely against the movement to reinstate the description of "Okinawa's mass suicide." We should handle this issue with adequate consideration of the Okinawan people. But our textbooks must be written with great care and should not be easily revised as a result of public influence.
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