Japanese internment

Essay by clacharmCollege, UndergraduateB, November 2014

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The domestic response by the US government to the bombing of Pearl Harbor by rounding up Japanese Americans and by issuing the loyalty questionnaires within the camps had many consequences within the Japanese community. Japanese internees questioned the ability of the government to prove loyalty with a questionnaire. This created conflicts among Japanese Americans by fostering divisions among those in the targeted community, persons of Japanese ancestry and undermined the any sense of family or community among them. In reaction to this oppression, those targeted responded in opposite ways: some striving to prove their loyalty; others demanding their rights as US citizens.

After the bombing of Pearl Harbor the American government took a series of measures aiming at Japanese Americans in the US. All Japanese Americans no matter women, men and children were all suspected of being spies. The media did everything they could to spread the news that Japanese Americans are a treat.

People started to believe the media and Japanese American were treated horrible by non-Japanese Americans. "Insurance companies cancelled our insurance. Bank froze out accounts. Milkmen stop delivering our milk." (Otsuka, p. 85) Japanese Americans who were citizens became enemy of the state. Rumors begun to spread throughout the Japanese community about the executive order 9066 issued by President Roosevelt, which called for the eviction and internment of all Japanese Americans. Julie Otsuka in the title "traitors" shows us how she and other Japanese Americans lived in constant fear and apprehension. They were hearing of individuals who have disappeared, and they heard of towns where all Japanese has been gone. "Only people who belonged to our race were on the list. There were Germans and Italians on the list, but their names appeared towards the bottom" (Otsuka, p. 82). The list did not represent...