Japanese American Life Essay

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Japanese-Americans being affected Japanese-Americans lives were hard during World War II, when Japanese-Americans were being relocated. Japanese- Americans were treated cruelly. “...although Mine and Toku were American citizens, they were considered the enemy because of their Japanese heritage” (The Life of Mine Okubo). Even if Mine and Toku were American citizens, they were seen as Japanese. Thoughts about Japanese-Americans changed fast, first they were seen as the friends and then the enemy. Louie Zamperini was treated in a similar way. Louie Zamperini, one of the POWs, was sent to an internment camp. In the internment camp, Louie was treated cruelly by the Japanese, he did not get enough to eat, and also was beaten terribly by the Japanese. …show more content…

Louie Zamperini, one of the POWs was blindfolded whenever the Japanese guards were taking any of the POW members into a different location or simply moving them from one place to another. “Louie was blindfolded and led out” (Hillenbrand, p 197). Louie is being blindfolded so he does not see where the Japanese are taking him, and this way the Japanese are treating him like he is invisible since they don’t want him to see things, which shows that the Japanese don’t see Louie as a human being. Blindfolding was not the only thing done to the POW members, they were also given beatings. An example is the Mochida family wearing tags with their number. When families were moved into internment camps, they were assigned an identification number and that marked all of their belongings. Japanese-Americans lost their own names and identities and were just known by numbers instead, like the Mochida family. “For the rest of their time in the internment camps, Mine and Toku were referred to by this number, not their names” (The Life of Mine Okubo). Mine and Toku had gone through a similar situation. They were also referred to their number, not their name, which is an another example of treating humans as invisible. Louie, Mine, Toku and others had ways, resisting being

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