Pearl Harbor and 9/11

In Audre Lord’s 1984 essay “Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference,” Lorde first opens her work by exposing the western European’s mindset. She argues that much western European history has conditioned humans to think of human characteristics or differences in terms of a binary oppositions: superior/inferior, good/bad, up/down. Therefore, age, race, class, sex, and sexual preference are also thought of in those terms. The youth, Caucasian, rich, and heterosexual are usually placed in the position of superiority, while the elderly, non-Caucasian, poor, and homosexual are placed in the position of inferiority. This binary mode of thinking, therefore, leads to the many “isms” that exist in society, such as ageism, racism, and sexism. Hence, she argues that the “isms” are essentially the same, that they are created from the same root. Lorde states that:

Racism [is] the belief in the inherent superiority of one race over all others and thereby the right to dominance. Sexism, the belief in the inherent superiority of one sex over the other and thereby the right to dominance. Ageism. Heterosexism. Elitism. Classism. (Lorde, 885).

Therefore, a feminism fighting sexism is, in a sense, fighting the same battle as a homosexual fighting heterosexism: they are both fighting against oppression. Because the oppressed are all fighting the same battle, it seems logical that they would unite to ease or alleviate oppression. However, this does not happen because, as Lorde states, “Those of us who stand outside that power often identify one way in which we are different, and we assume that to be the primary cause of all oppressing, forgetting other distortions around difference, some o which we ourselves may be practicing.” (Lorde, 885) Therefore, she argues that the oppressed do not unite mainly for two reasons: (1.) humans have a tendency to want to be in the “superior” group and (2) the majority of the oppressed do not realize that they are fighting the same battle. Hence, many oppressed women (oppressed in terms of sexism) are oppressors themselves (in terms of ageism, racism, heterosexism…). Hence, Lorde argues that all oppressions are the same and that we should not practice or tolerate oppression. Unfortunately, many people do not realize Lorde’s point and oppression continues throughout history. Two main period of conspicuous oppression can be seen in the aftermath of the attack of Pearl Harbor and the aftermath of 9/11.

In December 7th, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, precipitating WWI. After the attack, war hysterias took over Americans, and Congress pressured President Roosevelt to sign Executive Order 9066, which led to the internment of approximately 120,000 people of Japanese descent. The justification for Executive Order 9066 was that the people of Japanese descent were more likely to be spies for the Japanese. However, most of the people of Japanese descent placed in the internment camps were Japanese Americans, two-thirds of whom were kids. Therefore, in these times, the Japanese were marginalized and viewed as “inferiors” or “bad”. However, three years later, in 1944, Proclamation 21 was passed, which led to the release from thousands of Japanese from internment camps. The Americans have realized their mistakes in marginalizing the Japanese without proof.

The mistreatment of the Japanese parallels the mistreatment of the Arabs and Muslims post 9/11. In Louis Cainkar’s Homeland Insecurity: The Arab American and Muslim American Experience After 9l11, Cainkar explores the treatment of Arabs and Muslims in the aftermath of 9/11. For her book, she conducted more than a hundred interviews of Middle Eastern Americans and concluded that, in the aftermath of 9/11, Arab men were more vulnerable to hate crime attacks and that hijab (or headscarf) wearing Muslim women were more susceptible to sexual assaults; their hijabs were considered as anti-American symbols. Not only were the Muslims more susceptible to hate crimes, but laws were also turned against them. Arabs and Muslims were more closely inspected by federal and local authority in case they might be spies for the terrorists.

In both the post Pearl Harbor and post 9/11 case, a specific group were marginalized and oppressed. And in both cases, the laws adapted themselves to reflect the oppressive environment of the time: the laws were molded to reinforce the oppression.

In the case of Pearl Harbor, the people of Japanese descent were marginalized and scorned. However, Americans did eventually learn the wrongdoings and passed Proclamation 21. Unfortunately, history repeated itself, and in the aftermath of 9/11, Muslims became the marginalized and oppressed group. Had Americans realized that the oppression and wrongdoings given to the Japanese in 1941 were the same kind of oppression and wrongdoings given to the Muslims in 2001, maybe history would not have repeated itself. Had Lorde’s point or message, that all “isms” or oppressions are the same, been more prevalent, then maybe oppression would greatly lessens.