Thread:Vcharng/@comment-1915363-20151231130249/@comment-26574811-20160101100214

Ar-cen-ciel wrote: I see, That explains quite a lot there. that said, I have some more questions:

1. Is your homeland the oldest colony of Imperial Japan? Are there any older colonies under the Japanese rule that you know of?

2. Can you elaborate on the Japanese rule in your homeland back then? I recall that Taiwan was spared from much of the dark events from the Second Sino-Japanese War, but not much beyond that.

3. I recall I had read that some of the Taiwanese had compared the Japanese to dogs and the "waishengren" people as pigs due to some brainwashing propaganda and oppressive rule by KMT somewhere in "The Chinese in America"... oh, wait, that was related to the 228 Incident, isn't it? 1. I'm not so sure, but at least, if Okinawa (Ryukyu) counts, they are colonized earlier, and stayed as Japanese territory.

2. The Japanese rule in Taiwan can be roughly divided into three stages, the invasion, the colonization, and the Japanization. During the invasion, the Japanese rulers were very brutal. For example, they implemented "retaliatory suppression" toward opposition activities (that is, for every Japanese killed by opposition, around 10 Taiwanese, opposition or not, will be executed). Later, as opposition activity subsided, they colonized Taiwan with near-purely financial view. They built quite a lot of infrastructure, in order to develop Taiwan, and give rise to its productivity. Last, when the war drew close, they started to make Taiwan really part of Japan. They teach Taiwanese people Japanese language, as well as telling them that they are Japanese.

Was Taiwan spared from much of the dark events of the Second Sino-Japanese War? Yes, because Taiwan was already under Japanese rule for quite a while by then, so not much hostility between Taiwan and Japan were still present. This is also part of the reason why some benshengren consider themselves as Japanese over Chinese.

3. It should be reminded that in Chinese, it is very common to use "pig" or "dog" to insult others. So comparing some one to pigs or dogs actually doesn't mean much. It's just a very general way of insult.