Anyone who condones suicide is a bloody idiot and a complete coward. It is the most Unhonorable way to die.
So, ATC, in the stereotypical situation where you and your wife are in an aircraft going down, and the two of you only have one parachute, you'd grab it yourself and jump, leaving your wife to die, because to give
her the chute would be the same as committing suicide?
In the Bible, John 15:13, it says "Greater love hath no man, that he lay down his life for a friend." Over and over, ourage and dedication and devotion to honor and duty have been recognized by countries all over the world -- recognition of people doing something that they
know will get them killed, but which they do anyway because it needs to be done.
On 31 July 1943, the infantry company of which Pvt. Young was a member, was ordered to make a limited withdrawal from the battle line in order to adjust the battalion's position for the night. At this time, Pvt. Young's platoon was engaged with the enemy in a dense jungle where observation was very limited. The platoon suddenly was pinned down by intense fire from a Japanese machinegun concealed on higher ground only 75 yards away. The initial burst wounded Pvt. Young. As the platoon started to obey the order to withdraw, Pvt. Young called out that he could see the enemy emplacement, whereupon he started creeping toward it. Another burst from the machinegun wounded him the second time. Despite the wounds, he continued his heroic advance, attracting enemy fire and answering with rifle fire. When he was close enough to his objective, he began throwing handgrenades, and while doing so was hit again and killed. Pvt. Young's bold action in closing with this Japanese pillbox and thus diverting its fire, permitted his platoon to disengage itself, without loss, and was responsible for several enemy casualties.
That quotation is taken from the Medal of Honor citation for Pvt. Rodger W. Young. He could have attempted to disengage with his platoon; he had been wounded, and no one would have thought less of him for it. He chose to advance alone into enemy fire, in all likelihood knowing after he was wounded the second time that there was no way he was going to make it back from the hill. But he continued on, and carried out the task he had set for himself, even though it meant his death.
Go read the citations for MoH recipients, particularly the posthumous awards. You will find that a large proportion of them are for actions taken where the recipient knew that they were not going to survive their action, and chose not to remove themselves or be removed to safety.
. . . During the early stages of this attack, Sgt. Baker was seriously wounded but he insisted on remaining in the line and fired at the enemy at ranges sometimes as close as 5 yards until his ammunition ran out. Without ammunition and with his own weapon battered to uselessness from hand-to-hand combat, he was carried about 50 yards to the rear by a comrade, who was then himself wounded. At this point Sgt. Baker refused to be moved any farther stating that he preferred to be left to die rather than risk the lives of any more of his friends. A short time later, at his request, he was placed in a sitting position against a small tree . Another comrade, withdrawing, offered assistance. Sgt. Baker refused, insisting that he be left alone and be given a soldier's pistol with its remaining 8 rounds of ammunition. When last seen alive, Sgt. Baker was propped against a tree, pistol in hand, calmly facing the foe. Later Sgt. Baker's body was found in the same position, gun empty, with 8 Japanese lying dead before him. His deeds were in keeping with the highest traditions of the U.S. Army.
From the Medal of Honor citation for Sgt Thomas A. Baker, killed during the battle for Saipan. Do you think he didn't
know that he was going to die, that staying behind was a death sentence for him? Yet, like Rodger Young and the other 264 posthumous recipients of the Medal of Honor, his 'suicide' was recognized by our country with its highest military honor.
Somehow, it's okay for someone to decide, in the heat of battle, that they are going to die, but that they're going to make their death worth something, and become a hero, but it's
not okay for someone to undertake to make a massive strike against the enemy, knowing that they're going to die making it.
And as you think about that, ATC, consider the Western belief in confession and absolution. A man who committed dozens of rapes and murders across years, torturing his victims brutally to death, confesses his sins on his deathbed, is granted absolution, and goes straight to heaven, while a law-abiding man who is driving to church for his weekly confession hits a patch of ice or water, skids out of control, hits a freeway pillar, and is killed instantly goes to hell because he died unshriven and unconfessed.
We found in this place that the Government still thinks the most honorable way to die is to commit suicide and they have no regret over ww2, (at least in this place) . It still makes me sick and as a result I have lost much respect for their Government and many of their people.
And Japanese businessmen, watching the implosion of Enron, Arthur Andersen, and Worldcom, have lost much respect for American businessmen.
All you proved was that you don't understand their culture, or you would understand
why suicide is an honorable death in Japanese culture.
Western cultures are, almost invariably, guilt cultures. They create an arbitrary standard of ethics and morals, and inculcate each member of that culture with a conscience to hold their behavior up against that standard, and it is this internal knowledge of your transgression against this standard that creates guilt, even when no one else knows of the transgression. The many rituals of confession and expiation in guilt cultures exist to take internalized and private guilt and unburden oneself to others.
Eastern cultures, on the other hand, are almost universally shame cultures. In a shame culture, the guidance is imposed from without, from the other members of the culture. A person seeks to avoid doing something that will cause others to criticize or reproach them. This extends to continuing to do something that is wrong in context or inappropriate simply because to stop would be admitting that you made a mistake originally -- that you did not think through the consequences of your action beforehand.
In Japanese culture, suicide can be many things. It can be the ultimate apology; it can be a condemnation; it can be an assumption of responsibility. But what drove the
tokkotaijin -- at least, insofare as they were portrayed to each other and to the public, was as the ultimate expression of the Yamato warrior, throwing themselves into battle "as if they were already dead", spending their deaths to strike boldly and massively against the enemy. The only difference between what they did and what men like Rodger Young and Thomas Baker did is that they
planned to go out and die taking a bunch of the enemy with them.
