Should I get offended by pictures of Spanish athletes and sports officials players pulling back the skin on either side of their eyes, in a slit-eyed gesture?Hmmm. How is it that a story about the attitude of Spanish athletes towards the Chinese reminds Mark Tran of a story involving Americans and Japanese during the Second World War? I struggle to see the relevance myself. But then this is Comment is Free where gratuitous references to the supposed stupidity and racism of Americans are commonplace.
Not really, but the pictures make me think that Spain is stuck in a time warp when it comes to race relations. The incident brings to mind a story a former university professor told me about American attitudes towards the Japanese during the second world war – American pilots were told by their commanders that the Japanese were inferior pilots because they had slitty eyes.
So, did American commanders really tell their pilots that the Japanese were inferior flyers because they had "slitty eyes"? Well, if they did, it's news to me.
Of course, American attitudes to the Japanese were colored by the attack on Pearl Harbor and the widespread inclination at the time for Westerners to regard themselves as superior physical specimens when compared to "Asiatics" - American propaganda routinely depicted the Japanese soldier as a bespectacled, bucktoothed weakling. But is there any evidence to support Tran's specific accusation? Not that I've come across.
It's true American commanders were convinced that Japanese airmen (and soldiers) had poor eyesight but this misapprehension had nothing to do with the shape of their eyes. Rather, the impression was fostered by the prevalence of corrective spectacles amongst members of the Japanese forces and was reinforced by faulty intelligence early in the war. The following quote from Marine pilot (and Medal of Honor recipient) Gregory "Pappy" Boyington is illustrative:-
I suppose you know that the Japanese are renowned for their inability to fly. And they all wear corrective glasses."In any case, as Peter B. Mersky notes in "Time of the Aces: Marine Pilots in the Solomons" such misconceptions did not survive contact with the enemy:-
"Captain," said Boyington, "it's quite a setup, but how do you know the pilots wear glasses?"
"Our technical staff determines this from the remains after a shoot-down."
The stereotypical picture of a small, emaciated Japanese pilot, wearing glasses whose lenses were the thickness of the bottoms of Coke bottles [...] did not persist for long after the war began. The first American aircrews to return from combat knew that they had faced some of the world's most experienced combat pilots equipped with some pretty impressive airplanes.On a more general note, this article (from the January 1941 issue of "Flying and Popular Aviation") demonstrates the tendency of American commentators to underestimate enemy air power based in part on a stereotypical characterization of Japanese abilities. Nevertheless, there's no mention of "slitty eyes".
Mark Tran really shouldn't believe every negative story he hears about Americans: some people might think he's prejudiced.
