Over the weekend, Japan suffered probably its greatest disaster ever, an 8.9 earthquake, a tsunami so massive it wiped out an entire city from the map, and a potential nuclear meltdown. Although so far the death toll is small for a disaster of this magnitude, we have to thank the Japanese peoples' preparedness for just such a scenario. Unfortunately, it's times like these that bring out the worst in people.
Over the last few days, an unfortunately large amount of disparaging comments have been made towards the Japanese, particularly on Facebook. The vast majority of these comments state that this is what the Japanese get for bombing Pearl Harbor. Of particular, and rather ironic note, most of the people making these "karmic" comments are African-American. Even worse still, most of these comments are from people younger than 30. Why do blacks between the age of 20-30 seem to hate the Japanese so much, at least on Facebook? It's quite mind-boggling really. A women's college basketball player recently had to make a public apology for comments she made on her Facebook that echoed these "Pearl Harbor karma" comments.
Gilbert Gottfried posted a few Earthquake/Tsunami related jokes on his twitter, which ended up getting him fired as the voice of the AFLAC duck. Gottfried probably didn't know that AFLAC is the number 1 insurance provider in Japan. Although Gottfried has become known recently for making "too-soon" jokes, particularly at the expense of his good friend Greg Giraldo's death, the Japan jokes crossed the line, even though they were funny.
Of course, this isn't the first time something like this has happened. After every major natural disaster, disparaging comments about the victims always pop up, but with the proliferation of social media, these comments spread faster and further.
/end rant
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