You, dear sir or madam, have definitely won todays internet. 
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I think you, like the majority of the commenters here, narrow-mindedly misinterpret the mascot. Not unexpected since 99.99999% know very little about the history of our nuclear weapons complex. I don’t think the mushroom cloud is meant to represent the one bomb dropped on Japan using material processed at Hanford, but rather the area’s nuclear material processing industry in general. Hanford processed almost all of the plutonium used in all of the US’ plutonium-based weapons. Hanford Site was the largest employer in the area, and was seen as a valuable contributor to our national security.
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If you get mushroom clouds while you’re processing nuclear material, you’re doing it wrong.
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They literally named themselves the “Bombers.” Not the “Atomics” or the “Power Players” or the “Uranium Miners.” If you think that mushroom cloud doesn’t represent a bombing target going up in radioactive fire then you’re willfully ignoring the context they presented it in.
Also, a student of history such as yourself really ought to know that it wasn’t just “one” bomb dropped on Japan, it was two.
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Uh huh, and “noble injun” mascots are meant to “honor” indigenous people. Never mind what actual indigenous people think about being caricatured and ontologically trivialized for the sake of fun and games.
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Well, there is cheering for that, apparently, in this highschool’s logo, which should probably be changed.
Whether or not there is an alternate universe where world war 2 ended with more or fewer American and Japanese deaths is kind of beside that point, isn’t it?
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Your statement is nonsensical in this context. I would imagine the mushroom cloud is meant to symbolize the area’s history as the production site for almost all of the weapons-grade plutonium produced for all of the plutonium-based weapons that have ever been produced in the US. I imagine if you asked the area’s residents, that would be their answer.
Not only POWs. Japanese army was unimaginably cruel:
Student: “I’m not trying to change your mascot but just help you consider a perspective that’s more personal”
[insert 60+ comments debating changing the mascot]
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I imagine if you asked the area’s residents, that would be their answer.
Sure (I’ll parenthesize my first reaction, “Well DUH!”), and if you asked the residents of towns in which schools have racist mascots what those mascots mean, they too would mostly offer interpretations that vary widely from (and ignore) those of the victims of racism.
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Or they could have a symbol that isn’t a weapon of mass destruction that’s related to atomic energy, maybe? I don’t think this is rocket surgery, honestly.
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Don’t forget their use of chemical and biological weapons on the Chinese.
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But you have to understand. Killing that many Japanese citizens just makes sense, otherwise that many might have died and we might have suffered casualties too and since all lives matter we can all agree that it’s best for everyone the off-white people died? /s
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There are multiple instances of US military leaders involved in the war saying that dropping the atomic bombs was unnecessary to induce Japan’s surrender.
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As with most things* Revenge of the Nerds provides useful guidance
*sexual assault, racial issues, and homophobia excepted, of course
And let’s not forget about the Isotopes. Go 'Topes!
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You are still comparing apples and oranges. Hanford Site was once the largest employer of the residents of Richland. It was a valuable contributor to our national security until the decommissioning of its last reactor in 1998. Hanford’s only sin was the incompetent design of its waste containment, and the ecological threat it currently poses.
In case you haven’t figured it out, I believe the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the right thing to do. They saved a million US GI lives, and at least that many Japanese lives.
Maybe a reactor, then instead of a symbol of the deaths of thousands of people…
That is disputed by historians, in fact.
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The preponderance of evidence is against you.
For instance, why didn’t Japan surrender after Hiroshima?
OT, but Dan Carlin’s current series is on the rise of Japan in WWII. It’s a great dive into the events and personalities that charted the course of the war in the Pacific.
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Ugh. Where to start?
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Yes, Japanese schools teach about WW2, and the role of the militarists had in starting it, along with Roosevelt strangling their oil supply and doing a big fat ‘do as I say not as I do’ with colonies throughout East Asia and the Pacific. However, it’s taught differently in that schools teach to the test, they don’t open up ‘discussion circles’ where kids try to debate ethics and all that. Students don’t really write essays, school isn’t oriented toward critical thinking as much as we like to think it is in the US. As such, Americans perceive the schools as ‘glossing over’ the guilt of the war.
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Japan has apologized-- a lot. They’ve paid out huge amounts to Korea, Philippines, SEAsia. They don’t run around and rend their sackcloth like the Germans do toward apologizing for the Holocaust, so comparatively Westerners think that “Japan doesn’t apologize enough”. Compounding this is East Asian international politics: the DPRK loses nothing by painting Japan as an unapologetic militaristic puppet of the US, and actually gains points with South Korea (a fellow victim of Japan’s Imperial Army) by doing so. China, also a victim and also a 1-party state that maintains control by externalizing hatred toward Japan and the US, piles on. Seventy years! Let’s move on!
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English teachers are the 2nd worse source of information about Japan. They don’t speak the language, they’re poor so they focus on just paying the rent every week, and more than likely they’re preoccupied with one of their 18-year old female students.
I have all the respect possible for this student-- she raises the issue as non-confrontational as possible. I’m doubtful the redneck high school is going to change its mind anytime soon, but good for her.
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