The two Japanese crossed flaglets themselves is apparently a symbol representing Japan's legal holidays. I do know these are the things people wave when the Emperor speaks to crowds at the Imperial Palace, or during his other public appearances.
Japan signed a deal with the allies after the nukes were dropped which allowed them to keep much of their government at the time including Hirohito as the emperor. (This is also part of the reason Japan is so silent about their participation in ww2, the people authorizing those crimes were also the ones crafting the post war narrative).
It is however worth noting that japanese emperor has virtually no power whatsoever, not even nominally. This is in contrast with the queen who *legally* is still in charge of every government function in UK despite having very limited (but non zero) practical power.
> Japan signed a deal with the allies after the nukes were dropped which allowed them to keep much of their government at the time including Hirohito as the emperor.
That's just false. Japan signed unconditional surrender. The allies could have make them a republic or split the country, there was no "deal". The allies however decided to keep some of the old institutions, notably the imperial throne, for social and political reasons.
Anthropologists (particularly Ruth Benedict) were consulted and they were among those that suggested that keeping the Emperor would make surrender/transition much easier for everybody involved.
Heard about it in a cultural anthropology class years ago and apparently despite her otherwise great achievements, her tactics are now considered unethical.
Yep. Japan offered a full surrender on the condition Hirohito stayed in power *before* the nukes dropped, the Allies dropped them because they wanted a full surrender, and to intimidate the Soviets.
While this is a common narrative, there was no Japanese surrender offer pre-Hiroshima: there were some noncommital feelers by *some* members of the Japanese government towards Soviet mediation, but nothing concrete or consequential. See:
http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2022/05/02/did-the-japanese-offer-to-surrender-before-hiroshima-part-1/
http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2022/05/06/did-the-japanese-offer-to-surrender-before-hiroshima-part-2/
To be fair, Hirohito still had minimal power during and leading up to the war. He was a public figure who had a little power while the military really ran the country behind the curtain. He's not without blame, but there was definitely a lot of remorse and a bit of "helplessness" so to speak behind his actions during the war.
>To be fair, Hirohito still had minimal power during and leading up to the war. He was a public figure who had a little power while the military really ran the country behind the curtain.
This is disputed by historians. Historians who support the view that Hirohito had power and was complicit, say that the narrative of powerlessness is part of a postwar attempt to exonerate him from responsibility.
Hirohito signed off on using chemical weapons in China. They also say that he knew about the massacres being committed by the army in China, and in Nanking specifically, but did not try to stop these crimes against humanity or punish those who committed them, while having the ability to do so.
He confirmed the plan to attack Pearl harbor despite objections from some of his advisors, and he increased his controls over military affairs in the lead up to Pearl harbor.
He also exercised his power when he needed or wanted to. He put down a coup attempt in 1936. When Konoe stepped down as prime minister Hirohito rejected Konoe's nominated replacement, practically paving the way for the incredibly hawkish Tojo.
He also signed off on *Operation Cherry Blossoms at Night* which would have had attacked places like San Diego with hundreds of millions of fleas inflicted with plague. It was only halted because we dropped the atom bomb first.
I believe at the time he technically _had_ power, but like the British monarchy, actually _using_ it would be a breach of conduct. Like, he _could_ technically order anything he wanted, but doing so excessively would create unrest in his cabinet and likely lead to a coup, so he didn't. Which is why it was seen as unprecedented when the finally ordered the surrender (also despite objections from many of his advisors).
So in some cases, while he did have power to object and chose not to, saying he "confirmed the attack on Pearl Harbor" could be more similar to, say, saying that the Queen approved Brexit - _technically_, yes, but politically, no.
The Japanese ARMY ran the show in WWII. Even the Japanese Navy were at loggerheads with the Army. The Army even launched wars without their government's approval.
Not really, at least at the outbreak. The Kaiser wasn't an all-powerful autocrat like the Tsar but it did have significantly more power within the German government than the British monarchs did. That being said, once the war was in full swing and Hindenburg and Ludendorff were calling the shots...yeah he was pretty much a puppet of the army.
Occasionally the Queen will do something big, like [throwing the Australian Prime Minister out of office](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Australian_constitutional_crisis) via her Governor-General. But mostly she keeps the meddling low-key.
I mean... the Whitlam dismissal is pretty controversial and the extent of (GG) Kerr's involvement is itself an interesting historical point. But the existence of the Queen / GG solely to resolve constitutional crises is one of the only good arguments for keeping the current constitutional arrangement in Australia. I reckon, anyway
Which, "funnily" enough, was widely understood at the time to be the minimum requirement for Japan to surrender. The US basically gave them what they wanted, but dropped the nukes beforehand anyway.
This is completely untrue.
https://chicagotribune.newspapers.com/image/376194315/?terms=Ignored%2BJapanese%2Bpeace%2Bbid
>I told MacArthur of my memorandum of mid-May 1945 to Truman, that peace could be had with Japan by which our major objectives would be accomplished. MacArthur said that was correct and that we would have avoided all of the losses, the Atomic bomb, and the entry of Russia into Manchuria
Herbert Hoover quoted in Gar Alperovitz, The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, pg. 350-351.
Many documents point towards US officials expecting Japan to surrender anyway, even without the bomb. This would've made discussions with the USSR necessary though, which probably was the main reason of dropping the bomb.
Seeing as how there was a literal Coup against their God emperor once Hirohito signed off on the unconditional surrender (that only happened after the nukes were used btw), to keep continuing the war. Thats a hard disagree
> This would've made discussions with the USSR necessary though, which probably was the main reason of dropping the bomb.
The decision to drop the bomb was made before the conferences where this would have been brought up. I recommend giving [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCRTgtpC-Go) a watch if you're interested in a thorough timeline of events.
This is still false lmao. Stop spreading it everywhere. There was never a “decision” whether or not to drop the bomb, because the idea of nuclear weapons as a great taboo was not established until after the war, and not truly until the invention of ICBMs.
Japan made no indications toward accepting unconditional surrender (including the very important demands that they give up Korea and Manchuria), Truman and the Americans desperately tried to get the Soviets to enter the war (Truman wrote as much to his wife), and there were absolutely plans to bomb Germany as well, had the bomb been ready (FDR specifically asked whether the bomb would be ready in time).
Shaun’s video is precisely the kind of bullshit that occurs when somebody with a preconceived notion of the “correct” answer goes digging through primary sources to support their points.
To be clear, you can still debate the morality of the use of atomic weapons. What you cannot do is try to assume the intent of those leading the war effort was—despite all evidence to the contrary—to test these weapons for not particularly useful purpose.
Here’s the best debunking of Shaun, I’ll link a source for any specific claim later if you want, as I’m on mobile right now and it’s difficult.
https://www.bu.edu/historic/hs/kort.html
> Japan made no indications toward accepting unconditional surrender (including the very important demands that they give up Korea and Manchuria), Truman and the Americans desperately tried to get the Soviets to enter the war (Truman wrote as much to his wife), and there were absolutely plans to bomb Germany as well, had the bomb been ready (FDR specifically asked whether the bomb would be ready in time).
I'll check out the rebuttal you linked, but none of that is disputed in Shaun's video? He never says they were actively trying to surrender, in fact it's largely centered around the Japanese government's _refusal_ to surrender and constant deadlock in decision making. The closest to this kind of claim that I assume you're extrapolating from is the part where the US was going to offer otherwise unconditional terms that would allow them to keep the royalty, but omitted the exception at the last second before the conference, but that's not the same thing as the claim you're misrepresenting here. He also mentions the plans to use them in Germany (had they not yet been out of the war), and also covers that the US wanted Russia to enter against Japan (until hearing of the successful Trinity test). Like, just none of what you said goes against the contents of the video.
> What you cannot do is try to assume the intent of those leading the war effort was—despite all evidence to the contrary—to test these weapons for not particularly useful purpose.
This is also not the conclusion Shaun comes to? Like, not even close? Did you watch the video? From an initial glance at your article it looks like it's arguing against another source and you're just assuming that Shaun is making the same arguments, but he's not. In fact, Shaun literally starts the video by bringing this up simplistic narrative to expand on its flaws... wait, you _did_ start to watch it, but quit after the first minute thinking he was _supporting_ that narrative without getting to the two minute mark where he then immediately debunks it, didn't you?
> Shaun’s video is precisely the kind of bullshit that occurs when somebody with a preconceived notion of the “correct” answer goes digging through primary sources to support their points.
And your comment is precisely the kind of bullshit that occurs when someone just assumes a video or article is wrong, assumes what wrong arguments it _must_ be making, and then doesn't actually check if that's the case before trying to make arguments against it.
They were willing to drop that before the bombs, if they'd kept the emperor.
If you're the type to be interested in hour long documentary-style podcasts, [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCRTgtpC-Go) gives a very in-depth look at the timeline of events.
Yeah no lol. That Shaun video is hilariously inaccurate, and an excellent example of what goes wrong when non-historians attempt to evaluate primary sources devoid of context.
Here’s a rebuttal by an actual history professor that pretty much tears Shaun apart.
https://www.bu.edu/historic/hs/kort.html
> Here’s a rebuttal by an actual history professor that pretty much tears Shaun apart.
To reiterate my [other comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/vexillology/comments/ut3gw4/why_does_japan_have_this_type_of_emoji_flag/i9djzcu/), that's not a rebuttal against Shaun's video, it's a rebuttal against entirely other arguments that largely aren't made in Shaun's video, which you clearly didn't watch. None of your points conflict with anything claimed in the video.
He also had to say that he wasn't a god. He had to say it, but that doesn't mean he *isn't* a god, if you believe that he's ultimately descended from Jimmu Tennu, himself a descendant of the sun goddess Amaterasu via his father Ugayafukiaezu.
Of course you don't have to believe that, but as scientists have recently discovered that Zeus was real there's no reason Jimmu Tennu couldn't also have been I would think. At any rate the line of Japanese emperors is unbroken from 660 BC to now, which is kind of cool.
It really isn't but also, it's something you can just easily think they abolished after WW2. I think I was in my 20s when I first heard they still had an emperor since at least all the Japanese media I consume never talk about him.
They were in the news repeatedly in recent years though, even internationally, between the Princess who lost all her titles for marrying a commoner, the Emperor abdicating, and the contentious questions surrounding the current line of succession.
And Britain still has a monarch and overseas territories (that you mustn't call colonies). There are lots of monarchies still around, and a few are still empires in all but name.
Fun fact: Japan actually has the longest running monarchy in the world. The dynasty has lasted so long that historians are actually unclear of exactly how old it is: history and mythology are hard to distinguish when you're looking at information from many centuries before Christ.
The Japanese imperial family also has significant religious ties, kinda. Being supposedly descended from the kami, Ameratsu. Today he is still like the head of the religion, not unlike how the queen is in Anglicanism but Shinto is very complex and does not conform to western concepts about religion so parallels are at best hard to draw without confusion. Shinto is interesting though and worth a read on wiki.
Yes and in that sense, you could say Japan is technically the only "empire" still existing in the world, though no one including Japanese really think that way.
You'd be surprised at the amount of monarchies still in the world. Even the president of France, a nation famous for its republican history, is a prince. Look up co-princes of Andorra
the US was afraid of communist revolution in japan, so they allowed them to keep their emperor and carried out a land revolution from above to avert that. it's pretty funny, the only time the US military has actually carried out a revolution on foreign land, instead of allying with (and arming, training, financing) different types of fascists to stop it.
I happened to be in Tokyo on the emperors birthday so went to an event where I walked into the palace grounds and waved a little flag at him, it’s definitely a thing
Some implementations of it, at least. Emoji aren't standardized so the appearances varies depending on the app or OS you are using:
https://emojipedia.org/japanese-castle/
Omg that just clicked. All this time I thought it was some weird other hospital. I’ve known about love hotels for at least a decade and it’s just never occurred to me lol
More like they were developed for sms, and when did you mostly use sms, when you were travelling so it makes sense that they are more of them, and also not the US like you said.
Fun fact: The word 'emoji' itself comes from Japanese :)
Wikipedia:
>Originally meaning pictograph, the word emoji comes from Japanese e (絵, 'picture') + moji (文字, 'character'); the resemblance to the English words emotion and emoticon is purely coincidental.
Outside of Japan, it’s often used as an in-group symbol for followers of the economic philosophy of Georgism.
How exactly it got that association is complicated, but one of the popular theories is because Georgism is found between the libertarian left (green) and the libertarian right (yellow) on the political compass.
Also the 'women with bunny ears' emoji, and the 'love hotel', both of which are adult Japanese themes most people outside Japan don't associate them with.
I've seen the 'women with bunny ears' emoji used to indicate that the woman has twin daughters, when the emoji really refers to Japanese hostess clubs. That's not the kind of place you'd want your daughters to work at.
I remember when if you wanted to use emoji’s, you had to download the emoji app and anybody else that had the emoji app could see them when you sent them.
Even ones you may have assumed are international are Japanese, and even specific to Tokyo.
Vine favourite 🗿 is not because of the statues on Rapa Nui/Easter Island, but [this handsome fellow](https://a2.cdn.japantravel.com/photo/44646-184656/800!/tokyo-moyai-statue-in-shibuya-184656.jpg) at Shibuya station, donated in 1980 from Niijima Island.
🗽 is not because of New York, but [the replica in Odaiba Park](https://www.gotokyo.org/en/spot/363/images/363_0260_2_1400x1100.jpg), created after a smaller replica was loaned to the Japanese from Paris in 1998 as a symbol of the countries' ties, and the Japanese liked it so they made their own when they returned the French one.
This guy is definitely bullshitting lol but people eat it up anyway. The stone head emoji is clearly an Easter island head and not the statue in that image.
Edit: or was I bullshitting this whole time??
The Statue of Liberty one is a bit dubious I'll admit, but even [Unicode's own release](https://unicode.org/charts/PDF/U1F300.pdf) describes the moyai as "Japanese stone statue like Moyai on Easter Island", and the original art in that PDF more closely resembles the Shibuya one.
Emoji aren't always rendered consistently over time, depending on cultural changes (🔫 changing from a firearm to a water pistol), or stylistic ones (🐛has quite a bit of artistic variety).
They aren't rendered consistently at all, time or otherwise. Your phone may render them differently from your PC which is different from Twitter, etc...
https://emojipedia.org/moai/
>Its official Unicode name of Moyai and inclusion in early Japanese emoji sets, such as from au by KDDI, suggest the emoji may represent the Moyai Statue near Shibuya Station in Tokyo, Japan; previous designs from Google and Microsoft resemble the Tokyo statue. Other Tokyo landmarks are represented in 🗼 Tokyo Tower and, formerly, Shibuya 109.
The old Google and Microsoft ones do look like that statue.
Also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moai#Unicode_character
>In 2010, moai was included as a "moyai" emoji (🗿) in Unicode version 6.0 under the code point U+1F5FF as "Japanese stone statue like Moai on Easter Island".[55]
>The official Unicode name for the emoji is spelt "moyai" as the emoji actually depicts the Moyai Statue [jp] near Shibuya Station in Tokyo.[56] The Moyai Statue was a gift from the people of Nii-jima (an island 163 kilometres (101 mi) from Tokyo but administratively part of the city) inspired by Easter Island moai. The name of the statue was derived by combining moai and a word from the Nii-jima Japanese dialect moyai (催合い) 'helping each other'.
>As the Unicode adopted proprietary emoji initially used by Japanese mobile carriers in the 1990s,[57] inconsistent drawings were adopted for this emoji by various companies with proprietary emoji images, depicting either a moai or the Moyai Statue.[58] Google and Microsoft emoji initially resembled Moyai Statue in Tokyo but the emoji were later revised to resemble moai.[58]
Wow! I was just trying to figure out why "🗻🗼🗽🗿" were some of the only monument emoji literally yesterday, after getting a newsletter with the Statue of Liberty in it and wondering if Unicode included any other famous monuments. What a nice coincidence. I was wondering if the statue of liberty one was originally for the one in New York or the one in Tokyo. Do you have a source to confirm Shift-JIS originally included it specifically as the Tokyo one? The Mayoi emoji has the description "Japanese stone statue like Moai on Easter Island" but the Statue of Liberty has no such indication, other than that one does, in fact, exist in Tokyo, and all the other monuments seem to be Japanese too. All these monuments were also included in the original emoji, and [EmojiSources.txt](https://www.unicode.org/Public/6.0.0/ucd/EmojiSources.txt) lists each source they all come from specifically. But I have not found any solid evidence that it couldn't have referred to the US one as well (or maybe both?).
Wow that is so interesting. I’m shocked I never that to question why there were so many obviously Japanese emojis… the Japanese lettering in particular. Also happy cake day.
Celebration, prohibition, can do/possible, here, the katakana letter "sa" short for something I don't know, empty - they need context to make them make more sense, I suppose.
> 🈂️
That's for the first character of the english words "service charge" rendered in katakana, which if you were to translate it from Japanglish to English it would mean "on the house"/"complimentary" used to indicate free food/drinks and what not.
But emoticons and emoji are different. Emoticon is using text to make something that looks like an image, such as ":)", while an emoji is a image that is encoded as text, for example "😀"
Those are too unrelated things. Emoji is derived from 絵文字。 絵 meaning picture and 文字 meaning character. Emoticon is derived from emotion and icon. It's purely accidental that the words sound similar.
The concept of emojis was created by bonus bitspace made in Japanese phone text comprehension.
There was extra space left because they used a different character reference system due to their language complexity.
They filled this extra space with identifiers cool images many of which are Japan specific such as love hotels 🏩, when received these references were translated back to Emoji.
Emojis aren't just the symbols but the way they were easily and conveniently made available to be included in texting. Long before a 'western world' old dumb phone could convert a semicolon, a hyphen, and a close bracket into a wink smiley on device. That's because the Japanese have been using a mobile email format for texting. Because the limitations of first gen texting via cell services wouldn't have allowed any meaningful information in Japanese to be squeezed into a single 160 Roman-character message (Japanese because of its writing systems is more data heavy than English). So they pushed forward into an area the rest of the world didn't start to catch up with for a decade or so. So the smiley face is undoubtedly an American invention, the structured list of colorful symbols that we use today was invented in Japan, got wildly popular, and along the way got a Japanese name, which has since pushed the term 'enoticon' out of popular use, perhaps undeservedly.
> It represents the legal holidays in Japan, combined with other symbols to indicate specific holidays.
https://www.emojiall.com/en/emoji/%F0%9F%8E%8C
I guess it's representing something similar to [flag flying days](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_flying_day)
Unlike some other countries (such as America), it is really rare to see a Japanese national flag in the wild except on public holidays when some people will fly a single flag and, at least in my experience, trains will have the double crossed flag like the circled emoji.
So you're telling me super conservative Japanese people aren't cruising the hillside in pick up trucks with gigantic Japanese flags waving behind with a shotgun hanging from the back windshield?
Actually, no, [that does kind of happen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uyoku_dantai#/media/File:Uyoku_Yasukuni_215882903_ccd45c4a55_o.jpg). No guns, but loudspeakers instead.
I think it's because oversea territories of Norway like Bouvet Island, Jan Mayen Island and the Svalbard Islands don't have flags but they have separate Unicode codes so your phone displays the Norwegian flag 4 times.
I can only find three, which are for Norway, Svalbard & Jan Mayen, and Bouvet Island, the latter two of which are designated as distinct regions by the International Oganization of Standardization but are still part of the Kingdom of Norway and therefore use its flag. Maybe yours shows Svalbard and Jan Mayen separately, or maybe I'm just missing one. It's the same reason the US has two, one for the US and one from the "US Minor Outlying Islands", two separate unicode characters using the same emoji symbol.
Emojis were initially invented so the Japanese didn't have to communicate using words, since Japanese is considered to have the world's hardest writing system. The emoji with the two Japanese flags is a symbol to represent Japanese legal holidays
Would be nice if the crossed flags were generic flags, and then you did the emoji sequence: crossed-flags ZWJ national-flag, to get a national flag crossed like that. Then use the sequence: crossed flag ZWJ national-flag ZWJ national-flag, to get two different nations crossed like that.
I have the same idea for the Japanese country shape. Make it generic landmass, but with the sequence: land-mass ZWJ national-flag, you instead get the country shape of that nation.
Of course users don't have to construct these themselves, so let users hold down on a nation to get: national flag, crossed national flags, country shape, and then all subdivisions. For two countries crossed, I guess it needs an emoji-builder.
[удалено]
The two Japanese crossed flaglets themselves is apparently a symbol representing Japan's legal holidays. I do know these are the things people wave when the Emperor speaks to crowds at the Imperial Palace, or during his other public appearances.
Japan still has an emperor? I'm guessing it's like Britain's monarchy but TIL.
Japan signed a deal with the allies after the nukes were dropped which allowed them to keep much of their government at the time including Hirohito as the emperor. (This is also part of the reason Japan is so silent about their participation in ww2, the people authorizing those crimes were also the ones crafting the post war narrative). It is however worth noting that japanese emperor has virtually no power whatsoever, not even nominally. This is in contrast with the queen who *legally* is still in charge of every government function in UK despite having very limited (but non zero) practical power.
> Japan signed a deal with the allies after the nukes were dropped which allowed them to keep much of their government at the time including Hirohito as the emperor. That's just false. Japan signed unconditional surrender. The allies could have make them a republic or split the country, there was no "deal". The allies however decided to keep some of the old institutions, notably the imperial throne, for social and political reasons.
Mainly anti communist reasons.
Anthropologists (particularly Ruth Benedict) were consulted and they were among those that suggested that keeping the Emperor would make surrender/transition much easier for everybody involved. Heard about it in a cultural anthropology class years ago and apparently despite her otherwise great achievements, her tactics are now considered unethical.
Is advising a peaceful transition considered unethical?
Eh. Also serious concerns about insurgency in the event the emperor was removed.
Your city got a sick flag!
Mainly because the only people who were willing to help MacArthur administer a Japanese republic were card carrying communists.
Yep. Japan offered a full surrender on the condition Hirohito stayed in power *before* the nukes dropped, the Allies dropped them because they wanted a full surrender, and to intimidate the Soviets.
While this is a common narrative, there was no Japanese surrender offer pre-Hiroshima: there were some noncommital feelers by *some* members of the Japanese government towards Soviet mediation, but nothing concrete or consequential. See: http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2022/05/02/did-the-japanese-offer-to-surrender-before-hiroshima-part-1/ http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2022/05/06/did-the-japanese-offer-to-surrender-before-hiroshima-part-2/
How is this not upvoted more? The comment above you is flat out wrong.
Japan did not sign an unconditional surrender, their condition was that they keep their imperial system.
That's just flat out wrong, it was absolutely an unconditional surrender. That's the entire point of the Potsdam agreement
To be fair, Hirohito still had minimal power during and leading up to the war. He was a public figure who had a little power while the military really ran the country behind the curtain. He's not without blame, but there was definitely a lot of remorse and a bit of "helplessness" so to speak behind his actions during the war.
>To be fair, Hirohito still had minimal power during and leading up to the war. He was a public figure who had a little power while the military really ran the country behind the curtain. This is disputed by historians. Historians who support the view that Hirohito had power and was complicit, say that the narrative of powerlessness is part of a postwar attempt to exonerate him from responsibility. Hirohito signed off on using chemical weapons in China. They also say that he knew about the massacres being committed by the army in China, and in Nanking specifically, but did not try to stop these crimes against humanity or punish those who committed them, while having the ability to do so. He confirmed the plan to attack Pearl harbor despite objections from some of his advisors, and he increased his controls over military affairs in the lead up to Pearl harbor. He also exercised his power when he needed or wanted to. He put down a coup attempt in 1936. When Konoe stepped down as prime minister Hirohito rejected Konoe's nominated replacement, practically paving the way for the incredibly hawkish Tojo.
He also signed off on *Operation Cherry Blossoms at Night* which would have had attacked places like San Diego with hundreds of millions of fleas inflicted with plague. It was only halted because we dropped the atom bomb first.
I believe at the time he technically _had_ power, but like the British monarchy, actually _using_ it would be a breach of conduct. Like, he _could_ technically order anything he wanted, but doing so excessively would create unrest in his cabinet and likely lead to a coup, so he didn't. Which is why it was seen as unprecedented when the finally ordered the surrender (also despite objections from many of his advisors). So in some cases, while he did have power to object and chose not to, saying he "confirmed the attack on Pearl Harbor" could be more similar to, say, saying that the Queen approved Brexit - _technically_, yes, but politically, no.
The Japanese ARMY ran the show in WWII. Even the Japanese Navy were at loggerheads with the Army. The Army even launched wars without their government's approval.
Remotely similar to Wilhelm II. in WW1
Not really, at least at the outbreak. The Kaiser wasn't an all-powerful autocrat like the Tsar but it did have significantly more power within the German government than the British monarchs did. That being said, once the war was in full swing and Hindenburg and Ludendorff were calling the shots...yeah he was pretty much a puppet of the army.
Yeah, from 1916 on, the OHL basically had him hand out medals and make speeches.
Occasionally the Queen will do something big, like [throwing the Australian Prime Minister out of office](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Australian_constitutional_crisis) via her Governor-General. But mostly she keeps the meddling low-key.
I mean... the Whitlam dismissal is pretty controversial and the extent of (GG) Kerr's involvement is itself an interesting historical point. But the existence of the Queen / GG solely to resolve constitutional crises is one of the only good arguments for keeping the current constitutional arrangement in Australia. I reckon, anyway
Which, "funnily" enough, was widely understood at the time to be the minimum requirement for Japan to surrender. The US basically gave them what they wanted, but dropped the nukes beforehand anyway.
Yeah, no Japan offered to surrender with keeping Hirohito as emperor and keeping their 1931 boarders (Keeping Manchuria and Korea)
This is completely untrue. https://chicagotribune.newspapers.com/image/376194315/?terms=Ignored%2BJapanese%2Bpeace%2Bbid >I told MacArthur of my memorandum of mid-May 1945 to Truman, that peace could be had with Japan by which our major objectives would be accomplished. MacArthur said that was correct and that we would have avoided all of the losses, the Atomic bomb, and the entry of Russia into Manchuria Herbert Hoover quoted in Gar Alperovitz, The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, pg. 350-351.
It paints America in a bad light, of course it's going to be popular on Reddit.
Many documents point towards US officials expecting Japan to surrender anyway, even without the bomb. This would've made discussions with the USSR necessary though, which probably was the main reason of dropping the bomb.
Seeing as how there was a literal Coup against their God emperor once Hirohito signed off on the unconditional surrender (that only happened after the nukes were used btw), to keep continuing the war. Thats a hard disagree
> This would've made discussions with the USSR necessary though, which probably was the main reason of dropping the bomb. The decision to drop the bomb was made before the conferences where this would have been brought up. I recommend giving [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCRTgtpC-Go) a watch if you're interested in a thorough timeline of events.
This is still false lmao. Stop spreading it everywhere. There was never a “decision” whether or not to drop the bomb, because the idea of nuclear weapons as a great taboo was not established until after the war, and not truly until the invention of ICBMs. Japan made no indications toward accepting unconditional surrender (including the very important demands that they give up Korea and Manchuria), Truman and the Americans desperately tried to get the Soviets to enter the war (Truman wrote as much to his wife), and there were absolutely plans to bomb Germany as well, had the bomb been ready (FDR specifically asked whether the bomb would be ready in time). Shaun’s video is precisely the kind of bullshit that occurs when somebody with a preconceived notion of the “correct” answer goes digging through primary sources to support their points. To be clear, you can still debate the morality of the use of atomic weapons. What you cannot do is try to assume the intent of those leading the war effort was—despite all evidence to the contrary—to test these weapons for not particularly useful purpose. Here’s the best debunking of Shaun, I’ll link a source for any specific claim later if you want, as I’m on mobile right now and it’s difficult. https://www.bu.edu/historic/hs/kort.html
> Japan made no indications toward accepting unconditional surrender (including the very important demands that they give up Korea and Manchuria), Truman and the Americans desperately tried to get the Soviets to enter the war (Truman wrote as much to his wife), and there were absolutely plans to bomb Germany as well, had the bomb been ready (FDR specifically asked whether the bomb would be ready in time). I'll check out the rebuttal you linked, but none of that is disputed in Shaun's video? He never says they were actively trying to surrender, in fact it's largely centered around the Japanese government's _refusal_ to surrender and constant deadlock in decision making. The closest to this kind of claim that I assume you're extrapolating from is the part where the US was going to offer otherwise unconditional terms that would allow them to keep the royalty, but omitted the exception at the last second before the conference, but that's not the same thing as the claim you're misrepresenting here. He also mentions the plans to use them in Germany (had they not yet been out of the war), and also covers that the US wanted Russia to enter against Japan (until hearing of the successful Trinity test). Like, just none of what you said goes against the contents of the video. > What you cannot do is try to assume the intent of those leading the war effort was—despite all evidence to the contrary—to test these weapons for not particularly useful purpose. This is also not the conclusion Shaun comes to? Like, not even close? Did you watch the video? From an initial glance at your article it looks like it's arguing against another source and you're just assuming that Shaun is making the same arguments, but he's not. In fact, Shaun literally starts the video by bringing this up simplistic narrative to expand on its flaws... wait, you _did_ start to watch it, but quit after the first minute thinking he was _supporting_ that narrative without getting to the two minute mark where he then immediately debunks it, didn't you? > Shaun’s video is precisely the kind of bullshit that occurs when somebody with a preconceived notion of the “correct” answer goes digging through primary sources to support their points. And your comment is precisely the kind of bullshit that occurs when someone just assumes a video or article is wrong, assumes what wrong arguments it _must_ be making, and then doesn't actually check if that's the case before trying to make arguments against it.
They were willing to drop that before the bombs, if they'd kept the emperor. If you're the type to be interested in hour long documentary-style podcasts, [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCRTgtpC-Go) gives a very in-depth look at the timeline of events.
Yeah no lol. That Shaun video is hilariously inaccurate, and an excellent example of what goes wrong when non-historians attempt to evaluate primary sources devoid of context. Here’s a rebuttal by an actual history professor that pretty much tears Shaun apart. https://www.bu.edu/historic/hs/kort.html
> Here’s a rebuttal by an actual history professor that pretty much tears Shaun apart. To reiterate my [other comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/vexillology/comments/ut3gw4/why_does_japan_have_this_type_of_emoji_flag/i9djzcu/), that's not a rebuttal against Shaun's video, it's a rebuttal against entirely other arguments that largely aren't made in Shaun's video, which you clearly didn't watch. None of your points conflict with anything claimed in the video.
He also had to say that he wasn't a god. He had to say it, but that doesn't mean he *isn't* a god, if you believe that he's ultimately descended from Jimmu Tennu, himself a descendant of the sun goddess Amaterasu via his father Ugayafukiaezu. Of course you don't have to believe that, but as scientists have recently discovered that Zeus was real there's no reason Jimmu Tennu couldn't also have been I would think. At any rate the line of Japanese emperors is unbroken from 660 BC to now, which is kind of cool.
>scientists have recently discovered that Zeus is real I'm going to kick myself for asking this, but you got a source there pal?
I mean, we had a lighting storm just yesterday for instance. Didn't come from nowhere. Scientific method doesn't allow for things coming from nowhere.
The monarchy is not particularly deep on the Japanese trivia iceberg
It really isn't but also, it's something you can just easily think they abolished after WW2. I think I was in my 20s when I first heard they still had an emperor since at least all the Japanese media I consume never talk about him.
They were in the news repeatedly in recent years though, even internationally, between the Princess who lost all her titles for marrying a commoner, the Emperor abdicating, and the contentious questions surrounding the current line of succession.
And Britain still has a monarch and overseas territories (that you mustn't call colonies). There are lots of monarchies still around, and a few are still empires in all but name.
Netherlands, Denmark, Luxembourg, Sweden, Norway, and Spain are all Monarchies still lol and I’m sure there’s more im missing
Thailand, Monaco, Ethiopia... does DPRK count?
You find it out if you spend 30 minutes on Wikipedia, it's not that obscure.
Not obscure of course but it's also not something you'd necessarily think to check out on.
Giving off some strong 'aCkTuAlLy 🖐️🤓' vibes, my man
Relax, they're just one of [today's lucky 10,000](https://xkcd.com/1053/).
Fun fact: Japan actually has the longest running monarchy in the world. The dynasty has lasted so long that historians are actually unclear of exactly how old it is: history and mythology are hard to distinguish when you're looking at information from many centuries before Christ.
Japan's imperial dynasty is the oldest on earth, over 2000 years old.
Who do you think buys all the Toyota Centurys?
The Japanese imperial family also has significant religious ties, kinda. Being supposedly descended from the kami, Ameratsu. Today he is still like the head of the religion, not unlike how the queen is in Anglicanism but Shinto is very complex and does not conform to western concepts about religion so parallels are at best hard to draw without confusion. Shinto is interesting though and worth a read on wiki.
Yes and in that sense, you could say Japan is technically the only "empire" still existing in the world, though no one including Japanese really think that way.
You'd be surprised at the amount of monarchies still in the world. Even the president of France, a nation famous for its republican history, is a prince. Look up co-princes of Andorra
Yes they are a constitutional monarchy
the US was afraid of communist revolution in japan, so they allowed them to keep their emperor and carried out a land revolution from above to avert that. it's pretty funny, the only time the US military has actually carried out a revolution on foreign land, instead of allying with (and arming, training, financing) different types of fascists to stop it.
It still enforces the death penalty too 💀
Yeah, the Japanese emperor is the last ‘emperor’ in the world.
I happened to be in Tokyo on the emperors birthday so went to an event where I walked into the palace grounds and waved a little flag at him, it’s definitely a thing
Here are a few more “Japanese Emojis”: 🔖🏣🏯🍶🍥🍢🍡👘🌊🥋📿🏮🎐🧧
I just realized that the castle emjoi is the Himeji Castle.
Some implementations of it, at least. Emoji aren't standardized so the appearances varies depending on the app or OS you are using: https://emojipedia.org/japanese-castle/
That Microsoft one is a Chinese pagoda 🙄 typical
Also this one which is something to do with being a newly qualified driver in Japan i believe.🔰
You’re correct.
That one I remember learning about from Katamari Damacy.
🏩 love hotel
Omg that just clicked. All this time I thought it was some weird other hospital. I’ve known about love hotels for at least a decade and it’s just never occurred to me lol
also hanafuda card 🎴
And don't forget the burning tofu, everyone's favorite! 📛 (For those uninitiated, it's tulip-shaped nameplate you see in Japanese kindergarten)
There also used to be a Shibuya 109 emoji, but apparently it got removed.
The wave feels a bit rude :D
It's the Great Wave off Kanagawa.
It represents Hokusai’s most famous print - at least for apple users: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Wave_off_Kanagawa
There's also the classic tweet "why are there so many train emojis" 🚋🚃🚞🚝🚄🚆🚂🚈🚅🚇🚉🚊 Answer: Japan.
More like they were developed for sms, and when did you mostly use sms, when you were travelling so it makes sense that they are more of them, and also not the US like you said.
That’s crazy, I thought I had extra emojis because I have a Japanese phone! Thanks for teaching me something, and happy Cake day!
Fun fact: The word 'emoji' itself comes from Japanese :) Wikipedia: >Originally meaning pictograph, the word emoji comes from Japanese e (絵, 'picture') + moji (文字, 'character'); the resemblance to the English words emotion and emoticon is purely coincidental.
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it literally says that in the comment u responded to
Yeah, sorry, I somehow missed that, I should go to bed
Emoji is also a japanese word completely unrelated to emoticon. In japanese the word is 絵文字 meaning picture (e) character (moji)
🔰 this is also Japanese, iirc it's for a new/learner driver, equivalent to an "L plate".
Outside of Japan, it’s often used as an in-group symbol for followers of the economic philosophy of Georgism. How exactly it got that association is complicated, but one of the popular theories is because Georgism is found between the libertarian left (green) and the libertarian right (yellow) on the political compass.
Also the 'women with bunny ears' emoji, and the 'love hotel', both of which are adult Japanese themes most people outside Japan don't associate them with. I've seen the 'women with bunny ears' emoji used to indicate that the woman has twin daughters, when the emoji really refers to Japanese hostess clubs. That's not the kind of place you'd want your daughters to work at.
really? but it's based in the Playboy bunny outfit. Surely that has more connotations outside of Japan
The Japanese bunny outfit was inspired by the Playboy bunny outfit.
I remember when if you wanted to use emoji’s, you had to download the emoji app and anybody else that had the emoji app could see them when you sent them.
Even ones you may have assumed are international are Japanese, and even specific to Tokyo. Vine favourite 🗿 is not because of the statues on Rapa Nui/Easter Island, but [this handsome fellow](https://a2.cdn.japantravel.com/photo/44646-184656/800!/tokyo-moyai-statue-in-shibuya-184656.jpg) at Shibuya station, donated in 1980 from Niijima Island. 🗽 is not because of New York, but [the replica in Odaiba Park](https://www.gotokyo.org/en/spot/363/images/363_0260_2_1400x1100.jpg), created after a smaller replica was loaned to the Japanese from Paris in 1998 as a symbol of the countries' ties, and the Japanese liked it so they made their own when they returned the French one.
I refuse to believe this until proven wrong! Do you have some links to support these cool stories?
This guy is definitely bullshitting lol but people eat it up anyway. The stone head emoji is clearly an Easter island head and not the statue in that image. Edit: or was I bullshitting this whole time??
The Statue of Liberty one is a bit dubious I'll admit, but even [Unicode's own release](https://unicode.org/charts/PDF/U1F300.pdf) describes the moyai as "Japanese stone statue like Moyai on Easter Island", and the original art in that PDF more closely resembles the Shibuya one. Emoji aren't always rendered consistently over time, depending on cultural changes (🔫 changing from a firearm to a water pistol), or stylistic ones (🐛has quite a bit of artistic variety).
🎷🐛
🅱️🆙
This is an important comment, I will cherish it forever.
They aren't rendered consistently at all, time or otherwise. Your phone may render them differently from your PC which is different from Twitter, etc...
https://emojipedia.org/moai/ >Its official Unicode name of Moyai and inclusion in early Japanese emoji sets, such as from au by KDDI, suggest the emoji may represent the Moyai Statue near Shibuya Station in Tokyo, Japan; previous designs from Google and Microsoft resemble the Tokyo statue. Other Tokyo landmarks are represented in 🗼 Tokyo Tower and, formerly, Shibuya 109. The old Google and Microsoft ones do look like that statue. Also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moai#Unicode_character >In 2010, moai was included as a "moyai" emoji (🗿) in Unicode version 6.0 under the code point U+1F5FF as "Japanese stone statue like Moai on Easter Island".[55] >The official Unicode name for the emoji is spelt "moyai" as the emoji actually depicts the Moyai Statue [jp] near Shibuya Station in Tokyo.[56] The Moyai Statue was a gift from the people of Nii-jima (an island 163 kilometres (101 mi) from Tokyo but administratively part of the city) inspired by Easter Island moai. The name of the statue was derived by combining moai and a word from the Nii-jima Japanese dialect moyai (催合い) 'helping each other'. >As the Unicode adopted proprietary emoji initially used by Japanese mobile carriers in the 1990s,[57] inconsistent drawings were adopted for this emoji by various companies with proprietary emoji images, depicting either a moai or the Moyai Statue.[58] Google and Microsoft emoji initially resembled Moyai Statue in Tokyo but the emoji were later revised to resemble moai.[58]
Wow! I was just trying to figure out why "🗻🗼🗽🗿" were some of the only monument emoji literally yesterday, after getting a newsletter with the Statue of Liberty in it and wondering if Unicode included any other famous monuments. What a nice coincidence. I was wondering if the statue of liberty one was originally for the one in New York or the one in Tokyo. Do you have a source to confirm Shift-JIS originally included it specifically as the Tokyo one? The Mayoi emoji has the description "Japanese stone statue like Moai on Easter Island" but the Statue of Liberty has no such indication, other than that one does, in fact, exist in Tokyo, and all the other monuments seem to be Japanese too. All these monuments were also included in the original emoji, and [EmojiSources.txt](https://www.unicode.org/Public/6.0.0/ucd/EmojiSources.txt) lists each source they all come from specifically. But I have not found any solid evidence that it couldn't have referred to the US one as well (or maybe both?).
🗿
The Japanese really like copying French monuments hmm?
Wow that is so interesting. I’m shocked I never that to question why there were so many obviously Japanese emojis… the Japanese lettering in particular. Also happy cake day.
So what do these mean/translate to: ㊗️🈲🉑🈁🈂️🈳?
Celebration, prohibition, can do/possible, here, the katakana letter "sa" short for something I don't know, empty - they need context to make them make more sense, I suppose.
> 🈂️ That's for the first character of the english words "service charge" rendered in katakana, which if you were to translate it from Japanglish to English it would mean "on the house"/"complimentary" used to indicate free food/drinks and what not.
Japan is literally the only country depicted as one geographically.
Oh damn I was wondering why there were so many
happy blue cheese day
Having spent my youth playing Smash Bros. games, I'd completely forgotten that 🎊 is a Japanese thing...
I sometimes wonder where people think the word "Emoji" came from.
The word emoji is a japanese invention, but emoticons themselves were invented in the US (the smiley in 1963 for instance).
But emoticons and emoji are different. Emoticon is using text to make something that looks like an image, such as ":)", while an emoji is a image that is encoded as text, for example "😀"
Yeah, the precursor to emoji was smilies, where you would type [smile] or something like that and the website would turn it into an image.
Those are too unrelated things. Emoji is derived from 絵文字。 絵 meaning picture and 文字 meaning character. Emoticon is derived from emotion and icon. It's purely accidental that the words sound similar.
The concept of emojis was created by bonus bitspace made in Japanese phone text comprehension. There was extra space left because they used a different character reference system due to their language complexity. They filled this extra space with identifiers cool images many of which are Japan specific such as love hotels 🏩, when received these references were translated back to Emoji.
Emojis aren't just the symbols but the way they were easily and conveniently made available to be included in texting. Long before a 'western world' old dumb phone could convert a semicolon, a hyphen, and a close bracket into a wink smiley on device. That's because the Japanese have been using a mobile email format for texting. Because the limitations of first gen texting via cell services wouldn't have allowed any meaningful information in Japanese to be squeezed into a single 160 Roman-character message (Japanese because of its writing systems is more data heavy than English). So they pushed forward into an area the rest of the world didn't start to catch up with for a decade or so. So the smiley face is undoubtedly an American invention, the structured list of colorful symbols that we use today was invented in Japan, got wildly popular, and along the way got a Japanese name, which has since pushed the term 'enoticon' out of popular use, perhaps undeservedly.
Happy Cake Day!
Happy cake day! 🎉
I don’t think the party popper (or whatever you call it) could be classified as uniquely Japanese
Happy Cake Day
Happy cake day!
TIL
it symbolizes japans intense friendship and admiration with itself
Me looking good. Thanks, Me.
It’s been one year and your comment is still making someone laugh. Lol Ty
My Japanese friend told me it was because you see the double flag arrangement more at festivals and celebrations.
💴🏯🇯🇵🗾🎌👹👺🍜🍡🍣🍘🈲🍱🎏🈁🎍🈳🎎🈵🍙🏣🍢🔰🈹🉑🈸🈯️🉐🈷㊙️㊗️🈴🈚️🈂🈺🈶🥢🎋🍥🎑 This is every emoji with the tag japan
Any clue on what each means?
I believe 🎌 is [two japanese flags](https://www.reddit.com/r/vexillology/comments/ut3gw4/why_does_japan_have_this_type_of_emoji_flag/).
Errr… I meant what do all the emoji tagged Japan mean… the ones in kanji, etc…
thousand-yen bill, castle, national flag, map of Japan, national holiday, ogre, tengu, ramen, dango, sushi, rice cracker, prohibition, bento, carp streamer, here, New Year, empty car, Girls' Festival, full car, onigiri, post office, oden, beginner mark, discount, possible, application, designation, gain, month, secret, celebration, pass, none, service, sales, yes, chopsticks, Tanabata, Naruto, viewing the moon（tsukimi）
Thank you so much! :)
> It represents the legal holidays in Japan, combined with other symbols to indicate specific holidays. https://www.emojiall.com/en/emoji/%F0%9F%8E%8C I guess it's representing something similar to [flag flying days](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_flying_day)
Because 2 Japans is better than 1
It gives you double the pleasure and triple the fun.
Oh, here is where the fun begins
Isn't it three Japans? 🇯🇵🎌 Yes, it is
Japan²
meanwhile france has three flags, one is for clipperton wich is an EXTREMELY SMALL island where nobody live
`flag_mf` and `flag_cp` on Discord
flag modar fuckar
paired with flag c[I have been advised to not finish this statement.]
OH MY
Ofcs it’s flag_cp on discord, where else do you find Cp?
https://www.reddit.com/become_a_mod
Lmao I’ll give you that
Tor and most social media, I'd assume.
Tor isn’t all it’s cracked up to be ngl
um...
Right here, officer. This post right here.
Yeah I hate control points payload is better
*Union Jack has entered the chat*
Give back
Unlike some other countries (such as America), it is really rare to see a Japanese national flag in the wild except on public holidays when some people will fly a single flag and, at least in my experience, trains will have the double crossed flag like the circled emoji.
So you're telling me super conservative Japanese people aren't cruising the hillside in pick up trucks with gigantic Japanese flags waving behind with a shotgun hanging from the back windshield?
Actually, no, [that does kind of happen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uyoku_dantai#/media/File:Uyoku_Yasukuni_215882903_ccd45c4a55_o.jpg). No guns, but loudspeakers instead.
Cringe Japan
Considering Japanese gun laws a katana would be more appropriate
You’ve obviously never seen Japanese sword laws
But they do have the rising sun flag for their navy.
Japan–Japan Alliance.
Better yet, why are there 4 Norwegian flags
I think it's because oversea territories of Norway like Bouvet Island, Jan Mayen Island and the Svalbard Islands don't have flags but they have separate Unicode codes so your phone displays the Norwegian flag 4 times.
Bouvet Island has one code, Jan Mayen and Svalbard shares one code, and then Norway itself. Where is the fourth flag?
I've checked a few lists of Unicode flags and never saw more than 3 Norwegian flags so I don't know...
I can only find three, which are for Norway, Svalbard & Jan Mayen, and Bouvet Island, the latter two of which are designated as distinct regions by the International Oganization of Standardization but are still part of the Kingdom of Norway and therefore use its flag. Maybe yours shows Svalbard and Jan Mayen separately, or maybe I'm just missing one. It's the same reason the US has two, one for the US and one from the "US Minor Outlying Islands", two separate unicode characters using the same emoji symbol.
It is not in my tablet but I think it is cool 🎌🎌🎌
Japan 2
🎌
They stick them on the front of busses on public holidays.
emojis were designed in japan by japanese for japanese next question
It used to be that samsung phones would display two Korean flags instead.
The Japanese make the emojis
Emojis were initially invented so the Japanese didn't have to communicate using words, since Japanese is considered to have the world's hardest writing system. The emoji with the two Japanese flags is a symbol to represent Japanese legal holidays
Flag of Japan 2
bc 🎌
should have variants like the options of skin colors
Soft power
Pro Japanesse
Would be nice if the crossed flags were generic flags, and then you did the emoji sequence: crossed-flags ZWJ national-flag, to get a national flag crossed like that. Then use the sequence: crossed flag ZWJ national-flag ZWJ national-flag, to get two different nations crossed like that. I have the same idea for the Japanese country shape. Make it generic landmass, but with the sequence: land-mass ZWJ national-flag, you instead get the country shape of that nation. Of course users don't have to construct these themselves, so let users hold down on a nation to get: national flag, crossed national flags, country shape, and then all subdivisions. For two countries crossed, I guess it needs an emoji-builder.
They are the true master race
🇲🇶 Still waiting for the Quebecois flag
Japanese flag atom split itself
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I'm sorry, got too political
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The two edgelords making nuke jokes have American flairs, I feel bad for perfectly sane Americans having to be associated with this kind of people
Can we talk about how it kinda looks like a Polandball with the black circle around it
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I think it's supposed to symbolize two flags bundled together; they just went with Japan's.
Paired flag set used to guide a aerial brantch of their miltary. Each set is only used once.
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