Comment by NoGravitas | Hacker News Reader

Comment by NoGravitas | Hacker News Reader

> This stressful, ongoing debate fuels the seeming paradox of an “endearing” military force. In Japan, where indirect communication is highly valued, cute illustrations have long played the role of tension-breakers and mediators in situations of conflict. Thus kawaii mascots, whether miniskirted girls or bunny-rabbit decoy launchers, are both a reflection of pop-cultural trends and a way to defuse the very touchy issues surrounding the military’s undeniable presence.

Contrast this to the way [The Culture][0] dealt with their ambivalence over having to tool up to fight a full-scale war (the Idiran War). They specifically designed their warships to be ugly, and gave them ship class names reflecting the ugliness of their roles (e.g. Gangster, Torturer, Psychopath, and Thug). While depicting your weapons as kawaii is very different from depicting them as heroic/inspiring, I think the Culture's lack of euphemism is the better way to go.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Culture

This is a very good point, but I think the Japanese way might actually be better. The problem is that emphasising brutality and ugliness in the style of the Culture may over time lead to a shift in perception normalising agression, or in other words, it could shift the Overton Window towards militarism. For example, if ships were named something like "Peacekeeper" or "Ambassador" rather than "Torturer" or "Thug", it would lead to a perception of peace-keeping as their intended role.

It works in the case of the Culture because of their extraordinary degree of self-awareness and anti-militarism; no member of the Culture could possibly lack cognizance of the significance of the names, wheras we, alas, live in somewhat less enlightened times. In the Culture it serves to emphasise the ugliness of their purpose, wheras if applied in our world could be all to easily misinterpreted as unvarnished militarism.

It is interesting to note the degree of anti-militarism in Japan. Though this may be taken to an extreme in the opposition to taking part in international peacekeeping missions, at the very least it means that Japan is very unlikely to be subject to escalating influence and dominance by the military as may be permitted in other countries due to general public apathy. However, I think this also means that any attempt to emphasise the inherent ugliness the the purpose of the military would be prima facie faced with extreme opposition, no matter the intent.

> For example, if ships were named something like "Peacekeeper" or "Ambassador" rather than "Torturer" or "Thug", it would lead to a perception of peace-keeping as their intended role.

I'm reminded of Star Trek, where the Federation's focus on "peacekeeping and exploration" never stopped it from fitting even the most measly science vessels with phaser banks and maybe some photon torpedo launchers.

Keep in mind that in Star Trek, both phasers and photon torpedoes are versatile tools (the former being useful for all kinds of pinpoint-accuracy energy delivery, the latter being used for sending probes), and in general, Federation's armament is multi-purpose and not really too optimized for combat.

As well, it's got a lot of naval/old west parallels in story and setting. You'd be hard pressed to find a family venturing west in the 1800s that didn't have a few guns on hand, or a sailing ship between Europe and the Americas that didn't have an armory. There are dangers out in the wild spaces between worlds.

I wonder if these families and vessels had automated "self-destruct sequences" built right into them like the original ST Enterprise did?

The Culture doesn't have quite the same aims as Japan in this scenario. The Culture reluctantly entered into open, large-scale war against the Idirans because they had incompatible morals. The Idirans were religiously-motivated conquerors whose beliefs placed their species above all others, and the Culture is all about personal freedoms. The Culture's goal in the war was to defeat an enemy their ideals could not tolerate and then stop fighting. They were not looking to permanently transition to a more military society, or have those unpleasantly named warships around longer than necessary. The Culture's people knew going into the war that it would be an ugly thing, and the sooner it was done the better.

On the other hand, Japan is not really doing much fighting at all, and their military is even called the "Self-Defense Force." They can't get rid of their military-industrial complex because they already did and what they've got now is what they were left with at the end. It makes sense for Japan to try and make their people comfortable with the idea of coexisting with the SDF, since they will in fact have to coexist with the SDF indefinitely. It's not going anywhere, and it's not really doing anything particularly ugly just sitting there.

On the other hand, The Culture is just sci-fi, while Japan exists.

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