"At your Own Risk"

I want to answer the question from Joufy in her comment added to my April 19 blog. Her question is "Why do the ex-hostages feel ashamed after their return home?" I would say it is because the majority of Japanese people have been criticizing them for having gone to Iraq. When they were captured, some people even said that they deserved it. Then, what has made most of the Japanese so unkind? It's a long story.

Before the Japanese government decided to send its Self-Defense Forces (SDF) to Iraq, there had been some volunteers and NGO people from Japan. (Ms. Takato, one of the ex-hostages, was one of them and she had been helping Iraqi orphans.) They were against the government policy to send SDF to Iraq, because it would make their activities difficult and make their lives dangerous.

The government denied the helpfulness of these people, saying that only SDF could contribute to the recovery of Iraq. That was a mere excuse to make the anti-constitutional decision. In fact, the government was inconsistent when they said, on the one hand, that Iraq was too dangerous for NGO to act, and on the other hand, that SDF would be sent to an area out of danger.

When the three Japanese were captured by an Iraqi group, the government thought of using this incident as a propaganda: "Civilians must stop going to Iraq. Only the governmental policy, only SDF can do something." Governmental members criticized the three people for their anti-governmental act, and warned us not to think of going to Iraq to help people there. "If you insist on going, it must be at your own risk," they threatened. Newspapers and television affirmatively broadcast what they said, and many of us began to think, "The three people went to Iraq at their own risk. They had not followed Japan's decision. They were too selfish." So, there were a lot of people who did not welcome them when they were released. They were sometimes treated as selfish idiots who had troubled the government. People said, "It's not fair to spend our tax on them. They went to Iraq at their own risk. They have to pay." And the government asked them to pay a part of money needed to bring them back home.

Am I explaining well? Anyway, this is how I see the issue. Of course, there are different views like this.

I completely oppose the point of view of the government and many of the Japanese people. We must remember that the three people were captured because Japan had sent SDF, and that they were released because they had turned out to be civilians who have different view from the Japanese government.