Goodreads Doesn't Have It, Data Migration: No-No Boy
It was nice to read a book about the Japanese in Seattle. This book's strength is that it shows that both sides are excessively screwed up to the point he can't acquiesce to either willfully; thus the protagonist gives the "none of the above answer"...No-No boy. He speaks on how his parents came to make it rich on easily chumped Americans and then use the money to buy territory in Japan. They never became rich, but they never returned to Japan either. He also speaks on how the Americans incarcerated and racialized the Japanese into internment camps, but then expected them to join the army. Why? Just so they'd be treated the same. There's a pretty powerful section where the suggestion that one marry someone that is sufficiently white so things will just become normal happens towards that end. Freedom from racism isn't a good reason to marry someone. And as much as we know it isn't a good reason, it's often how Japan has been treated... to say no is clearly made to be financially and culturally impossible to them, forcing them to take an offer that in many cases has little to nothing in it for them. But that's not the book's point; the point also says, there is a lot of denial of failures and mistakes, serious blockheaded aggression in Japanese culture. There is the concept of always asking "what's in it for me" that is behind the hard work that caused the Japanese workforce to be exploited. Okada poses the hard question...is one better than the other? It's clear he doesn't think so. That said, not having anything to offer Japan but terrorism is terrible for teaching consent, and mutual trade. However, going in to chump stupid Americans at a profit isn't any better. The protagonists says no to both as equally toxic. But what does he say yes to? Not much. He stays with his parents because it's convenient, it's clear. He goes where the wind takes him. His life doesn't seem meaningful and his connections aren't deep. There isn't a lot of emotional richness to the dialogue here. For instance, when the mother commits suicide it's very much an aside. It's clear she couldn't survive the denial of Japan losing and the father no longer being interested in her as she grows more and more depressed. In addition, with Emi he simply describes her having a sweet face and being beautiful, but there is little to no sign of a true connection that drives him to her strongly. That said, there's content here about police abuse in Seattle, including when they don't bribe the police officer they accuse the Japanese boys of drunk driving, going 80, and attempting to bribe. This wasn't all that long ago and it's clear such a sick culture is still here. They also talk about positive and negative discrimination and how they hurt equally. How being heaped in with the Chinese hurts. How being offered jobs out of guilt or drinks out of sadness at losing skilled labor in the Japanese population that left when the war broke out hurts just as much as being pulled over and treated with injustice hurts. All in all it talks about the difficulty of saying no to both your mother and your bully. A no-no boy.