Viewers are divided over whether the film should have shown Japanese victims of the weapon created by physicist Robert Oppenheimer. Experts say it’s complicated.

  • infamousbelgian@waste-of.space
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    77
    arrow-down
    8
    ·
    1 year ago

    The story is not about bombing Japan.

    Yes, that was a war crime. Yes, that was terrible.

    But if you know the story of Oppenheimer, or seen the movie, he did not decide anything. The military took over at that moment in time.

    So if it was a movie about the military, this had to be shown. But it is about him. So a suggestion (as is clearly in the movie for about the last hour or so) is more than enough of you ask me.

    • ormr@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      13
      ·
      1 year ago

      You’re totally right and the discussion (as so many these days) is completely bollocks.

      Since when should the public have the right to demand what an artist ought to put in his work or must not omit. I don’t get it…

      • infamousbelgian@waste-of.space
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        22
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        Agreed, but that is not what the movie is about.

        He did say (no one knows what he believed) that just having the bomb would mean world peace…

          • NuPNuA@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            25
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            1 year ago

            Literally part of the film is him realising this, did you leave after the bomb went off in testing or what?

            • ormr@reddthat.com
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              7
              arrow-down
              17
              ·
              edit-2
              1 year ago

              Typical aggressive online SJW behaviour. Preaching absolute truths and spitting condemnations as if no one had thought about it before. Obviously, the world can be best explained without any nuance or shades of grey ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

          • kayjay@kbin.social
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            15
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            1 year ago

            His reasoning was if the US didn’t make it, the Nazis would, and that would be even worse. He never wanted to make the bomb, it was just the lesser of two evils.

              • TopRamenBinLaden@sh.itjust.works
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                1 year ago

                The US was never trying to exterminate the Japanese race and culture, so no it wasn’t genocide. It was a fucked up act of war, maybe you could even call it an atrocity, but calling it a genocide is wrong by definition.

            • OurToothbrush@lemmy.mlM
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              3
              arrow-down
              6
              ·
              1 year ago

              You can’t use a weapon on a nation, you can only use a weapon on a nation’s population.

      • NuPNuA@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        16
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        Yes, but part of the story of the film is that he’s so caught up in the joy of science and discovery he isn’t thinking that far ahead and it suddenly becomes real after he’s in the meeting deciding on targets (note how that’s one of the few scenes without a score). Then the distance he’s kept at from the use of the weapons inspires his outlook in later scenes.

    • RatherBeMTB@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      arrow-down
      17
      ·
      1 year ago

      Americans in general hate to acknowledge the war crimes they commit. I think it was more about a business decision than anything else.

      • Burnt@lemmy.one
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        7
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        Show me a culture that likes to recognize the war crimes they commited as war crimes.

        The Japanese seem to do way more of sweeping their dirty laundry under the rug from WWII under the rug than Americans.

        And no, that’s not trying to excuse Americans of acknowledging their own war crimes. Every culture should own their past and do their best to learn from their mistakes.

        • Waldhuette@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          1 year ago

          Germany/Germans have absolutely no issue with recognizing our war crimes. I doubt anyone comes as close in terms to acknowledging their dark history.