Hence the not terribly thrilled response within the halls of government at the report that Tanaka, when asked why there is no release date for the environmental impact report on the Futenma Replacement Facility at Henoko, replied in a private meeting with reporters:
「犯す前に犯しますよと言いますか」which, in context, means:
"When you are planning to rape someone, do you say, 'I am going to rape you' ahead of time?"Chief Cabinet Secretary Fujimura Osamu in his morning's press conference said, "If this is true [that Tanaka said such a thing], this is something we cannot just let slide." (J).
Yeahhh, probably not...as it offends just about everybody...and makes difficult the government's job to present the Futenma-to-Henoko move in a positive light.
Holeeeee crap. What an amazing gaffe. I'm guessing that the environmental assessment is just as awful as everyone expects it to be, and soon-to-be-removed Tanaka-san was probably not thrilled with the task of having to "convince" the Okinawans to accept it.
ReplyDeleteWhat government official hangs out with reporters in an izakaya, of all places? Was it a drunken slip of the tongue, or a deliberate (though alcohol fueled) assessment of the assessment?
犯す means to commit a crime, hence 犯罪 is crime, not to rape...
ReplyDeleteUsing the word rape, especially in the context of Okinawa, is a very poor translation.
I think you'll find, anonymous, that it can (and most often does) indeed mean rape. Did you read the Mainichi article? This sentence: 「普天間返還が動いたのは（９５年の）少女暴行事件だ。そういう普天間の歴史を考えても問題がある。簡単に許されるものではなく、更迭に値する」would make no sense if it didn't mean rape.
ReplyDeleteTo the best of my knowledge, there is an equivalent of the English term "raping the environment" in Japanese. If there were, and if it weren't for the awful disregard for political context, it might actually be quite an appropriate metaphor.
That is: To the best of my knowledge, there is NO equivalent of the English term "raping the environment" in Japanese.
ReplyDeleteWhile his choice of words displayed extremely poor taste,
ReplyDeleteI think his point is a good one, and, perhaps I am wrong but appears to be somewhat sympathetic with the Okinawan people...
Is this, then, not "political correctness gone mad"?
強姦する
ReplyDeleteごうかんする
無理矢理仕事などをやらせること。特に女性がこの単語を使うのはいかがかと思います。私はこの言葉が大嫌いなので、もしこの用語を使う男性がいたら「その用語はいかがなものでしょう」と注意し、撲滅する運動にご協力下さい。
http://www.ops.dti.ne.jp/~makinoh2/official/shinjin6.html