In light of the issues concerning the alt-right, controversial statues, racism and other current issues in America, I decided to look at pop culture from the 1960s for answers. To do this, I am returning to discuss, again, the themes from a Twilight Zone episode. This time I'm looking at episode 31 of season 5, "The Encounter". This is an incredible episode and can't recommend watching it enough. The plot is a Japanese gardener named Arthur (George Takei) comes to a WWII vet's house looking for gardening work. In the end, mutual prejudices, loneliness and guilt are revealed to be the downfall of both characters.
The overarching theme is racism, prejudice and guilt. The vet, Fenton, is in his attic, which displays a myriad of Japanese souvenirs from the war. The one piece that freaks him out is a samurai sword, engraved in Japanese with the words "the sword will avenge me. While he claims he got it off an officer who tried to kill him, it is revealed that it was taken off of a surrendering officer that Fenton shot rather than take in. The sword "speaks" to the gardener when he holds it, almost possesses him to act like a WWII Japanese soldier.
While Fenton's racism and prejudices are playing out, it is revealed that the gardener was a 4-year-old at Pearl Harbor during the attack and his father worked on the base. Initially, he tells a story about his father looking on in dismay that "men of his own race" would bomb what he built and that he was trying to warn the sailors about the attack. Turns out, his father was actually a traitor and was signaling the bombers. The veracity of this historical tidbit aside (I haven't been able to confirm or dispute it), it shows the constant guilt Arthur is living with. His family was responsible for the deaths of thousands of men, women and children throughout the Pacific theater.
So on one side, we have a hypocritical racist, willing to pawn off the responsibility for his actions. On the other side, a guilt ridden man who thinks hiding his identity (changed his name, won't speak Japanese in public) will ease his guilt and make life easier. Deep down Fenton is conflicted with himself and alone because of his own actions. Arthur's guilt has made him prejudicial in his own right as well as reactionary and short tempered.
In the final struggle, Fenton's racism leads him to attack Arthur, leading to his accidental death by the samurai sword. This adds to Arthur's guilt, he is now personally responsible for the death of a man, and he kills himself by jumping out the window. Because neither man truly deals with their biggest character flaws, those flaws are the cause of their own deaths. This is a genuinely universal and timeless truth of humanity. If we do not deal with our "issues", they will kill us.
What's my point in all of this? If we don't deal with our own troubled national and personal histories we will end up destroying ourselves. Yes, America was founded and grew on racist law and activities. Nothing can excuse it, but hiding it or rationalizing it won't make things better. We as a nation need to own it, recognize what it was and acknowledge that we have evolved past that as a nation and we will never go back to it. Individual groups who are at each other's throats also need to recognize their own ugly roots and disassociate from them but don't bury them otherwise no one will learn from them.
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