6. The Severe Isolation of the Japanese in Brazil
Brazil joined the Allies in 1942, and declared war on Japan. That deepened the Japanese immigrants’ isolation. All communication with Japan was severed, and no new Japanese were admitted. The immigrants’ radios were confiscated. Those in the more urban coastal areas, with easy access to news, were expelled and relocated to the more rural interior, where news was quite limited. Severed from the outside world and reliable news, Brazil’s Japanese immigrant community became ripe for, and ready recipients of, unreliable news. As a result, many were hurled headfirst into a world of alternative facts – one in which Japan was winning WWII. By the time the war ended in 1945, many Japanese-Brazilians, innocent of the world beyond their immediate circle, were exceptionally vulnerable to bad information. They sincerely believed that Japan had won the war. Those who disagreed or said any different were subjected to rough – at times lethally rough – treatment.
