LETTERS: JAs say injustices ‘must never happen again’

Dear Editor,

We join with 40 other Jodo Shinshu Buddhists, the Jodo Shinshu being a school of Buddhism whose adherents in this country are largely Japanese American.

Many of us were imprisoned in internment camps during World War II, most as children, in some cases without our fathers, (as is happening to some children today,) all this solely because of our ethnicity. Some of us were born in internment camps. Others have (or had) parents, grandparents, spouses, in-laws, or dear friends who were interned.

Because of this, and because Buddhists believe that we must not wrong others, the prospect of more detention camps on American soil — camps for asylum seekers who had a legal right to apply for asylum and for their children as well — is deeply distressing to us. The wrong that we suffered must never happen again.

Also, the fact that so many of the children who have been forcibly separated from their parents have not been reunited with them, and the plan to establish a special detention camp with military guards for “unaccompanied and separated children,” are appalling, not only to Buddhists but surely to anybody.

Evelyn Nakano Glenn, Albany, Calif.

Carolyn Kuroda Fernandez, El Cerrito, Calif.

Diane Ames, El Cerrito