Natural Disasters and Man-Made Disasters

All the many tens of thousands of people whose lives were affected by the earthquake and tsunami of March 11 were victims of a horrendous natural disaster. Even in the greater Tokyo metropolitan area, hundreds of kilometers away from the epicenter, many people suffered damage to their homes and other property. But if these same people later help to spread groundless rumors by refusing to buy a certain type of vegetable or vowing not to consume a particular kind of fish, thereby harming the livelihoods of farmers and fishermen, then they are no longer victims. They become perpetrators of harm themselves.

The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) was also a victim of the earthquake and tsunami—but most people hold the company responsible for the nuclear crisis in Fukushima. In a sense the same thing can be said of Japan as a whole. In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, as expressions of sympathy and support poured in from all over the world, Japan was seen exclusively as the victim of a terrible catastrophe. But as the situation in Fukushima grew more serious, some people began to think of Japan as a culprit too, as the source of potentially dangerous radiation leaks.

Perpetrator or Victim—Where to Draw the Line?

In this sense, the question of who is a victim and who is a culprit is not as clear as it might seem. In the case of natural disasters, it may seem obvious at first glance that nature is the perpetrator and human society the victim. But it was people who reclaimed land from the oceans in the first place, putting up factories along the coast and scattering hotels in places of natural beauty. If these acts ultimately lead to greater suffering when a natural disaster hits, then one could take the position that human activity is at least partly to blame for the calamity.

Of course, the suffering of all those whose lives have been affected by this terrible disaster demands our deepest sympathies. But if we look at the situation from the perspective of Mother Nature, we may see that human beings are not simply victims in cases like these, and that nature, despite her awesome destructive power, is not simply an inflictor of violence. We are culprits too, harming nature through our activities perhaps as much as nature ever harms us.

To put it another way, perhaps it is the people who live alongside the awesome destructive power of nature on a constant basis who are better qualified than anyone else to act as the true protectors of nature.

(Originally written in Japanese on May 12, 2011.)