In my September 25, 2017 article, “In Order to Show with Facts That No One Has Ruined This Country More Than You Have over the Past Twenty Years,” I placed my criticism of Haruki Murakami within an even larger criticism of the mass media.
This chapter was originally based on an article I published on July 25, 2010, with additions and revisions.
In other words, from immediately after I began my blog, I had thoroughly criticized how much the postwar Japanese mass media had degraded this country.
What I criticized was not mere biased reporting.
It was overconcentration in Tokyo, overconcentration of information in Tokyo, the second-rate status imposed on regional cities, mob politics, populism, the mass production of celebrity politicians, the fixation of a deflationary mindset, and the loss of Japan’s national wealth.
Over the past twenty years, the greatest culprit that ruined Japan was not politicians, but rather the mass media.
The mass media themselves had become an organization like the Imperial Rule Assistance Association, while calling others by that name.
They continued to mistake GHQ’s occupation policy for Japan itself.
They convinced themselves that attacking their own government was journalism, and they did not conduct discussions to enrich Japan, free the Japanese people, and raise Japanese intellect to the highest level.
What I sought was for Japan to become one of the world’s greatest financial powers, alongside the United States, to increase its national wealth, eliminate deflation, and put an end to the declining birthrate and aging population.
Only wealth, prosperity, and the freedom and highest intellect born from them can save human beings from the foolishness of poverty, envy, jealousy, resentment, and killing one another.
However, the mass media avoided such essential discussion and devoted themselves to immature comedy programs, attacks on politicians, and the elevation of celebrity politicians.
Within that structure, I saw the conduct of NHK and the Asahi Shimbun as being of the same nature.
NHK’s news department uses Beat Takeshi, and the Asahi Shimbun uses Haruki Murakami.
This is an extremely important point.
For the Asahi Shimbun-like discourse space, Haruki Murakami was not merely a writer.
He was a symbolic figure whom the Asahi Shimbun could use to reinforce its own pseudo-moralism, masochistic view of history, anti-government attitude, and postwar values.
That is why the Asahi Shimbun continued to elevate him.
That is why Haruki Murakami’s statements and works cannot be dismissed as merely a matter of literature.
He was a person given an important role within the atmosphere created by the postwar Japanese mass media: an atmosphere that degraded Japan, refused to look at reality, avoided discussion of wealth and prosperity, and guided the people through pseudo-moralism.
Therefore, my criticism of Haruki Murakami was not criticism of Haruki Murakami alone.
It was criticism of the Asahi Shimbun-like mass media, the NHK-like news space, the information control of postwar Japan, and the very structure that had degraded this country for more than twenty years.