July 31, 2017
The headline read, “Tokyo High Public Prosecutors Office Superintending Prosecutor Norisada Has a ‘Woman Problem.’”
The newspaper made a private matter involving a woman the lead story on its front page.
Moreover, the article was based not on the Asahi Shimbun’s own reporting, but on Uwasa no Shinso, a publication regarded as a gossip magazine.
The article stated:
“According to the May issue of Uwasa no Shinso, this 28-year-old woman met Norisada, who was then Director-General of the Minister’s Secretariat at the Ministry of Justice, at an exclusive club in Tokyo’s Ginza district where she worked six years earlier, and the two began a relationship.”
I remember reading this article and feeling strongly, “Ah, the Asahi Shimbun is not a newspaper at all.”
I do not know what kind of conflict may have existed between the Asahi Shimbun and Norisada, but I was chilled by the thought that, merely to discredit someone it disliked, the newspaper would place a quotation from Uwasa no Shinso as the lead story on its front page without conducting any reporting of its own.
I have never seen another newspaper publish an article that unabashedly says, “According to Uwasa no Shinso.”
The aforementioned Yomiuri Shimbun article, although it has been criticised in various ways, was at least based on the newspaper’s own proper reporting and was so much more respectable that the two articles cannot even be compared.
Casting aside its dignity as a major newspaper, devoid of the pride expected of reporting and journalism professionals, heedless of shame or appearances, and intent solely on bringing down anyone it has identified as an enemy—the Asahi Shimbun’s attitude runs through its present indiscriminate attacks on the Abe administration.
To be continued.