This article presents a detailed English translation of a WiLL magazine dialogue between Masayuki Takayama and Akira Iiyama, exposing severe distortions in Japanese media reporting on the assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
Key issues include the premature labeling of Yamagami as a “former MSDF member,” contradictions in ballistic evidence, unanswered questions about funding and equipment, the lack of thorough investigation, and the media’s fixation on the former Unification Church.
The discussion highlights how outlets such as Asahi and Mainichi frame Yamagami as a victim while implying that Abe “brought it on himself,” contributing to nationwide financial support for the suspect and creating an alarmingly distorted public narrative.

And while they defend and sympathize with Yamagami as a victim, they also imply that the killing of Abe, who was a symbol of conservatism, was his own fault.
November 29, 2022

The following is from the special dialogue published in the November 26 issue of the monthly magazine WiLL, titled “Celebration: The Death Agony of the Asahi as It Falls Below Four Million Copies,” featuring Masayuki Takayama, the one and only journalist in the postwar world, and the rising critic Akira Iiyama, who has swept onto the intellectual stage with confidence.
Emphases within the text other than headings are mine.

There are so many things that raise concerns, yet the media refuse to investigate—sheer negligence.

The Asahi drops below four million copies
Takayama:
Professor Iiyama, I always enjoy reading your Sankei column “Newspapers, Pull Yourselves Together!”

Iiyama:
Thank you very much.

Takayama:
The media have truly become hopeless.
It was officially announced that the Asahi Shimbun has fallen below four million copies.

Iiyama:
And those numbers include the oshigami—the excess copies forced onto distributors beyond actual subscriber numbers.

Takayama:
Exactly.
If you subtract those numbers, some say the real circulation is just over three million.
The oshigami system actually used to benefit distributors in a way.
If a distributor said, “We deliver this many copies,” they could attract more lucrative insert advertisements.
Their income increased.
For example, if the Tokyo Shimbun reaches a hundred households but the Asahi reaches three hundred, the advertisers expect greater effect.
But due to the COVID pandemic, insert advertisements plummeted.
As a result, even Asahi distributors found no meaning in accepting more oshigami, and it became a burden, leading some to go out of business.
Naturally, the number of oshigami dropped.

Iiyama:
A welcome development (laughs).
Newspapers haven’t been read for a long time, but it seems the real numbers are finally catching up.

The media have changed drastically
Takayama:
Another factor accelerating the loss of readers is that the media itself has transformed beyond recognition.
When I was active, social-affairs reporters were fueled by a strong sense of justice.
Political reporters also had a certain political ethic when they reported.
But today’s reporters are different.
They only nitpick people’s words and behavior, doing anything they can to drag down politicians.
Izoko Mochizuki of the Tokyo Shimbun is the very embodiment of that trend.

Iiyama:
It’s not limited to the Asahi.

Takayama:
Indeed, including foreign correspondents.
Reporters should look at the facts and write accurately, but that is no longer the case.
Even in the Abe shooting incident, the media’s reporting attitude raises major doubts.
The first responsibility of a social-affairs reporter is to get the full picture from the police.
But there was no independent reporting—only leaks and fragments from the police.

Iiyama:
Very early on, information spread that Yamagami was a “former Maritime Self-Defense Force member,” and I found that strange.

Takayama:
Moreover, the image “former MSDF member = bad” preceded everything.
Then came information that his family had been involved with the former Unification Church and that he held resentment.
But that was from twenty years ago.
And when did he decide to carry out the attack?
That was only within the past year.
It makes no sense.

The public—including myself—must remember that at first the media strangely emphasized that he was a former MSDF member.
While organizing this section, I became even more convinced: the only country that wants to villainize the MSDF is China (perhaps Korea as well).
My conviction deepens that China may have been involved in manipulating Yamagami.

Iiyama:
The pieces just don’t add up.

Takayama:
His parents supposedly went bankrupt due to church donations, and he himself supposedly couldn’t hold down a job as a SDF officer and lived in poverty—yet Yamagami rented two apartments, drove a car, and bought expensive machining tools to manufacture modified guns.
It is utterly strange.
One can’t help suspecting a sponsor.
And as some journals have pointed out, the explanation of the bullet trajectory that killed Abe contradicts the known position of Yamagami when he fired.
According to Professor Hidekata Fukushima of Nara Medical University, the bullet passed from above to below.
But the video shows clearly that Yamagami was firing upward from below.
The angles do not match at all, yet no media outlet mentions it.
Some dismiss concerns with “that’s just a conspiracy theory,” like Oswald in the Kennedy assassination.
But social-affairs reporters should address such doubts.

Iiyama:
The remaining bullets are still unaccounted for.

Takayama:
The weapon seems to have been designed to fire three rounds at a time, and Yamagami fired twice.
Even if one bullet hit Abe, five are still missing.
And yet the Nara Prefectural Police waited five days to conduct a full on-site investigation.
An unbelievably sloppy investigation.
And still, the media do not press this issue.
Reporters should not accept “the bullets can’t be found”; they should investigate why.
Where did Yamagami learn to manufacture firearms?
Some say he learned on the internet, but that seems impossible.
There are so many things that raise questions, yet the media refuse to examine them.

Iiyama:
In short, nothing has been revealed.

Turning him into a “tragic hero”
Takayama:
Meanwhile, the media focus solely on the former Unification Church, and social-affairs reporters only chase alleged ties between LDP lawmakers and the church.

Iiyama:
They aggressively feature “poor second-generation victims” raised under the church.
As a result, calls escalate—from stripping the church of legal religious status to demanding a dissolution order.
But an objective comparison of doctrine and practice does not lead to the conclusion that the former Unification Church is uniquely dangerous compared with other religions.
As for “second generation” issues, children born to Muslim parents are born Muslims.
Apostasy is punishable by death.
Unless they are extraordinarily lucky, they cannot escape it for a lifetime.
By contrast, Yamagami himself was not a church member.
His mother is said to have donated 100 million yen, but the family was economically well-off.
Ignoring such facts, the media frame Yamagami as a “tragic victim” of the church—almost as if he were a “tragic hero.”
Especially the Asahi and Mainichi publish daily “expert opinions” based on feelings and speculation, repeating the claim that the real villains are conservative ideas, traditional values, and the LDP that promotes them.
And while defending Yamagami as a victim, they imply that Abe—symbol of conservatism—deserved to be killed.
They even spread conspiracy-like claims that “the LDP is controlled by the former Unification Church.”
Perhaps encouraged by such rumors, more than one million yen in support money has been sent to Yamagami from all over the country.
Yamagami is undergoing psychiatric evaluation, but unknown to him, he is being treated as a hero.
A truly abnormal situation.

This essay continues.