This essay argues that harmful rumors surrounding the Fukushima accident—including bullying of evacuated children and foreign import bans—originate not from citizens but from mass-media fear-mongering. It calls for “information decontamination” and warns that China and South Korea exploit Japan’s misreporting just as in historical-issues propaganda.

February 21, 2017
It is not the state power nor the internet that can create such rumors, but none other than the power of the mass media.
What follows is from the Sankei Shimbun’s Sunday column “Shinbun ni Katsu!” on page 9.
This essay by former University of Tokyo Historiographical Institute professor Nobuhiko Sakai is another example in which a small newspaper column contains genuine truth.
The likes of TV Asahi’s Hōdō Station during the era when Furutachi was the anchor must recognize that their program embodies the very root of bullying pointed out in this essay.
What this essay reveals is yet another proof that pseudo-morality creates evil.
Against the nation, it fabricates the wartime comfort-women issue and the Nanjing Massacre; against children, it produces bullying over the nuclear accident.
Furutachi, employees of the Asahi—no matter how second-rate you may be, it is time you realized the evil you have continued to commit.
You must consider taking responsibility for it.
(All emphasis except the title is mine.)
Why Children Are Bullied After Evacuating
By Nobuhiko Sakai, former Professor, University of Tokyo Historiographical Institute
One problem that has been widely discussed recently is that children evacuated to other prefectures because of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident have been bullied at their new schools.
The issue surfaced with a case involving a Yokohama junior-high student in November last year, and the student’s written account was also made public.
According to it, the student was treated as if contaminated, told “you got compensation money,” forced to hand over money, and had 1.5 million yen taken.
Moreover, this bullying had continued since elementary-school days.
After that, cases of “evacuation bullying” were gradually revealed in Niigata City, Tokyo’s Chiyoda Ward, Kawasaki City, Chiba Prefecture, and elsewhere.
It is strange that nearly six years after the Great East Japan Earthquake, the issue is only now becoming prominent.
Bullying may have various pretexts, but nuclear-accident bullying is indeed extremely peculiar.
In these cases, children imitate adults.
The Sankei Shimbun’s February 7 editorial “Shuchō” is commendable for focusing on this point.
It states:
“Calling someone names such as ‘radiation will infect me’ wounds them without cause.
It is a base act that shows ignorance of the pain of the victims.
Responsibility cannot be placed solely on children.
We must recognize that the root lies in the actions of adults who, without grounds, fear the effects of the nuclear accident and fuel harmful rumors.”
The editorial asserts that “the behavior of adults” lies behind the bullying, and concludes by saying, “We must strive to build a society that does not tolerate discrimination and prejudice, including in the mass media.”
Yet the greatest responsibility lies with the mass media—the newspapers, television broadcasters, and publishers.
While the media have repeatedly criticized the response of educational authorities, it is the media’s excessive fear-mongering reports about the nuclear accident that lie at the root of this bullying.
The editorial also mentions “rumors” and “harmful rumors.”
But rumors are not natural phenomena.
Only the mass media—not state power, not the internet—can create them.

February 21, 2017
What follows continues the previous section.
One major form of harmful rumor related to the nuclear accident is the import bans placed on Japanese agricultural and marine products by foreign countries.
In particular, China, South Korea, and Taiwan have continued to impose strict import restrictions.
This too is a full-fledged case of harmful rumor on an international scale.
Moreover, in the case of China and South Korea, these actions must be regarded as deliberate political measures.
Just as China once banned imports of Filipino bananas.
The structure in which Japan’s mass media distribute erroneous news and China and South Korea exploit it politically is identical to that of the historical-issues problem.
The conscientious press must devote its strength to reporting that corrects such false rumors.
In other words, it is not only the soil that requires decontamination.
The contamination of information surrounding the nuclear accident must also be removed.
Nobuhiko Sakai
Born 1943 in Kawasaki City.
Completed the Master’s Program in Humanities at the University of Tokyo Graduate School.
Worked at the Tokyo University Historiographical Institute on the compilation of Dai Nihon Shiryo.