As Osaka Prefectural Police expand their cybercrime units, this essay recounts the author’s own experience of relentless and malicious online attacks.
It argues that the destruction of The Turntable of Civilization constituted a grave crime that deprived Japan and the world of a transformative intellectual work, inflicting profound economic and social damage, and exposes the deep responsibility of the Asahi Shimbun.

2016-07-03

It was recently reported that, in order to respond to cybercrime, the Osaka Prefectural Police increased the number of personnel assigned to the relevant division by more than 200.
My Turntable of Civilization, one of the greatest essays for the world of the twenty-first century, did not merely result in enormous business losses because I had been a long-time subscriber to the Asahi Shimbun; rather, perhaps because the criminal had roots in a country of bottomless evil and plausible lies, I suffered unbelievable damage both in my life as a businessman and economically, accompanied by anger and bitterness… I encountered firsthand what NHK recently featured over two nights as “killer stress.”
Thanks to the excellent doctors who graduated from Kyoto University’s medical faculty and the nurses (in my case, my attending physician said that the cause of my illness was, in effect, an accident), I completely recovered from a life-threatening illness.
Although the work was done in a hospital room, I had no choice but to appear online, and soon thereafter I received offers from two publishers; I decided to entrust the book to one that was overwhelmingly larger as a company, setting publication for six months later.
The moment I announced this on my blog, The Turntable of Civilization and “Akutagawa Kenji” were subjected to attacks so malicious and persistent as to be unbelievable.
Even my lawyer at the time, who had said he hated the internet and wanted nothing to do with online matters, remarked upon glancing at it during a post-discharge consultation, “This is terrible,” such was the nature of the crime.
It was perpetrated by the aforementioned criminal with roots in a country of bottomless evil and plausible lies.
The moment he was released from prison—where he had been incarcerated for a large-scale bank fraud committed prior to the crimes against my company—he once again began attacking The Turntable of Civilization and “Akutagawa Kenji.”
It was only natural that I could not permit this evil any further, and after consulting a lawyer well-versed in internet matters, I decided to file a criminal complaint.
To the detective in charge, I spoke candidly.
I told him that this crime was, in fact, far larger and deeper.
This was because not only the publisher and I were convinced, but, as it appeared, Kinokuniya’s Umeda Main Store was also convinced that The Turntable of Civilization would certainly achieve a certain level of sales and would have delivered the impact on Japan and the world that it was meant to.
Had that happened, pseudo-moralists—so foolish, arrogant, and childish that they are unaware they are being manipulated by countries of bottomless evil and plausible lies—would not have been able to suddenly hold press conferences in front of television cameras under false academic names,
remaining oblivious not only to how they have long continued to belittle Japan, but also to how they have inflicted enormous damage on the Japanese economy,
and seeking instead to keep Japan—an undisputed great power—diminished, imprisoned as a political captive,
thereby merely further delighting countries of bottomless evil and plausible lies; I am convinced such foolish press conferences would have been impossible.
In other words, that is how grave the crime was.
It was a crime far too great for Japan and the world.
The Asahi Shimbun’s guilt is also profound and deep, for it has continued to plant in the Japanese people nothing but pseudo-moralism—urging unfounded compassion—while entirely failing to convey the true nature of countries of bottomless evil and plausible lies.
To be continued.