Last night, in order to watch the weather forecast, I turned on NHK around 6:50 p.m.
Since there had also been tsunami information this morning, I continued watching the 7 p.m. news.
Then NHK began presenting what it called the results of an opinion poll.
It said that the approval rating for the Takaichi Cabinet was 60 percent.
I could hardly believe my ears.
NHK had begun presenting a figure similar to that of the Mainichi Shimbun.
It is over.
There can be no such thing as a de facto state broadcaster that appears to be manipulated to this extent by China.
How long will the government remain silent while an organization that calls itself a public broadcaster and collects receiving fees from the people continues this kind of reporting?
The limit of silence has already been exceeded.
NHK should immediately be summoned to the Diet, or subjected to strict public scrutiny.
Even JNN / TBS NEWS DIG reported today that “according to the latest JNN opinion poll, the approval rating for the Takaichi Cabinet was 70.0 percent.”
And yet NHK presents a figure of 60 percent.
Can this difference really be dismissed merely as a difference in polling methods?
If NHK calls itself a public broadcaster, it should fully disclose to the people its polling methods, questions, sample, response process, and method of aggregation.
NHK has reached the end of the road.
For a long time, I have had serious doubts about NHK’s reporting stance.
A masochistic view of history.
Anti-Japanese thinking.
Pseudo-moralism resembling a left-wing childish disease.
A biased attitude that speaks as if criticism of the government alone were justice.
NHK has continued to create this kind of atmosphere for many years.
And it has elevated, as if symbolic of this atmosphere, certain figures whom it calls its ace announcers.
A person who, to me, appears to have divorced in order to secure the son of one of Japan’s leading celebrities.
After achieving that objective, her husband was placed as the MC of a commercial television wide-show program, where he was made to speak in terms of masochistic historical views, anti-Japanese thinking, and pseudo-moralism, and to criticize the government.
To me, NHK appears to have beautified and praised such a structure.
This is not the form a public broadcaster should take.
At the very least, it is not the form an organization should take if it collects receiving fees uniformly from the people.
I basically watch NHK only for sports broadcasts, nature documentaries, and overseas documentaries such as those from the BBC.
As for its news programs, I can no longer trust them.
If NHK is still going to collect receiving fees, then at the very least those fees should be divided by genre.
Those who want to watch news.
Those who want to watch sports.
Those who want to watch nature programs.
Those who want to watch overseas documentaries.
Each person should pay only for the genre he or she wishes to watch.
At the very least, the present system, under which all citizens are uniformly charged receiving fees for politically biased news programs, can no longer be justified.
If NHK calls itself a public broadcaster, it should first prove its political neutrality before the people.
If it presents opinion poll figures, it should fully disclose the basis for them.
And the government must not continue to leave NHK untouched.
On the very day JNN reported 70 percent, NHK reported 60 percent.
This discrepancy is not merely a difference in numbers.
It is a serious warning that shows how distorted Japan’s reporting space has become.
Watching NHK News tonight, I became convinced once again.
NHK’s reporting no longer deserves the name of public broadcasting.
The Japanese people have reached the point where they must seriously reexamine the true nature of the giant media organization called NHK.