The following is the written statement that, at the time, I had an employee of my company deliver to the Kansai Economic Federation.
2010-7-19
When people come to Tokyo from Osaka, a certain number of them say, “Osaka has less greenery than Tokyo.”
Naturally.
They arrive at Tokyo Station.
An immense expanse of greenery can be seen before their eyes…
Yet they fail to notice that it is a place no one is permitted to enter and that it reveals an essential difference between this country and America.
As soon as Mr. Shimozuma became chairman of the Kansai Economic Federation, he said, “Why not turn the second phase of the North Yard into a park like New York’s Central Park?”
Whether or not he knew that it was land belonging to the Japanese National Railways Settlement Corporation, which left behind a deficit of 30 trillion yen as a “tax burden on the people.”
Needless to say, this coveted land can be sold for several hundred billion yen.
Just think how many people in need of help could be saved with that money.
Tokyo is a plain extending as far as the eye can see, but Osaka has Minoh to the north, Ikoma to the east, and Rokko to the west.
It is a narrow plain surrounded by green mountain ranges.
That is why it has the highest population density in Japan.
Minoh Quasi-National Park is fifteen minutes by car from Umeda.
Rokko and Arima Onsen are forty-five minutes away.
Ikoma is slightly inconvenient—Nara has the smallest population—but even with congestion, it is only an hour away.
Senri New Town, ten minutes by car from Umeda, is a city of greenery.
Even Kyoto! is only forty-five minutes away by car.
By train, it takes twenty-four to fifty minutes on JR, Hankyu, or Keihan.
Even Arashiyama, which requires a transfer, is only fifty minutes away.
Having rediscovered Kyoto yet again last autumn, I spent every weekend walking alone around Arashiyama and Kiyomizu-dera in order to immerse myself in autumn foliage that could only be described as exquisite and in the atmosphere of the finest city in the world.
I even engaged in somewhat astonishing power walking, such as walking continuously for an hour from Ginkaku-ji to Hankyu Shijo Station…
Naturally, I was accompanied by the streets of Kyoto and the finest music of our time on my iPod.
Here lies the pitfall into which the people called prominent figures in our country fall.
And it is also the pitfall of Japan’s mass media, led by the Asahi Shimbun, which have continued genuinely to believe that asking prominent figures for their opinions constitutes democracy.
The reason this happens—are they not all supposed to be outstanding elites and mild-mannered, cultivated gentlemen?—is summed up in a single line that I wrote on my website almost as if out of nowhere.
After writing this text last weekend, I searched the Internet on Sunday because I wanted to obtain accurate figures concerning parks in Tokyo and Osaka.
I discovered something truly valuable.
It was an article published in the Osaka Asahi Shimbun in Taisho 12.
I have enclosed it, but I quote an extract below.
(The black lettering is mine.)
Urban Parks and Their Use by Citizens: A Comparison of Tokyo and Osaka and Their Respective Merits
Differences in Facilities and Maintenance: A Statistical Study by Park Researcher Mr. Obayashi
In short, Tokyo is superior in parks within the city, while Osaka is superior in suburban parks; Tokyo has parks within the city, such as Ueno, Asakusa, Shiba, and Hibiya, which are well equipped and widely used, but as parks outside the city it has only Inokashira and Asukayama; by contrast, the outskirts of Osaka are extremely rich in suburban parks, including Minoh, Sumiyoshi, Ohama, Hamadera, and Momogaike on the Hankai Hirano Line, as well as Takarazuka and the Ikoma amusement park; however, its parks within the city are extremely poor.
It is disheartening that Osaka, an industrial city, has poorer parks within the city than Tokyo, which is comparatively quiet and is a city of learning; this is because suburban parks are of little use to the classes that need parks, such as workers and the poor, while nearby parks within the city are urgently needed by workers and others who have little leisure time.
This article also teaches us that Japan, in imitating Europe, imitated even its class society.
I conclude that the idea of turning the land for the second phase into a green forest is almost identical to the thinking of this writer and amounts to nothing more than riding the environmental boom and talking about greenery.
The statement that “it will lead to greater motivation among working people…” in the September 26 article in the Nikkei Shimbun entitled “The Association of Corporate Executives Calls for Green Space” proves precisely that point.
I believe it vividly proves that your way of thinking has not changed in the slightest from that of Japan eighty years ago.
What do you think?
The same applies to the fundamental defects of Japan’s mass media, represented by the Asahi Shimbun.
A journalist, and journalism itself, should thoroughly pursue reflection and verification concerning the issue being addressed and publish the resulting opinion under the journalist’s own name, yet whenever something happens, the media attempt to ask the opinions of people they call experts.
I believe journalism should first publish the opinion at which the journalist has arrived and arouse public debate, and then express thanks or offer rebuttals in response to the arguments for and against it.
Generally speaking, no one can suddenly be asked a question and give an answer that strikes the very heart of the matter.
They may be able to say something that is no more than an idea that has just occurred to them.
Yet they still do not understand something so obvious.
What wretched journalism this is.
They have effectively produced newspapers by prominent figures and for prominent figures, and that is connected to the fact that, more than sixty years ago, they drove innocent citizens into the worst war in history.
Regarding the proposal to turn the second-phase land into a green forest, although Japan has suffered a major decline for twenty years and although people may work throughout their lives for an annual income of five million yen, this is now an age of two-day weekends, and almost every household owns at least one car.
Indeed, even a twenty-year-old owns a car or at least has a driving licence, and rental cars are available everywhere.
Yesterday, I was speaking with a perfectly ordinary female office worker who visited my company.
“When I want greenery and nature on a day off, I go to Kyoto or some other place in the suburbs…”
Among Yosui Inoue’s masterpieces is the wonderful song “The Frame of a Picture of a Long Slope.”
It contains the lyric, “Watching the arrogance of those who are fulfilled.”
People who are fulfilled become arrogant, whether consciously or unconsciously.
When I searched the Internet, I was astonished to find on the first page, among the displayed headlines, a 2channel-style remark saying, “Osaka is ○○, isn’t it? Don’t compare it with Tokyo.”
Yet I also thought that it was only to be expected.
Might it not be close to the “true feelings” of satisfied Tokyo and the true feelings of the Liberal Democratic Party?
In the past, whenever there was a political upheaval, I foolishly thought, “As expected of the Asahi,” when reading its articles displaying an intimate knowledge of the inner workings of the Liberal Democratic Party, and I found them interesting.
Since Heisei 2, however, I have regarded it as a grave sinner.
This time, I cannot simply stand by and watch.
Why?
Because, never imagining that anything like this could happen, I paid no attention whatsoever to Tokyo, where everyone else was heading, and, completely convinced that the North Yard would revive Osaka, I also made a major investment in Osaka.
In other words, just as I had chosen Osaka as the stage of my life, I confidently chose Osaka for the final stage of my life as well—although there was only one property that met my standards.
This incident is the second disaster brought about by the fundamental illness of this country.
I was seized by a despair and melancholy that you could not possibly imagine, but then came the determination that I would not allow this to be done to me twice.
This is a battle.
I absolutely cannot lose.
I recovered with the determination that I would not allow my life to be reduced to nothing twice by egotists who are, in truth, the guilty parties.
It is precisely the familiar TV Asahi phrase: “There is a battle we absolutely cannot lose.”