This essay examines the silence of Japanese media regarding issues involving South Korea, the contrast with the intense coverage of the Moritomo and Kake scandals, and the societal consequences of Japan’s Personal Information Protection Law enacted under the Koizumi administration.
Through a conversation with a well-read friend, it highlights structural problems in politics, media, and governance.

2019-02-06
The conversation extended even to such matters, and afterward a friend of mine, an avid reader, called me.
“The Diet is investigating matters using extremely primitive methods carried out by workers of the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, which you yourself have described as a workplace in Kasumigaseki with conditions so poor that it is practically equivalent to a black company.
Even bureaucrats are workers after all.
Yet they are conducting surveys in such a pre-modern way, and even attempting the unbelievable task of surveying all companies.
Shinjiro Koizumi, that is what can truly be called nonsense.
Why don’t you stop pretending to be a politician who repeats statements merely to gain favorable coverage from the media.
Instead of doing that, shouldn’t you first answer the allegations that are now being confidently presented on the internet, which can hardly be denied as one of the few media platforms that still convey the truth.
The law your father created for some reason, the Personal Information Protection Law, did not cause any disadvantage to Japanese citizens when it did not exist.
In fact it would not be an exaggeration to say that virtually no Japanese suffered any disadvantage from its absence.
Today it would also not be an exaggeration to say that the only people benefiting from this law are criminals.
Even if victims of criminals who live freely with no fixed address win a civil lawsuit, they cannot recover even one yen.
Lawyers cannot investigate their whereabouts.
Police and prosecutors also say that because of the Personal Information Protection Law they cannot disclose information even if they know it, which is nothing less than a completely absurd excuse.
For what purpose did your father, Junichiro, create such a law?”
Our conversation extended even to such matters.
After that he said.
Even so, regarding the current issues involving South Korea, newspapers and television should naturally report on them with even greater intensity than they did on the Moritomo and Kake scandals.
In particular the wide-show programs of TBS should do so.
And what on earth are programs such as “Chichin Pui Pui,” which you mentioned before, doing.
Perhaps this itself proves that the five percent of pro-North Korean Chongryon-affiliated Koreans in Japan are controlling TBS.
What a disgraceful group they are.
To begin with, are there any decent Japanese people left in that broadcasting station at all.