The following is from a feature article in the February issue of the monthly magazine WiLL, entitled "Asahi's Ishiba Control Operation," a dialogue between Masayuki Takayama and Mion Sugita.
When Ishiba goes right, Asahi whips him to make him go left
A lie becomes the truth if it is told a hundred times
Takayama
Several critical political events have recently occurred, including the Tokyo gubernatorial election, the LDP presidential election, the general election, and the US presidential election, and the question of the role of the media has always been raised.
In particular, the fact that social networking services (SNS) have impacted election results, particularly among the younger generation, has been a notable feature.
Have the existing media (old media = newspapers, TV, magazines) lost their power?
Ms. Sugita, who decided not to run in the general election this time, has been fighting against the old media for a long time.
Sugita
I don't think there has ever been a politician who has been attacked as much as I have.
In 2017, I was elected to the House of Representatives as a proportional representation candidate for the LDP.
This was my second term after serving one term in the opposition.
The Asahi Shimbun and other media outlets seized on me, a first-year LDP member of parliament who was neither a minister nor a parliamentary secretary, and denounced the article "LGBTs are not productive" that I wrote for the August 2018 issue of Shinchō 45 as "discrimination."
Takayama
It was a group lynching.
The fact that Shinchō 45 was forced to suspend publication due to the furor only added to the problem.
I can understand if a first-year member of parliament is attacked over a scandal, but normally, ministers and other high-ranking officials are attacked for taking things out of context.
From the very beginning, they treated you like a big shot.
Sugita
Sugita
I think they were trying to make an example of people by firing a volley of criticism at them, saying that anyone who objects to sexual minorities like LGBT is an enemy of human rights and must not be tolerated.
Because of this atmosphere, the Act for the Promotion of LGBT Understanding was passed without much opposition in 2023.
Anyway, after that, I was criticized every time something happened.
I was criticized for heckling in the Diet, for saying that "women tell lies," and for writing on his blog about "cosplay grannies."
Mr. Toshihiro Nikaido even said, "Why is Mr. Sugita being criticized so much?
Takayama
In 2016, when Sugita was just an ordinary citizen and not a member of parliament, she participated in the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, which continues to disseminate anti-Japanese sentiment.
She wrote about the behavior of the people involved on her blog.
She wrote about the women who participated: "There were even cosplay grandmothers in traditional Korean dress and Ainu folk costume. There is a complete lack of dignity."
It was just a straightforward opinion.
However, the media, including the Asahi Shimbun, picked up on that one sentence and hung her out to dry.
It's been six years since she made that comment, but they've dug up and brought up an old story.
Sugita
It was easy to attack me because I was a parliamentary secretary.
The Asahi editorial (dated September 23, 2023) even wrote that I "no longer has the qualifications to be a member of parliament" and was effectively sentenced to "resign."
Takayama
It's a threat that you won't get another chance if you go against the Asahi.
Sugita
Speaking of heckling, when Yuichiro Tamaki, the leader of the Democratic Party for the People, said in the Diet that there were women who couldn't get married without the option of having different surnames, several Diet members heckled back, saying, "If that's the case, then don't get married."
I was the only one who got hammered for it.
I consulted with a senior member of the LDP, saying, "I'm being asked about the heckling."
He replied, "Just ignore the heckling," so I didn't do anything.
Then it all blew up.
Takayama
On September 25, 2020, at a closed-door meeting of the LDP, Sugita commented on violence against women and sex crimes, saying, "Women can lie as much as they like."
It also caused a stir.
Sugita
The person I was referring to was Yoon Mee-hyang, who was the head of the Teitaikyo (now the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan) at the time.
At the time, the Korean Council was a sacred place, and there had been a series of revelations about problems, such as the misuse of public funds that no one had been able to touch for many years.
However, before I knew it, the story had been twisted to make it seem like I was criticizing women who had suffered sexual abuse.
Takayama
Yoon Mee-hyang misappropriated donations for her own use and was convicted.
The newspapers and TV stations knew this but still quoted you out of context and attacked you.
But as the saying goes, "A lie told a hundred times becomes the truth," if the media continue to report on Sugita-san in this way, then that will become the accepted view.
Sugita
Even now, I meet people criticizing me at lectures and other events.
However, when they hear me speak, they say their impression of me has changed.
Also, people say I say "abusive things," but most of the things I say are in blogs or magazine articles, and the number of times I have spoken directly is only a handful.
There are a lot of false impressions.
This article continues.
*I stopped subscribing to Asahi in August 2014, so I had no idea, but it was Asahi that consistently made Ishiba the most popular candidate in public opinion polls and even made him prime minister.
It was also the Asahi Shimbun that made Naoto Kan prime minister and turned Fukushima into "Fukushima."
The Asahi Shimbun is also responsible for the ongoing deflation we are still suffering from today.
Even though the true nature of the Asahi Shimbun has become clear and it has fallen into a deep decline, the Asahi Shimbun still has a lot of influence because the TV media still produces news programs and talk shows based on the content of the Asahi Shimbun.
Because of newspapers like this, Japan is in such a mess.
It is indisputable that the people with brains who read the Asahi Shimbun carefully and subscribe to it still dominate the world of politics, academics, and so-called intellectuals, but Ishiba and Kishida, who gave birth to him, have further demonstrated this indisputable fact.
However, the manner in which this Kishiba administration has been dominated by such a ridiculous, traitorous, and sellout newspaper must end.
