Since 2023, several jaw-dropping scandals have broken out in the Japanese entertainment industry, from the BBC's report at the beginning of the year that the late Johnny Kitagawa, the founder of Johnny's Agency, sexually assaulted his male artists before his death, and the disintegration of Johnny's Agency; to the scandal at the Takarazuka Opera Company Aoi, an important member of the Dezhou team, chose to commit suicide because he could not bear the bullying and work pressure; and then Matsumoto Shi was exposed by Bunharu for sexually assaulting an amateur woman at a banquet. Yoshimoto Kogyo Office, where Matsumoto worked, will cooperate with the weekly magazine that reported the matter Bunharu went to court to fight a lawsuit over his reputation; in addition, the fourth generation Ichikawa Sarunosuke was arrested on suspicion of assisting his parents to commit suicide, Nagayama Ayato was arrested for drug abuse, director Sakaki Hideo was arrested on suspicion of rape, and manga artist Ashihara Princess Naiko was arrested for the live-action of her comics Being tampered with by ntv during the process, he couldn't bear the harassment and psychological pressure and committed suicide. Among these incidents, there are some personal behaviors that have nothing to do with the firm or the group, and there are also incidents that are related to the firm or the group. Scandals include sexual assault, bullying, drug abuse and even assisted suicide.
Although many people attribute the darkness of the Japanese entertainment industry to "evil capital" and "evil plutocrats", this "omnipotent" and vague attribution cannot provide a strong explanation for specific events and gives people a big impression. The feeling of emptiness, as Tilly pointed out when evaluating Custer's works: is like a giant ship with most of the screws not tightened, sailing precariously on the sea [1]. The main causes of different scandals are different. This article aims to analyze the specific situations of different cases and explore the factors behind them.
1. Comparison of sexual assault incidents between Kitagawa and Matsumoto Shi.
As celebrities in the entertainment industry who have been deeply involved in sexual assault scandals, there are many similarities between Kitagawa and Matsumoto Shi. There are also many differences.
The biggest difference between the two scandals lies in their identities, which directly determines the defense logic and motivation of the defenders. Kitagawa Johnny is the founder of Johnny & Associates and the actual helmsman of Johnny & Associates for a long time. He is the producer and promoter (Bole) of many Johnny's male idols. In terms of his position in the entertainment industry, Kitagawa is the man behind the scenes. After the 21st century, he rarely stands in front of the media and only appears in paparazzi photos. He has formed a relationship with Hollywood luxury industry giants such as David Geffen. sharp contrast. Japanese bosses are even more isolated than their Korean counterparts [2]. The very few appearances make it impossible for Kitagawa to enjoy a large number of personal fans in Japan, which has highly developed media resources; but the choice of rarely appearing in front of the camera has given Kitagawa himself a layer of mystery, and it is easy for people to think of "genius Kitagawa" Cognition. And because the success of Johnny's male idols is inseparable from Kitagawa's promotion and accumulation of resources, most of Kitagawa's defenders are "Auntie Jay", that is, specific Johnny's artists (such as Kimura Takuya, Sakurai Sho, Ninomiya Kazuya etc.) female fans. They believe that Kitagawa is the backbone of Johnny’s artists, and without Kitagawa there would be no success for these artists.
Kitagawa
The structure and composition of Kitagawa's defenders gave fans who defended Kitagawa two minds: On the one hand, Kitagawa directly created Johnny's glory, allowing Johnny's artists to come to the stage and be loved by fans, which made Johnny's Female fans have great respect for Kitagawa (even after Kitagawa was revealed to have been sexually assaulted, they still called him "Grandpa Kitagawa"). Because the characteristic of Johnny's artists is that they participate in idol production[3] on the basis of ensuring that idols are inaccessible. Fans can psychologically close the distance with their idols by participating in their idol's growth, creating a "family" The imagination of a close relationship [4], and Kitagawa, who rarely actually shows up, can easily be imagined as the "loving" "father" of Johnny's big family, and thus easily gain the recognition and support of Johnny's idol fans.
On the other hand, it was precisely because Kitagawa sexually assaulted a young male Johnny's artist that it destroyed the main premise for Johnny's fans to imagine their idols: idols are inaccessible. Sexual assault, a sex-related behavior, has destroyed the unique, genderless "little boy" image of Johnny in the minds of fans[5], leaving fans with nowhere to place their love for the idol.In particular, most Johnny's fans have grown up with their idols for a long time. For example, Ren Meguro, an important member of Johnny & Associates' popular Snowman group, debuted in 2010, and Snowman was formed in 2020, while Matsumura Hokuto, a member of another popular group Sixstones, Debuted in 2009 and debuted with the group in 2020. The strategy adopted by Johnny & Associates for these groups is to cultivate young Jrs for a long time and form a certain size of fixed fans before making their debut; in terms of spending money on idols, According to statistics from Nikkei Entertainment, fans of Johnny's artists spend an average of around 5,000 yen a year on their idols[6], which is in the upper middle of the range among all artists' fan spending, and can reach more than 10,000 yen. It costs a lot. It can be seen from this that fans of these groups have invested a huge amount of time and money. The psychological defense mechanism generated by the huge sunk cost makes fans naturally reject the fact of Kitagawa's sexual assault and willingly defend it.
The consequences of the Kitagawa sexual assault incident were extremely serious. As a symbol of Johnny's glory, he was deeply tied to Johnny's Agency, so much so that Johnny's Agency was named after Kitagawa. When his reputation was disgraced, Johnny & Associates also collapsed, idols left in large numbers, and the remaining idols were immersed in rumors.
According to Nikkei Entertainment’s fan gender ratio (horizontal axis) and star chasing money (vertical axis), fans of Johnny’s artists generally gather around 5,000 yen.
Compared to the behind-the-scenes producer Kitagawa, Matsumoto Shishi stood in front of the stage. star. Matsumoto Shi belongs to the downtown group under Yoshimoto Kogyo (partner is Hamada Masako). Yoshimoto Kogyo is one of the largest comedy agencies in Japan. It is said that "Yoshimoto is the best, and the group is not producing" (without Yoshimoto Kogyo, the group cannot be produced). The firm consists of Japan's five major private television stations (Fuji TV, TV Asahi, NTV, TBS and TV Tokyo) and their sub-stations (Kansai TV, Mainichi Broadcasting TV, etc.), Kyoraku Sangyo, Dentsu, and Hakuhodo (in charge of advertising Broadcasting) and other companies closely related to the entertainment industry hold shares, and they have a dominant position in the Japanese entertainment industry. Comedians such as Akashi Saury, Yamazato Ryota, Watanabe Naomi and Hakata Hanamaru Daiyoshi, who are familiar to domestic audiences, all came from Yoshimoto Kogyo.
Matsumoto Shi has a very high status in the circle. In the variety show "水曜日のダウンタウン" hosted by him and Hamada Masako, the top 100 most famous celebrities in Japan were counted in 2018 and 2020 respectively. Among them, Matsumoto Shi I ranked 17th and 15th respectively; in the Nikkei Entertainment Power Ranking, which evaluates the popularity of artists, Matsumoto ranked 25th, 16th, and 22nd respectively in the past three years; the program "wide na show" he hosted has been ranked 25th, 16th, and 22nd respectively. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will go to support [7]. As an artist that audiences can see in TV programs and commercials every day, Matsumoto Shi has accumulated a large number of die-hard fans. These die-hard fans have a high degree of recognition of Matsumoto Shi, or adopt a tolerant attitude towards his various behaviors, or I don't believe that Matsumoto Chi would do such a thing.
"水曜日のダウンタウン" counts the top 100 most famous celebrities in Japan in 2018, and Matsumoto's journal ranks 17
"水曜日のダウンタウン" counts the top 100 most famous celebrities in Japan in 2020, and Matsumoto's journal ranks 15
Shinzo Abe (right) in Matsumoto Chi (Left) Appearance in the program "Wide Na Show" hosted by
Shi Matsumoto's identity as a male comedian causes his fans to have a different logic from fans of other types of artists. First of all, statistics from Nikkei Entertainment show that the proportion of male fans among Matsumoto's fans has reached 60% (only Japanese anime specifically aimed at otakus or the idol girl group produced by Yasushi Akimoto have a higher proportion of male fans). The large proportion of male fans may also be one of the reasons why fans tolerate sexual assault. These fans regard this kind of violence against women as a masculine behavior and do not think there is anything wrong with it.
Secondly, Matsumoto Shi is a comedian himself. The programs he hosts such as "水曜日のダウンタウン" contain a lot of negative elements such as pranks and acting ugly [8]. Japanese comedians often make some inappropriate comments in program dialogues and on TV. Sense of boundaries, disrespectful remarks. Although the TV show itself is a reality show, and all participants will most likely have psychological expectations before participating in the show, the negative content of the variety show can easily attract members of society with more extreme values to watch and become fans of Matsumoto's ambitions. This type of fans lacks awareness of the boundary between reality shows and the real world. They believe that pranks on variety shows are fine even if they happen in reality. Therefore, they do not think that there is anything seriously wrong with Matsumoto Shi's sexual assault.
Finally, some fans of Matsumoto's ambitions have the mentality that "the law does not punish the public" and believe that all scenes related to "sex" and "coercion" should be held accountable, not just one person, otherwise Matsumoto himself The ambition should not be liquidated. The result of the efforts of these fans was the success of Rino Shihara, an artist who criticized Matsumoto's ambitions. The latter was accused of "forcibly kissing" Miku Tanaka and Nako Yabuki in front of the camera. As a junior of the hkt48 idol group, he was regarded as having the same behavior as Kitagawa [9], which directly caused the cosmetics brand "ririmew" produced by Rino Sashihara to cancel the scheduled live broadcast [10]. Although the parties involved, Mihisa Tanaka and others, have clarified the matter[11], the incident not only caused a negative impact, but also reflected the blurring of distinction between reality shows and the real world among Matsumoto fans: Rino Sashihara "forcibly kissed" a child Idols all happen in front of the camera. Compared with Matsumoto's sexual assault of women in the real world, it is more of a "persona" in front of the camera and is part of a reality show. Facts have proved that Rino Sashihara and her The juniors have very close personal relationships. Even if this behavior is considered bullying, the producers of the show are more to blame than the participants of the reality show.
2. Fan economy and firm system - a double-edged sword
When dealing with issues in the entertainment industry, the strong reaction of die-hard fans is an important factor that hinders the handling of incidents. From Matsumoto's fans' attacks on Sashihara Rino, we can see the reason why artists remain silent during major events in the entertainment industry - if they speak without authorization, they are likely to be criticized by the fans of the person concerned, which will lead to the termination of endorsement contracts and lack of resources. and other risks that reduce their own income and hinder future development.
fans do not directly affect the artists themselves, but they can tell the artists what will happen if they offend them through practical actions. The main source of income for Japanese artists is advertising endorsements. An advertisement of more than ten seconds can earn tens of millions of yen[12], and even a first- and second-tier actor participating in an episode of a prime-time TV series only earns more than 1 million yen. Yuan[13]. As the effectiveness of television advertising has declined in recent years, advertisers have found they need to reach an audience of fans who are more receptive to their messages. Advertising to fan audiences includes converting the sense of identification and intimacy with celebrities into actions to increase brand loyalty. The fan economy is the cornerstone of the Japanese entertainment industry, and a large number of fans spending money on their idols is enough to make the market prosperous [ 14]. In turn, the fan economy will also affect the self-purification and progress of the entertainment industry. Those with the most fans have a huge voice in the market, so much that others are worried about their reputation and dare not accuse them of their mistakes; many people blame the development of Japanese music There is a tendency for "Galapagosization" (which refers to "optimizing" alone in an isolated market environment and losing interchangeability with outside the region). In other words, before the 21st century, Japan had musicians like Ymo who led the world's trends, but now Japanese music has gradually derailed from European and American trends, and j-pop's output capability is no longer as good as k-pop. This is closely related to the huge Japanese market and the relatively conservative tastes of j-pop fans - the vast majority of singers are content to cater to the needs of the Japanese local market, and the huge fan economy is enough to make them lose the motivation to take the initiative to reform [15]. It can be seen that the fan economy has brought prosperity to the Japanese entertainment industry, but it has also hindered many changes in the entertainment industry.
The Japanese law firm system is based on the fan economy and has also become a double-edged sword for innovation in the entertainment industry. The relationship between the Japanese office system and the fan economy is the same as the state machine and the economic foundation. Although it is based on this, it has a certain degree of independence. Similar to the French state machine described by Marx in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, the agency is responsible for the creation, management and overall production of performers. They train artists and then send them to television stations to participate in program recordings. And shooting advertisements, the agency directly determines the artist's long-term development height.
Because the foundation of the firm's existence is the fan economy, based on the preferences of fans, the firm tends to promote stars who can successfully become national spokespersons for other companies. The most obvious thing is that the agency prefers "cute" female idols [16], which results in the exclusion of many artists with characteristics, leadership, and artistry - Japanese artists such as xjapan all come from personal labels Or when an underground label debuts, mainstream agencies lack interest in signing them.
Office is also affected by the fan economy because of the conservative nature of the company's selection of producers. Producers represented by Yasushi Akimoto debuted in the 1980s. It has been forty or fifty years now, but they are still being regarded by the office. The reason for choosing to participate in the production and guidance of artists lies in the conservative nature of fans - as an aging country, the number of young people and middle-aged and elderly people in Japan is completely disproportionate, and the latter are relatively fixed and relatively wealthy (after all, most of them Starting a family, starting a business, and having spare money) makes many agencies willing to cater to their tastes to produce artists, and even reproduce movies or TV series from decades ago from time to time. The agency will directly intervene in the future development of artists based on fans. This tendency can easily lead to artists with many fans and high voice being protected, because the agency needs to rely on these artists to make money, improve the reputation of the agency, and attract young and promising Wakatoshi. Artists join the firm to achieve what Althusser calls the “reproduction of labor power.” Regarding the bullying incident within the Takarazuka Revue, Takarazuka's management company, Hankyu Electric Railway, has always strongly denied its responsibility and emphasized that no bullying incident occurred within the group. They are so confident because their fans spend a lot of money (an average of 15,000 yen according to Nikkei Entertainment statistics) and the number of fans is stable, so the management is not too worried about losing fans due to such things.
The founding Japanese visual kei rock band xjapan is a representative artist who debuted in a non-mainstream company.
But the agency is not always dominated by the fan economy. As the agency system dominates the Japanese entertainment industry, the structure between agencies has gradually solidified. The overall industry structure of the firm world, and especially the fact that it is difficult for new firms to enter, essentially means that the same people continue to be responsible for creating new stars for decades [17]. This is not necessarily the result of the fan economy. As pointed out by "path dependence" in institutional economics, when there are significant transaction costs in the economy and politics, people's perception of the system may be based on incomplete information feedback. , and the path of institutional change will be more influenced by people's subjective cognitive models, that is, ideology. At this time, due to the nature of increasing returns of the system, once an ineffective system deviates from the effective path due to people's subjective cognitive model, it will still continue [18]. Even though the scripts written by Kitagawa Etsuko are out of date and often criticized [19], due to path dependence, there are always TV stations looking for her to write TV series scripts. It is easy for an agency to fall into path dependence because its production inertia is not easily changed by changes in audience tastes. This means that although on the one hand, the agency will give up on some artists with relatively large fans, for example, Hirosue Ryoko, who was terminated due to a cheating scandal, was hidden by the agency and finally left the agency to work alone; but on the other hand, This also allows ordinary artists to "lean against a big tree to enjoy the shade" and do whatever they want with the huge size of the office.
Choosing the right fans is one of the reasons why group offices are confident in producing artists. In an era when people's preferences are becoming more and more divided, since it is difficult for agencies to introduce artists who can please various fan groups, it becomes even more important to choose to please the fan groups who are rich and have a high desire to speak.Such fan groups are not only rich, but pleasing them means earning a steady income. For example, Johnny chose Japanese women with strong spending power; these fans have a strong desire for expression and can influence "public spaces" (such as social media) through the power of fans, such as trends on x (Twitter), causing various media coverage. The firm is also good at using media reports to influence public opinion. Conservative media reports will make critics feel that their views are in the minority, so they dare not speak, remain silent, and cannot use actions to interfere with the firm's choices. Under such circumstances, there have been cases where large offices "break away from their fan base" to produce artists: on the one hand, a large number of passers-by expressed confusion about the artists chosen by the offices, and on the other hand, these artists are still active in the entertainment industry , doesn't seem to be affected at all.
The means used by large law firms to protect the artists involved include suing newspapers for infringement of reputation rights. Compared with the United States, Japanese law favors plaintiffs whose reputations have been harmed: Japan does not require plaintiffs to cause financial harm in certain circumstances to initiate a lawsuit; in civil cases involving matters of public concern, Japanese defendants must prove that they believe the story of authenticity, Japan does not accept the principle of actual malice. In the United States, plaintiffs must prove actual malice by the media; in civil cases involving private matters, Japan's press can be held liable if it harms a person's honor, even if the story is true [20]. The defamation legal system that favors plaintiffs has led to an extremely high frequency of defamation prosecutions in Japan. In 2004, complainants filed 741 complaints to prosecutors in Japan. Of the 741 cases, 101 were prosecuted. In comparison, in the United States, only 64 defamation cases were prosecuted in the 40 years from 1965 to 2004[21]. In Japan, because there are many lawsuits but the overall amount of compensation is not large (maybe even no compensation), weekly tabloids that do not need to consider authenticity can report at will; in response, they turn major events into entertainment and lose The ability to arouse people's critical consciousness. It is easy for the mainstream media to be sued and damage their own prestige and reputation, so the mainstream media is very conservative in reporting on entertainment industry issues. The firm's strong legal team helps exposed artists successfully sue the media and individuals for defamation. Mainstream media tend to be conservative and do not report. Individuals are prone to losing a lot of income in the long-term litigation process, so they tend to avoid unnecessary cases. Take the initiative to report problems.
Genesis sued Bunchun for damaging Kitagawa's reputation.
The way the firm protected the artists involved also included using illegal means to deter newspapers and individuals. Large Japanese firms represented by Yoshimoto Kogyo and the Burning Department are often suspected of colluding with the underworld. In 2019, former Yoshimoto Kogyo artist Goro Maeda alleged that he received jobs from gangsters every week in the 1980s [22]. In December 2014, at the annual meeting of the fraud group held in a hotel in Tokyo, many well-known Yoshimoto Kogyo artists were present, and the famous Japanese gangsters Yamaguchi-gumi and Yoshimoto Kogyo had a close relationship in history [23]. These factors related to gangs have largely hindered efforts to purify the entertainment industry, because neither newspapers nor individuals are willing to get involved with gangs. Even if their lives are not in danger, their work itself will be greatly affected.
3. Oppression in the entertainment industry
What Kitagawa’s sexual assault, Takarazuka member’s suicide, and Awara Princess’s suicide have in common is that the three incidents are unilateral oppression and infringement of one party’s rights, and both parties involved are in the entertainment industry. (The victim in the Matsumoto Chi incident was an amateur). However, there are many differences between the three incidents that are worth pondering. They each represent different directions of the problem of hierarchical oppression in the Japanese entertainment industry.
Kitagawa’s sexual assault is a persecution of artists as a producer and leader. Artists are affiliated with the company. As the top leader of Johnny & Associates, Kitagawa used his position to persecute his own artists.Japan is a country with a strong sense of collective consciousness. It is allowed to tell lies for the sake of collective reputation and interests "without exposing family scandals to the public". Moreover, Japanese groups have a strong sense of autonomy from the law, and problems need to be solved internally [24]. Therefore, even if other people know the victim's experience, they dare not tell it. However, what makes Kitagawa’s sexual assault more complicated than simply leading the persecution of artists is that it involves the sexual assault of minors. In Japan, even minor sex trafficking is relatively slow to be criminalized. On the one hand, there are very few participants. Due to the Child Prostitution and Child Pornography Act, about 1,000 people are arrested every year, but about one-third of them One is the case of online pornography, which is more about pornography than sex trafficking; on the other hand, society does not pay serious attention to this type of matter [25], which encouraged Kitagawa's sexual assault of minors. From the perspective of sexual harassment, Japanese law focuses on individual rights, especially physical contact. As a result, if the current person is not caught, it will not be easy to successfully prosecute. And for a long time, Japan did not have the concept of "sexual harassment", which is undoubtedly This makes prosecution more difficult [26]. For the minors who were sexually assaulted by Kitagawa, it is difficult for them to tell their experiences and seek legal asylum.
On September 7, 2023, local time, in Tokyo, Japan, incoming new president of Johnny & Associates Noriyuki Higashiyama (left) and outgoing Julie Keiko Fujishima (right) bowed and apologized at a press conference.
There are other problems with the suicide of Takarazuka members. According to Bunshun reports, the reason why Takarazuka member Yu Ai committed suicide was that the senior members of the group were bullied and the team's burden was placed on one person, which led to his mental collapse and finally chose to commit suicide [27]. Team bullying often occurs in highly hierarchical artist teams. Although Takarazuka management strongly denies this, it just proves the team's dereliction of duty on management issues: there is no external supervision mechanism, and juniors can only unconditionally obey the orders of their superiors. Failure to resist, this old Japanese Showa-style style will inevitably lead to psychological problems. However, the management of Takarazuka did not intervene in this matter. They neither intervened to stop the bullying nor provided psychological counseling. Regardless of whether they knew it or not, the management bears huge responsibility for this incident. Bullying in the Japanese entertainment industry is not uncommon. In 2019, akb48's sister group ngt48 broke the scandal in which member Yamaguchi Maho was attacked by someone hired by members of the group. This incident eventually led to the disintegration of the akb48 group. The reason why Takarazuka escaped was mainly due to the stability of its fan group and its high status, so it was not too worried about the wavering of its reputation. Takarazuka's revenue in 2023 will increase by 1.3 billion yen compared with the same period in 2022 [28], and revenue from 2021 to 2023 will be stable at around 17 billion yen. At present, the impact of Yu Ai's suicide incident on the group's economic income is still unknown and remains to be seen. Another direct reason for
Youai’s suicide is too much work pressure. According to the timetable given by the lawyer for the deceased's family, Yua Ai often could only sleep 3 hours a day in 2023, and sometimes he could only sleep 4 hours in 3 days. Such an astonishing working hours, coupled with the fact that Yu Ai had to guide the juniors, be told what to do by seniors, and organize rehearsals, the workload was also staggering, which eventually led to her suicide due to overwhelm.
The lawyer for the victim's family announced the victim's daily schedule on the TV station.
Similar to Yu Ai, the suicide of Princess Ashihara was also caused by unreasonable work pressure. Princess Ashihara is the original author of the TV series "Sexy Miss Tanaka" to be released in October 2023. In the process of NTV turning the original work into a live-action, the screenwriter made extensive adaptations of the first 8 episodes, which seriously deviated from the original author's intention. Since the original author allowed the live-action to be true to the original work, and if there was any discrepancy, it would need to be added. It was revised in writing, so episodes 9-10 were adapted by the original author[29]. After the TV series was aired, screenwriter Aizawa said on Instagram: "Episodes 1-8 were written by me, and episodes 9-10 were written by the original author. This was a quite bitter experience." The official tiktok account even went on to praise and criticize the final result of the TV series. Reply comments. Since then, an "unusual amount" of negative comments about the original author and support for the screenwriter have appeared online.Princess Ashihara later opened a But in the end, Princess Ashihara couldn't bear the public opinion, so she deleted the x account and committed suicide[30].
The poster of "Survivor Tanaka" (Left: Starring Haruka Kinami, Right: Eru Ibimi)
The suicide of Princess Ashihara's name reveals an unequal relationship that is easily overlooked in the production process of Japanese TV dramas: Since most Japanese TV dramas are based on novels and Animation adaptation, but the relationship between the original author, the novel publisher and the TV station is not equal. Theoretically, the original author has the highest decision-making power and can lead the direction of the adaptation. However, in fact, the original author is just an unpaid "Party B". They participate in the supervision of the original work, but bear a huge workload. Not only do they need to make modifications, but they also Need to explain and guide to the TV station. The most critical thing is that there is no extra compensation for such a large amount of hard work. Generally, artists and staff can earn a fixed salary from Japan's huge offices, and life is not a problem. However, many writers and cartoonists do not have a contract with an agency or publisher. Whether they can make money depends entirely on whether their works can sell well. Supervising TV dramas takes up a lot of time and energy from writers and cartoonists, affecting their creations without being paid, which greatly increases the pressure on their lives. Princess Ashihara's name may have ultimately chosen to commit suicide because of this[31]. In addition, the price of Japanese comics is extremely low. The famous comic "Weekly Shonen Jump" is only 290 yen (about 15 yuan) and has a total of 485 pages; "Weekly Shonen Sunday" is only 360 yen and has more than 500 pages. The low pricing will obviously reduce the actual income of cartoonists; for the weekly serial pages, cartoonists have to bow their heads at their desks and draw day and night to meet the needs of readers. There is a rumor in Japan that the average life expectancy of cartoonists is only 57 years [32]. Although the statistical data is not necessarily reliable, there are a lot of well-known cartoonists who died of unnatural deaths, which shows that cartoonists are under great work pressure.
From the perspective of revenue sharing, most copyrights in Japan belong to offices and large companies. For example, the copyright of music belongs to music companies such as Sony [33], and the copyright of novels and comics belongs to publishing companies. This results in a low share of the share for creators. , a song or a book sells well, the company makes a lot of money, but the individual share is relatively small. For singers, they signed a contract with an agency and received a fixed annual salary. It can be said that the agency helped them resolve the risk; but for novelists and cartoonists who are independent creators, the company will not bear the risk for them, so it is easy to Being in a passive position and losing the right to speak. Relatively low income, lack of voice, unstable work and great work pressure make the work of cartoonists very difficult.
Princess Ashihara complained on With some indifferent slogans or continued silence, those seeking responsibility mainly hope to request Shogakukan to give a reasonable response [34] rather than deeply exposing the structural problems exposed in such incidents or fighting for own rights and interests.
In Japanese law, whistleblowers have always been excluded, and the law cannot provide them with protection. The root cause is also a high degree of collective consciousness. Even if the organization to which they belong has some inappropriate behavior, individuals should avoid leaking information to the outside world. This is what Japan considers public morality. Before 2006, Japan did not have a specific whistle-blowing law. Article 104 of the Labor Standards Act only stipulates that employees shall not be charged for reporting violations of the Labor Standards Act to administrative officials or labor standards inspectors, but related measures are usually It only provides protection in a narrow sense and cannot avoid broader retaliatory measures such as exclusion. Japan’s case law on retaliatory firing does not provide uniform protection for whistleblowers. Decisions are based on the veracity, sincerity and reporting style of the assertion [35].Japanese attitudes towards whistleblowers are also inconsistent. In some surveys, the vast majority of respondents believe that they will take the initiative to report problems, but in other surveys, the vast majority of respondents said that they will not report problems in their own teams. [36], this diverse psychology hinders the emergence of potential whistleblowers. All in all, the lack of corresponding protections in Japanese law and the complicated attitudes of social members towards reporting under social culture have hindered the emergence of whistleblowers. They have also covered up the problems in the Japanese entertainment industry and hindered the improvement of the entertainment industry.
4, Conclusion
The specific analysis of Nagayama Ayato's drug abuse is limited to the length of the full text. Compared with the public nature of the previous incidents, Nagayama Ayato's drug abuse behavior was more caused by the "loneliness" of his personal life. Famous musicians such as Ryo Asuka and Yutaka Ozaki studied American folk and rock singers and found inspiration through drug use; artists were in Sartrean "freedom pain" when they were not working, and chose to take drugs in order to escape such "hell".
The above-mentioned events all involve one point: subjectivity. Sexual assault, team bullying and other behaviors can be nipped in the bud if they are exposed and dealt with correctly. However, most of the participants are only for their own selfish interests, without considering the public interest, and remain silent when they need to assume social responsibilities. Silence or compliance with more powerful figures allows illegal incidents to continue to occur. In post-war Japan, post-war activists represented by Masao Maruyama lamented that the pre-war Japanese people's individualism in escaping from politics produced obedient people who obeyed militarism, and emphasized the need to establish "subjectivity" and assume personal political responsibility. [37].
The basis of pre-war "supranationalism" was not everyone's sense of responsibility, but "the unlimited intrusion of 'private' into 'public'", that is, the pursuit of interests. The common people express their loyalty to local leaders, or the local leaders express their loyalty to the central government. These are just to get ahead and gain benefits, or to squeeze into the power class with the emperor as the apex. In this case, "patriotism" is Expression of personal interests [38].
The problem in the contemporary Japanese entertainment industry is that everyone only pursues personal interests and ignores the public nature of the entertainment industry order, which ultimately produces various scandals. Only when everyone develops public awareness and takes responsibility can the occurrence of scandals be gradually reduced.
Reference
[1] Zhao Dingxin, 2012, "Lecture Notes on Social and Political Movements (Second Edition)", Beijing: Social Sciences Literature Press, p. 82.
Since 2023, several jaw-dropping scandals have broken out in the Japanese entertainment industry, from the BBC's report at the beginning of the year that the late Johnny Kitagawa, the founder of Johnny's Agency, sexually assaulted his male artists before his death, and the disintegration of Johnny's Agency; to the scandal at the Takarazuka Opera Company Aoi, an important member of the Dezhou team, chose to commit suicide because he could not bear the bullying and work pressure; and then Matsumoto Shi was exposed by Bunharu for sexually assaulting an amateur woman at a banquet. Yoshimoto Kogyo Office, where Matsumoto worked, will cooperate with the weekly magazine that reported the matter Bunharu went to court to fight a lawsuit over his reputation; in addition, the fourth generation Ichikawa Sarunosuke was arrested on suspicion of assisting his parents to commit suicide, Nagayama Ayato was arrested for drug abuse, director Sakaki Hideo was arrested on suspicion of rape, and manga artist Ashihara Princess Naiko was arrested for the live-action of her comics Being tampered with by ntv during the process, he couldn't bear the harassment and psychological pressure and committed suicide. Among these incidents, there are some personal behaviors that have nothing to do with the firm or the group, and there are also incidents that are related to the firm or the group. Scandals include sexual assault, bullying, drug abuse and even assisted suicide.
Although many people attribute the darkness of the Japanese entertainment industry to "evil capital" and "evil plutocrats", this "omnipotent" and vague attribution cannot provide a strong explanation for specific events and gives people a big impression. The feeling of emptiness, as Tilly pointed out when evaluating Custer's works: is like a giant ship with most of the screws not tightened, sailing precariously on the sea [1]. The main causes of different scandals are different. This article aims to analyze the specific situations of different cases and explore the factors behind them.
1. Comparison of sexual assault incidents between Kitagawa and Matsumoto Shi.
As celebrities in the entertainment industry who have been deeply involved in sexual assault scandals, there are many similarities between Kitagawa and Matsumoto Shi. There are also many differences.
The biggest difference between the two scandals lies in their identities, which directly determines the defense logic and motivation of the defenders. Kitagawa Johnny is the founder of Johnny & Associates and the actual helmsman of Johnny & Associates for a long time. He is the producer and promoter (Bole) of many Johnny's male idols. In terms of his position in the entertainment industry, Kitagawa is the man behind the scenes. After the 21st century, he rarely stands in front of the media and only appears in paparazzi photos. He has formed a relationship with Hollywood luxury industry giants such as David Geffen. sharp contrast. Japanese bosses are even more isolated than their Korean counterparts [2]. The very few appearances make it impossible for Kitagawa to enjoy a large number of personal fans in Japan, which has highly developed media resources; but the choice of rarely appearing in front of the camera has given Kitagawa himself a layer of mystery, and it is easy for people to think of "genius Kitagawa" Cognition. And because the success of Johnny's male idols is inseparable from Kitagawa's promotion and accumulation of resources, most of Kitagawa's defenders are "Auntie Jay", that is, specific Johnny's artists (such as Kimura Takuya, Sakurai Sho, Ninomiya Kazuya etc.) female fans. They believe that Kitagawa is the backbone of Johnny’s artists, and without Kitagawa there would be no success for these artists.
Kitagawa
The structure and composition of Kitagawa's defenders gave fans who defended Kitagawa two minds: On the one hand, Kitagawa directly created Johnny's glory, allowing Johnny's artists to come to the stage and be loved by fans, which made Johnny's Female fans have great respect for Kitagawa (even after Kitagawa was revealed to have been sexually assaulted, they still called him "Grandpa Kitagawa"). Because the characteristic of Johnny's artists is that they participate in idol production[3] on the basis of ensuring that idols are inaccessible. Fans can psychologically close the distance with their idols by participating in their idol's growth, creating a "family" The imagination of a close relationship [4], and Kitagawa, who rarely actually shows up, can easily be imagined as the "loving" "father" of Johnny's big family, and thus easily gain the recognition and support of Johnny's idol fans.
On the other hand, it was precisely because Kitagawa sexually assaulted a young male Johnny's artist that it destroyed the main premise for Johnny's fans to imagine their idols: idols are inaccessible. Sexual assault, a sex-related behavior, has destroyed the unique, genderless "little boy" image of Johnny in the minds of fans[5], leaving fans with nowhere to place their love for the idol.In particular, most Johnny's fans have grown up with their idols for a long time. For example, Ren Meguro, an important member of Johnny & Associates' popular Snowman group, debuted in 2010, and Snowman was formed in 2020, while Matsumura Hokuto, a member of another popular group Sixstones, Debuted in 2009 and debuted with the group in 2020. The strategy adopted by Johnny & Associates for these groups is to cultivate young Jrs for a long time and form a certain size of fixed fans before making their debut; in terms of spending money on idols, According to statistics from Nikkei Entertainment, fans of Johnny's artists spend an average of around 5,000 yen a year on their idols[6], which is in the upper middle of the range among all artists' fan spending, and can reach more than 10,000 yen. It costs a lot. It can be seen from this that fans of these groups have invested a huge amount of time and money. The psychological defense mechanism generated by the huge sunk cost makes fans naturally reject the fact of Kitagawa's sexual assault and willingly defend it.
The consequences of the Kitagawa sexual assault incident were extremely serious. As a symbol of Johnny's glory, he was deeply tied to Johnny's Agency, so much so that Johnny's Agency was named after Kitagawa. When his reputation was disgraced, Johnny & Associates also collapsed, idols left in large numbers, and the remaining idols were immersed in rumors.
According to Nikkei Entertainment’s fan gender ratio (horizontal axis) and star chasing money (vertical axis), fans of Johnny’s artists generally gather around 5,000 yen.
Compared to the behind-the-scenes producer Kitagawa, Matsumoto Shishi stood in front of the stage. star. Matsumoto Shi belongs to the downtown group under Yoshimoto Kogyo (partner is Hamada Masako). Yoshimoto Kogyo is one of the largest comedy agencies in Japan. It is said that "Yoshimoto is the best, and the group is not producing" (without Yoshimoto Kogyo, the group cannot be produced). The firm consists of Japan's five major private television stations (Fuji TV, TV Asahi, NTV, TBS and TV Tokyo) and their sub-stations (Kansai TV, Mainichi Broadcasting TV, etc.), Kyoraku Sangyo, Dentsu, and Hakuhodo (in charge of advertising Broadcasting) and other companies closely related to the entertainment industry hold shares, and they have a dominant position in the Japanese entertainment industry. Comedians such as Akashi Saury, Yamazato Ryota, Watanabe Naomi and Hakata Hanamaru Daiyoshi, who are familiar to domestic audiences, all came from Yoshimoto Kogyo.
Matsumoto Shi has a very high status in the circle. In the variety show "水曜日のダウンタウン" hosted by him and Hamada Masako, the top 100 most famous celebrities in Japan were counted in 2018 and 2020 respectively. Among them, Matsumoto Shi I ranked 17th and 15th respectively; in the Nikkei Entertainment Power Ranking, which evaluates the popularity of artists, Matsumoto ranked 25th, 16th, and 22nd respectively in the past three years; the program "wide na show" he hosted has been ranked 25th, 16th, and 22nd respectively. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will go to support [7]. As an artist that audiences can see in TV programs and commercials every day, Matsumoto Shi has accumulated a large number of die-hard fans. These die-hard fans have a high degree of recognition of Matsumoto Shi, or adopt a tolerant attitude towards his various behaviors, or I don't believe that Matsumoto Chi would do such a thing.
"水曜日のダウンタウン" counts the top 100 most famous celebrities in Japan in 2018, and Matsumoto's journal ranks 17
"水曜日のダウンタウン" counts the top 100 most famous celebrities in Japan in 2020, and Matsumoto's journal ranks 15
Shinzo Abe (right) in Matsumoto Chi (Left) Appearance in the program "Wide Na Show" hosted by
Shi Matsumoto's identity as a male comedian causes his fans to have a different logic from fans of other types of artists. First of all, statistics from Nikkei Entertainment show that the proportion of male fans among Matsumoto's fans has reached 60% (only Japanese anime specifically aimed at otakus or the idol girl group produced by Yasushi Akimoto have a higher proportion of male fans). The large proportion of male fans may also be one of the reasons why fans tolerate sexual assault. These fans regard this kind of violence against women as a masculine behavior and do not think there is anything wrong with it.
Secondly, Matsumoto Shi is a comedian himself. The programs he hosts such as "水曜日のダウンタウン" contain a lot of negative elements such as pranks and acting ugly [8]. Japanese comedians often make some inappropriate comments in program dialogues and on TV. Sense of boundaries, disrespectful remarks. Although the TV show itself is a reality show, and all participants will most likely have psychological expectations before participating in the show, the negative content of the variety show can easily attract members of society with more extreme values to watch and become fans of Matsumoto's ambitions. This type of fans lacks awareness of the boundary between reality shows and the real world. They believe that pranks on variety shows are fine even if they happen in reality. Therefore, they do not think that there is anything seriously wrong with Matsumoto Shi's sexual assault.
Finally, some fans of Matsumoto's ambitions have the mentality that "the law does not punish the public" and believe that all scenes related to "sex" and "coercion" should be held accountable, not just one person, otherwise Matsumoto himself The ambition should not be liquidated. The result of the efforts of these fans was the success of Rino Shihara, an artist who criticized Matsumoto's ambitions. The latter was accused of "forcibly kissing" Miku Tanaka and Nako Yabuki in front of the camera. As a junior of the hkt48 idol group, he was regarded as having the same behavior as Kitagawa [9], which directly caused the cosmetics brand "ririmew" produced by Rino Sashihara to cancel the scheduled live broadcast [10]. Although the parties involved, Mihisa Tanaka and others, have clarified the matter[11], the incident not only caused a negative impact, but also reflected the blurring of distinction between reality shows and the real world among Matsumoto fans: Rino Sashihara "forcibly kissed" a child Idols all happen in front of the camera. Compared with Matsumoto's sexual assault of women in the real world, it is more of a "persona" in front of the camera and is part of a reality show. Facts have proved that Rino Sashihara and her The juniors have very close personal relationships. Even if this behavior is considered bullying, the producers of the show are more to blame than the participants of the reality show.
2. Fan economy and firm system - a double-edged sword
When dealing with issues in the entertainment industry, the strong reaction of die-hard fans is an important factor that hinders the handling of incidents. From Matsumoto's fans' attacks on Sashihara Rino, we can see the reason why artists remain silent during major events in the entertainment industry - if they speak without authorization, they are likely to be criticized by the fans of the person concerned, which will lead to the termination of endorsement contracts and lack of resources. and other risks that reduce their own income and hinder future development.
fans do not directly affect the artists themselves, but they can tell the artists what will happen if they offend them through practical actions. The main source of income for Japanese artists is advertising endorsements. An advertisement of more than ten seconds can earn tens of millions of yen[12], and even a first- and second-tier actor participating in an episode of a prime-time TV series only earns more than 1 million yen. Yuan[13]. As the effectiveness of television advertising has declined in recent years, advertisers have found they need to reach an audience of fans who are more receptive to their messages. Advertising to fan audiences includes converting the sense of identification and intimacy with celebrities into actions to increase brand loyalty. The fan economy is the cornerstone of the Japanese entertainment industry, and a large number of fans spending money on their idols is enough to make the market prosperous [ 14]. In turn, the fan economy will also affect the self-purification and progress of the entertainment industry. Those with the most fans have a huge voice in the market, so much that others are worried about their reputation and dare not accuse them of their mistakes; many people blame the development of Japanese music There is a tendency for "Galapagosization" (which refers to "optimizing" alone in an isolated market environment and losing interchangeability with outside the region). In other words, before the 21st century, Japan had musicians like Ymo who led the world's trends, but now Japanese music has gradually derailed from European and American trends, and j-pop's output capability is no longer as good as k-pop. This is closely related to the huge Japanese market and the relatively conservative tastes of j-pop fans - the vast majority of singers are content to cater to the needs of the Japanese local market, and the huge fan economy is enough to make them lose the motivation to take the initiative to reform [15]. It can be seen that the fan economy has brought prosperity to the Japanese entertainment industry, but it has also hindered many changes in the entertainment industry.
The Japanese law firm system is based on the fan economy and has also become a double-edged sword for innovation in the entertainment industry. The relationship between the Japanese office system and the fan economy is the same as the state machine and the economic foundation. Although it is based on this, it has a certain degree of independence. Similar to the French state machine described by Marx in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, the agency is responsible for the creation, management and overall production of performers. They train artists and then send them to television stations to participate in program recordings. And shooting advertisements, the agency directly determines the artist's long-term development height.
Because the foundation of the firm's existence is the fan economy, based on the preferences of fans, the firm tends to promote stars who can successfully become national spokespersons for other companies. The most obvious thing is that the agency prefers "cute" female idols [16], which results in the exclusion of many artists with characteristics, leadership, and artistry - Japanese artists such as xjapan all come from personal labels Or when an underground label debuts, mainstream agencies lack interest in signing them.
Office is also affected by the fan economy because of the conservative nature of the company's selection of producers. Producers represented by Yasushi Akimoto debuted in the 1980s. It has been forty or fifty years now, but they are still being regarded by the office. The reason for choosing to participate in the production and guidance of artists lies in the conservative nature of fans - as an aging country, the number of young people and middle-aged and elderly people in Japan is completely disproportionate, and the latter are relatively fixed and relatively wealthy (after all, most of them Starting a family, starting a business, and having spare money) makes many agencies willing to cater to their tastes to produce artists, and even reproduce movies or TV series from decades ago from time to time. The agency will directly intervene in the future development of artists based on fans. This tendency can easily lead to artists with many fans and high voice being protected, because the agency needs to rely on these artists to make money, improve the reputation of the agency, and attract young and promising Wakatoshi. Artists join the firm to achieve what Althusser calls the “reproduction of labor power.” Regarding the bullying incident within the Takarazuka Revue, Takarazuka's management company, Hankyu Electric Railway, has always strongly denied its responsibility and emphasized that no bullying incident occurred within the group. They are so confident because their fans spend a lot of money (an average of 15,000 yen according to Nikkei Entertainment statistics) and the number of fans is stable, so the management is not too worried about losing fans due to such things.
The founding Japanese visual kei rock band xjapan is a representative artist who debuted in a non-mainstream company.
But the agency is not always dominated by the fan economy. As the agency system dominates the Japanese entertainment industry, the structure between agencies has gradually solidified. The overall industry structure of the firm world, and especially the fact that it is difficult for new firms to enter, essentially means that the same people continue to be responsible for creating new stars for decades [17]. This is not necessarily the result of the fan economy. As pointed out by "path dependence" in institutional economics, when there are significant transaction costs in the economy and politics, people's perception of the system may be based on incomplete information feedback. , and the path of institutional change will be more influenced by people's subjective cognitive models, that is, ideology. At this time, due to the nature of increasing returns of the system, once an ineffective system deviates from the effective path due to people's subjective cognitive model, it will still continue [18]. Even though the scripts written by Kitagawa Etsuko are out of date and often criticized [19], due to path dependence, there are always TV stations looking for her to write TV series scripts. It is easy for an agency to fall into path dependence because its production inertia is not easily changed by changes in audience tastes. This means that although on the one hand, the agency will give up on some artists with relatively large fans, for example, Hirosue Ryoko, who was terminated due to a cheating scandal, was hidden by the agency and finally left the agency to work alone; but on the other hand, This also allows ordinary artists to "lean against a big tree to enjoy the shade" and do whatever they want with the huge size of the office.
Choosing the right fans is one of the reasons why group offices are confident in producing artists. In an era when people's preferences are becoming more and more divided, since it is difficult for agencies to introduce artists who can please various fan groups, it becomes even more important to choose to please the fan groups who are rich and have a high desire to speak.Such fan groups are not only rich, but pleasing them means earning a steady income. For example, Johnny chose Japanese women with strong spending power; these fans have a strong desire for expression and can influence "public spaces" (such as social media) through the power of fans, such as trends on x (Twitter), causing various media coverage. The firm is also good at using media reports to influence public opinion. Conservative media reports will make critics feel that their views are in the minority, so they dare not speak, remain silent, and cannot use actions to interfere with the firm's choices. Under such circumstances, there have been cases where large offices "break away from their fan base" to produce artists: on the one hand, a large number of passers-by expressed confusion about the artists chosen by the offices, and on the other hand, these artists are still active in the entertainment industry , doesn't seem to be affected at all.
The means used by large law firms to protect the artists involved include suing newspapers for infringement of reputation rights. Compared with the United States, Japanese law favors plaintiffs whose reputations have been harmed: Japan does not require plaintiffs to cause financial harm in certain circumstances to initiate a lawsuit; in civil cases involving matters of public concern, Japanese defendants must prove that they believe the story of authenticity, Japan does not accept the principle of actual malice. In the United States, plaintiffs must prove actual malice by the media; in civil cases involving private matters, Japan's press can be held liable if it harms a person's honor, even if the story is true [20]. The defamation legal system that favors plaintiffs has led to an extremely high frequency of defamation prosecutions in Japan. In 2004, complainants filed 741 complaints to prosecutors in Japan. Of the 741 cases, 101 were prosecuted. In comparison, in the United States, only 64 defamation cases were prosecuted in the 40 years from 1965 to 2004[21]. In Japan, because there are many lawsuits but the overall amount of compensation is not large (maybe even no compensation), weekly tabloids that do not need to consider authenticity can report at will; in response, they turn major events into entertainment and lose The ability to arouse people's critical consciousness. It is easy for the mainstream media to be sued and damage their own prestige and reputation, so the mainstream media is very conservative in reporting on entertainment industry issues. The firm's strong legal team helps exposed artists successfully sue the media and individuals for defamation. Mainstream media tend to be conservative and do not report. Individuals are prone to losing a lot of income in the long-term litigation process, so they tend to avoid unnecessary cases. Take the initiative to report problems.
Genesis sued Bunchun for damaging Kitagawa's reputation.
The way the firm protected the artists involved also included using illegal means to deter newspapers and individuals. Large Japanese firms represented by Yoshimoto Kogyo and the Burning Department are often suspected of colluding with the underworld. In 2019, former Yoshimoto Kogyo artist Goro Maeda alleged that he received jobs from gangsters every week in the 1980s [22]. In December 2014, at the annual meeting of the fraud group held in a hotel in Tokyo, many well-known Yoshimoto Kogyo artists were present, and the famous Japanese gangsters Yamaguchi-gumi and Yoshimoto Kogyo had a close relationship in history [23]. These factors related to gangs have largely hindered efforts to purify the entertainment industry, because neither newspapers nor individuals are willing to get involved with gangs. Even if their lives are not in danger, their work itself will be greatly affected.
3. Oppression in the entertainment industry
What Kitagawa’s sexual assault, Takarazuka member’s suicide, and Awara Princess’s suicide have in common is that the three incidents are unilateral oppression and infringement of one party’s rights, and both parties involved are in the entertainment industry. (The victim in the Matsumoto Chi incident was an amateur). However, there are many differences between the three incidents that are worth pondering. They each represent different directions of the problem of hierarchical oppression in the Japanese entertainment industry.
Kitagawa’s sexual assault is a persecution of artists as a producer and leader. Artists are affiliated with the company. As the top leader of Johnny & Associates, Kitagawa used his position to persecute his own artists.Japan is a country with a strong sense of collective consciousness. It is allowed to tell lies for the sake of collective reputation and interests "without exposing family scandals to the public". Moreover, Japanese groups have a strong sense of autonomy from the law, and problems need to be solved internally [24]. Therefore, even if other people know the victim's experience, they dare not tell it. However, what makes Kitagawa’s sexual assault more complicated than simply leading the persecution of artists is that it involves the sexual assault of minors. In Japan, even minor sex trafficking is relatively slow to be criminalized. On the one hand, there are very few participants. Due to the Child Prostitution and Child Pornography Act, about 1,000 people are arrested every year, but about one-third of them One is the case of online pornography, which is more about pornography than sex trafficking; on the other hand, society does not pay serious attention to this type of matter [25], which encouraged Kitagawa's sexual assault of minors. From the perspective of sexual harassment, Japanese law focuses on individual rights, especially physical contact. As a result, if the current person is not caught, it will not be easy to successfully prosecute. And for a long time, Japan did not have the concept of "sexual harassment", which is undoubtedly This makes prosecution more difficult [26]. For the minors who were sexually assaulted by Kitagawa, it is difficult for them to tell their experiences and seek legal asylum.
On September 7, 2023, local time, in Tokyo, Japan, incoming new president of Johnny & Associates Noriyuki Higashiyama (left) and outgoing Julie Keiko Fujishima (right) bowed and apologized at a press conference.
There are other problems with the suicide of Takarazuka members. According to Bunshun reports, the reason why Takarazuka member Yu Ai committed suicide was that the senior members of the group were bullied and the team's burden was placed on one person, which led to his mental collapse and finally chose to commit suicide [27]. Team bullying often occurs in highly hierarchical artist teams. Although Takarazuka management strongly denies this, it just proves the team's dereliction of duty on management issues: there is no external supervision mechanism, and juniors can only unconditionally obey the orders of their superiors. Failure to resist, this old Japanese Showa-style style will inevitably lead to psychological problems. However, the management of Takarazuka did not intervene in this matter. They neither intervened to stop the bullying nor provided psychological counseling. Regardless of whether they knew it or not, the management bears huge responsibility for this incident. Bullying in the Japanese entertainment industry is not uncommon. In 2019, akb48's sister group ngt48 broke the scandal in which member Yamaguchi Maho was attacked by someone hired by members of the group. This incident eventually led to the disintegration of the akb48 group. The reason why Takarazuka escaped was mainly due to the stability of its fan group and its high status, so it was not too worried about the wavering of its reputation. Takarazuka's revenue in 2023 will increase by 1.3 billion yen compared with the same period in 2022 [28], and revenue from 2021 to 2023 will be stable at around 17 billion yen. At present, the impact of Yu Ai's suicide incident on the group's economic income is still unknown and remains to be seen. Another direct reason for
Youai’s suicide is too much work pressure. According to the timetable given by the lawyer for the deceased's family, Yua Ai often could only sleep 3 hours a day in 2023, and sometimes he could only sleep 4 hours in 3 days. Such an astonishing working hours, coupled with the fact that Yu Ai had to guide the juniors, be told what to do by seniors, and organize rehearsals, the workload was also staggering, which eventually led to her suicide due to overwhelm.
The lawyer for the victim's family announced the victim's daily schedule on the TV station.
Similar to Yu Ai, the suicide of Princess Ashihara was also caused by unreasonable work pressure. Princess Ashihara is the original author of the TV series "Sexy Miss Tanaka" to be released in October 2023. In the process of NTV turning the original work into a live-action, the screenwriter made extensive adaptations of the first 8 episodes, which seriously deviated from the original author's intention. Since the original author allowed the live-action to be true to the original work, and if there was any discrepancy, it would need to be added. It was revised in writing, so episodes 9-10 were adapted by the original author[29]. After the TV series was aired, screenwriter Aizawa said on Instagram: "Episodes 1-8 were written by me, and episodes 9-10 were written by the original author. This was a quite bitter experience." The official tiktok account even went on to praise and criticize the final result of the TV series. Reply comments. Since then, an "unusual amount" of negative comments about the original author and support for the screenwriter have appeared online.Princess Ashihara later opened a But in the end, Princess Ashihara couldn't bear the public opinion, so she deleted the x account and committed suicide[30].
The poster of "Survivor Tanaka" (Left: Starring Haruka Kinami, Right: Eru Ibimi)
The suicide of Princess Ashihara's name reveals an unequal relationship that is easily overlooked in the production process of Japanese TV dramas: Since most Japanese TV dramas are based on novels and Animation adaptation, but the relationship between the original author, the novel publisher and the TV station is not equal. Theoretically, the original author has the highest decision-making power and can lead the direction of the adaptation. However, in fact, the original author is just an unpaid "Party B". They participate in the supervision of the original work, but bear a huge workload. Not only do they need to make modifications, but they also Need to explain and guide to the TV station. The most critical thing is that there is no extra compensation for such a large amount of hard work. Generally, artists and staff can earn a fixed salary from Japan's huge offices, and life is not a problem. However, many writers and cartoonists do not have a contract with an agency or publisher. Whether they can make money depends entirely on whether their works can sell well. Supervising TV dramas takes up a lot of time and energy from writers and cartoonists, affecting their creations without being paid, which greatly increases the pressure on their lives. Princess Ashihara's name may have ultimately chosen to commit suicide because of this[31]. In addition, the price of Japanese comics is extremely low. The famous comic "Weekly Shonen Jump" is only 290 yen (about 15 yuan) and has a total of 485 pages; "Weekly Shonen Sunday" is only 360 yen and has more than 500 pages. The low pricing will obviously reduce the actual income of cartoonists; for the weekly serial pages, cartoonists have to bow their heads at their desks and draw day and night to meet the needs of readers. There is a rumor in Japan that the average life expectancy of cartoonists is only 57 years [32]. Although the statistical data is not necessarily reliable, there are a lot of well-known cartoonists who died of unnatural deaths, which shows that cartoonists are under great work pressure.
From the perspective of revenue sharing, most copyrights in Japan belong to offices and large companies. For example, the copyright of music belongs to music companies such as Sony [33], and the copyright of novels and comics belongs to publishing companies. This results in a low share of the share for creators. , a song or a book sells well, the company makes a lot of money, but the individual share is relatively small. For singers, they signed a contract with an agency and received a fixed annual salary. It can be said that the agency helped them resolve the risk; but for novelists and cartoonists who are independent creators, the company will not bear the risk for them, so it is easy to Being in a passive position and losing the right to speak. Relatively low income, lack of voice, unstable work and great work pressure make the work of cartoonists very difficult.
Princess Ashihara complained on With some indifferent slogans or continued silence, those seeking responsibility mainly hope to request Shogakukan to give a reasonable response [34] rather than deeply exposing the structural problems exposed in such incidents or fighting for own rights and interests.
In Japanese law, whistleblowers have always been excluded, and the law cannot provide them with protection. The root cause is also a high degree of collective consciousness. Even if the organization to which they belong has some inappropriate behavior, individuals should avoid leaking information to the outside world. This is what Japan considers public morality. Before 2006, Japan did not have a specific whistle-blowing law. Article 104 of the Labor Standards Act only stipulates that employees shall not be charged for reporting violations of the Labor Standards Act to administrative officials or labor standards inspectors, but related measures are usually It only provides protection in a narrow sense and cannot avoid broader retaliatory measures such as exclusion. Japan’s case law on retaliatory firing does not provide uniform protection for whistleblowers. Decisions are based on the veracity, sincerity and reporting style of the assertion [35].Japanese attitudes towards whistleblowers are also inconsistent. In some surveys, the vast majority of respondents believe that they will take the initiative to report problems, but in other surveys, the vast majority of respondents said that they will not report problems in their own teams. [36], this diverse psychology hinders the emergence of potential whistleblowers. All in all, the lack of corresponding protections in Japanese law and the complicated attitudes of social members towards reporting under social culture have hindered the emergence of whistleblowers. They have also covered up the problems in the Japanese entertainment industry and hindered the improvement of the entertainment industry.
4, Conclusion
The specific analysis of Nagayama Ayato's drug abuse is limited to the length of the full text. Compared with the public nature of the previous incidents, Nagayama Ayato's drug abuse behavior was more caused by the "loneliness" of his personal life. Famous musicians such as Ryo Asuka and Yutaka Ozaki studied American folk and rock singers and found inspiration through drug use; artists were in Sartrean "freedom pain" when they were not working, and chose to take drugs in order to escape such "hell".
The above-mentioned events all involve one point: subjectivity. Sexual assault, team bullying and other behaviors can be nipped in the bud if they are exposed and dealt with correctly. However, most of the participants are only for their own selfish interests, without considering the public interest, and remain silent when they need to assume social responsibilities. Silence or compliance with more powerful figures allows illegal incidents to continue to occur. In post-war Japan, post-war activists represented by Masao Maruyama lamented that the pre-war Japanese people's individualism in escaping from politics produced obedient people who obeyed militarism, and emphasized the need to establish "subjectivity" and assume personal political responsibility. [37].
The basis of pre-war "supranationalism" was not everyone's sense of responsibility, but "the unlimited intrusion of 'private' into 'public'", that is, the pursuit of interests. The common people express their loyalty to local leaders, or the local leaders express their loyalty to the central government. These are just to get ahead and gain benefits, or to squeeze into the power class with the emperor as the apex. In this case, "patriotism" is Expression of personal interests [38].
The problem in the contemporary Japanese entertainment industry is that everyone only pursues personal interests and ignores the public nature of the entertainment industry order, which ultimately produces various scandals. Only when everyone develops public awareness and takes responsibility can the occurrence of scandals be gradually reduced.
Reference
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[4] patrick w. galbraith, jason g. karlin. 2012. idols and celebrities in japanese media culture. new york: palgrave macmillan：185-186
[5] patrick w. galbraith , jason g. karlin. 2012. idols and celebrity in japanese media culture. new york: palgrave macmillan：104-105
[6] "日経エンタテインメント! 》March 2024 issue, pages 30-31
[7] 160501 wide na show (referring to Rino Hara, Shinzo Abe) [Soy milk Chinese subtitles] https://www.bilibili.com/video/av4599074/?vd_source=54b2f72eb7e00012e84e7db0d34e0711
[8] The perverted reality show of Douban 9.5, when the passers -by, alarm alarm https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/102610752
9] Refers Anti-attack! https://article.auone.jp/detail/1/5/9/178_9_r_20240305_1709606811990028
[10] [Discontinued list] Sashihara Rino, カメラのない placeでも起きていた「Doubt」 https ://news.goo.ne.jp/iw/252750/【Cancel the list】Sashihara Rino, カメラのないplaceでも开きていた「Doubt」
[11] 元hkt48 Tanaka Mihisa, Sashihara Rinoと「めちゃくちゃ"Noisy" past confession https://news.yahoo.co.jp/articles/a1b80b4dcc363d0c4cb2710aab946cb303d81fff
[12] Shohei Otani, Masaharu Fukuyama, Ayase Aya, Ryoko Hirosue... "cmギャラランキング2023マルデータ is revealed! https://friday.kodansha.co.jp/article/319936
[13] The first place of "Love is falling" is Yumura Kasumi, and Ishihara is chasing... 2021 spring ドラマ "ヒロイン Actress" 1200 people アンケート https: //smart-flash.jp/entame/139943/image/3/
[14] patrick w. galbraith, jason g. karlin. 2019. akb48. new york: bloomsbury academic usa: 74
[15] A related case is : The "royal progression" that became popular in Europe in the 1980s was introduced to Japan in the 1980s and is still one of the most important chord progressions in Japanese music.
[16] patrick w. galbraith, jason g. karlin. 2019. akb48. new york: bloomsbury academic usa: 50
[17] patrick w. galbraith, jason g. karlin. 2019. akb48. new york: bloomsbury academic usa: 49
[18] Yao Yang, 2022, "Institutions and Economic Growth: and "Dialogue on New Institutional Economics", Shanghai: Wenhui Publishing House
[19] She chooses the protagonist online, satirizes actors, and scolds fans. Can she now only rely on hype to attract attention? https://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=1662678692054885135&wfr=spider&for=pc
[20] west, mark d. 2007. secrets, sex and spectacle: the rules of scandal in japan and the united states. chicago: university of chicago press: 77-78
[21] west, mark d. 2007. secrets, sex and spectacle: the rules of scandal in japan and the united states. chicago: university of chicago press: 82
[22] 元吉本大物踸人がconfession 「At that time, the official affairs of the time were cut off やった」 https://www.news-postseven.com/archives/20190805_1426245.html?detail
[23] Yoshimoto Kogyo and the Yamaguchi-gumi relationship 伝の広报マンが语った「Lin Yuan President’s secrets” https://www.dailyshincho.jp/article/2020/06271100/?all=1&page=1
[24] west, mark d. 2007. secrets, sex and spectacle: the rules of scandal in japan and the united states. chicago: university of chicago press: 118-119
[25] west, mark d. 2007. secrets, sex and spectacle: the rules of scandal in japan and the united states. chicago: university of chicago press: 255- 256
[26] west, mark d. 2007. secrets, sex and spectacle: the rules of scandal in japan and the united states. chicago: university of chicago press: 248-249
[27] 文春続报 有爱きいさん的故事Takarazuka Opera団Hankyu Hanshin HDの経営・イメージに撃恮価値lowもhttps://ameblo.jp/tychobranche/entry-12823136954.html
www.itmedia. co.jp/business/articles/2311/15/news106.html
[29] Author's note: It is indeed obvious that in the first seven or eight episodes, the lead actor Kinami Haruka and the female supporting actress Mi Airi have to really develop their emotional lines, and the finale There is no love result
[30] The content is from: "Sexy Miss Tanaka" event timeline https://www.douban.com/people/clsca/status/4514855081/?_i=9804113agxfhod,9808463agxfhod
[31] See the detailed description ： https://www.douban.com/people/clsca/status/4515280896/?_i=9804111agxfhod
[32] The short life of the cartoonist https://ameblo.jp/m-kamou/entry-12471765548.html
[33] carolyn stevens. 2007. japanese popular music: culture, authenticity and power. new york: routledge: 80
[34] "Shogakukan" was denounced by many cartoonists for not publishing the truth about the Awara Princess Miko incident https://baijiahao.baidu. com/s?id=1790236035179726843&wfr=spider&for=pc
[35] west, mark d. 2007. secrets, sex and spectacle: the rules of scandal in japan and the united states. chicago: university of chicago press: 51
[36] west , mark d. 2007. secrets, sex and spectacle: the rules of scandal in japan and the united states. chicago: university of chicago press: 51
[37] Xiaoxiong Eiji, 2020, "Democracy" and "Patriotism": Postwar "Japanese Nationalism and Publicity Volume 1", Beijing: Social Sciences Literature Press, pp. 62-44.
[38] Xiaoxiong Eiji, 2020, "Democracy and Patriotism: Nationalism and Publicity in Postwar Japan Volume 1", Beijing: Social Sciences Literature Press, p. 274.
[38] Xiaoxiong Eiji, 2020, "Democracy and Patriotism: Nationalism and Publicity in Postwar Japan Volume 1", Beijing: Social Sciences Literature Press, p. 274.
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