It's perhaps the most prestigious and well-recognized newspaper column in Japan. It runs on the front page of The Asahi Shimbun, it's read by millions of people each day and is regularly studied in schools. But the column, called Tensei Jingo (known in English as Vox Populi, Vox Dei), has recently suffered a blow to its reputation because of accusations of plagiarism. While American giants in journalism struggle with their own reporting scandals -- from Jayson Blair's escapades at The New York Times to the mea culpa from CBS for relying on inauthentic documents about President George W. Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard -- Japanese media giants are facing a similar gut-check as accusations of plagiarism, sloppy journalistic practices and corruption fly around some of the country's biggest and most powerful newsrooms. Much of this swirl of criticism is being fueled by a vibrant discussion of journalism in the Japanese blogosphere. Blogs such as Will the Net Kill Newspapers? by Jiji Press senior journalist Tsuruaki Yukawa and Takeshi Kimura's Weekly! are adding a new twist to discussions of journalism in Japan. And while high-profile journalists such as Kimura have large presences in the blogosphere, there also are many journalism blogs run by editors and reporters who refuse to attach their names to their postings -- some fear repercussions at work. One blogger responded to questions for this article on his Study of Modern Journalism blog, but has yet to identify himself. A few days later, the same questions were answered by another journalist-blogger who hadn't even been contacted for this story. This blogger calls himself a "sergeant," saying he is 31 years old and works as a reporter for a regional newspaper.
The trouble with Tensei Jingo, a whimsical and witty column that often can't be deemed hard-hitting, started in a more traditional way. Last year, popular weekly magazine Shukan Shincho pointed out similarities between the writings on a person's Web site in May 2001 and a Tensei Jingo column that had run in the newspaper in August of the same year. The magazine also claimed that another Tensei Jingo column contained plagiarized passages. The Asahi quickly sued for damages in both cases, saying the magazine had defamed its character. Anonymously run Web site Asahicom.com, which satirizes and critiques the Asahi media group, compared the two essays. One of the essays that Shukan Shincho claimed was plagiarized dealt with how people who read while standing up in bookstores often feel the urge to go to the toilet. The judge's ruling Sept. 17 left no clear winners. Judge Shigeru Nakanishi of the Tokyo District Court ruled that Shukan Shincho should pay part of the damages requested by Asahi for accusations of plagiarism on the bookstore column, but he did not award damages for the other accusation. The Asahi Shimbun filed an appeal on Sept. 29.
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"In some cases, reporters are requested by other sources to secretly ask questions for them (and pretend it is part of the interview)." -- Jin Mayama, former newspaper reporter |
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The Asahi was hit with another blow in August when one of its reporters secretly recorded an interview, and another blog was ready to take note when the scandal broke. The source had asked the 46-year-old reporter not to record an interview involving embezzlement at a private medical university. But the reporter defied his request, then gave a minidisc containing the recorded conversation to a person connected to the university.Later, the source was shocked to find that someone had written a memo criticizing the comments he had made to the Asahi reporter. Soon after the scandal broke, the Study of Modern Journalism blog criticized the newspaper for being slow to report the ethical breach. "This story has appeared on the Yomiuri and Mainichi Web sites, but not on Asahi.com," a blogger wrote. "It is also barely mentioned in the morning edition of The Asahi Shimbun. Asahi is showing no sign of remorse over this matter." The Asahi eventually opened an internal investigation. It also asked the reporter to resign and cut the pay of several others working on the story. The paper apologized to the source and other people caught up in the scandal and promised to take measures to improve journalistic ethics in its newsroom. Another example of an ethical lapse has kept NHK on the defensive. An NHK production chief was fired in late July when he was caught trying to embezzle 48 million yen (about $436,000). The public broadcaster admitted in early September that four other employees had been fired for embezzlement between 1997 and 2001. And to make matters worse, NHK refused to broadcast a live Lower House committee meeting attended by NHK President Katsuji Ebisawa to discuss the scandals, but later aired a 40-minute version of the three-hour session. "I hear that local collectors have met with critical remarks from householders, and some have even refused to pay (their monthly fees)," Ebisawa told the press. Japanese media reports say as many as 13,000 households refused to pay their NHK fees since the scandal broke. (NHK charges each household with a TV 1,395 yen, or $13 a month; satellite TV subscribers pay more.) NHK is planning to send executives to many of these homes to apologize for the scandals.
Despite this series of journalistic scandals, most reporters interviewed did not feel their profession was facing an ethics crisis. They acknowledged that cuts in staff and increasing workloads have made their job harder, but they rejected the argument that low morale and lack of ethics are widespread. "I don't think we have a morale problem," said Konoe Yoshida, a business reporter for a major daily newspaper in Tokyo. "As for more work, yes, definitely ... The nature of business news reporting has changed tremendously over the past 10 to 20 years. Before, when the economy was going up, it was easier to write about, say, company A's capital spending going up, or company B opening new plants in such-and-such a place. But when the economy is going down, companies don't want to give out information, so it's more work for the reporters." While most, if not all, major media outlets have policies forbidding final articles to be shown to third parties, several journalists said they sometimes show a copy of a story to a trusted source to ensure accuracy. All these reporters were quick to condemn the actions of the Asahi Shimbun reporter, however, with one journalist calling it "really odd" and a "stupid action." But former newspaper reporter turned novelist Jin Mayama had a more pointed critique of the Asahi scandal. "I don't think this is a rare case," he said. "Of course, passing recorded or audio materials on to someone with a conflict of interest is not common, but if we're talking about leaking information or sending out memos from an interview, that's not so unusual. In some cases, reporters are requested by other sources to secretly ask questions for them (and pretend it is part of the interview)." Mayama, whose novel "Vulture" ("Hagetaka") about buyout funds is to be published in December, said reporters in Japan consider themselves "elites." "For example, many reporters believe that they'll get a free pass if they're pulled over for a traffic violation," Mayama says. "They'll just tell the police that they're from such-and-such newspaper. In fact, they are let go in most cases. I recall once when I told a police chief in charge of transportation that I got a speeding ticket and had to pay a penalty. He asked me, 'Why didn't you tell me?'" Mayama also blames the press club system for a decline in journalistic standards. That all newspaper stories are similar demonstrates the over-reliance on press clubs, he said. As a result, readers might as well read only one newspaper. "Here's what front line reporters are told by their superiors on a daily basis: Forget scoops; just don't miss out on any of the other stories running in other papers," Mayama argued. "All you have to do now is summarize a press release to turn it into a story. Because the reporter has only to copy the release, it facilitates this system where every newspaper churns out the same stories." This sort of frank discussion of journalism is increasingly appearing on blogs in Japan. In late June a blog run by Kyodo News and called "News Diary, Signed by a Reporter" took issue with another blog written by Takafumi Horie, Net entrepreneur and CEO of Livedoor. The Kyodo blog entry, written by senior Kyodo Editor in Chief Shin Koike, criticized Horie's blog entries for being self-absorbed: "The contents are all about how his muscles are developing after his total workout, what he ate during a trip to Shanghai, how his massage felt, what he thought of this or that movie or play ... Frankly, I think this is nothing more than snobbery." By American standards, this seems pretty tame, but in a country where politeness still plays a central role in public discussions when people aren't hiding behind a cloak of anonymity, Koike's entry stirred up a huge debate on the Net. The blog was inundated with hundreds of comments, most of them critical of Koike's opinion. Kyodo shut down the blog a few days later. But two months later, at the end of August, the Kyodo blog was back up and running. Meanwhile, Livedoor's Horie has upped the ante with plans to launch a newsroom of his own in November. The newsroom staff of about 40 will write, edit and post news on the Livedoor Internet portal while also building up a network of citizen journalists. The company said it "hopes to start a new wave in existing journalism by providing a variety of news contents that major mass media companies do not have room for." How will major media outlets respond? Mayama, whose next novel (tentatively titled "Virtual Collapse") takes on the TV industry, thinks they've grown too tame for their own good. "The management does not take risks," Mayama said. "Fearing lawsuits or retribution from the government, media organizations tend to be too amicable. I can't help but feel that mass media has (sic) abandoned one of its significant roles as a social watchdog and has lowered itself to the role of a PR person for the administration."
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