Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

shingetsunewsagency.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 494 posts

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#31

Post by paulmd »

ehvatum wrote: post #28
hugh-avherald wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also quite chauvinist to suggest that the major newspapers cannot arrive at the same conclusion about disclosure independently, and pretty ignorant to imply that suppressing information is inconsistent with democracy.

> pretty ignorant to imply that suppressing information is inconsistent with democracy It sort of is inconsistent with democracy. People should know for whom and for what they vote.

Is it? In most democracies in the world there are things you cannot publish even if they are true - Britain for example still maintains an official state censor, and even in the US there are still some state secrets that you cannot publish regardless of how true they are. Britain and many other countries also maintain a right to privacy that protects non-public-figure individuals against salacious soap-opera tabloid shit - you can't just go telling the whole world that Joe Q Public cheated on his wife, even if it's absolutely true because it's not a good idea for the panopticon to be pointed at the powerless like that.

Again, as should be said every time the topic comes up here on HN - the idealization of absolute and unlimited free speech is kind of a uniquely American phenomenon and even then it is not quite absolute. The rest of the world views freedom of speech as a right that needs to be limited and balanced like every other right.

Everyone has frequently talked about how we shouldn't be having media broadcast the manifestos of these shooters and glorifying them, how the media should just suppress information about them and refuse to publish their pictures and only and talk about them in the abstract... isn't that exactly what is going on here? This guy killed the prime minister and you want to know exactly what his cause was in exacting detail...

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#32

Post by samtheprogram »

nier wrote: post #23

> He adds that Shintaro Abe, Kishi’s son and Shinzo Abe’s father, “depended upon ‘Moonies’ in his election campaigns.” They got the family situation wrong. Shintaro Abe is Nobusuke Kishi’s son-in-law not his son. From Wikipedia: > Shintaro Abe married Yoko Kishi [ja], daughter of Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi, in 1951. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shintaro_Abe

Seems like the article has been fixed already. That was fast.

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#33

Post by thematrixturtle »

Larrikin wrote: post #25
tkgally wrote: post #5

The linked article ends with this: “Why the Japanese media has refused to identify the ‘religious group’ that formed the motive for the killing must remain as speculation at this juncture, though it reflects very poorly on Japan’s status as a democratic nation.” It’s important to note that the Japanese media is not monolithic. It’s true that the major newspapers (Asahi, Yomiuri, Mainichi, Nikkei, etc.) and the broadc…

It was explained to me when I lived in Japan, that while there are many Japanese media companies that exist independently in Japan, they all have to go to one central government body to renew their licenses to exist. They get some leeway but it's it's not much

It's not about "licenses to exist", but access to the press clubs (kisha clubs). Basically, if the government doesn't like what you print/say, you get frozen out the clubs and hence out of all government news.

https://freespeechdebate.com/discuss/an-impregnable-fortress...

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#34

Post by safety1st »

ehvatum wrote: post #28
hugh-avherald wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also quite chauvinist to suggest that the major newspapers cannot arrive at the same conclusion about disclosure independently, and pretty ignorant to imply that suppressing information is inconsistent with democracy.

> pretty ignorant to imply that suppressing information is inconsistent with democracy It sort of is inconsistent with democracy. People should know for whom and for what they vote.

Not necessarily backing the decision of the Japanese newspapers here, but US politics is basically a circus of unsubstantiated allegations which are front and center because they get more eyeballs. Sensationalism is hardly a pillar of democracy. It's a scourge and the country would be better off if Fox, MSNBC, Twitter's apocalypse algorithms etc. were a little more reserved.

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#35

Post by petre »

uwagar wrote: post #26
chrischen wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's definitely a culture of brothels that still exists thats pretty foreign to the West. You won't really hear about it because Japanese people don't just offer there stories up to foreigners... but I've had sources inform me of places where people can go for orgies (in a way Americans may casually visit a strip club which is a toned down version of this) and I believe in some cases can even be expensed to the bu…

interesting. any books or websites to find out more about this culture?

I hadn't realized but it's sometimes even mentioned in some of Haruki Murakami's stories.

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#36

Post by grapeskin »

SllX wrote: post #15
ETHisso2017 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why aren't the major Japanese media outlets covering this angle before the polls close in Japan's upper house elections (today)?

Isn’t it controversial whether or not he did have a connection? There is a value of free speech in Japan but it’s not exactly like America’s, and I think the Japanese media would mostly avoid stirring the pot immediately prior to an election, and especially for a claim that may be unfounded. I won’t argue whether their approach is the right one or not and this is just my opinion, but that seems like that would be why…

Controversial in the sense that he’s on video as a presenter in one of their events.

It’s as controversial as the My Pillow guy having a connection to a political party. We don’t know whether he literally believes in what he’s saying, but we do know he’s being paid to speak for them.

But whether this is the cult he was killed for is yet to be confirmed. He also had heavy involvement with Soka Gakkai through his alignment with the Komeito party. They also drain people of their cash.

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#37

Post by thematrixturtle »

jsnk wrote: post #13

I would like to wait more for more information. This speculation seems incomplete and premature, and in the end, likely, inaccurate. Political assassinations rarely stem from one particular situation or event, but accumulation of beliefs and world view over a long period of time. He may stated his disdain for Abe to be his connection with the religious organization, but that can easily be just one of many reasons tha…

The assassin stated that he killed Abe due to his association with a "certain group", so this theory lines up nicely. Of course it's all speculation until we hear from the suspect themselves.

Update: the suspect has now confirmed. https://japantoday.com/category/crime/update2-abe-shooter-sa...

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#39

Post by moomin »

paulmd wrote: post #31
ehvatum wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> pretty ignorant to imply that suppressing information is inconsistent with democracy It sort of is inconsistent with democracy. People should know for whom and for what they vote.

Is it? In most democracies in the world there are things you cannot publish even if they are true - Britain for example still maintains an official state censor, and even in the US there are still some state secrets that you cannot publish regardless of how true they are . Britain and many other countries also maintain a right to privacy that protects non-public-figure individuals against salacious soap-opera tabloid…

Britain’s an interesting case, but I don’t think it makes the point you think it does. Yes, there’s a censor, but the real reason all the newspapers report the same thing at the same time is cultural a) newspaper ownership is concentrated amongst a very small group of people, most of whom are billionaires b) they employ people who they trust to do the right thing c) journalism in the U.K. operates a revolving door with the conservative party’s communications division d) partly as a result of that and partly as a result of falling revenues, most journalist's idea of what good journalism is consists of asking two people what they think and reporting what they say e) this makes them extremely dependent on the lobby system, which is pretty similar to press clubs e) Blair set a precedent for cutting funding to the BBC if it said things it didn’t like, and the current government hasn’t hesitated to threaten to do it again f) this culture is so ingrained it has spread even to those publications that theoretically shouldn’t be affected.

So the situation in Japan is pretty similar to that in the U.K. You just need to identify the levers.

Re: The Crime That Killed Shinzo Abe

#40

Post by [deleted] »

g5095 wrote: post #21

"Why the Japanese media has refused to identify the 'religious group' that formed the motive for the killing must remain as speculation at this juncture, though it reflects very poorly on Japan’s status as a democratic nation." I'm struggling to understand the author's bias here (there clearly is one), are they claiming that the poor reflection on Japan as a democracy is: - that the media has not reported an unsubsta…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN