Category Archives: Media

Media watch: Revision of 300-day law isn’t all it’s cracked up to be

Posted on October 22, 2022 by philipbrasor

As we’ve said here many times before, one of the main purposes of Japan’s family register system (koseki) is to determine paternity for the sake of bureaucratic convenience, which means that it is the authorities who have the last word … Continue reading →

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Number 1 Shimbun October

Posted on October 4, 2022 by philipbrasor

Here is our column for the October issue of the Number 1 Shimbun, which is about separate names for married couples in Japan.

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Media watch: Statues of limitations to honor not-dead political figures

Posted on October 1, 2022 by philipbrasor

Now that Shinzo Abe’s state funeral is history, we can get back to the business of mocking politicians, like former prime minister and sports honcho Yoshiro Mori, whose penchant for gaffes is even more fulfilling than Taro Aso’s. On Sept. … Continue reading →

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Media watch: Government does itself no favors with new incentives to promote My Number cards

Posted on September 11, 2022 by philipbrasor

For several years the Japanese government and, more specifically, the new digital agency has been trying to sell the public on the My Number system, which assigns a 12-digit ID number to everyone who lives in Japan. Assigning the numbers … Continue reading →

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Media watch: Media take a more clinical look at sex crimes

Posted on September 6, 2022 by philipbrasor

Last month, a man named Akinori Hashimoto was sentenced by the Tokyo District Court to 20 years in prison for sexually abusing and photographing 20 boys between the ages of 5 and 11 from 2015 to 2020. Hashimoto, an accredited … Continue reading →

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Media watch: Doc maker’s first narrative feature to tackle 1923 quake massacre

Posted on September 1, 2022 by philipbrasor

September 1 marks the 99th anniversary of the Great Kanto Earthquake, in which more than 100,000 people perished. Local governments use the occasion to carry out preparedness drills for major quakes. A few localities also hold memorials for victims, including … Continue reading →

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Media watch: Asahi focuses on the reality of Okinawan women’s lives

Posted on August 29, 2022 by philipbrasor

Asahi Shimbun’s regular Koron feature typically asks three experts to contribute short essays on a designated theme. On Aug. 24, the column’s topic was the status of Okinawan women on the 50th anniversary of the prefecture’s reversion to Japanese control … Continue reading →

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Media watch: Opinions about state funeral show the limitations of public surveys

Posted on August 28, 2022 by philipbrasor

Polling and public surveys suck up a lot of media oxygen, especially with regards to political issues. Earlier this year, the justice ministry questioned the public on the separate married names matter. Over the years the portion of respondents in … Continue reading →

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Media watch: Olympic legacy update

Posted on August 23, 2022 by philipbrasor

One of the supposed benefits of holding the Olympics is the “legacy” it provides for the future. As is almost always the case with the Games, these benefits tend to be understood in economic terms—use of specially built Olympic facilities … Continue reading →

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Media watch: Olympic sponsorship deals an open secret

Posted on August 20, 2022 by philipbrasor

As we pointed out in this space a few weeks ago, the investigation into possible bribes paid to Tokyo Olympics official Haruyuki Takahashi, which led to his arrest last week, might not have happened if Shinzo Abe were still alive, … Continue reading →

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