Japan's Media Has to Account for Its Own Failures, Too
Its action, and inaction, in the takedowns of the Unification Church and J-pop agency Johnny’s demands some introspection.
A bride poses before an image of deceased Unification Church founder Sun Myung-Moon and his wife, Hak Ja-Han, before a mass wedding ceremony in 2017.
Photographer: Ed Jones/AFP via Getty Images
The recent downfalls in Japan of the Unification Church and J-pop agency Johnny & Associates Inc. seem to be, on the face of it, victories for justice: Two odious groups that used their outsized clout for years to cover up noxious acts have at last been hobbled, if not eliminated.
The country won’t miss the church, whose followers are often derisively called “Moonies,” after founder and supposed-messiah Sun Myung Moon. It’s now set to be dissolved in Japan after an investigation into its forced donations. Nor will it mourn Johnny’s (as the agency is known), which is changing its name, structure and management after a decades-old sexual abuse scandal perpetrated by its founder, Johnny Kitagawa. Few could have predicted 18 months ago that both institutions, whose tentacles run deep into Japanese society, would be chopped down to size. Though each will live on in other forms, their impact will be severely diminished.