Until about 10 years ago, the Japanese term “masu-gomi” — rubbishy mass media — was a derogatory word only known to a few Internet users. Not anymore.
On March 11, 2011, Japan experienced a major earthquake and subsequent tsunami. Explosions at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in the northern region followed. All told, about 25,000 died or went missing. Two years later, more than 310,000 evacuees have been unable to return to their homes. Decontamination work at the power plant progresses at a snail’s pace.
The unprecedented level of the disaster stunned the nation, including its journalists.
Credibility in Question
Without much time and sufficient background in nuclear expertise, reporters rushed to feed what the government, bureaucrats, academia and the Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, wanted them to tell the public.
When the government and TEPCO gave only partial facts or no facts at all, the resulting reports became inaccurate or simply wrong. The credibility of the press — as well as the authorities — fell sharply.
“Rather than trying to find out the truth, the media became a PR machine for the establishment,” says Yasuo Onuki, a journalist who used to be an executive producer at Japan’s public broadcasting service, NHK.
Some dubbed the Japanese media reports as “announcements by the Japanese Imperial Army headquarters” as in World War Two. Back then, the media deliberately downplayed Japanese casualties in the Battle of Midway, which is said to have been the most important naval battle of the war.
Waseda University professor Jiro Mori has a more measured view.
“The reason that important facts were not covered soon enough was, mostly, the media’s insufficient ability to pursue the facts and a lack of good reporting skills.
“If the public got frustrated by the level of reporting, it reflects their high expectations. People believe that the media can do much more,” Mori says.
Science journalist Shigeyuki Koide, who was a senior writer at Japan’s national daily, Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper, until 2011, says that a certain level of distrust in the media among the public is “healthy.”
“How to interpret what the media say is up to you — readers or viewers.”
But what if there are no reports or no journalists?
Unfiltered Reports Fill the Gap
On March 26, 2011, about two weeks after the disaster struck Fukushima Prefecture and surrounding areas, Katsunobu Sakurai, the mayor of Minami Soma, a city in Fukushima, appeared in a YouTube video. Minami Soma is about 25 kilometers from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, where the explosions had occurred. By then, the government asked residents in the affected areas to evacuate or stay indoors.
“We are left isolated,” Sakurai said, bespectacled and wearing emergency gear.
Although the city asked the residents to evacuate, about 20,000 people still lived in the city. Substantial lack of supplies to the city and insufficient information from the government and TEPCO were major problems.
Speaking in Japanese but with English subtitles on screen, Sakurai spoke to the world. If the media “do not step into this area and get direct information,” they will never be able to get or tell what really is the situation with the residents, he said.
“We would urge them to come here and witness what is happening.”
It was a plea from the heart.
A blogger and former journalist at another daily, Asahi Shimbun newspaper, Yasuharu Dando records the press’ spinelessness in his blog.
According to Dando, there was an article carried in the Asahi Shimbun on March 15, 2011, in which a staffer in charge of locating the journalists on the ground, “instructed the correspondents in Fukushima Prefecture to get out from a 30-kilometer radius and report from indoors.”
It was March 12, the day after the disaster hit, when the government had set the evacuation area at a 20-kilometer radius.
Not everything is in a sorry state, though. One survey shows that the majority of Japanese people on the whole give a thumbs-up to the media.
According to the Central Research Services, its 2011 media research on 3,461 people showed that the respondents gave an average score of 72 out of 100 in terms of trustworthiness of Japanese newspapers. This is the same score as in the previous year. They gave higher scores to NHK, at 74.3.
But while 75.5 percent of the respondents said the newspapers’ earthquake reports were good, in terms of reporting the nuclear accidents, the percentage drastically drops. Only 39.4 percent said the papers’ reporting of radiation levels was satisfactory, for example.
2011, Public Broadcasting Service (PBS)