“The time has finally come for the Japanese people to learn about the Emperor of Japan!” This is the sales message of a comic book “Tenno ron” (The Thesis of the Emperor of Japan) written by comic writer Yoshinori Kobayashi. He has been exploring “taboo” in his works such as “Senso ron” (The Thesis of War) and “Okinawa ron” (The Thesis of Okinawa).
Now he talks about the Emperor of Japan who marks the 20th anniversary of His Majesty’s accession and the 50th anniversary of the Imperial Couple’s marriage in 2009.
Guardian: A pop group EXILE performed at the ceremony of the 20th anniversary of His Majesty’s accession and this seems a strange phenomenon because people regard the Emperor and the pop group as “stars” equally. What do you think about it?
Yoshinori Kobayashi: That is a very progressive way of thinking. The Emperor has been treated as a star since the early times and so it’s not a big problem. What is important is that the Japanese people are fascinated by something pure.
G: What is something pure?
K: It’s what people admire. The Emperor of Japan is of absolutely pure existence and so are celebrities. That is why most people admire them and it is natural for them to see both the Emperor and celebrities as stars of equal status.
G: What is the influence that the pure Emperor of Japan has on people?
K: His Majesty plays the role as an absolutely public existence and stops individuals from becoming atomic.
Yoshinori Kobayashi
A comic writer and a philosopher
Born in 1953.
Debuted in 1976 with the comic “Todai Icchokusen”.
Has many hits such as “Obocchama-kun” and “Gomanizm-sengen”.
G: What does becoming atomic mean?
K: It has almost the same meaning as becoming a wandering individual. Japanese people are originally group-oriented and citizens used to live in naturally-made communities. But today such communities are no longer there and individuals cannot rely on and live in groups, so they live with few relations just like atoms.
G: What is the influence of atomic individuals ?
K: When they gather, they become a mass of people. The mass is different from “the common people” that are a group of different cultural areas. One idea does not easily rule over individuals in the common people, but in a mass of people, a peculiar phenomenon of populism occurs where a single idea dominates everybody.
G: Is it only the Emperor of Japan who stops individuals from becoming atomic?
K: People brought about the Emperor to escape from the control of Sui Dynasty in China and to be equal to that country in the early times. It is not an artificial ideology but rather a natural-born idea. The Emperor of Japan has authority but not power.
G: Why doesn’t His Majesty have power? What is the difference between authority and power?
K: Ideologies did not actually disappear although it seems to have come to an end. For example, we are told that November 23rd is the Labor Thanksgiving Day, but it was originally called “Niiname-sai,” (harvest festival) where His Majesty offers the new grain to the gods, eats the new rice and appreciates the year’s harvest. We don’t call the day “Niiname-sai” anymore because the left-wing ideology hides things relating to the Emperor of Japan such as what our country is composed of and the reasons for having national holidays in the first place.
Democracy that everybody adamantly believes in is also an ideology. There is no absolutely universal idea, but people are made to believe that democracy is absolute by the power of the ideology.
G: What do you think of right wings and left wings?
K: Right wings cannot exist without the existence of left wings that try to break up the country. People say respecting the Emperor of Japan makes you right-winged but that’s not necessarily correct. If so, most Japanese people would have been right-winged since the early times. The Imperial Household was produced from the thought that the Emperor is absolutely public and exists selflessly on top of the country. On the other hand, communism and socialism are artificial, and post-modernism and relativism are a variety of left-sided ideology. This kind of ideology deconstructs the history of the country and breaks the nation.
G: What happens if the nation is broken?
K: Power is sandwiched between the Emperor with his authority and the common people, and that is why there have not been revolutions in Japan. But if the movement of post-modernism gives a rise to a new existence with both authority and power, then the current power structure would be broken down and the country would be ruled by violence.
G: So do you mean that people cannot live without something absolutely pure and unexplainable by theory?
K: That is correct. People admire something pure and absolute and that is why ideas of post-modernism or relativism are impossible in principle. Anybody, if they know history, is fascinated by the Emperor of Japan who prays for the citizen in the most sacred place and who is absolutely public and pure. That is because people look for something to depend on in urgent times.
For instance, when the huge earthquake occurred in Hanshin and Awaji in 1995, a man who was then a boy said that he was so relieved and felt saved when he met His Majesty. It’s hard to convince people of the messages contained in “The Thesis of the Emperor of Japan” during peaceful times.
G: What do we have to do today?
K: Young people today don’t seem to have great dreams or desires. It’s because they are influenced by progressive people and ideas of post-modernism as well as relativism. We have to remake the community and take back public minds to make strong individuals. Also, atomic individuals are losing vitalities, but each of them needs to start having an ambition such as “I’ll be the one to lead this country!”
BY Miki Arai
EDITOR Kyosuke Higuchi
