I just applaud all the people who are actually finding these videos and tweets. A short story about bullying. I know it's a tad off topic but just hear me out. I've had a few best friends in my life, and one of them I don't consider to be one anymore. I have known her since grade school. When it was just her and I hanging out it was fine - we were both happy and she helped me with homework and we enjoyed meals together. Typical girl friendship with sleepovers. I loved her. I knew I could depend on her. However, when we were with a group of classmates/friends, she made fun of me. One time it was because I didn't wear make-up and said how I would never get a boyfriend. If I asked her when we were alone, she would have denied saying that. That's her. I'm not friends with her now not because of this, we simply grew apart. But, my point in saying this is because if management does nothing with the accused members (since there are substantial facts coming to light), nothing like quiet behind the scenes punishment, or graduation announcement(s) of these accused, there's no benefit on having them in the group. Sure, only management sees $$$'s. But something like a shuffle won't make things work. That's actually scary because if Team NIII members now mix with Team G, Team G members will be victims.Then Mahohon's beloved Team G that she's worked hard for will be brought down. I can't imagine what Mahohon's even feeling since the 3rd anniversary since she had to stand backstage with all the members - those who are against her.... If the accused members stay, who knows there might be another target in mind. That can't go on. No one will want to join NGT knowing there's members who can't be trusted. This is old, obvious stuff I'm talking about but one way or another management needs to realize that something has to be done. Sadly I don't think anything will.
^So, you're going to disregard all the evidence that has been picked up linking Ayakani to the situation? Out of all the members you named she is the only name to be mentioned so much when a new piece of information comes out. I get that you support her, it's not nice to see your oshi being accused on something so horrible (Rika is my #1 ngt member so trust me I know LOL), but when there is so much evidence in place, rather than jumping to defend her, just see how it plays out and wait until you're sure she's been cleared of her name. What company would allow for this to happen? At my job, if we give out any sort of information about a colleague to some random person who comes in, we would be in serious trouble. Even if it was a question as small as "when are they getting back from their lunch break?". Maho and Management's comments both confirmed that a member gave out information to where she lives, her contact details, and what time she would be back from work. If I did that at my place of work I would be fired on the spot.
Of having a boyfriend and hanging out with the stalker wota group. Both of which are extremely bad for an idol and unhealthy for the group dynamics, but not actually criminal. I don't think this part of Maho's account can be relied on. At the very least it is hearsay, as she must have been informed of this by someone else. Even worse, if I recall correctly she said she was told this by the criminals themselves. If they told Maho this with the police or uninvolved members present, they would surely want to conceal the existence of Inapooh's network and instead make up some believable story about how they found her apartment. Assuming it was Rika who made those tweets, she said *none* of the members were involved beyond what management had already revealed (i.e. one member accosted on the street). All recent NGT48 tweets have been extremely suspicious, however. I agree with that all the evidence against Ayakani can be explained by her being close to the arrested men, rather than suggesting she hard a part in planning or instigating the assault. So far all the evidence of animosity I've seen from her against Mahohon came after the incident, and after the arrest of her alleged boyfriend. There is quite a lot of evidence she was involved with those guys and the rest of their group long before that, but that in itself doesn't implicate her in the assault. That was Furuhata Nao. SKE member. I was under the impression they could arrest and detain suspects for almost a month with a charge.
This is of course OT but I thought the T-ara bullying scandal was always portrayed as a very black and white situation while there is still a lot we don't know. At the start it was T-ara that was in the wrong and at the end everyone decided that Hwayoung was to blame. All the information that came out against Hwayoung at the end doesn't mean that there wasn't any bullying, her being a slacker and the other girls turning her into an outcast or whatever could still have occurred. From my interpretation both parties were at fault and the scandal was handled extremely poorly by their company. That just shows that like with this case, we're just scraping the surface and people are making assumptions based on social media posts and whatnot. That said, both cases are extremely different because there aren't two parties at fault here. Maho is the victim.
Apparently not solely their decision. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_justice_system_of_Japan#Arrest
She is unequivocally the victim of the assault, but it's unclear whether any other member was involved in that incident. The bullying is a separate issue and there is a lot (i.e. almost everything) we don't know. As Mahohon says she was heartbroken to learn the names of some of the members involved, it seems unlikely that all of the current suspects were involved in the bullying. Ayakani herself seemed close with Mahohon up until recently, and her snide remarks since the incident can be attributed to anger at having her boyfriend locked up.
Here's a GC thread on Suda Akari's statement in a variety show yesterday (article linked in the OP) + her earlier tweets. Article tl;dr: Dasu said it's not just a case of bad management but also certain fans acting badly, and that if the girls who leaked Maho's private information to those fans had any dignity as idols (i.e. keeping a professional distance from their fans), none of this would have happened. Also, the girls involved would have to decide on their own whether they want to continue as idols or graduate...it kinda seemed like she was implying that Ayakani's gang should graduate, but she also tweeted that she doesn't agree with publicly naming the girls involved as they're all in their teens and 20s and shouldn't have this kind of thing following them around for the rest of their lives. GC commenters pointed out that this would mean showing more consideration to the perpetrators than to Maho, the victim, who did not get the luxury of choosing whether she wanted to live with the consequences of this crime. Further, people in their 20s are adults, not little kids who can't be held responsible for their own actions (I know some of the bully gang members had their adult ceremony today so...lol). Someone also wrote that whether they graduate or not is beside the question and the more important fact is that the girls who leaked Maho's info committed a crime. There are way too many comments to translate but basically, a lot of the commenters bring up that both the management and the girls involved are treating this as a case of schoolyard bullying when what happened is an actual crime that has severe consequences in the adult world. The management half-assing their statements and having underlings apologize for them when Imamura and Akimoto can't even be bothered to comment, the girls themselves casually bullying those they don't like and leaking personal information everywhere like it's no big deal, seemingly not understanding that in the real world, having your wrongdoings exposed makes you unemployable, acting like all of this will go away after they graduate, etc. Lots of comments on the dirtiness of the entertainment world in general and more specifically on AKB's scandals (Togasaki's drugs and underage prostitutes, Kasai, girls sleeping with sponsors). Onyanko Club was also brought up as a group that also had members secretly sleeping around. As an aside, probably everyone knows that Akimoto married an Onyanko girl, but I haven't seen it mentioned here that he also tried to tank the career of a woman who wouldn't sleep with him (I think he cried about it on ANN? CMIIW) and has a 30+ year reputation of putting hands on his talents so the fact that AKB continues to be dogged by these kinds of rumors whenever a scandal happens is unsurprising. In summary, the normies (GC is heavily female and typically hostile to AKB) are still taking this seriously. Like someone even said that they preferred Sashihara's comments on the topic as she was very unsmiling and sober in Wide na Show, rather than putting on a smiling face like Suda (someone else called Sasshi a management's dog who isn't actually on Maho's side so...YMMV). Seems like this topic hits home for a lot of people (bullying, power harassment, injustice etc.), which is part of the reason why this shitstorm has gotten to be as big as it is. There are also loads of people who hate idols, AKB and Akimoto in particular, who are now jumping on the opportunity to go for the jugular and are crowing for the end of AKB, not surprising considering that AKB is in decline. So basically @Akimoto protect ya neck
I wanna just remind everyone that the first translation of Maho's SR and tweet can be found at page 24/25 Some parts of it are still hard to digest "A certain member informed them about what time we would return back home from theater shows, one more member also informed them about my house address and apartment number. Yet another certain member also incited the perpetrators to go to where my home was." "I am now frightened of walking out alone anymore. Even though I had moved out, my parent's home as well as my telephone number all got leaked around and everyone has learned about them. I have no place where to escape." "If you suspect that those could be lies, feel free to doubt me, I don't mind." I do. lol also, thanks to @remusat that's an interesting post, I didn't even knew GC existed
Even if Tano Ayaka was totally unrelated to Moho's assault incident, I do not condone her and Noe Yamada's showroom bullying of Moho. Ayaka is 21 years old, she is not 16 years old, and furthermore, she is a professional public personality. I expect her to be more professional about her choice of words even when she is angry with the fact that her boyfriend is locked up. On the contrary Moho was much more mature, choosing to let management sort out the issue (which failed), then choosing not to reveal any of the 'guilty' member's, and finally, apologizing even when she is not at fault. Granted she is 23, but Ayaka, I'm sorry. No excuse and I am severely saddened and disappointed.
I don't think she's lying, but she heard this story from the perpetrators themselves: As I said in a previous post, if the source was actually Inapooh, it is unlikely the culprits would want to reveal that to the members and staff (and police). The word she uses here isn't actually a word, more like a portmanteau of two others. "Incited" makes it sound like the member wanted them to come over to her room and attack her, but what she actually says is closer to "suggested they swing by her room". Other than that sentence, I'm not seeing a connection in her account to the bullying people are so keen to search out, but rather to members being way too friendly with men and freely giving out information thereby exposing the rest of them to danger.
And the 行け used as an imperative in that same sentence sounds more like there were orders involved, if anything.
"Go to her room" perhaps. But not "go to her room and assault her". Her conclusion to that tweet tells us she feels the problem is with the members freely giving out information, not with the willful intent on their part to harm her that some people have read into it. ファンと繫がらなかったら繋がってるメンバーに個人情報ばらされて襲われないとけないんですか Is it really necessary for members who are in a relationship with fans to have your private informations leaked and be assaulted by others if you aren't in a relationship with fans yourself?
I guess Imamura was transferred because Inapuu adviced Aki-P to do it then? Unfortunately I had a system failure and didn't log the comments of that Showroom but I'm pretty sure he greeted her and she greeted back (which is not that uncommon). But yes, it could mean they chatted til late that night... Spoiler {"av":1002859,"d":0,"ac":"いなぷぅ","cm":"彼女にチョコレート塗りたくります","u":891000,"created_at":1518528001,"at":0,"t":"1"} {"av":1002859,"d":0,"ac":"いなぷぅ@チョコDD","cm":"だってあやかににチョコ塗りたいんだもん！！","u":891000,"created_at":1518528451,"at":0,"t":"1"}
And what were they going to go to her room and do, ask if she had some sugar they could borrow for their tea? Girls can be bitchy, especially bullies trying to impress scumbag boyfriends, it wouldn't surprise me at all if they told them that Maho was trying to cramp their style and she needed to chill out or shut up (speculation of course but that was the impression that I got from the context of that full comment and also that Maho had complained about the dating circle to management) --------- btw that AKS board member was interviewed but basically said "No comment" when asked about members involvement https://www.asahi.com/and_M/interest/entertainment/Cfettp01901146147.html I guess they're trying to figure out how to keep their sacred cows and maybe at the worst, sacrificie a minion or two.
“No comment” is pretty standard on both side of the coin. That’s why you have a Lawyer to speak for you.
Invite her to the slumber party, obviously. It's impossible to be sure, but I don't think they were going to rape her, and I'm not sure if Maho thinks that anymore now, if she was able to sit down (surrounded by friends and allies) and discuss what happened before the police got there. But she was still terrified for her life in that moment, and no girl should be exposed to that because her coworkers can't keep their mouths or other mobile extremities shut. Yes this is all completely speculation and not corroborated by Maho's own account.
So, even if the members did give out the address and time, was it their intent to harm Mahohon? Maybe a bit too helpful to the wrong people. Maybe I have read up too much spy stories growing up where people unwittingly gave out information to a spy the befriended them and were then taken as traitors when the spy got exposed. Cisalpine88 is digging up all those pieces of showroom material to actually show kani knows the suspects on twitter. To me, it just shows she knows her fans. If you disagree. I am fine with it. If it was her that gave out the info and her intentions to give out the information was to get back at or cause harm to Mahohon, she will be off my list. To me the idea that Kani's intention to keep Mahohon quiet about the boygirl relationship part is kinda weak. The only thing that happens when a relationship is exposed, is most girls leave. It is not a a secret that Kani considered leaving NGT48 about a year ago but was persuaded to stay. Now, it looks like she will have to leave and if that saves her family member's house from being burnt down by fans, it is a good choice. Since other members have taken 2-shots with the suspects, do the girls actually know them other than being very committed fans? I love all the 1st Gens and I hate it when 1 leaves. They made NGT48 to what it was. These are just my thought process. Ps. If the guys were in Kani's room as some say they were, is there a need to even ask for the address?
Has she ever said she didn't? The more I read the more I think that yes, Ayakani could bully other members, but she didn't plan to have Mahohon "attacked".
