Shintaro Ishihara

Shintarō Ishihara (石原 慎太郎, Ishihara Shintarō^?, Hyogo Prefecture, Japan, September 30, 1932 - Tokyo, February 1, 2022) was a Japanese writer, Governor of Tokyo Metropolis until 2012. Members of the House of Representatives Nobuteru Ishihara and Hirotaka Ishihara were their first and third children; actor and weather forecaster Yoshizumi Ishihara was his second child.

Biography

Youth

Ishihara was born in Kobe, raised in Zushi, and attended Hitotsubashi University, graduating in 1956. Just two months after graduation, Ishihara won the Akutagawa Prize (Japan's most prestigious literary award) for his novel Seasons in the Sun (太陽の季節, Taiyō no kisetsu^?). His younger brother Yujiro Ishihara played an important role in the novel's screen adaptation, and the two quickly became admired by the youth (Yujiro Ishihara died in 1987).

In the early 1960s he concentrated on literature, writing plays, anime, novels, and a musical version of Treasure Island. He was a director, had his theater company, traveled to the North Pole, drove his own yacht and crossed South America on a motorcycle. From 1967 to 1968, he covered the Vietnam War as a reporter for the newspaper he worked for, Yomiuri Shimbun .

Legislative Career

In 1968 Ishihara served as a candidate in the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) for councilor in the Diet of Japan. He placed first on the LPD list with an unprecedented 3 million votes for him. After four years in the upper house, Ishihara held the position of representative of the second district of Tokyo in the House of Representatives, winning the elections again.

As a member of the Legislative Assembly, Ishihara was quite critical of the LDP. In 1973, he moved with thirty other legislators from the LDP to the anti-communist group Seirankai (Blue Storm Group); the group gained notoriety in the media for making a blood pact to achieve the unity of the members.

Ishihara ran as a candidate for governor of Tokyo in 1975 but lost to popular Socialist incumbent Ryokichi Minobe. Later, he returned to the House of Representatives and worked to increase his status in the party leadership, serving as director of the General Environmental Agency under Takeo Fukuda (1976) and as Minister of Transportation under Noboru Takeshita (1989).). During the 1980s, Ishihara was often said to be part leader within the LDP.

In 1989, shortly after losing a close dispute in his party's presidential race, Ishihara gained notice in the West with his book, A Japan That Can Say No (「NO」と言える日本, "No" to ieru Nippon^?), which he co-authored with then-Sony president Akio Morita. The book invited his fellow countrymen to stand up to the United States.

In 1995 Ishihara retired from national politics, culminating in a 25-year career as a member of Japan's Legislative Assembly.

Governor of Tokyo

In 1999 he was an independent candidate for governor of Tokyo, and was elected. Since then, it has taken several government measures at the metropolitan level that have sometimes won the favor of the people, such as the new gross profit tax imposed on banks (instead of net profit), and the new occupancy tax. to hotels, as well as the restriction on the operation of diesel-powered vehicles. He was reelected in 2003.

In 2005 Ishihara declared that Tokyo would bid to participate in the 2016 Olympics, a bucket of cold water for Fukuoka's bid. In 2007 he was re-elected for the second time.

Ishihara was not planning to run in the 2011 election, but eventually announced his candidacy. Although this time he was subjected to harsh criticism towards his comments regarding the earthquake and tsunami of March 11, such as "the tsunami is a divine punishment", he ended up being re-elected. However, a year later he left office.

Racism and sexism

Ishihara has also generated controversy for his support of Japanese nationalism as well as harsh displays of racism, historical distortion, and sexism.

He has made statements referring to Chinese and Korean immigrants settled in Tokyo as sangokujin (三国人), an old derogatory term that literally means "third country person". Ishihara also stated in an interview with Playboy magazine in 1995 that the Nanjing Massacre (a series of atrocities committed by the Japanese in the 1930s) "never happened"; and that it was "an invention of the Chinese".

In November 1999, Ishihara told Metropolitan Police Department Superintendent General Takeshi Noda that in the event of a major natural disaster, "there is a possibility that illegally residing foreigners may do something that get out of hand." At the same time the publication Japan Traveler published an article saying that the governor needed some history lessons as it was the foreigners who had been attacked by the Japanese mobs, and even elements of the police and the Imperial Army. during the last major earthquake to hit the Kanto area in 1923.

He has also made blatantly discriminatory statements against women, including an interview with Shukan Josei in which he said that elderly women without reproductive functions were useless.

In 2005 he was sued by a group of French and Japanese for speaking at the inauguration of a university building "I have to say that it is not a surprise that French has failed as an international language, which is a language that cannot be counted on". Later he rebutted his comments against French culture, professing his love for French literature on a Japanese news channel.

On March 25, 2006 during the Tokyo International Animation Fair, Ishihara attacked Mickey Mouse by claiming that the Disney mascot was inferior to Japanese anime, declaring: 'I hate Mickey Mouse, he has nothing that bears resemblance to the unique sensibility that Japan has. The Japanese are inherently adept at visual expression and detailed work".

Main works

• Sun Season (literate, 1956)
• Crazy fruit () fiscal fraud, novel, 1956)
• The perfect game (writing diligence, 1958)
• Crossing ten thousand kilometres across Latin America (PHONE RINGING)
• Act and death (と️, novel, 1964)
• Military education. Book to educate strong children (RAPING FOR COMPLIANCE TO COMPLIANCE, ENDITURE, 1969)
• The fossil forest (mind-making, novel, 1970)
• Secret party (/25070/, novel, 1984)
• Survival (White, novel, 1988)
• The sublime time of my life (counseling, 1990)
• The Yukio Mishima eclipse (PHONESING)
• Memory on the wind (afterwards, 1994)
• Question on the sale of home goods (国Прарики) сти, rehearsal, 1996)
• The angel of the body (天ENCIA, novel, 1996)
• My brother (novela, non-fiction novel, 1996)
• State, that ghost: antimemories of my political life (Philippines engaged in exploitation, 1999)
• The Island of Fire (book, 2008)