Quote:
Originally Posted by frivolity
Allegations about the apology being insincere are ones that I'm really hesistant to make unless actual (not circumstantial) evidence is available. It is for this reason that notwithstanding all the questionable inferences being drawn, I lean towards the default position that the studio has issued an apology and Ichiki has decided to move on.
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There are posts that already explain why their claim for "misunderstanding" is nothing short of unbelievable, considering circumstances and points that are not even opinions but hard fact.
So far, there is -no- hard fact evidence, since there is no way to have them, unless you have the words from the involved party (and so far, we have a vague mention in the website, and few seiyuu, but no personal words from Yamanaka).
Consequently, there is no evidence the note was sincere either, -however- there are aggravating points that make the apology totally not convincing:
1) deleting the videos (It is highly questionable why, because they weren't tampered. if it was really a mere prank, why are they afraid of letting these live anyway? Especially the radio event)
2) cancelling the radio event (same point above: no reason if it was really a joke, so supposing it is that, there is no reason for them to cancel them).
3) Sueing people who will upload the videos, claiming the previous ones were shown "differently" of what actually happened (so that means ALL recording (both the event AND radio) were tampered and changed to make it like a malicious prank... really?)
4) no direct mention of Ichiki whatsoever (apology was directed towards the audience)
5) absolutely no detail whatsoever nor the purpose of all of this (aside of the PR?)
As it is, it has absolutely no weight in sincerity, since it doesn't cover the core problem of the prank: the damn reason of that.
So far, we have "business like" apology note, which are nowhere close to apology, and taking them for face value is dubious imho, especially how Japanese Society works a lot on the facade, requiring tricks to save face, or using someone to take all the blame for a company in general.
And frankly, there is a huge difference between Ichiki deciding to make that blog post because he really believes things went out of hand or him being forced to do that. The latter is absolutely not "his" decision at all. It is the usual context of people forced to quit their job instead of being fired: the former being "softed" to the public, despite pressure from highers up would be the cause, which means it is actually the latter.
We will probably never know the absolutely true stance for Ichiki unless the responsible behind that admit what they actually have done. But, wait... even with this "apology", we don't know jack why everything has happened so far, so it is back to square one. basically speaking, these apologies aren't any, and it will just add oil to fire, for those who feel unsatisfied by these and continue their boycott or whatever reckless actions they may perform.