Kokoro Connect Bullying Incident

[Agent86]

If you accept the company's current spin on the event, the one thing that doesn't quite fit neatly in the box is Ichiki's appearance on Sugita's radio show. Because that would mean Ichiki massively played Sugita, or that Sugita knew about the PR nature of the stunt but played along to help manufacture drama.

[Gohan78]

What, people are actually believing the lies of the Production Committee?

For me it's quite obvious that this is a late attempt at damage control. The producers realized that they went too far with the "prank" and that the only way to sort out this mess was to say that it was all staged and that Ichiki knew everything beforehand.
Well, if that's true Ichiki-san deserves an Academy Award because his acting in the Nico Nico video was incredibly realistic.

At least I hope that Ichiki actually gets a role in the anime now. It was truly painful to see the hopes and dreams of a B-list seiyuu being shattered like that.
Nobody deserves to be humiliated like that. Nobody.

[Klashikari]

I can't take this new turn of event seriously either.
If they really intended to back off the whole deal, implying Ichiki and the "new characters" will be in the show, the process and plan themselves went so far in so many lengths it doesn't exactly match the events.

In fact, it is yet another statement that provides more solid ground to the "failed prank, attempt tp cover it quickly". All statement given by the actors don't match this new turn of event, and again, the commitee measures applied (radio being cancelled, videos taken down "supposedly" showing different things than intended etc).

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Gohan78

What, people are actually believing the lies of the Production Committee?

For me it's quite obvious that this is a late attempt at damage control. The producers realized that they went too far with the "prank" and that the only way to sort out this mess was to say that it was all staged and that Ichiki knew everything beforehand.
Well, if that's true Ichiki-san deserves an Academy Award because his acting in the Nico Nico video was incredibly realistic.

At least I hope that Ichiki actually gets a role in the anime now. It was truly painful to see the hopes and dreams of a B-list seiyuu being shattered like that.
Nobody deserves to be humiliated like that. Nobody.

Originally Posted by Klashikari

I can't take this new turn of event seriously either.
If they really intended to back off the whole deal, implying Ichiki and the "new characters" will be in the show, the process and plan themselves went so far in so many lengths it doesn't exactly match the events.

In fact, it is yet another statement that provides more solid ground to the "failed prank, attempt tp cover it quickly". All statement given by the actors don't match this new turn of event, and again, the commitee measures applied (radio being cancelled, videos taken down "supposedly" showing different things than intended etc).

What you guys are saying has occurred to me as well.

But ultimately, I'm not sure how much it matters at this point (presuming that Ichiki does in fact get an actual role in the anime now).


One of two things are true here:

1) The current official story is more or less the complete truth. They had a questionable PR plan to begin with, and they botched it horribly. If so, the anime industry has learned that this sort of PR approach won't go over well with anime fans, so in the future they'll hopefully avoid it. So, lesson learned. And now the more controversial possibility...

2) This really was a total prank, but the fallout from it had spiraled completely out of control for the pranksters. It was now at the point that the only way for them to save face and mitigate the damage done was to come up with the official story that we now have, and give Ichiki an actual seiyu role (since that's necessary for the official story to work). If so, the whole prank pulled on Ichiki has been completely turned on its head, and I doubt that the poetic irony of the situation is lost on the perpetrators. So, lesson learned. If you pull a prank like this, and the anime fan community catches wind of it, it's going to backlash badly.


So, either way, this story ends on a relatively positive note, imo. And either way, lessons were learned and the KC Production Committee had to make amends/correct itself. It's probably the most we could reasonably hope for.

I'm willing to leave it at that, and give the current official story the benefit of the doubt. It may well be true, after all.

[Agent86]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

So, either way, this story ends on a relatively positive note, imo.

The main problem with the new official story being true would be that it turns Ichiki from a victim to a willing co-conspirator. And he's already denied being in the know on his blog.

[Krono]

Originally Posted by relentlessflame

It doesn't mean that all the people involved are blameless and have never done anything wrong, whether in the midst of this situation or outside of it. The hyperbole in your sarcasm is ridiculous.

But, given the extensive involvement of the staff to carry out this plan, I think the explanation offered now is much, much more likely than having so many people on so many levels be involved in malicious systematic bullying of a staff member for no good reason, nor that they'd come up with the idea of offering him a role now as some sort of consolation prize. That theory never once added up for me. This explanation seems much more likely. It's quite likely that some people took the joke too far, and may have even secretly enjoyed the game even though they knew what was really going on (that they'd soon reveal this casting)... but yeah.

Bullying is a real, serious problem everywhere. That they made light of it was insensitive at best. This whole situation is sure to have wide-ranging repercussions across the industry, so I don't think anyone is pretending that "it's all okay now". It's not okay. But, I do think it's over.

I rather doubt the explanation they're now giving, and suspect the original situation off being more or less exactly what it seemed.

The whole first announcement from the "Staff" reeks of the producers responsible for the idea trying to cover their asses while blaming anyone but themselves. Which failed spectacularly as they were threatening their fans and accusing them of forging the whole thing.

Resulting in the second announcement from Production Committee who were unamused that their investment was being threatened and attempting to do some genuine apologizing, damage control, and fixing things.

Bottom line is that there are just too many things that don't add up for it to be purely a poorly conceived publicity stunt.

[Kirarakim]

I honestly don’t buy this new situation either, call me distrustful or whatever. It seems like after their last “not an apology” didn’t work they came up with this whole it was just a “double joke” thing. And still the whole we were wrong thing is only you misunderstood, not we were wrong for what we did.

I am not watching the series but I would be curious to know how this new character fits into the story.

I certainly do hope for the best for Ichiki with this role (however it came about) and future roles and that’s all I can say right now.

[Marcus H.]

Way to go KokoroCo Production Committee for bringing a fire extinguisher when the fire is already spreading.
But hey, at least you tried.

[serenade_beta]

Originally Posted by Gohan78

What, people are actually believing the lies of the Production Committee?

For me it's quite obvious that this is a late attempt at damage control. The producers realized that they went too far with the "prank" and that the only way to sort out this mess was to say that it was all staged and that Ichiki knew everything beforehand.
Well, if that's true Ichiki-san deserves an Academy Award because his acting in the Nico Nico video was incredibly realistic.

At least I hope that Ichiki actually gets a role in the anime now. It was truly painful to see the hopes and dreams of a B-list seiyuu being shattered like that.
Nobody deserves to be humiliated like that. Nobody.

I don't really believe in it either, because from the videos I've seen, I don't see this "Ichiki knew everything" part.
And considering how late this is and how the previous apology was one of the worst "genuine (as some people tried to defend them called it)" apologizes I've seen before, it really does look like a final effort to put out the fire. Because considering the absolute outburst from day 1, any person with the brain size of an ant would know to "spoil" this surprise immediately to calm everything down, not you know, wait a few days after the fire got bigger?

[Guardian Enzo]

If there weren't a victim here, watching the production committee dig themselves deeper and deeper into this hole with their prevarication and non-apologies would be downright hilarious. As is, it just makes the whole thing more pathetically sad.

"Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it", indeed. Just own up and pretend you're sincerely sorry, even if you're not - is it really so hard?

[relentlessflame]

Originally Posted by Agent86

The main problem with the new official story being true would be that it turns Ichiki from a victim to a willing co-conspirator. And he's already denied being in the know on his blog.

The issue is only when he knew what and what he was under order/contract to say, particularly considering they were trying to keep the fact he really did get a role a secret to be revealed at the end of the PR campaign.

His statement implied that he didn't know at the time that he was being hired for the PR job, but accepted the job subsequent to the offer. But he never said whether or not he knew that he really was going to get a role in the anime in the fourth act, because they were keeping that a secret from the fans (even amidst this controversy) until just now. It's conceivable that what he said before was the truth, but was not the entire truth (because he was ordered to keep certain things a secret to not ruin the surprise).

I, for one, still believe that -- if anything is different from the official story -- a more likely explanation all along was that some people weren't given all the details of the plan (whether rightly or wrongly), as I can think of no credible motivation on the production committee level to do this unless it's part of the PR master plan -- however inadvisable that PR plan was. Just making fun of someone by itself makes no sense, but tying to a revelation later that the PR lead was actually getting a job after all make sense (spurned -> hard work -> reward).

But in either case, it's not like anything I or anyone says at this point is going to change people's minds. If people believe there was a conspiracy of legitimate wrongdoing here, everything said is just going to seem like one more layer in the cover-up.

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

Just own up and pretend you're sincerely sorry, even if you're not - is it really so hard?

I'm not sure how you can say this in light of the most recent statement. Are they not owning up and apologizing?

But like I said, nothing anyone can say...

[Guardian Enzo]

No, they're not owing up and apologizing. They're still effectively making excuses - only this time, they're saying Ichiki knew all along - something he's already contradicted, and his interaction with Sugita certainly suggests he was telling the truth.

If this latest cock and bull story was the truth they'd have said so from the beginning, since it paints themselves in a better light than the first cock and bull story they tried on Sunday.

[relentlessflame]

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

If this latest cock and bull story was the truth they'd have said so from the beginning, since it paints themselves in a better light than the first cock and bull story they tried on Sunday.

...There's nothing in this "new story" that contradicts the first one at all. The only thing that's different is the tone and the amount of details provided. The first level was the staff response, and the second level was the Production Committee response after it got elevated further (because the first response wasn't complete enough and the tone caused more problems than it solved -- and they apologized for that in the second response). This is definitely not a case of changing stories, but just changing their communication strategy once the issue got elevated. That's the way it works in most any business; the higher up an issue gets elevated, the more thorough an investigation and response you'll get.

[Nico87]

Originally Posted by relentlessflame

I, for one, still believe that -- if anything is different from the official story -- a more likely explanation all along was that some people weren't given all the details of the plan (whether rightly or wrongly), as I can think of no credible motivation on the production committee level to do this unless it's part of the PR master plan -- however inadvisable that PR plan was. Just making fun of someone by itself makes no sense, but tying to a revelation later that the PR lead was actually getting a job after all make sense (spurned -> hard work -> reward).

Exactly what I'm thinking, but the force of the internet is way too huge to make this go away, ever.

Some of the exaggerations are quite frankly unbelievable (Twitter spam, etc.), you'd actually think that it has personally affected some people or even made it sound like they were the victims themselves. Conclusions were also drawn way too early, and the "false" report here and there didn't really help either (e.g. fake character created that the victim was supposed to voice for). The off-air comments or whatever, try to put it into context. Something along the lines of "haha, it was great fun to watch a human break blabla", but it actually ended well for the VA. It's like pulling a prank on a friend or whatever, a real bad one. The initial response is happiness, then hearts broken, crying and all that (equals breaking down) and in the end it's all smiles.

The boycotting and the 150 one-star reviews on Amazon.jp is absurd.

If what I'm thinking about this is true, this is actually a "good-ending" prank, it's just the bandwagon thing that ruined any potential Japanese sales numbers. Not everyone likes or feels comfortable going against the public opinion of matters so they jump on the wagon and on it grows.

With that said, no one related to the show should have put themselves in a position where it could be potentially end with a shitstorm in the first place, but I don't think that they even for one second thought about any consequences as it was most likely not meant to offend anyone anyway. Also the way other VA's came to the defense of Ichiki is also suspicious, but I don't know.

Not cancelling my pre-order over this. All talk about a second season (I asked a question about it myself in the main KC thread) is just speculation as no one knows if one was planned anyway. From what I've gathered in the main thread, there isn't any need for a second season.

I'm sorry if I'm offending anyone in any way, it's not my intention at all. This post isn't particularly aimed at anyone on this forum.

[Guardian Enzo]

We're degrading into trench warfare here, with the studio's defenders just digging in deeper and deeper, so I'm not sure any good can possibly come out of this debate.

Rule of thumb: when you have to apologize for your apology, your PR campaign is in pretty bad shape.

[Dextro]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

What you guys are saying has occurred to me as well.

But ultimately, I'm not sure how much it matters at this point (presuming that Ichiki does in fact get an actual role in the anime now).


One of two things are true here:

1) The current official story is more or less the complete truth. They had a questionable PR plan to begin with, and they botched it horribly. If so, the anime industry has learned that this sort of PR approach won't go over well with anime fans, so in the future they'll hopefully avoid it. So, lesson learned. And now the more controversial possibility...

2) This really was a total prank, but the fallout from it had spiraled completely out of control for the pranksters. It was now at the point that the only way for them to save face and mitigate the damage done was to come up with the official story that we now have, and give Ichiki an actual seiyu role (since that's necessary for the official story to work). If so, the whole prank pulled on Ichiki has been completely turned on its head, and I doubt that the poetic irony of the situation is lost on the perpetrators. So, lesson learned. If you pull a prank like this, and the anime fan community catches wind of it, it's going to backlash badly.


So, either way, this story ends on a relatively positive note, imo. And either way, lessons were learned and the KC Production Committee had to make amends/correct itself. It's probably the most we could reasonably hope for.

I'm willing to leave it at that, and give the current official story the benefit of the doubt. It may well be true, after all.

I get the feeling that either way what we saw was someone with some sense of proper PR facepalmed hard when the situation reached him (or her) and kicked this into gear. I reserve my opinion on whether this is an hastly made change to the show to sweep the whole thing under the rug or if it was the real plan all along to the final 4 episodes of the show. If they truly scrambled to get the character in, and given the relatively decent quality of the show so far, it'll be visible then which is which (but then again people may just see whatever they want to see).

Originally Posted by Agent86

The main problem with the new official story being true would be that it turns Ichiki from a victim to a willing co-conspirator. And he's already denied being in the know on his blog.

The problem with the official blog post is that it could never be taken at face value either way: if it was indeed a case of "bullying" then Ichiki would never be able to really complain about it since that would effectively kill his career right there (and his honour as well). On the other hand if it was a PR stunt all along what he wrote was obviously staged from the get go and would, again, be made to sound like someone who couldn't really complain. There's just no way for him to sound honest either way. Yeah, life's complex.

But what really gets me, and that's valid whether this was a stunt or not, is that anyone actually thought they could get away with this? If it was a true case of bullying then were probably out of their minds to drag something so far along and if it was a PR stunt gone wrong the one's responsible should have their careers severely damaged for thinking that something like this wouldn't go wrong. Bullying is a hot topic. It's a particularly hot issue in Japan in general and amongst the DVD buying Otaku crowd in particular given how, and forgive me for pushing the stereotype here, this particular type of person tends to end up on the wrong end of this kind of stuff way too many times. It's like mocking God inside a church: you won't get out particularly respected afterwards.

And do the PR guys think their promoting Kokoro Connect or Haruhi? Heck, not even Kadokawa would try a stunt like this I suppose.

[relentlessflame]

Originally Posted by Guardian Enzo

We're degrading into trench warfare here, with the studio's defenders just digging in deeper and deeper, so I'm not sure any good can possibly come out of this debate.

I think it particularly isn't helpful that you frame this as some sort of "us vs. them" debate. I am not an "entrenched studio defender"; I have no vested interest whatsoever in any side of this issue, but am interested in the truth like everyone else. I also have said multiple times how much I hate bullying, how I don't find this sort of skit funny even when pulled off correctly, and I don't think everything that happened is okay. But, I do think people have gotten themselves in such a frenzy over this that they refuse to even consider the possibility that this wasn't intended as pure malice by all people at all levels. I see very little consideration at all for the other side of the story, only assuming the worst in every situation. And anyone who doesn't agree with this rather extremist view is painted as a "entrenched studio defender", like this is some sort of war now. It's like debating religion.

Maybe we should channel all this frustration and find an appropriate anti-bullying charity to donate money to instead of all this wailing over one voice actor who was ostensibly spurned. At least then all this raw emotion will have a lasting impact beyond just adding more posts to this thread. (Seriously, if anyone knows of an appropriate charity, please propose it.)

[Archon_Wing]

At this point I wouldn't really care if the latest story was true or not, as long is it benefits all parties involved. >.>

[liquidmetal]

Well we only have to wait and see if Ichiki does voice anyone in the later episodes.

Seems like everyone has their own view on whether this is just being shoehorned in or not.

[minakichan]

Originally Posted by Gohan78

Well, if that's true Ichiki-san deserves an Academy Award because his acting in the Nico Nico video was incredibly realistic.

The real scheme of this whole affair: turn Ichiki into a star by having him act so amazingly convincingly in this prank that casting crews everywhere want him to grace their anime with his talents.