Sex abuse scandal-tainted Johnny's eyes setting up new firm

What's in a name?

Why can they not stop using the name Johnny's? They say that the company will work to offer redress for the victims, but if I were a victim, I would not want anything that comes from that company. Each and every time I would hear that name it would bring back those terrible memories. Just get rid of the name, start a new company with oversight and go from there.

Yep just change your name and it will all go away and people will forget. Then carry on, business as usual. Now let me finish up my Meg Milk.

Will they even bother to change their name or acknowledge it, if it weren't by BBC?

At that time BBC go to their office to get statement because BBC considered this as huge allegation, however they got nothing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmF6mDZjZZw

Words fail me. If the fans, media or advertisers have any conscience they should boycott the "new" agency. But I guess it's never been an issue for them before now.

When rampant, extensive and sanctioned pedophilia is treated as nothing more than a branding inconvenience.

Johnny & Associates Inc behaviour, the pursuit of self-interest, at any cost, the shameful depths to find a strategy circumventing responsibility, accountability instigating a public masterclass to avoid, exclude or limit the availability of damages that statutory law otherwise entitles so setting limits on the damages one party can receive.

So maintaining a means to control, stifle any future adverse publicity or independent investigation, so Johnny & Associates Inc or any relaunch (reincarnation) of the business model can continue untouched.

Preventing any parties to adequately assess and control their business risks when entering into an agreement.

No formal government legislation, little or no statutory independent body, no independent ombudsman to ensure media broadcasting has to follow a formal code of conduct. No formal police investigation.

It is frankly outrageous, nothing to see here, let the blatant conflict of interest, the fragrant abuse of power, the open deliberate exploitation continue, so inappropriate influence prevails.

I can just see the articles here on JT, Insert Name of New Company, ( formerly known as Johnny & Associates) for the next ten years or so!

Lest we forget!

What's the bet these creeps will also focus on under-age boys?

Noriyuki Higashiyama, a veteran performer who recently took over as the new president of Johnny's, is expected to double as chief of the new talent management firm, according to the sources.

Never heard of him. But I can speculate at the type of "lifestyle" he follows...

A leopard can't change its spots.

flagrant, fragrant, I know my L's and R's were left to stagger around in a state of intoxication.

A leopard can't change its spots.

But it can die and be as dead as the guy everyone keeps talking about.

I wish everyone would let the story die with him. Cause he is dead and he isn't coming back.

As long as none of the directives from the current agency are included in the new one that would be fine, but it is obvious that the only thing that will happen is a change of name, which is just making fun of the suffering of the victims.

It would be much better to dissolve the whole thing and let the people that have talent (and do not need a huge corrupt organization to push them to the media) make contracts with other agencies.

I wish everyone would let the story die with him. Cause he is dead and he isn't coming back.

Do you really think that filthy child-raping paedophile Johnny Kitagawa existed in a vacuum? That no-one in that huge corporation knew or suspected what was going on with all these child rapes?

No, the story - and decades-long cover ups - did not die with rapist paedophile Kitagawa.

Same crap, different package. Does anyone believe a name change will truly root out the systemic problems that made this situation possible?

Predictable.

It's the same firm, with a different name.

What needs to be done is Johnny's needs to be shut down. The individual managers and agents who worked their need to be allowed to start their own companies with the artists they individually worked with. And, competition must be allowed, with the gov't and police agencies going after any non-competitive behavior, like that which was engaged by Johnny's and still is common in the Japan entertainment industry, as a whole. With only one major boy-band agency, one major idol-group agency, one major comedian agency, etc, collusion and extortion is rampant.

Different name same story .

Sure that’ll help. Like the time Mitsubishi renamed the MRJ the “space jet” and then proceeded to end the project which was 8 years behind schedule, hadn’t delivered one damn plane and had been effectively boxed out of the market by better offerings.

Yeah, the name change fixed all that.

Just like here. I’m sure we will all forget all about the systemic decades long sex-trafficking ring and the blind eye turned by the media if they don’t use the word “Johnny’s” anymore.

That’s sound PR right there….

Close shop. Those who are free agents can go sign elsewhere or go start their own label/agency.

As alluded to by other posters, the real story here is the culture of silence and collusion by much of the industry and associated advertisers. Kitagawa's crimes have been an "open secret" for a long time.

A different name with the same old Mentality and Faces.

I always thought Johnnys was a bit weird.

Where i come from a "Johnny" is a male contraceptive

Slapping lipstick on a pig doesn't change the fact it's still a pig! It always amazes me that companies think by renaming something it it is therefore cleansed. But what do I know, maybe lipstick on a pig looks kawaī to Japanese.

It's not just Johnny, it is NHK, all radio stations, all TV stations and all media outlets. They all knew and they should all be shut down. We know that will never happen........... Johnny artists should have a controlling stake in the company and slowly the artists need to bleed this pedophile company of all their power. Financials are the only way to keep them in line.

Not a gaol term or a fine?

Change the name ?

Not really a punishment, more like a marketing ploy

Takuya Kimura ( formerly of SMAP) proved on some level that a talent agency is not necessary to achieve and maintain success. Perhaps entertainers can use this tragedy and guidance from people like Kimura-san to end the stranglehold that these dubious talent agencies and scouts have on the entertainment business.

Change their name, brush it all under the carpet, pretend it never happened.

Yeah, that’s a great idea.

This company should be dissolved, it was a centre for pedophilia, and many still working there knew it, and it was on just a huge scale they must have known. Very much like what happened at the BBC in the Saville case. This type of thing goes on the world over and has done for decades, perhaps longer.

Japan's major media at Tokyo apologized about silence during decades against this sexual exploitation last month, but they haven't explained or investigated why they had silenced or whose order.

And, self-censorship about political or economical or social news are still rampant among major media of Japan.

Just need an extra investigation from a foreign media group to make it collapse definitively, after the base was shaken.

Japanese love to "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil", wise only in name which does no allow to avoid repeating the past.

Sam Waters, not sure what you are talking about. Kimura Takuya was the only member who didn't leave the agency, and he has benefitted greatly from it. If you remember, after the other members of SMAP left, Johnny threatened all the major broadcasters et al that if they hired any of them, he would black ball them. So no, Kimtaku is not someone to look up to in this case!

Lol this is literally what the unification church, aumn, and more did when they got in trouble. Changed names but it’s still the same people and systems in place.

Id ask if they think people are so shallow or dumb to not associate old Jonny’s with … whatever super obvious name they choose, but people love an earnest and heartfelt… rebranding to eat back their status above all others. What it be called “Jo’s boys ltd” or something