tokyo 2020 olympics

Under-fire Olympic composer steps down over past bullying

18 Comments
By YURI KAGEYAMA

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18 Comments
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Good. Now what about the organizers who thought it was acceptable to employ him and stood by their decision even after his revolting actions were spotlighted?

14 ( +16 / -2 )

A lot of people at fault here besides this dirtbag. That includes the classmates that didn't stop this/participated perhaps, teachers, his parents, the magazine interviewer, magazine editor, publisher and those in charge of hiring this guy. Tokyo Olympics organization should have taken a better stance and fired him without letting him take the soft resignation approach. No apologies until his career is in jeopardy close to 30 years later?

6 ( +8 / -2 )

He should give all the pay he received from the JOC to his victims. Plus lots more.

10 ( +11 / -1 )

So cancel culture is at it again…..

the comments here are ridiculous also. The guy is 52, why is he being judged and cancelled for things he did as a young teenager?

-18 ( +4 / -22 )

Oyamada's is the latest resignation to plague the Games. Yoshiro Mori resigned as organizing committee president over remarks perceived as sexist. Hiroshi Sasaki also stepped down as creative director for the opening and closing ceremonies after suggesting a Japanese actress should dress as a pig.

The dreaded "outside pressure" is what did them in after the JOC issued statements they were satisfied with some weak expression of contrition and wanted to move on.

If the games keep on this trajectory:More athletes, well-known ones, getting infected and dropping out. Athletes and staff sent home for violating the "playbook". Some other breaking scandal.

Might we see the IOC and JOC wanting to carry on no matter what but the foreign pressure and withdrawals forcing a historic mid-Olympic cancellation?

4 ( +4 / -0 )

ChizukoToday  07:44 am JST

So cancel culture is at it again…..

the comments here are ridiculous also. The guy is 52, why is he being judged and cancelled for things he did as a young teenager?

He not only taunted kids with Down Syndrome, he forced them to strip and masturbate then even boasted about it later in life showing no remorse.. Oyamada is a particular kind of 'privileged sick'. I don't care if he did this 60yrs ago. He should've never been asked to lead. The Paralympics are also part of the Olympics.

14 ( +15 / -1 )

Correct action by the admitted abuser. Surprisingly correct action by organizers. He should now let this be ‘The beginning of his atonement’ and setting an example for others.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

If the games keep on this trajectory:More athletes, well-known ones, getting infected and dropping out. Athletes and staff sent home for violating the "playbook". Some other breaking scandal.

Might we see the IOC and JOC wanting to carry on no matter what but the foreign pressure and withdrawals forcing a historic mid-Olympic cancellation?

It's a possibility that's obviously been discussed at the highest levels of the JOC/IOC/Japanese government but unlikely we'd ever get to hear about the parameters for suspension or cancellation. "Barring Armageddon" said John Coates and that seems to be their line as NBC will want its billions of dollars back if there's no Olympics.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

Correct action by the admitted abuser. Surprisingly correct action by organizers. He should now let this be ‘The beginning of his atonement’ and setting an example for others.

Not really, correct action would be doing your homework and not hiring him in the first place. If you didn't do your homework, take a stance and fire him immediately after learning about it. They let him bow out gracefully on his terms.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

@Chizuko, if you've been following the story, it's because in a 1994/1995 interview when he was an adult, he admitted to the bullying and wasn't repentant at all, and just laughingly offered an apology. He bullied students who were mentally disabled and it lasted years from elementary school through high school. This is the Olympics / Paralympics; note that last word. That's why.

9 ( +10 / -1 )

"Games organizers said on Sunday that he would stay on because he had shown remorse. Hours after Oyamada submitted his resignation, they reversed their position and called his actions "absolutely unacceptable""

And now he'll never work for the government again. Not because of the bullying and horrible behaviour, but because he further made them look like fools, which they are for letting him on and letting him stay.

-6 ( +9 / -15 )

The following interview with Keigo Oyamada (Cornelius, a famous Japanese musician) was published in Japanese music magazine "Rocking on Japan" in January 1994.

http://oymdkig.blog.fc2.com/blog-entry-2.html?sp

The interview in question.....The translation is not particularly commendable....

However, Keigo Oyamada, relentlessly tormented his victim throughout their school life.

Keigo Oyamada mea culpa should be made in front of the judiciary, maybe the learned Judge might take that into consideration.

Keigo Oyamada, the nature of the abuse, physical , mental, and sexual meant it was only a matter of time before his past caught up with him.

The interview is truly juddering in the implication and suggestion that Oyamada took pleasure in such demeaning treatment of his victims disabilities throughout his early adult life.

Keigo Oyamada involvement in these Olympics/Para Olympic is the ultimate and final humiliation to his victims.

6 ( +6 / -0 )

What he did is really bad. Very sick.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

In interviews in 1994 and 1995, Oyamada said that he had bullied and assaulted several students with disabilities in school.[5] In one interview, Oyamada dismissed the incidents with a laugh.[6] In a 1995 interview for Quick Japan [ja],[7] Oyamada said he had locked a disabled student in a vaulting box,[8] wrapped another student in gymnastics mattresses and kicked them,[9] forced a student to eat their excrement,[9] taped a cardboard box around a student's head and poured chalk inside,[8] made fun of a disabled student running a long-distance race,[8] and forced a student to masturbate in front of other students.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornelius_%28musician%29

3 ( +3 / -0 )

A loathsome individual, who should be in prison. Forever. He has absolutely no socially redeeming value. His music be damned.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

Times up, Mr. Oyamada. Your music career, as we know it, is open-shut case. Now compose on apologizing to all those who you made a mockery of. This disgrace won't go unpunished. And to believe you were given this honorary representation of Japan to the world-at-large. Do the right thing and step down from this post and then work on your public confessions.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

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