Nuclear News Out of Japan - The Canadians Cited as Contemptable There.

I won't pretend to be a nuclear expert, but there are a couple of reads from closer to Fukushima that may interest this blog's readers.

For data folks, the measurements updated regularly on pages at the MEXT site(Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology-Japan).  Curious amateurs, like me, can pretty quickly view different times and see their is a definite trend in the radiation measurements, in the air anyway.  Which is down.  It appears beyond ridiculous that there are North Americans ignorantly, or stupidly, worried about their own safety, given the trials people are undergoing in Japan.

The Japan Time Online picked up on this today, and in their poll today the current results see 22% vote that “Japanese media outlets need to be more aggressive”, 22% that “the government needs to open more communication channels”, and 41%, by far the largest group, believe that “Foreign journalists should act more responsibly.”

While the article is critical of the most sensationalist foreign reports, it is also critical of the spin from TEPCO and politicians, and the people’s apparent willingness to accept it.  This was the sentiment that first lead me to the site upon locating, “Disaster analysis you may not hear elsewhere,” which focused on the Citizen’s Nuclear Information Center (CNIC), and the regular press conferences and updates they have been giving.  The article also referenced a prescient article from 2004, albeit one written by an American visitor, “Japan’s deadly game of nuclear roulette.” 

Another article, “Nuclear meltdowns and Japanese culture,” is worth a read.  It ends; “The national ganbaru (try hard) mentality will conquer all, they seem to think, including those warnings by the foreigners. Or else some kamikaze (divine wind) will come to rescue Japan, once again. TV stations continue with their usual diet of cheap gag shows and food tasting. Similarities with Japan's fatalistic optimism in the final Pacific War days are not hard to find.”

Not non-stop misery?

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Here's the list of Canadian reporters currently on the JPQuake Wall of Shame:

CBCnews for “Japan visitors urged by their countries to leave” – and David Gutnick, DBC Radio/The Current for “All in all, a truly disgusting performance.”

CHUM-FM Radio Toronto for, apparently, a report on the 18^th re: INES rating change from 4 to 5

Rosie DiManno for “Nuclear fear grips Tokyo” … Rosie Dimanno is also identified for other specific articles, and for her body of work (corpse of work?) as “An excellent example of reporting that causes family and friends living back in North America to fear for the safety of people living here.”