From fantasy to nightmare
(From The Japan Times June 15 issue)

妄想から惨事へ：秋葉原通り魔事件

The nightmare in Akihabara on June 8, when a knife-wielding man drove a truck into a Sunday crowd, leaped out and started stabbing people at random, has continued to shock the country. As the victims' families grieve, the injured recuperate and witnesses struggle to recover, the attack has become even more horrifying as evidence reveals how well planned it was.

Even more disturbing was that each step of the way was blogged by the assailant on a cell-phone site, right up to the moment of attack. In a case like this, the possible solutions are overwhelmed by unanswered questions.

Certain recommendations seem obvious: restricting access to knives (the assailant purchased six); monitoring cell-phone blogs (he left a clear trail of messages about his plans); better employment opportunities; and higher levels of street policing (crowded areas need protection). However, none of these solutions will ultimately solve what the attacker described as his weariness of life.

Predicting when an individual with such mental weariness will turn to violent action is impossible. In Japan, suicide often becomes the means to express confused and violent urges, and the assailant had allegedly crashed his car years ago in a suicide attempt. What drives one person to hurt himself, or hurt others, or simply suffer in silence can never be answered with certainty. We are left to try to make sense of it all from blogs, surveillance camera videos and police interrogations.

Yet, the search for answers can potentially lead to understanding what kinds of help can be extended to seriously disturbed and intensely isolated individuals before it is too late. How the cracks of Japanese society could become so large is a question that needs to be confronted. The mix of obsessive blogging, social isolation, suppressed rage and obsession with fantasy games is no longer unusual. When horrifying incidents like this happen, there are no simple solutions.

How can the general feeling of hope and connectedness be improved? How can unhappiness be diverted from tragic actions? There are perhaps only half-solutions and partial answers, but in the search for these, at least, we can find some small way forward.

日曜日の人込みに男がトラックで突っ込み、車から飛び出してナイフで次々と人を刺した8日の事件の衝撃はいまだ消えやらない。容疑者の緻密な計画性の高さは恐るべきものだ。

犯行直前まで携帯電話サイトで書き込みをするという不気味な事件は、答えの見つからぬ疑問が解決策を圧倒する。

再発防止策としては、ナイフの購入規制、携帯電話サイトの監視、雇用機会の増加、繁華街の警備強化が挙げられるが、どれも男の言う「生活の疲れ」を防ぐものではない。

精神的に憔悴した者がいつ暴力的行為に走るかを知るのは不可能だ。サイトへの書き込みや監視カメラのビデオ、警察の取調べから察するしかない。

過度のブログへの書き込み、社会的孤立、抑圧された怒り、幻想ゲームへの執着が入り交じることは珍しくなく、事件の完全な解決策はない。

希望や社会的連帯感を強め、惨事を防ぐにはどうしたらよいか。その答えを探し続けることが、小さな前進につながると思いたい。