Soichiro Tahara Apologizes for His “Outburst” on “Live TV till Morning!”

In a late-night broadcast of “Live TV till Morning!” (TV Asahi), which aired late at night on October 20, the host, Soichiro Tahara, became furious with Yuichiro Tamaki, a representative of the People’s Democratic Party of Japan, which led to flames on SNS and other social media, and Tahara posted a comment on X expressing his regret.

 

What caused a stir was a comment by panelist Tamaki, who said,

“Japan, with its limited energy resources, needs to increase its technological capabilities.”

He then went on to explain that the government has been reducing the R&D budgets of Japanese universities.

 

When Mr. Tahara tried to change the subject by saying, “I don’t care about such a difficult thing,” 

Mr. Tamaki replied, “I’ll tell you one more thing,”

Mr. Tahara snapped at Mr. Tamaki, “Shut up!” To this, other panelists responded, “You can’t say ‘shut up’ in that way.”

Tahara was also criticized for his X.

 

Tahara’s X also received a variety of criticism, and on the 22nd, he wrote

“Thank you for watching. You are right. I have to listen carefully to what you say. I sincerely regret what I said. Thank you very much for your comments.” (Original text)

and posted it on X. In addition

“I remember again what Mr. Shuntaro Torigoe said to me: “Journalists need to listen to what people are saying, so you should put in hearing aids. You have to listen to what people are saying.”

It is true that there are many people on X who praise Tahara’s words of remorse, but on the other hand, there are also an overwhelming number of people who cannot stop being angry at his arrogant hosting of the event,

“I recommend that you retire. I think you have a good program, but I don’t think it’s possible for you to run it anymore.”

“You just realized that now? How old are you?”

 

“The “Morning Show” has been a long-running program since 1987, and there is no doubt that Mr. Tahara has made a great contribution to the show. His ability to summarize and direct the opinions of big-name politicians and sharp-tongued commentators is unparalleled. However, as he gets older, he often asks, “What?” and then that person explains the same thing again, and so on, more times than I can count.”

“In short, he’s becoming deaf. Furthermore, when things don’t go the way he wants them to, he often becomes agitated, as he did this time. This is not the first time this has happened, but it is a complaint that has been numerous for quite some time. TV Asahi is hardly able to force Mr. Tahara, a man of great merit, to graduate. In the end, he will have no choice but to retire by himself.” (TV station official)

On the other hand, there may be people who watch the program because they think “it has to be Mr. Tahara,” and there may be companies that support Mr. Tahara and sponsor him. However, there are also viewers who are upset with Mr. Tahara for shutting people out without listening to them.

It was announced that Hiroshi Sekiguchi will also graduate from “Sunday Morning” (TBS) next spring. What will Mr. Tahara make of this wave of generational change?