But that was then. Now, in a flurry, Tokyo’s gossipy weekly magazines are sniping at the royals -in particular at Empress Michiko, the wife of Emperor Akihito -about a whole range of matters that share one common trait: they are utterly trivial. According to the Weekly Bunshun, for example, some once favorite trees of the late emperor Hirohito were razed recently during the ongoing construction of a new imperial palace in central Tokyo. That, the magazine suggested, was somehow Michiko’s fault. The same publication said that the imperial family had angered Japan’s Self Defense Agency by complaining that its members wore military uniforms when they greeted the royal couple on their return from a recent trip to Europe. “The Imperial Household Agency said it wasn’t the emperor’s opinion,” wrote the Weekly Bunshun. “Then whose opinion was it?” Answer: Michiko’s.
What else has Michiko done to irritate her staff ? Another magazine wrote that she has the gall to order a meal occasionally in the middle of the night. When her name comes up in meetings at the household these days, some of the less respectful members of her staff apparently respond with a vaguely obscene gesture.
This is not, to be sure, the equivalent of a topless Fergie having her toes nibbled by a Texas investment banker, but it’s fairly racy by Japanese standards. Readers love the stuff, and Japan’s editors may have decided they need to sell magazines no matter what. The air of political change in Japan has also loosened some restraints. Japan’s small but vocal right wing has never liked Michiko and still doesn’t. Many objected to her originally because she was a commoner when she won Akihito’s hand in 1959. Now they claim she’s a-well, it rhymes with “rich”- who has “henpecked” her husband.
For her part, Michiko in her early years as crown princess was harassed so badly both by the stuffy Imperial Household Agency and, allegedly, by the Empress Dowager (Hirohito’s mother) that she suffered a nervous breakdown in the early 1960s. As empress, some say, she has not hesitated to voice her disdain for the people who once made her life so difficult. The Michiko-bashing all started with a pseudonymous article written this summer by a former member of the Household Agency. So some royal watchers conclude that the flap is the latest round in the empress’s long-running feud with some members of that archaic group of emperor protectors. And the royal press corps, stung by criticism of its lap-dog coverage last year, may finally be trying to gain some credibility. But don’t expect nude pix any time soon.
