Justin McCurry “Sumo threatened by scandal and crime” http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/04/sumo-threatened-by-scandal-and-crime
『ガーディアン』が、時津風部屋のリンチ殺人、朝青龍の追放*1、さらに最近の野球賭博発覚等々の日本大相撲の危機を取り上げている。
相撲は座蒲団飛びまくりで、満身創痍なのだけれど、敢えてMark Bucktonという人のコメントに注目してみる；
このMark Bucktonという方は「英国相撲協会（The United Kingdom Sumo Association）」の会長（President）であるらしい；
But some experts say sumo is being unfairly singled out for misdemeanours that barely raise an eyebrow in other sectors of Japanese society. "It has been open season on sumo for the past three years," said sumo writer Mark Buckton. "People do hold sumo wrestlers to higher standards of behaviour, but they have to admit that wrestlers are only doing what many other Japanese have been doing for years. Other sportsmen have been found guilty of illegal gambling, but no one said a word."
また、Buckton氏のスタンスは、現在の危機にも拘わらずSumo won’t be dead! というもの。何故なら、”Sumo is too much a part of the Japanese national psyche.”
Mark Buckton - PresidentMark Buckton is involved in sumo at various levels. As Editor-in-Chief of Sumo Fan Magazine he runs the only multi-lingual site on sumo on the net today. Also sumo columnist for The Japan Times Online, much of his time is now taken up by sumo in one way or another. Another sumo column in Eye-Ai (Japanese culture magazine available in Hawaii and Japan) and work as a contributor on sumo to various publications in Japan keep him at the sharp end of the sport so living in Tokyo is by far the best place to be to achieve all of the above.
Originally from South Manchester, Mark is ex-RAF and very well travelled because of it. At his final 'post' now, Mark has been in Tokyo since 1997.
http://www.uk-sumo.com/staff.php
また、暴露された角界とやくざ界とのリンクについて、米国人ジャーナリストJake Adelsteinに、
と語らせている。Jake Adelsteinについては、取り敢えず
Jake Adelstein, author of Tokyo Vice and an authority on organised crime in Japan, said the scandal was connected with a fresh crackdown on a notoriously violent faction within the Yamaguchi-gumi that also had strong ties to the sumo world. "The media haven't suddenly decided to expose the relationship between sumo and the yakuza," Adelstein said. "The details were leaked to them by the police."Failed sumo wrestlers often end up as yakuza enforcers. The sumo world and the yakuza world have long been intertwined. Some ex-sumo wrestlers have even become yakuza bosses."
Lisa Katayama “Meet Jake Adelstein, a Jewish reporter who thinks like a Japanese gangster” http://boingboing.net/2010/03/09/meet-jake-adelstein.html
をマークしておく。
