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Probably the first, only, and last Japanese with four characters in his given name.
菅原 有道出人 suga wara aru dou de bito
In a way it is unnecessary for me to defend myself against the likes of Sugawara Arudoudebito, formerly David Aldwinckle, because so many people have already objected to his unsavory attempt at character assassination. Notwithstanding, I am deeply concerned and must take action when a name I struggled so hard to develop has been so cheaply sullied by Mr. Sugawara.
As Mr. Sugawara has been politely asked by me on two occasions to remove his offensive page, legal action appears to be the next best step. Unfortunately, this is not a reasonable alternative until I have returned to Japan. In the interim I offer the following as a way to unbug the dissonant hum that Mr. Sugawara has sought to spread across the internet with regard to my name.
The entire mishap began when I corrected Mr. Sugawara's economic interpretation of events on the Dead Fukuzawa Society mailing list. He did not push the matter, because he was clearly found in the wrong, but neither did he appear to forget who it was that had set him straight. He thus grabbed the first opportunity to sully my own DFSociety reputation and ran with it. To both his and my dismay what followed was an injurious debate that eventually led to Mr. Aldwinckle's temporary disappearance from the society.
The name Hashimori Iwato was a legally registered Japanese alias at the time I joined the DFSociety and remained a legally registered alias until I left Japan in August 2000. Not only did the name appear on my Japanese alien registration card, but also on my driver's license, my Japanese seal (inkan or hanko), and every other Japanese document that required a personal seal as a means of identification in Japan. To the best of my knowledge I was the only Western foreigner living in Japan at the time with a registered alias that was written in Sino-Japanese characters. In contrast Mr. Sugawara's pen name, Arudou Debito, did not become official until he became a Japanese citizen, and I had already left Japan. Even then, he adopted his wife's surname to create what must be the most alien-sounding Japanese name a Japanese has ever heard -- Sugawara Arudoudebito.
Mr. Sugawara's claim that I was some sort of an imposter and using a Japanese pen-name is not only erroneous, but slanderous.
By the time I joined the DFSociety I had already lived in Japan for many years and was quite accustomed to defending the Japanese position against individuals with strongly biased Western viewpoints. Thus, my behavior on the DFSociety was neither unusual nor out of character. Certainly I was aware that many people in the DFSociety could mistake me for a Japanese. Certainly I did nothing to dissuade them from perceiving me as such. After many years of keeping my nationality a secret there was no reason for me to change my behavior just because I joined the DFSociety and no one could see my face! I had learned very early in my Japanese career that claiming one's nationality did far more to build new walls, than to remove those that were already in place. In fact, I was elated when Mr. Sugawara told the DFSociety that Mr. Arai had told him that he did not know my nationality.
Mr. Sugawara's further claim that I was an English teacher just like himself is also filled with important missing information. What I taught at Saitama University and my formal titles shared little in common. In the Economics Department I taught international trade, US/Japan relations, industrial organization, and microeconomics under the same course title -- Readings in English Foreign Literature. Although I started out as an English instructor in the General Studies Department at the university, by the time I joined the DFSociety I was already teaching something that could be more appropriately labelled cross-cultural communication. Moreover, by the time I joined the DFSociety all of my courses -- both in economics and cross-cultural communication -- were conducted in Japanese. Certainly my Japanese was not perfect, and as neither Mr. Sugawara nor myself have ever met, let alone held a conversation in Japanese or English, we have only his interpretation of what Mr. Arai told him with regard to his and my Japanese language ability. Would Mr. Sugawara have cause to lie? Just read through a few of his many articles that he posts on his debito.org website and see how many times he contradicts himself.
Where Mr. Sugawara begins his Hashimori Humbug story is also noteworthy. Rather than providing his readers with copies of the email that preceded his intrusive investigation into my employment, he conveniently interprets them for his audience in a manner that makes himself appear an innocent victim of fraud and deception. In short, his entire smear is based on what were then his own feelings of inadequacy in my regard. In order to make himself appear correct and thus polish his own tarnished pride, he seeks to demonstrate that he was deceived. Indeed, Mr. Sugawara had been deceived, but not by me, rather by his own ignorance. I was the first foreigner he had ever encountered, if only on the net, with a legally registered Sino-Japanese alias!
What he also fails to show is that his intrusive behavior in my regard was the same sort of behavior I had taken him to task about with regard to Japanese culture. Missing are numerous emails submitted by others and myself that would provide evidence for this. Moreover, Mr. Aldwinckle misportrays the true dialogue between him and me by leaving out personal email that was sent to him while the more public dialogue was in progress. In effect the only act of fraud in the whole matter is what Mr. Sugawara has himself perpetrated on his personal website.
One more important point. I joined the DFSociety while it was still recovering from a scandalous episode regarding certain Japanese journalists who had quoted participants without their knowledge. It was for this reason that I even volunteered my department's telephone number as a means for Mr. Sugawara, then Mr. Aldwinckle, and others to check my identity. Little did I know what would follow.
The DFSociety was finally sabotaged by an unidentified spammer -- likely the same person who tried to destroy the Moogoonghwa mailing list somewhat later. Although once a member of both lists, I had already left the DFSociety when the spammer struck the DFSociety. Whoever it was who struck the Moogoonghwa list, I was still a member, when it happened. Fortunately, the Moogoonghwa list survived. Mr. Sugawara's reference to spam is likely an attempt to lay the blame for the spamming on me. I quit the DFSociety before the spamming took place, because I was exhausted with the kind of debate that supported -- at least in part -- the likes of Mr. Sugawara. I did not quit on a particularly friendly note, but neither am I a vandal (pdf document - 164 KB).
Finally with regard to any claim on Mr. Sugawara's part about superior knowledge of Japanese society, please open to my book draft entitled "Imagine: The rudiments of a book about Japanese society" and judge for yourself.
So why does Mr. Sugawara insist on leaving the Hashimori Humbug webpage on his website and risk criminal proceedings when I return to Japan? One can only surmise. One explanation might be the following: Whereas he adopted Japanese citizenship, I left Japan. Thus, he might appear the hero in Japanese eyes, and his side of things would stand a better chance of winning. I have more faith in my understanding of Japanese society. Alternatively, he may believe that I will never return to Japan, or is simply waiting until I do, whereupon he will take it down, as if nothing ever transpired. Maybe nothing will. I am not a particularly vengeful person, and I place good faith in my own credentials -- not what others necessarily make of them.
In truth, what Mr. Sugawara is doing in Japan is perpetuating the very system of education that is helping to destroy good communication between the East and the West -- East Asia's universal English language requirement. Moreover, Mr. Sugawara's approach to improve Japanese internationality is litigious and thus repugnant to most Japanese. What it does for Mr. Sugawara, however, is to draw attention to himself in Japan's international community, and this in the end appears to be what Mr. Sugawara is most about.
２００４年３月１日
橋守岩人
Japanese website for English readers