The World Cup of Swimming

By Hiroya Sakaguchi

A few days ago, the world cup of swimming was held in Shanghai. Kosuke Kitajima also took part in this meet in the breast stroke. As you know, he is one of the greatest swimmers in the world, because he got first prize in various games, so we expect he will get first prize again. The media expected the same thing. The media usually regards him as “The King of Swimmers.” Maybe, most of the media does not say “he is bad”. However, the outcome was far away from our (including the media’s) expectation. As for the 100m breast stroke race, he got second prize, and as for the200m race, he got fourth prize. In the former race he was so close to winning, but in the later race I can not say he was so close to winning. This news was surprising. For me, that was pretty shocking.

What is important is that both races have a champion who got first prize. But, the Japanese media provides us the information of Kosuke lost or getting second prize. Why Japanese media does not broadcast about who got first prize? I think that the Japanese media and people have some bias. I can also say that is because of nationalism. We usually have no doubt but we cannot avoid having skewed views. So, I suggest that we have to read some newspaper in some foreign country. If we do so, we can know the difference of culture.