Having experienced the Tsunami during my time in Japan, I was astonished to see only a low reaction towards the whole nuclear energy issue in Japan. Either it was not prominently featured in the news or the issue was not causing too much trouble in people’s every day life. I was especially surprised, because I have the contrast to the radical change towards nuclear energy in my home country Germany.
Shutting all nuclear power plants down was a very short-sighted decision, which ended in reactivating some of them, and I kept wondering, what is the strategy behind that? But furthermore I was interested in the attitude of the Japanese population. So, when I went to Japan this year for vacation, I discovered these street tags in downtown Tokyo and was surprised and proud. Actually there is an anti nuclear energy movement!
The man behind it is 281_anti nuke, a Japanese artist, who does Street Art in a fantastic way that reminds me a little bit of Banksy. He made the anti nuclear energy issue his topic and I think it is a creative way to reach especially the younger generation. I found other interesting ways of communication, such as the “no nukes” poster project and the “1 for 10” project for educating people about nuclear energy and I think they are worth to have a look at.
281_anti nuke: http://www.281antinuke.com/profile/
NO NUKES POSTERS: http://int.nonukeart.org/about
1 for 10: http://1for10.jimdo.com/