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Mission_Scar_7283 t1_j47o3xd wrote

Murder is inexcusable but his story is just incredibly sad.

“After my mother joined the church (in the 1990s), my entire teenage years were gone, with some 100 million yen ($735,000) wasted,” he wrote in the typed letter, which he sent to a blogger in western Japan the day before he allegedly assassinated Abe during a campaign speech on July 8 in Nara, western Japan. “It’s not an exaggeration to say my experience during that time has kept distorting my entire life.”

Yamagami was 4 when his father, an executive of a company founded by the suspect’s grandfather, killed himself. After his mother joined the Unification Church, she began making big donations that bankrupted the family and shattered Yamagami’s hope of going to college. His brother later committed suicide. After a three-year stint in the navy, Yamagami was most recently a factory worker.

Abe, in a September 2021 video message, praised the church’s work for peace on the Korean Peninsula and its focus on family values. His video appearance possibly motivated Yamagami, said Nishida, the psychology professor.

Yamagami reportedly told police he had planned to kill the church founder’s wife, Hak Ja Han Moon, who has led the church since Moon’s 2012 death, but switched targets because it was unlikely she’d visit Japan during the pandemic.

“Though I feel bitter, Abe is not my true enemy. He is only one of the Unification Church’s most influential sympathizers,” Yamagami wrote in his letter. “I’ve already lost the mental space to think about political meanings or the consequences Abe’s death will bring.”

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Deep-Mention-3875 t1_j48dzxz wrote

But it’s his moms money. Was she hurt by the church? Sounds like he’s just bitter his mom neglected him and donated the money instead of giving it to him?

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Mission_Scar_7283 t1_j48lhp3 wrote

He was bitter but its not because he didnt get any money... He was probably bitter because his dad committed suicide, a cult “brainwashed” his mother leaving his family bankrupt, than his brother commits suicide… That kinda shit will make a person bitter…

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Enhancing_Guru t1_j48j3zr wrote

Picture loosing your father at the age of 4, and for the rest of your life your mother provides the extreme bare minimum for you and your siblings while sending every penny to a stranger saying "good things will happen to you if you keep sending me money. I know I said that last time but this time for real"

Ya know what would have helped prevent his brother's suicide? Money for a therapist. Or maybe the depression was onset from constant lack of money in the first place. You know who never helps anything? Literally anyone involved with mega churches.

His entire life and family were ruined by the Unification Church and you think he shot a former prime minister (who openly supported such predatory behavior on desperate individuals) because of...greed?

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