Renka Iwamoto announces hiatus from Nogizaka46 after leak of photos with alleged boyfriend
Nogizaka46 has announced that Renka Iwamoto will be suspending her activities with the group after “private photos” leaked online.
Those photos show the 20-year-old, a member of Nogizaka46 since 2016 (when she was all of 12), posing with and hugging a man who is presumed to be a boyfriend. Nogizaka46 and such Sakamichi Series groups, like those in the AKB48 Group, have a quasi-official no-boyfriends policy for their members, because it destroys the illusion for their fans that they could date the idol one day. It is not clear at this point how the photos leaked.
Instead of publicly defending its young member, who is surely now suffering a lot of mental anguish over the leak, Nogizaka46 instead apologized to fans for the leak, and blamed Iwamoto’s “reckless actions.”
No doubt thinking about the loss of sales from her photo book that came out last November, the group’s management has effectively thrown her under the bus and it’s hard to see how she can recover.
No end date has been announced for Iwamoto’s hiatus and it may well end only with her graduation from the group.
Such leaks can have a mixed effect on your career. For a music idol, it can be the end (Mayu Harada was promptly fired after photos of her kissing her boyfriend came out). Or the other hand, a sex scandal hit Rino Sashihara early on and she rode the notoriety and built a career out of it. Likewise, a sex scandal simply pushed Sumire Yokono from doing music with NMB48 to focusing fully on gravure.
For an actress or model, it is possible to keep going (Elaiza Ikeda’s career was not impacted by the leak of her alleged sex tape, for instance, mainly because she maintained a stoic silence over the incident, neither confirming nor denying it, which seemed to satisfy some fans that the girl in the video was not her).
We see nothing wrong about Renka Iwamoto’s photos. The ones we have seen are relatively tame (they are not even kissing). Of course she has a boyfriend. She’s an attractive 20-year-old working in the music industry. It would be crazy for her not to be fending off young men. The problem lies in a music industry that monetizes and exploits the deception of naive fans.
1 Comment
Nogizaka46 did well to have Renka apologize to the target audience
but the problem lies in the hypocrisy of the CEO of that company.
Instead of giving a warning message like : “We will take legal action for anyone who leaks personal information and/or photos of our employees”
and making Renka apologize.
He decided only to have her apologize.
For a few months now, the executives of that company have been laying off staff and using any excuse to do so.
Renka is a 20-year-old lady to naively think that her actions have no consequences.
In the contract there is a quasi-official policy No boyfriends… or they should not be seen
But by not abiding by this rule, not only is she harming herself but she is harming all the company’s staff.
There are some girls who take their idol career seriously.
About the leak: Remember even if your profile is “private” and only your friends can see your photos and/or publications.
There will almost always be a mole.
I think the mole is an ex-girlfriend of Renka’s boyfriend.