Inori Minase, the voice actress who is known for voicing Rem from Re:Zero and Itsuki Nakano from Quintessential Quintuplets, recently found herself embroiled in a controversy wherein she was accused of running a fan account, Doyakonga, to diss her fellow seiyuu.

The controversy ignited on April 3, 2024, when Minase’s official account quote tweeted a fan who reposted her photos without permission, calling them an “idiot” who couldn’t read Minase’s warnings.

The tweet was swiftly deleted, with Minase’s staff later claiming her account was hacked.

“It is possible that our account was hacked by a third party late at night on April 3rd. We have deleted the post in question and are currently investigating the extent of the damage, the cause of the incident, and measures to prevent a recurrence. We deeply apologize for any concern this may have caused to our fans and stakeholders,” Minase’s tweet read.

4月3日深夜、当アカウントが第三者からの不正アクセスにより乗っ取られた可能性がございます。
当該ポスト1件は削除し、現在は被害状況の確認、原因の調査、再発防止策の検討を進めております。
ファンの皆さま、関係者の皆さまにご心配をお掛けすることとなり、深くお詫び申し上げます。

(スタッフ)

— 水瀬いのりinfo (@inoriminase) April 5, 2024

However, what’s interesting is that around the same time the controversial tweet was made from the official account (and removed), the fan account Doyakonga too got deactivated.

Netizens, drawing connections and finding Minase’s reasons unconvincing, speculated that she herself might be the one behind both accounts and that she accidentally posted a tweet meant for Doyakonga on the official account.

Note: It is important to note that these are just allegations at this stage and nothing has been confirmed.

Doyakonga’s questionable behavior:

Doyakonga’s sudden deactivation, coinciding with Minase’s alleged hacking incident, made netizens look into some of the fan account’s questionable behavior.

According to popular sentiment, if Doyakonga was actually a fan account who cared about Minase, they would have remained active to support her during this difficult time; not vanish and potentially worsen the situation. However, the fan account did disappear, and it only turned the situation into a full-blown controversy.

Furthermore, Doyakonga was known for being extremely knowledgeable about Minase and getting its hands on unreleased information about the voice actress. At the same time, the account also sabotaged other voice actresses with some very personal information regarding them.

For instance, Doyakonga accused Yuka Iguchi (Ascendance of a Bookworm’s Myne) of undergoing plastic surgery in a bid to boost declining CD sales. Similarly, it repeatedly claimed that Yui Ogura lip-synced at her concerts and that Maaya Uchida’s sales figures were often inflated.

Conversely, the account consistently praised voice actresses like Aoi Yuki, Saori Hayami, and Ayane Sakura – all of whom, as noted by social media users, were collaborators of Minase.

A lot of similarities between Minase and Doyakonga’s habits were also pointed out by those who investigated the matter. Some of them are listed below:

• Doyakonga has the same idol as Minase.
• Doyakonga has the same hobbies as Minase.
• Doyakonga has a similar writing style and uses the same emoticons as Minase.
• Doyakonga has a “girly” likes section with things like Twice, makeup, and Disney.
• Doyakonga is unusually strict about the unauthorized reposting of Minase’s photos.
• Is unusually knowledgeable about Minase’s past words and actions.
• Tweets a lot about Minase’s feelings and emotions.

Additionally, Doyakonga also raised suspicion when the fan account was able to attend three live performances of Inori Minase at the recently concluded Inorimachi Town People’s Assembly 2024 (Omiya), even when Minase’s fan club had restricted the attendees to a single live performance.

The revealing personal information combined with the convenient alignment with her colleagues fueled speculations that Minase herself ran Doyakonga.

However, not everyone was quick to jump on the bandwagon.

According to some, Minase’s demanding schedule contradicted the notion of her managing two accounts at once, with Doyakonga, in particular, displayed high activity, frequently engaging with other celebrities and tweets.

An alternative theory suggested that a member of Minase’s social media team, responsible for her official account, could be behind Doyakonga, and that they accidentally posted a tweet meant for the fan account on the official one.

Targeted seiyuus respond:

As the Inori Minase controversy gained traction at one end, the voice actresses who were frequently targeted by Doyakonga, including Yuka Iguchi released comments regarding the slander on social networking sites.

Iguchi made a cryptic statement on Threads, saying “People who mock others’ efforts are often incapable of putting in effort themselves.”

While it is not known if she was particularly targeting Minase or Doyakonga, or the online slander on social networking sites in general.

The voice acting agency of Yui Ogura and Miku Ito, two other actresses who were targeted by the Doyakonga account, also released a statement saying that they will be taking action, and requesting for disclosure against those who spread false information against their talents on the internet including social networking sites. Check out the full comment below:

We have noticed that there are a number of posts on the Internet, including SNS, that contain false or defamatory information about our talents. Some people are posting based on this information.

We are considering taking legal action, such as requesting disclosure of information, against the sources of this information, those who quote it, and those who post based on it. We ask that you refrain from making unnecessary posts.

Style Cube (Voice acting agency)

Miku Ito herself put out a tweet in which she mentioned that she was taught by both her parents and her agency that greetings are important. She added that she would “continue to greet people by looking them in the eye” in order to avoid misunderstandings.

This tweet was probably in response to the claim made by Doyakonga that Ito ignored Minase’s greeting.

挨拶は大事です！！親からも事務所からもそう教わって行動してきました🙇🏻‍♀️

でも誤解を招かぬようこれからも目と目を合わせて挨拶！！しっかりしていきます！！(みく)

— 伊藤美来 公式info (@InfoItomiku) April 10, 2024

But, Ito’s tweet also had a promotion for her upcoming live tour in the same thread, making fans wonder if this was just a PR move from her staff.

Support flows in for Minase:

Minase’s fans, however, chose to be optimistic, saying that Doyakonga’s identity should be unveiled, as it would eventually prove the voice actress’ innocence.

According to a user, this whole issue was only an attempt to slander the image of the voice actress and there was no way that someone who has done voice acting for so long could do something like this.

“It’s hard to imagine that someone who has done voice acting for so many popular works would do something like this! So I think that we fans should stop slandering them and just continue supporting them to the best of our ability!!“

Others said that they found Minase to be a very straightforward person, and that they found it hard to believe that she could be the one running the Doyakonga account.

The voice actress herself is yet to comment on the controversy that has been much talked about in the past few days.

Sources: Takizawa Gareso on Twitter, Facebook