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But Ian Reader, a professor at Lancaster University and a leading expert on Aum, thinks the threat posed by Aleph and Hikari no Wa are overblown. "They are actually a small inefficient group who are not going to do anything but they are still seen in the public eye as highly dangerous," says Reader. He thinks that some government agencies use Aum's legacy of fear to further their own agendas. "The security forces have used this image of Aum as dangerous to constantly push for more state control over religious groups and for increased surveillance budgets, much as we are seeing in the West with the idea of radical Islam," he says.Prior to the Aum Affair, police stayed away from religious groups. During the prewar period, the state used security forces to target groups that were seen as subversive—basically anyone who didn't blindly follow the emperor and his militarism. Religious groups were often victims of the emperor's witch hunt.In the postwar, pre-Aum period, the police tried to distance themselves from that legacy and were reluctant to investigate religious groups for fear of being accused of interfering in religious freedom. That all changed after the subway attacks. There is a much greater readiness today by security agencies to intervene in religious affairs and they regularly do."The image of religion as something potentially dangerous became very, very major in post-Aum Japan. I think that still has an impact." —Ian Reader
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