“Comfort Women” Show Makes Nikon Uncomfortable But Not Tokyo Courts

The “comfort women” aka 慰安婦 (ianfu) issue is one that divides Japan. Who were the comfort women? They were Korean, Chinese, and sometimes even Japanese women who worked as prostitutes during the Second World War, primarily offering sexual services to Japanese soldiers (There were also Dutch women in Indonesia). Many of the women were coerced into working as virtual sex slaves, while others may have worked on their own initiative, just as many women today still work in... Read More

Japan’s Human Trafficking Problems Not Resolved: US State Department

The US State Department released their annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report today  (June 19th 2012) and once again Japan was ranked as a 2nd tier nation. It barely escaped being placed on the watch-list for a 2nd time, according to some sources. Human trafficking in Japan not only includes sexual slavery, a government sponsored intern system for foreign workers has also received heavy criticism as virtual slavery, unchecked and almost condoned by the Japanese government.... Read More

“She is the most handsome man you’ll ever see…” A Review Of Takarazuka Revue

"New-half." "I know it's shocking, but I am a 'She-Male.' Oh no! it stood up!" (Illustration, 1990) Illustration from Watanabe Tsuneo, sexologist, in Takarazuka: Sexual Politics and Popular Culture in Modern Japan by Jennifer Robertson. This article was already published on this website in January 2012.  Since Jake Adelstein took a couple of friends to The Black Swans’ Lake/黒鳥の湖 /(Kokucho no Mizuumi), in Shinjuku Kabukicho last... Read More

Curfew For Pussy-Cats (Japan)

As of June 1, Tokyo cat lovers deprived of feline affection will face something of a crisis as new animal welfare laws will go into effect requiring cat cafés, which provide kitty companionship for as little as $19 an hour, will be forced to close their doors at 10 p.m. Calico Cat Cafe, Shinjuku, from outside “It will be difficult for my business,” said Takafumi Fukui, proprietor of the Calico Cat Café, which is located on the edge of Kabuki-cho, Tokyo’s infamous... Read More

Tokyo Police Give Shoeshines the Boot

It’s tough time for shoeshines–not the people getting the shoeshines, fewer every year, but the old school street vendors who give them. Yurakucho(有楽町） home of the Foreign Correspondent’s Club of Japan, was a very different place in its early days. On one side was the Dai-ichi Seimei Building, MacArthur’s GHQ and the formal seat of Occupation power. The other side was the hotbed of a bustling informal economy–the black markets. Under the tracks,... Read More

Yakuza Big Boss Has Big Bail: 1.5 Billion Yen

Kiyoshi Takayama, the second most powerful gangster in Japan, and for years the de facto head of the Yamaguchi-gumi (39,000 members) will be released for the remainder of his extortion trial at a bail set at 1.5 billion yen. The Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan’s top yakuza group, is already said to have collected the bail money. It is not known where the money was collected but probably not from a celebrity auction or nationwide lemonade sales.  Mr. Takayama is being given bail due... Read More

Yakuza Go On The Record About 3/11 Relief Efforts In July Fanzine (実話時代）

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”—Yakuza saying. “It’s partly about living up to the slogans they profess for the yakuza doing the relief work–about helping the weak and fighting the powers that be. That’s the so-called humanitarian way (任侠道）they espouse. It’s also about getting a stake in the reconstruction of Japan. Construction is big business.” –Suzuki Tomohiko, author of Yakuza and The Nuclear Industry, investigative journalist, former... Read More

NewsFLASH: Cop Dressed in School Girl Uniform Fired For Public Nudity; “Sailor Moon”!?

The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department announced the punitive dismissal of a thirty-eight year old male traffic cop yesterday (June 8th, 2012). The police officer was previously arrested in March, for dressing up in sailor girl outfit (school uniform) and exposing his genitals and buttocks to a 16 year old girl in Musashino City–adding a new meaning to the term “sailor moon”. It's not a crime for a cop to dress up as a woman in a sailor outfit, but it is... Read More

Ex-TEPCO President Testifies: “The Prime Minister Yelled At Me.” Denies Cut & Run

For the first time since the Fukushima nuclear disaster last year, the former president of TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company)  was publicly interrogated by the country’s most powerful independent investigation committee, appointed by the parliament and chaired by Kiyoshi Kurokawa on Friday, June 8th, 2012. Leaving the TEPCO chairman alone to deal with the crisis management, Masataka Shimizu, 67, is known for having been ill the months which followed the world’s most damaging... Read More

Ray Bradbury, Journalism & Mr. Dark. “You can’t act if you don’t know.”

“Sometimes the man who looks happiest in town, with the biggest smile, is the one carrying the biggest load of sin. There are smiles and smiles; learn to tell the dark variety from the light. The seal-barker, the laugh-shouter, half the time he’s covering up. He’s had his fun and he’s guilty. And men do love sin, Will, oh how they love it, never doubt, in all shapes, sizes, colors, and smells.” Charles Halloway, town librarian, in Ray Bradbury’s Something... Read More