Another touchy subject following my unclear thoughts on Japanese culture.
I once had a Japanese lady who was my flat mate in London. She was lovely and we talked about me going to Japan one day (how ironic now, I’m actually here). We also talked about many things including Japanese men and women. I picked up through anime a lot of very questionable things around the traditional school girls (and when I say school girls, I literally mean under 18s!)
I always felt very uncomfortable about the whole thing, so I asked her whats the deal? Now I don’t really remember but yesterday when I met up with Alexandra who recently moved out here, she also thought it was a bit creepy and weird. But she also told me something which shocked me at first. The legal age of consent is 14 in Japan and 13 in Tokyo!
This deeply troubled me and while walking around Akihabara earlier in the week I was always wondering why there were girls on the streets handing out flyers? So I googled it… found some very interesting bits including tourist trap akihabara.
Maid cafes? They’re the biggest scam in Japan. The most dispirited girls will line the streets in their costumes and when they’re not looking at their phones, they’ll try and get you into one of their cafes that I guarantee you are run by Yakuza. Inside you’ll find drinks and food prices 5x more than what they’re worth and scenes that will make you weep for manhood
So of course I had to check it out to see what it was about (while in Tokyo and all that). I did and all I can really say its cutie overload! The only reason I stayed to the end, was because the guy next to me TAHK0 (pkmn trainer garrett) was a interesting guy. From Wyoming and LA and going on a tour of all the places on the Pokemon map.
In the cafe photos and video recording is banned, so I can’t show you how it looks but I had cocktail and some sausages. I also had my photo taken with a girl who looked like 16… There were things which you had to do like sing with them to activate food and drinks. They danced and generally walked around collecting orders and delivering drinks. I would say it was like Hooters (not that I have been in one) but the girls are fully dressed and being cute all the time. I would say the ages seemed to be about 16-19, but they might be a bit older. There was a western woman there who had the same look I had on my face really.
So once I finally got out of the crazy cute land of the maidcafe, I looked into the age thing again still feeling weird about everything. Wikipedia make me think…
The Japanese Penal Code sets a minimal age of consent of 13. However, all prefectures and districts have (largely similar) “obscenity ordinances” (淫行条例) that forbid “fornication” (淫行) with anyone under 18 years of age, but exempt sex in the context of a sincere romantic relationship (typically determined by parental approval)
Ah so I think the age of consent is low but for teenagers having sex with each other, not so sleazy business men can take advantage of young women! This confirmed my thoughts and got me thinking… I have always been in favour of clearing up this myth that kids don’t have sex. We all know they do and open sex education is the important thing here. I had jumped to the conclusion that it was too low…
So low compared to where? Look at many of the European countries and you find similar ages: Austria, Albania, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Estonia, Hungary and Italy it is 14; France, Czech, Greece, Denmark it’s 15, many others it’s 16, and Spain is at 13.
I don’t think this excuses the fact some business men see these girls in a highly sexual way but it explains a little more. Still freaks me however.
