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This interview with the creator of La Blue Girl is pretty hilarious

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S

Skinpop

Member
Ri'Orius said:
Yeah, surprised nobody else in this thread is pointing that out. Doesn't Japan actually have a huge issue with sexual harassment? Still better than mass shootings, but when he specifically says women are safe, that struck me as the same sort of blind spot that a lot of Americans seem to have regarding our society's shortcomings.
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I wouldn't call it a huge issue but yeah it is an issue.
 
H

HoJu

Member
is it true that sexual assault rates are that much less in Japan compared to US? or does the topic not get much traction there

i mean japan is a country where women have to wait 6 months after getting divorced when men don't, so there is still inequality there.
 
andythinkpad

andythinkpad

Member
HoJu said:
is it true that sexual assault rates are that much less in Japan compared to US? or does the topic not get much traction there

i mean japan is a country where women have to wait 6 months after getting divorced when men don't, so there is still inequality there.
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No they just don't get reported there. Japan and Saudi Arabia have lowest reported rape. Do you want to know why?
 
M

Massive Duck. C.M.

Banned
HoJu said:
is it true that sexual assault rates are that much less in Japan compared to US? or does the topic not get much traction there

i mean japan is a country where women have to wait 6 months after getting divorced when men don't, so there is still inequality there.
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It's not like dude said they've solved women's rights in Japan
 
A

AcademicSaucer

Member
rpmurphy said:
cryingeagle.jpg
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America_9dd3a8_137986.jpg
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U.S.A.
 
M

Mik2121

Member
Dresden said:
The alone at night thing also feels like an illusion given Japan's problems with underreporting sexual abuse or its rotten police culture that suppresses the number of criminal cases being filed to keep the stats low.

I'm not surprised that the quote resonates pretty heavily with some given the general attitude towards anime here, and it's definitely annoying, but uncritically applauding fluff like this isn't helpful either.

The quote about his three sons is great tho.
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The alone at night is true though. Sure, they still have some problems, but if you're walking alone with real skimpy clothes you will be way safer in Japan than in most other countries.
Sure, they got some weird shit going on on public transport (I believe it has decreased a lot though in the last 10 or so years?), but overall it's way safer even after including whatever under reported sexual abuse and everything else.
 
D

Dresden

Member
PillarEN said:
Pretty much any female JVloger eventually goes on to talk about "how I feel in this country as a women" and every single one of them always mentions she doesn't feel afraid to go outside alone at night compared to her home country whether that be Canada, Argentina, or someplace in Europe. Of course that's not saying it's a safe haven but these women are hard pressed to find a country where they would feel more safe at odd times walking alone back home or wherever.

The whole public transport groping is of course a whole nother story,
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Mik2121 said:
The alone at night is true though. Sure, they still have some problems, but if you're walking alone with real skimpy clothes you will be way safer in Japan than in most other countries.
Sure, they got some weird shit going on on public transport (I believe it has decreased a lot though in the last 10 or so years?), but overall it's way safer even after including whatever under reported sexual abuse and everything else.
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The thing about harassment on public transport and whatnot is that when people are willing to molest others on trains, what stops them off it? It feels like something that's only acknowledged because it happens in such close confines and in front of so many witnesses that it can't simply be ignored. And ignoring or hiding crime isn't exactly a new thing there.
 
T

Trojan X

Banned
Mik2121 said:
The alone at night is true though. Sure, they still have some problems, but if you're walking alone with real skimpy clothes you will be way safer in Japan than in most other countries.
Sure, they got some weird shit going on on public transport (I believe it has decreased a lot though in the last 10 or so years?), but overall it's way safer even after including whatever under reported sexual abuse and everything else.
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He is not lying, it is definitely much safer here in Japan. Heck. The things i have seen would have gotten many girls robbed or gropped easily in another country, but in japan, i am not saying it doesn't happen but the chances of it happening is much lower. One thing for sure, if you are caught gropping a girl here in japan then your life here is officially f**ked (been talked about on tv a few times times and the conclusion is the same) and there is no coming back from it, ever. Even if you were innocent (the girl lied or mistaken you with someone else which does happens) then you are still 100% f**ked as the police and system will side with the girl no matter what unless you can provide absolutely video proof, which is impossible.
 
H

hey_monkey

Banned
Dresden said:
The alone at night thing also feels like an illusion given Japan's problems with underreporting sexual abuse or its rotten police culture that suppresses the number of criminal cases being filed to keep the stats low.

I'm not surprised that the quote resonates pretty heavily with some given the general attitude towards anime here, and it's definitely annoying, but uncritically applauding fluff like this isn't helpful either.

The quote about his three sons is great tho.
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Yeah. Funny interview and I really appreciate his honesty but that doesn't make him always right. Good stuff to discuss, though.
 
S

Saucycarpdog

Member
American journalists have come to me and told me that my hentai scenes will corrupt American youth. Yet, you still have very little gun control in America, and kids have access to this all the time. You see in Japan, nothing happens, you can walk on the street in the middle of the night with a skimpy T-shirt or a mini-skirt on and nothing happens, but, in American, seems like you really care about the human rights of the anime and manga world. You don’t give a shit about real human rights, but you will do all you can to judge or put down Japanese culture.
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I mean, he sounds like a cool guy, but damn. Using a whataboutism argument to address criticism toward Japan and/or anime is a very weak one. Problems in both countries can be criticized and discussed without trying to one up each other in the domestic issues olympics.
 
G

GorillaJu

Member
Ri'Orius said:
Yeah, surprised nobody else in this thread is pointing that out. Doesn't Japan actually have a huge issue with sexual harassment? Still better than mass shootings, but when he specifically says women are safe, that struck me as the same sort of blind spot that a lot of Americans seem to have regarding our society's shortcomings.
Click to expand...

Yes Japan absolutely has a problem with sexual harassment on trains, however I'm not sure that it's quite the situation people imagine. I think the biggest problem isn't that there is a high number of "natural" train molesters, it's the drinking culture that creates situations where people are jam packed into a crowded train car at 11pm after a night of drinking with their co-workers. And then the situation is made even more volatile because there's often no response/recourse.

My wife got into a scuffle with a guy on a train in Tokyo a few weeks ago who tried to fondle her butt. She knows that you have to teach these guys a lesson by shaming them, and she got people around her involved.

The catch? My wife's molester wasn't even Japanese. Dude was French, and when he did it, she stirred up a storm and got people around him all shouting at him in broken English :lol Dude ended up crying and apologizing and begging for pity because it's "so hard to be a foreigner"

Also they have tiny ass escalators all over Japan but that's because the country is aggressively accommodating to those with disabilities. Every sidewalk has a yellow path in the center with a designated relief-texture so those without vision can navigate. Buses use hydrolics to lower the entry door all the way to the curb so there's no step up, etc.
 
F

flintstryker

Banned
I enjoyed this interview way more than I thought I would

edit: I have some female friends from my country who live in Japan and they tell me its the safest they have felt in their life, have never been myself so I have no idea how true this is.
 
M

meltingparappa

Member
GorillaJu said:
Yes Japan absolutely has a problem with sexual harassment on trains, however I'm not sure that it's quite the situation people imagine. I think the biggest problem isn't that there is a high number of "natural" train molesters, it's the drinking culture that creates situations where people are jam packed into a crowded train car at 11pm after a night of drinking with their co-workers.
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This might only be tangental to what you're talking about, but I think some people might have not immediately visualize the risk factors that contribute to the problem.
Crowded-subway-1024x768.jpg
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This is even close to the density of the trains around Shibuya during rush hour.

Famously, station attendants will push stragglers into the car in order to make the doors close.

In NYC, if you were to have more than one square inch of your body touching someone else, that would be the grounds of an altercation. During rush hour in Tokyo, the concept of physical personal space is universally diminished when everybody knows that you're going to be scrunched up as tight as possible to the people around you, so just live with it and not make a big fuss out of it.

In that image above, you can see how it's a physical environment where's the a huge potential for accidental or criminally deliberate inappropriate contact. Like you mentioned, it only gets more complicated when you add alcohol to the mix, or have victims that may be more likely to remain quiet of our embarrassment/fear than to yell in someone's face and bring the mob into it.
 
G

GorillaJu

Member
meltingparappa said:
This might only be tangental to what you're talking about, but I think some people might have not immediately visualize the risk factors that contribute to the problem.

This is even close to the density of the trains around Shibuya during rush hour.

Famously, station attendants will push stragglers into the car in order to make the doors close.

In NYC, if you were to have more than one square inch of your body touching someone else, that would be the grounds of an altercation. During rush hour in Tokyo, the concept of physical personal space is universally diminished when everybody knows that you're going to be scrunched up as tight as possible to the people around you, so just live with it and not make a big fuss out of it.

In that image above, you can see how it's a physical environment where's the a huge potential for accidental or criminally deliberate inappropriate contact. Like you mentioned, it only gets more complicated when you add alcohol to the mix, or have victims that may be more likely to remain quiet of our embarrassment/fear than to yell in someone's face and bring the mob into it.
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Yep yep, you nailed a lot of how I assess the problem. It's not restricted to sexual harassment, either, I see old dudes shoving and yelling at each other on occasion.

On the topic of weird shit scoped on the train: I also saw a drunk foreign woman, who clearly had a bad day, screaming at people on the Yamanote line in Japanese about how she hates the Chinese and Taiwanese. I think she was Korean, but I can't be sure. She had a thick accent.

I ride a train that's a little worse than the first pic you posted Haly, every single morning BibleThump
 
N

Nyoro SF

Member
His frankness is amusing. But he's right about here in America and our glorification and acceptance of violence, especially with firearms.
 
Coreda

Coreda

Member
Extollere said:
"America just shot themselves in the foot. Which is easy, because everyone has a gun. I don’t know how much the rest of you know about American culture (I’m an expert), but fat people and burgers are a huge part of it. It’s not like it is in Japan where you can become successful by being a hentai artist." etc
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That first line leads right into it. Perfect.
 
O

ohlawd

Member
dude's right about the US. pretty much the entire west.

we waste our time debating and arguing about the most useless shit
 
R

Rimon-hanit

Member
Saucycarpdog said:
I mean, he sounds like a cool guy, but damn. Using a whataboutism argument to address criticism toward Japan and/or anime is a very weak one. Problems in both countries can be criticized and discussed without trying to one up each other in the domestic issues olympics.
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Yep, very disappointed to see this kind of deflection accepted so enthusiastically in here.
 
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