NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #27/NN_1992_27.iso/spool/alt/censorsh/8837

Internet Message Format | 1992-11-17 | 3.1 KB

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From: [e-mail] (Jim Breen)
Newsgroups: alt.censorship,alt.sex,soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Genitals in Japan( was Madonna...)
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 16 Nov 92 22:42:42 GMT
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Sender: [e-mail] (Usenet system)
Organization: Monash University, Melb., Australia.
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[e-mail] (Robert H Brueckner) writes:

>[e-mail] (Keis Ohtsuka) writes:

>>Carl's phrase "Stragne people, the Japanese.." sums up my opinion when
>>it comes to their attitude to pornography and exposure of genitals
>>etc.

>>Why can't they [the Japanese] admit a simple fact that
>>they did a horrible thing during/before WWII and that human
>>beings have public [sic] hair and genitals and do make love!

>Because it's not a simple fact. It would involve a national loss of face,
>which is something most Japanese I have met would not suffer gladly. The
>Japanese, as any Japanese-surnamed individual ought to know, are
>particularly thin-skinned about criticism, especially when it comes
>from gaijin (read: racial inferiors, i.e., the rest of the world).

The strange thing is that the hangup over nudity is of relatively
recent origin. Read, for example, Isabella Bird's classic book on
her travels in rural Japan in the late 1870s. She was appalled the
way the peasants worked naked in the fields (often just topless in the
case of the women) and then crowded together in the altogether
(so to speak) in the village bathouse.

In fact, the big cover-up which occurred at that time was at the
instigation of the Meiji authorities, who were reacting to the
shock/horror/disgust reaction from the (mostly missionary)
Westerners flooding into Japan at that time.

Even now things seem funny to westerners. When we were living in an
8-mat apa-to in Matsumoto, and using the local bathhouse, we were
amused the way there was a low partition between the male & female
undressing areas. A hardened perve would have had a fine time.
Moreover, the (usually male) attendant sat at a high desk overlooking
both areas. No-one cared a jot. It all seemed (to us) a bit
inconsistent with airbrushing pubic hair on imported Playboys.

Then again, Japanese of my acquaintance find us just as inconsistent,
what with total segregation of changing areas (e.g. at swimming pools)
but fairly prevalent near-nudity on beaches.
--
Jim Breen                           JIS:$B%8%`!!%V%j!<%s(J
Department of Robotics & Digital Technology. Monash University.
PO Box 197 Caulfield East VIC 3145 Australia (ph) [phone]
(fax) [phone]  AARNet/Internet:[e-mail]