Most Americans have heard strange tales about the unique sexual culture of Japan from vending machines on the streets of Tokyo dispensing "soiled" schoolgirl's underpants to automated "love hotels" designed exclusively for furtive quickies. Yet these reports don't jibe with the average Westerner's preconceived notions of Japanese society. For a country that has been criticized for its social repression and conformity, sex in Japan is surprisingly candid and manifold. Men and women alike pore over ero manga, (pornographic, often violent, comic books) while sitting on crowded commuter trains. Although officially outlawed, the raging sex industry of kabuki-cho (Tokyo's red-light district) unabashedly advertises its wares on ubiquitous pink flyers papered all over the city. Is this externalization of sexual interiors a recent change, born of progressiveness or, perhaps, cultural desensitization? Not necessarily. Japan has a long and colorful history of frank sexuality, manifested in their pagan fertility idols, instructional "pillow books" and erotic artwork. For our special issue on sex in Japan, we have selected stories, essays and poetry to reflect this broad historical range: we travel from geisha to contemporary sex workers, from the first novel ever written, The Tale of Genji by Lady Murasaki, to the dark and disturbing perversions of modern Tokyo in Kenzeburo Oe's J.
This issue is not a comprehensive tell-all of Japanese sex. It's merely a glimpse into a modern culture that manages to be simultaneously explicit and demure, strictly traditional and seemingly liberated. And, above all, consistently fascinating. Jessica Baumgardner
Fark.com
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