• Thu. Apr 3rd, 2025

Japan Subculture Research Center

A guide to the Japanese underworld, Japanese pop-culture, yakuza and everything dark under the sun.

jakeadelstein

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  • What’s really obscene in Japan? It shouldn’t be the vagina.

What’s really obscene in Japan? It shouldn’t be the vagina.

A vagina shaped boat. A blueprint for printing a vagina on 3D printer you have to download to see. Is it more obscene than these replicas of porn star vaginas…

Reposted: The high price of writing about anti-social forces–and those who pay. 猪狩先生を弔う日々

Igari-san wasn’t an investigative journalist and he wasn’t a saint. But he fought for justice and for truth, and as an investigative journalist, I’ve always believed that’s what our job…

Bitcoin Exchange Kraken Joins The Mt Gox Investigation; The collapse still shrouded in darkness

Ten months after Mt Gox’s fiasco, bitcoin businesses launch one after the other in Japan, one of the rare countries where bitcoin is easily regulated. Concerns rise over the ability…

The difference between a pick-up artist & getting picked up for crimes in Japan.

It’s one thing to teach dubious techniques to socially inadequate men on how to bed women; it’s another thing to grab Japanese women and force their face into your crotch.…

The Most Hated Man In Japan Is Coming Back…He’s not welcome. He’s not sexy

“When you go to Tokyo….if you’re a white male, you can do what you want. Just grab her, pull her in. She’ll giggle. Just say PIKACHU or POKEMON or something…

Saying Goodbye To Japan

I count this as one of my teaching successes. One of my Japanese students is a budding illustrator, and one of her characters is Gachico. Last year when she started…

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

"Have I said anything I started out to say about being good? God, I don't know. A stranger is shot in the street, you hardly move to help. But if,…

Saying Goodbye to The Buddha Of The Yakuza (極道の仏にお別れ)

井の上さんは裏社会でも表社会でも「仏 (ほとけ)」(Buddha)として親しく呼ばれた。警察用語では、「仏」は「死人」という意味もある。彼の死を知った知人は「いよいよ本当に身も心も仏様になりましたね」と肩を落としながら弔いの言葉を述べた。

無縁仏(Muenbotoke): Buddhas Without Connections

On the 8th and 15th of this month, in Japan and in parts of Asia, they celebrate Nirvana Day. It commemorates the death of the Buddha and his liberation from…

“Karaoke Man”: An Ode For the Expat In Japan Reeling From Ennui

And the hostess is practicing pouring green tea As the businessmen get drunk real slow Yes they're sharing a drink they call loneliness But it's better than drinking Jinro