Many train lines in Japan have women’s only train carriages. This is designed to give women an place to ride the train without fear of the gropers, or molesters called “chikan” in Japanese. The special cars are generally available during rush hour only to prevent the overcrowded trains in Japan from providing opportunity and cover…
This story is an interesting one because it is a modern view of what’s going on in Japan. If you are already confused about fashion in Japan, school rules about hair coloring, and what people think of all the bleached blonde boys and girls running around the streets here, this story is not going to…
I thought my next update about this case would be some months down the line, however even at this early date the case has been settled. The victim has agreed to an undisclosed financial settlement with the six men sh accused of rape. The settlement seems to imply that the six Kyoto University of Education…
In a previous post I wrote about six Kyoto University of Education students who raped a girl at a party in February. The university never reported the incident to police until June. There were some pretty outrageous moral violations by the school, such things as refusing to report the incident to authorities, and the fact…
By now, I assume that the big gang rape incident at prestigious Kyoto University (link goes to news story in Japanese) is international news, and I would not like to go into the details of the incident. However, of interest to students of the media and society in Japan are the reasons that Kyoto University…
I really am looking for positive news to write about but this kind of randomly violent crime just keeps jumping out at me. If you’ve been to Osaka, you probably know the big Hep Five mall (with the big Ferris Wheel on top). At the North entrance to Hep Five, two guys approached a girl…
I used to write a lot about the bad teachers in the new here in Japan. They were all shapes of wacky, evil, and embarrassing, but it got pretty depressing for me so I stopped. I think most teachers have good intentions (even if I don’t think many have been properly trained in education, teaching…
A list of members of the Waseda University who sought counseling for sexual harassment, “power harassment”, or stalking was released on the internet through file sharing software. On the list were 390 cases which listed the names and addresses of victims, the reason for seeking counseling, and the name of the accused. The list referred…
There was another recent case of professor accepting bribes to give a good review to PhD students’ theses… (if anyone’s interested in the details I can dig them up) This time we have a case of a Chiba University professor threatened saying that she would never be able to graduate without his help. In return…
Here’s the article in the Japan Times: “High School Principal’s Office Searched Over Alleged E-mail Threats to Woman“ You have to love the quote, “I can kill somebody in cold blood.” I always wondered why people think that’s going to get somebody to come back to you. Another thought, given that the girl is in…
The story in English on Mainichi can be found here:“Exec arrested for saving naked photo of junior high school girl on his mobile phone” It says the guy met the girl online (probably on one of the cell phone dating cites) then offered her a million yen to send him a photo. He got the…
Teacher threatens to force schoolgirl to strip for using mobile phone in class Not that a high school girl would be better, but the schoolgirl mentioned in the article is a junior high school student… in Japan that means from 7th grade to 9th grade. I doubt that I’ll be able to follow up on…