The Japanese Groping Problem

If you thought that Japan wasn’t weird enough, you just might be appalled by the latest step to curb perversion. Due to the rising number of complaints aboard Japan Metro lines about groping and men taking sneaky upskirt photos there has been a trend towards dedicating certain cars of the train for women only. As backwards as it sounds, the highly advanced nation still has childish problems.

To explain a little, as many westerners wouldn’t understand the phenomena, on average the Japanese culture teaches its subjects to stay docile. Japanese women are less likely to openly react to such abuse than their Western counterparts largely because they were taught not to make a fuss. Though the mindset is changing, it won’t happen overnight.

I had a discussion about this subject with my host siblings which consisted of two daughters aged 20 and 22 respectively and a son 19 years old. I had shared my thoughts on the matter, and frankly had found the problem quite appalling. Though I have to admit, much to the chagrin of feminists, that train groping isn't that big a deal compared to the train stabbings that occur every once in a while in New York City. When they had asked what Americans would have done in this situation, I had said flat out "He would get his ass kicked" and they had all reacted in a way I did not imagine. They were amazed. They thought this kind of selfless defense was the coolest thing they've heard of.

Groping attacks seem to be a widespread phenomenon in Japan because the trains are usually so crowded that close physical contact is unavoidable with as many as 66% of women polled admitting to some kind of perverted attack. We can see that even some in the youngest generation find the art of defending your countrymen (or women in this case) against the deviants of the country extremely new and refreshing.

Seedy types take advantage of this situation, and grope the night away. It just so happens I got “caught,” and I want to share my experiences with any foreigners visiting Japan so they don’t make the same mistake I did. Before you jump all over my balls, let me explain myself, I don’t grope women and I never will. I’ve been raised to respect a women and her personal space. Many of my friends know I won’t even invade a girls personal space to make out with her. I would just stand and stare at the girl from across the room, asking if “it feels good.”

Now, many train lines in Japan have a new policy towards giving the first few cars or the last few cars for women only. Often the cars are available to women during the morning and afterwork rush hours, when groping is most prevalent. One of the first things you need to do when trying to rush on that metro, is to check whether you’ve passed a makeshift barrier with a big pink sign mostly in Japanese. You see I made the mistake of passing one of these barriers, ignoring the not-so-obvious “Women Only” signs. While I stood in line, I had thought to myself how lucky I was that most of the people in the cars would be women.

Then I noticed the stares.

These so-called docile witches began staring me down. To give them some credit, I am Asian, and they might not have readily seen me as a tourist. Instead, I was 6 feet 0 inches of pure pervert. Standing there with my bag of stuff I just bought and staring stupidly at a group of women thinking it was my lucky day. Being pretty weirded out, I began to back away from the line and walk away. I didn’t ask what was up, I didn’t confront them, I just thought it was really uncomfortable. It wasn’t until I walked several feet away from the line, did I look back and notice the big pink sign. I can’t tell you how much I wanted to apologize to the women on that line, and I can’t tell you how mortified I was knowing what they must have thought of me. Here’s to future tourists not making that same mistake.