Maybe some of you will disagree, but from my experience (a foreigner living in Japan for several years) porn consumption is very normalized and accepted in Japan. Porn does not seem to be taboo or frowned upon at all. I'm sure there are some that do, but it general it seems to be a normal part of life/society. It seems to be widely accepted that all guys watch porn, and women don't seem to have an issue with their boyfriends/husbands watching porn.
This surprised me considering Japan is such a conservative and traditional country. In my experience many western/liberal countries that are less traditional than Japan have a more taboo/conservative approach to porn (I'm not saying they are conservative about porn, but more so than Japan). For example, people in other countries/cultures on average seem to be much less open and accepting about porn consumption (even if they probably do consume just as much porn).
by Independent_Bill_793
26 comments
I’m not Japanese but I think regulated things are better than illegal things and what’s wrong about porn isn’t sex same as breathing and eating it’s a human need and porn is the catalyst to fullfill that need faster and efficiently
They know the difference between reality and fantasy, acting and real life.
Western traditionalists have that Abrahamic sex-guilt thing going, but that isn’t really part of Japanese traditionalism
What is your definition of traditional / conservative? Japan’s openness to sex and sex depiction in media goes back a long time.
Traditional = puritanical sex is bad is a western thing
Well, most traditional and conservatives are porn producers/customers, in most countries.
“porn consumption is very normalised”
yeah, that’s because it is, in fact, normal
Because eastern and western conservatism aren’t the same
Not a Christian country…
Check out shunga 春画 and it’d be interesting to know the western equivalents of the day
This again. OP stop posting the same material in different Japan related subs.
Karma harvesting much?
It’s like steam in a kettle. The more proper you are, the lonelier and frustrated you’ll be until something snaps.
Wait till you go to the Philippines…
If OP is from a Christian-majority nation/background, then it is OP’s own cultural biases that create this view.
What a well-timed question, there was literally a man next to me on the train watching porn on X.
The restrictions about the distribution and sale of pornographic materials, “documents, drawings and other objects” came in around 1907 in the efforts to modernise the country and be on par with the West not only with technology but with social norms so can thought to be influenced by Western culture at that time.
Also, it would have put an end to the open sale of antique [Shunga](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shunga) paintings to tourists and visitors, the production of which was illegal since 1722:
> The Kyōhō Reforms, a 1722 edict, were much more strict, banning the production of all new books unless the city commissioner gave permission. After this edict, shunga went underground. However, since for several decades following this edict, publishing guilds saw fit to send their members repeated reminders not to sell erotica, it seems probable that production and sales continued to flourish. Further attempts to prevent the production of shunga were made with the Kansei Reforms under Emperor Kōkaku in the 1790s.
Even foriegn expats were shocked in the 1850s to discover what their Japanese neighbours had hidden away.
> In the journal of Francis Hall, an American businessperson who arrived in Yokohama in 1859, he described shunga as “vile pictures executed in the best style Japanese art.” […] Hall was shocked and disgusted when on two occasions his Japanese acquaintances and their wives showed him shunga at their homes.
It was even a problem to show antique Shunga collections abroad…
> Shunga also faced problems in Western museums in the twentieth century; Peter Webb reported that while engaged in research for a 1975 publication, he was initially informed that **no relevant material existed in the British Museum** , and when finally allowed access to it, he was told that it “**could not possibly be exhibited to the public**” and had not been catalogued. In 2014 he revisited the museum, which had an exhibition entirely of shunga “proudly displayed”.
Up until the 1990s, before the death pornographic magazines due to the advent of CD based, shortly followed by Internet porn, every Playboy, Hustler etc magazine had the public area physically scratched out before sale. (Unless someone had got one from somebody on base.) Also pre-Internet, there were porn VHS vending machines secreted in many residential areas that automatically uncovered their wares when darkness fell.
The 1907 act doesn’t say what exactly indecency is, it’s certain that if you carry a 2m tall pink penis in the street in Kawasaki that is ok but if you display a kayak made from a 3D scan of your vagina that is not OK.
> [In 2014, Rokudenashiko was arrested](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megumi_Igarashi) following the creation of Man-Boat (short for manko boat), a kayak with an opening attachment modeled after a 3-D scan of her own vagina, for which she drew financial support from an online crowdfunding platform. Accused on the grounds of posting the downloadable 3-D scanned digital data of her vagina for the public as part of her crowdfunding campaign, Rokudenashiko became the first woman in Japanese history tried on the grounds of obscenity. The ensuing legal battle attracted a lot of media attention in Japan and internationally, where the artist amassed public support and became the subject of online protests about Japan’s inconsistent obscenity laws. In 2016, Rokudenashiko was fined 400,000 yen (around US$3,660) for making the data publicly available.
So a pornographic culture has existed in japan since as long as people carved wood or painted art works. However, there has always been some embarrassment at its existence and the law will come down on people openly challenge and try and test the norms. Because, as with many laws in Japan, “the law must be protected” and not only obeyed because it is an entity in itself.
To be honest, the darkest problem with the Japanese porn industry is nonconsensual porn where women are tricked and forced into it.
Even in Japan, talking about sex is considered embarrassing. Japan is an open country, so please don’t think it’s okay to talk about sex in front of women.
It’s sexual harassment.
Pornography is legal in Japan simply because of the freedom of expression law.Just that.
The porn is traditional.
Because traditionally people like sex.
The two faces of Japanese:
Tatemae — We are conversative.
Honne — We are pervs.
Compared to where?
Of the 50 states in the US, Utah is overwhelmingly both the most anti-porn culture, and also the highest per capita consumer of porn. It is considered a serious sin for Mormons to consume porn or even masturbate. But of course they do.
[https://www.cnbc.com/2009/07/14/Top-US-States-For-Online-Pornography.html](https://www.cnbc.com/2009/07/14/Top-US-States-For-Online-Pornography.html)
The reason is simple. The more conservative and culturally repressed people are, the more they will watch porn.
Next question.
In some points, yeah Japan being a non-christian country has a lot to do with it, but also some of your points vary a lot from country to country more than Japan vs Non-Japan. I’m pretty sure most people in my country are ok with their partners watching porn and do not consider it “cheating”.
Idk if you’re american, but a lot of times americans here complain about something about Japan, without considering that maybe it’s not that Japan is different, but that the US is the one different from the rest of the world/doesn’t stop to think that every country is different.
And wasn’t child porn only banned in Japan in the last 20 years or so?
Japan is traditional without being nutbag Christian or Muslim
It’s honestly great
Li