The Sexy Japanese Movie/TV Starlet and Me (Also Known As: The Formerly Famous TV Star-Lady at the Discount Grocery Store)

"This is a true story. The names were changed to protect the innocent." - Dragnet TV show 1965

"No one is innocent." - Sex Pistols 1980

This is a true story. I go grocery shopping at the big local supermarket about 2 or 3 times a week. The supermarket is called, "OK Store." I'm a regular there. I've written about it before (you might get a laugh).

OK Store is a "no frills" grocery store: There's never any fancy displays. Cartons and cases of stuff like toilet paper or bottled water are stacked high to the ceiling in their cardboard shipping boxes. 

It's not a pretty sight.

OK Store advertises that they don't spend money on crap like "poncy-hairdresser-type" displays and the like and that allows them to pass on the savings to you... Or, me... to us... Whatever... 

I'll say "to me," since I'm betting most of my readers don't shop there.

I am always one of the first ones to arrive at OK Store in the mornings so I always get the discounted stuff left over from the day before. I run to the 'Day-Old' "Fish and Buffalo Chips Counter" for the 20~30% discounts on stuff. If you get there and see no discounted stuff, that means I have already been there and am long gone. 

Loser! The early bird catches the worm, so they say.

OK Store definitely has a "K-Mart," "Target," or "Woolworth's" groove about it (do they still have Woolworth's?) What I want to say is the rich people don't shop at OK Store; it's too "Low Class."

I like to shop there. I go to sleep in my T-Shirt and sweatpants; then I like to wake up and go to work (or shopping) in those same jammies. 

It's a time-saver. Works for me.

The wife doesn't like it. She thinks I should change clothes before I go out. "What for?" I ask.

I'm eco-friendly... Global warming and all that....

We live in a sort of fancy neighborhood. There's lots of rich people around here and just a few apartments. My house is like a desert island in a sea of opulence. We are surrounded by people with huge houses and fancy cars that the owners keep shiny and clean. Me, being a cheap skate, don't care about having a shiny German car. I have a used junky old Toyota family 4-door that I got for free. It comes with lots of dents, dings and scratches, thank you very much...

I want to say that my wife drove it around and so it got all the dents and stuff. But that would be a lie... 

Japan has too many narrow roads...... 

Well, that's my story and I'm sticking with it!

My clothes? You kidding me? I haven't bought any clothes in 15 years. OK. That's a lie too... I haven't bought any clothes in 35 years. 

My wife buys me underwear at Christmas. Which is good, because my mom used to do that but she passed away a long time ago...

I had lots of old underwear with worn out rubber banding at the waist for several years after mom died and before I married my wife... They used to bunch up in my butt crack. I hated that.

Getting married solved that problem.

My hair? Well, wife is constantly complaining 'bout that too. But, get it cut at the at the cheap-assed barber by the station and waste $10? You nuts? I cut it myself for free.

I was in a punk band when I was a kid. I don't care about clothes, cars or my hair.

I do have to care about the house though, so, I have to keep it looking nice. I absolutely hate having to trim the shrubbery... God! Cutting the hedges once a year is a royal pain....

But I digress. 

This isn't about my trend setting fashion pace or the house I live in or my neighborhood. It's about the Formerly Famous Movie/TV Actress Lady I rendezvous with at OK Store once a week or so with.

Like I said, I am always one of the first ones to get to OK Store when I go shopping. All the cash register ladies know who I am. I am a friendly guy and always say, "Good morning ladies!" 

I always see the other regulars there too in the early hours. Shopping at OK Store first thing in the morning is the best. There's almost nobody there. You can be in and out in 15 minutes. 

But get there after 10 am? Are you nuts? After 10 am there will be a line of 20 people at every cash register. It's crazy crowded anytime the rest of the day.

I'm a busy man. I have rivers to swim and mountains to climb (figuratively speaking, of course.) I don't have time to wait in line.

Anyhow, besides the regulars; the old guy who runs a restaurant, a few hot housewives and some old ladies, the catholic sisters and me, there is one "special" customer. She is the lady who used to be really freaking famous but I guess she's not anymore.

I know she must have been really famous because I don't own a TV, yet even I recognized her. And I haven't owned a TV set for over 11 years! I hate TV. So, if I know her face, so does everyone else. She was a huge star on toothpaste and shampoo commercials, doing the laundry and showing off bright new kitchen appliances along with the rest of the beautiful people. That means she was plastered all over the mass media. She must have been really super-star famous here in Japan. 

I guess.

Alas, even though I recognize her, I don't know what her name is. But she is really famous; everyone here knows who she is. You can trust me on that point.

One day, maybe the 10th time or so I saw her at the store, my wife so happened to be there with me. I saw the Formerly Famous Movie Star/TV Lady pointed a broccoli towards her and said to my wife, "Say! Isn't that lady famous and on TV!"

My wife got mad and said, "Don't shout and don't point at people!"

My wife told me that the lady used to be really famous but she also couldn't remember her name. Why couldn't my wife remember her name? My wife doesn't have a TV at home. We live together. Maybe that's why she doesn't have a TV at home.

Anyway, back to the Formerly Famous Movie Star/TV Lady... She shops at OK Store once or twice a week too, just like me. We see each other there. 

It's like destiny. 

I guess she shops early in the mornings too because she doesn't want to be recognized either; just like me. We meet there by the veggies on the second floor. She looks for bargains. I stand there holding my cucumber.

She was there again, the other day. I bought my shit, and so did she... Er, I mean she bought her groceries. I bought my crap. High Falutin' Formerly Famous People like her do not "buy crap."

In my cart was instant Cup of Ramen and cheap-assed imitation beer substitute. I imagined that in her cart was expensive French cheese, baguette and Dom Perignon. 

Do they even sell expensive French cheese, baguette and Dom Perignon at OK Store? Probably not. But whatever...

I paid at the cash register and so did she.  

In the parking lot, she drove a nice Mercedes Benz. Did I tell you that I drive a used Toyota 4 door that I got for free? I did? OK. Never mind. 

She lives somewhere in my neighborhood. I'm sure she lives in splendor.

Me? I live on a desert island in a sea of opulence. 

How far the once mighty have fallen! She used to be a big star, but now she shops at the same discount grocery store that I do. 

Poor Formerly Famous Movie Star/TV Lady.

How fame is fleeting. 

But she still gets the last laugh...

As my old friend Napoleon Bonaparte once said, "Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever."

Photographic proof positive of vegetables at OK Store that both the Formerly Famous TV Lady (and me) might have looked at at sometime or another.  (Photo by Mike Rogers - Lady Not Included!)

Tokyo in 1979, 1984 and Today

(This article is being rerun for Michael McThrow and all the other Michael McThrows out there...)

All my life I've thought that having a diary was a good thing. I never started writing one because I was; a) way too lazy. And, b) Never really thought what was going on was worth writing about...

Actually, that last part is not exactly true... I thought it was interesting enough, it's just that I was always too drunk/high or fatalistic and figured that I'd die before I finished the book about my life's story... So why bother? I wouldn't get the royalties for the movie rights anyway. 

I reckon that makes sense in a twisted sort of way.

One guy, though, that seems to have been keeping a diary for all these years is my friend Andrew Joseph. He writes a blog called, "It's a Wonderful Rife." "Wonderful Rife" is all about his escapades as an English teacher in Japan in the early 1990's. Sometimes he has some really steamy stories that are quite full of ribaldry and sex. One such story is a recent posting about a hot babe named Junko. I think Andrew is in that story too somewhere, but I can't remember...

Read more about Junko and her other "friends" at

It's a Wonderful Rife

Ahem... 

Well, as you can guess... I've never written a diary. That's why, sometimes, I use this blog for one. Recently, Andrew's postings have inspired me to tell a short story about what Tokyo was like when I first came to Japan in 1979... Then, in 1984, when I moved here for good.

Today, in 2011, Tokyo is full of foreigners. Foreigners are not unusual at all in today's Japan (excepting way out in the countryside I hear). But it wasn't that way not that long ago. It used to be that foreigners were like movie stars in Japan merely by the fact that they were foreigners. I know. I was here when that was the case.

I first came to Japan in December of 1979. I was a Southern California boy and a university student. The Socialists who were running the government in the California at the time had something they called, "Affirmative Action." What that meant was that they thought they could use your tax money to even things out for others. If the population of your town was, say, 50% Hispanic, or some other minority, then they did some social engineering and required that all schools, government positions, and scholarships had to be divvied up amongst the Hispanics and whites 50/50.

At that time, I was a half-Japanese American guy at university. Having a Japanese mom and American dad put me in the classification as a "Pacific Islander" (nonsense, sure, but I didn't make the laws). Most of the Japanese American kids I knew studied stuff like becoming a lawyer or doctor. I was studying television. I would find out later that, at my entire university, I was the only "Pacific Islander" studying television (those were the days way before Tricia Toyota and Connie Chung, and all these other beautiful Asian American women you see so often on TV nowadays). 

Since I was the only "Pacific Islander" and I had very good grades, that set me up for a scholarship... Are you sitting down?... That was in 1979 and the government of California gave me over $7,800 to go to university! It wasn't a loan. They just gave it to me!!! Can you believe it? I couldn't either.

Of course, I didn't waste that money on school or books or stuff like that! I wanted to use it to have fun! I found out how to go around the system (It's the government after all! Of course they were all messed up!) and I got the check cashed and immediately went and spent a large part of it on taking a one month vacation to Japan.

I stayed at some friend's house in Chiba but, most of the time, I stayed at my girlfriend's house in Kawasaki. I didn't have much of a clue as to what was going on the entire time I was in Japan because, even though I was half-Japanese, I was too stupid to bother learning any of the language before I got here. After all, the second language of the Japanese people is English right?... Wrong!

One day, my friend in Chiba decided to take me to a prostitution parlor... Er, I mean, a massage parlor, er, I mean a "health parlor" called, "Soapland." He  brought me inside and I sat in a waiting room. It soon became apparent to me what kind of establishment that place was and I got very frightened! I know! I know! I am a wimp, but I was only 19 at the time and had never, ever paid for sex and wasn't about to then.

I'm not that kind of guy!  

Yes. She could frighten me out of my pants!

Like an idiot, I ran out of the Soapland and into the "pink" area of town and was completely and totally lost. Like I said, I couldn't speak any Japanese so I was walking around trying to get someone to help me find my way back to where ever it was I was going to....

In Japanese, the word "lost" can be said a few ways. There is "makeru" which means like, "I lost the game" and there is "mayou" which means like "I am lost and can't find my way" (as well as a few others). I opened my Berlitz dictionary and looked up "lost." There I choose the first definition which was "makeru." Which means, "I lost (the game)"....

But, "Makeru" can also mean "discount" too! So here I was walking around the pink area of town and all these yakuza looking types were trying to get me to go into their parlors for some paid sex and I was looking for someone to help me get back to my friend's place. I kept mistakenly saying, "Makeru!" (I'm lost!) and they took that to mean, "Give me a discount!" They all smiled and nodded and welcomed me into their places.

I couldn't figure out why they didn't understand that I needed help. They probably couldn't understand why, when I asked for a discount, and they said, "Yes!" yet I kept walking on. Finally, after wandering around totally lost for over 2 hours, through a stroke of blind luck, I found a police box and the police helped me to find my way back. 

I knew that I had better not take a chance and get lost like that ever again!

A few days later, my same friends took me to Shibuya to drop me off so my girlfriend could pick me up and take me to stay for the remainder of my trip at her home. What a relief that was! At least her English was pretty good.

I was taken to a very famous landmark in Shibuya. It is known by all Tokyoites and visitors to Tokyo as 109 department store. It still stands today as an extremely well-known landmark and meeting place. When I was taken there to meet my girlfriend, 109 had just finished construction and it was the pride of Shibuya.

My friend dropped me off and told me to stand in front of 109 department store, but I was early by an hour or so. Even with that, I was quite leery of going off and adventuring by myself because of the recent experience in Chiba so I thought I'd better stay put and wait for my girlfriend.

So that's when it happened. And that's the first amazing part of this story. I told you that there were no foreigners here at all. There weren't. While I stood there waiting for my girlfriend, all sorts of people were walking by me and pointing and staring. Some people said, "Hi!" I said, "Hi!" back.

After about 10 minutes of waiting an extremely beautiful girl walked up to me and said in very good English, "Why don't you come and have a coffee or tea with me?" I thought, "WTF? I didn't know this girl. What was going on here?" Even though she was a babe, I declined because my girlfriend was a babe too and, after coffee, what was I going to do? Where would I stay?

I know what you are thinking: "Duh! This Rogers guy is a real moron!" And, yes, I would agree with you.

Well, I said, "Thanks, but no thanks" to the beautiful girl and just thought, "Wow! What an awesome babe!"

But it wasn't just that girl. After her, three different extremely gorgeous women walked up to me and, in very good English, basically asked me the same thing! The last two really blew my mind. One said,

"Oh, I'm sorry. She's not coming, you know. Why don't you just come along with me?"

The last one was even more brash and said, 

"She called me up and told me that she can't make it, so she wanted me to take you to dinner." 

I thought, "You know my girlfriend? Are you sure? Wait a minute!" 

Finally, not being the sharpest tool in the shed, it dawned on me what was going on. These girls were actually trying to pick up on me. I couldn't believe it!  In all the years I had lived in the USA not once did a girl ever ask me out for a date excepting Shanda Shinkaruk, my very first date which was a Sadie Hawkins "Backwards dance" when I was in ninth grade. Now, here I was in Japan, standing on the street corner and, all within an hour, four different girls... NO! Four different extremely awesome sexy Japanese girls who you'd die for were trying to pick me up!

It was like I'd died and gone to heaven!

"What a wonderful country Japan is!" I thought. "I want to live here!"

That was 1979. You may think I am totally stupid, but, my girlfriend, by the way, was a famous model at that time and was on the cover of magazines... That's why I thought twice about dumping her for these hussy women... Today? Absolutely not! I wouldn't think about it for 1/2 a second before I'd be massaging their toes and cooking dinner for them every night!

Anyway... Between 1979 and 1984, I came to Japan many times and, each time, I never wanted to return to the USA... Finally, in 1984 or so, I got fed up with the USA and my job and decided to move around the world. I wrote about that in Working With Thieves Liars and Crooks. But the first place I wanted to live was, of course, Japan.  

In 1984 foreigners were still rare in Japan - and popular with the women, and that led to my first divorce as I was unable to control my hormones.

I still feel sorry for my ex-wife and kids about that. Forgive me. The How to Survive Women Blog has an excellent article about that entitled: Cheated on - Now What? 

But I digress.

By 1984, when I moved to Japan, I had taken several courses in Japanese language at my university and was one of the top students in class (it didn't hurt that there were many Japanese exchange student women living in the dorms with which I could, er, "exchange" lessons with.)

I landed a job with an English school in Shinjuku, then Iidabashi. Since I could speak some Japanese, I was the liaison between the Japanese staff (managers) and the few foreigners on roster. 

Those, my friends, were the glory days of English teaching in Japan.

Yen to dollar rate from 1985 to 1989. From 1985 to 1989, the US dollar lost 1/2 its value against the Japanese yen. English teachers were being paid $50,000 a year - or more - working part time teaching English!

In those days, since I was in management, I know, there were English teachers at our company getting paid, I'd say, on average, ¥700,000 per month. Some were earning over ¥1,000,000 per month. ¥700,000 per month, in 1985, was "only" about $2,756 per month in USD. By 1989, that was about $5,512 per month... And that was for 20 hours a week of classroom time!

Think about that! English teachers were so rare in those days that they were earning, on average, more than $60,000 a year in 1989. People who couldn't get a job mowing lawns back home were pulling down $60 thusand dollars a year teaching part time and sleeping with their students! Since I was a measly liaison, I was only making $80,000 a year to babysit those dumb foreigners (maybe not so dumb, eh?) I even knew a few guys who were making twice that amount.

Like I said, those were the Golden Days of English teaching in Japan. No matter how much I warned other foreigners around me, people played and spent like the gravy train would never end. So don't tell me that teaching English in Japan is a crap job, I remember when it was an awesome job!

Like I said, English speaking people were a rarity and we were always short of them. My old boss, Mr. Hasegawa, and I would go to Shinjuku station and hang around looking for foreigners to teach classes for that evening. We were desperate! If the foreigner was walking and breathing, then they qualified for a teaching job.

We even hired white guys with the names of Ewvig and Euwie (from Austria and South Africa) and told them to say their names were Eric and Ernie, just to save, er, "confusion"... Oh, and don't forget to say that you are from "Canada" or "Nevada"... That's to "explain the accent."

I remember a guy named Arya who, during class, wowed the students with some great phrases like, "Someone explain me this!" or "How to someone say that?" Seriously, he really did say things like that. I cringed...

But it didn't matter...

Those were the days. Us foreigners were rare and oft sought after. We got paid gross amounts of money. Even if we were the dorkiest jerks in town, we got the hottest girls... And why? Not because of our training or education, but just because of our looks, even if they weren't good. Just because we didn't look Japanese. We had the place in the top of society just because of who our parents were and where we were born. Pure and simple and stupid blind luck.

Today, being a foreigner in Japan is no big deal... In fact, in many circles, it is now a detriment... It used to have style and pizzazz! Not anymore.

There is no real moral to this story excepting that I can say that Japan, up until the mid-nineteen nineties was pure men's heaven... I thank god to have been able to have lived through that, in the right place, and at the right time.

Seriously, she was one of my students... Well, at least several girls who look exactly like her were.

NOTE: Later on, I'm going to have to write about when I was a teacher at a girl's high school... Now THAT was a dangerous job. There were at least 9 awesome girls in my class. Or the time I was teaching another class and a girl that easily scored a 10+ wanted to talk to me after class and she started unbuckling my belt while we were discussing her score... Of course, I gave her a 100... Both jobs I quit immediately... Like I said, they were way too dangerous.

Beauty Contests and Sports Are Rigged? Say it Ain't So, Joe! (They Are)

Well, well, well... Lookie here. What do we have? Another rigged beauty contest? How timely and perfect for the Euros! (That's European soccer for some of you folks). How timely and perfect and a total reflection of our broken economy and society...

Artwork and photograph by Mike Rogers (please use freely!)

As I wrote in Quite Coincidental Results of Miss Universe Beauty Contests, Games and Sports After Japan Disasters

In the seminal George Orwell book, 1984, the protagonist Winston Smith is at his office working. He gets up from his desk and heads to the restroom. There he is greeted by his boss. His boss asks Winston if he saw the 'big game' last night. Winston answers in the negative. Then the boss says something like,

"Wow! That was an exciting finish to a very exciting game! That's the best script we've written in a long time!" 

I think most people can already get what I am implying here. What I want to say is not a negative comment, nor a positive one. I am merely making  an observation as to the way things are and run in this world.

It doesn't matter if it's sports, or elections, news or even beauty pageants; if big money is involved you can bet that a big factor of "entertainment" and "drama" is indelibly tied into the result.

Let me give you some recent examples:

Japan suffers the worst natural calamity in centuries.... That year Japan's Women's Soccer team wins the world championship for the first time in their history...

A year later, the winner of the Miss Universe Japan 2012 beauty contest comes from the prefecture that was worst hit by the earthquake and tsunami...

In 1995, Kobe was devastated by the Great Hanshin Earthquake... Quite coincidentally, I'm sure, the Kobe baseball team, the Orix Blue Wave, won the championship in 1995 and 1996.

I also added in: Sumo is Fixed Like All Other Pro Sports

Take the example of CBS who used to do the Superbowl every year. CBS sells commercial time on the Superbowl for tens of millions of dollars. CBS wants to sell 4 or 5 hours of this commercial time to a sponsor.

If the games are blowouts and 70% the viewers turn off their TVs before the first half ends, sponsors are very upset. When sponsors are upset, the TV stations are very upset. Why? Because, if games are boring and people tune out, if this happens too much and too often then sponsors won't want to spend big money next year because they fear the same thing will happen.

If the sponsors don't pay big money, then who doesn't make big money? The league and team owners.

If you are an American, you might remember the Denver Broncos getting to the Superbowl in the early 1980s. They got blown out two years in a row. The games were basically over 1/2 way through the second quarter. The viewers turned their sets off. There haven't been any blowouts since then. Is it any wonder why?

Like I said, pro sports are a big business. The leagues have a product to sell. That product is supposed to be an exciting sports event that last for 4 hours and is profitable to their mass media partners too. When the game is over after 45 minutes, there are some very unhappy sponsors and media partners.

The league cannot afford to have that.

Yes, and it's not just sexy Japanese girls and big time sports in Japan... Today we have girls involved with the Miss American contest claiming "the fix was in" at the recent Miss America contest. Fox News (hold your nose) reports in: EXCLUSIVE: Second Miss USA Contestant says she overheard list of Top 5 finalists before live announcement.

Another Miss USA contestant has come forward saying she heard Miss Florida Karina Brez reveal the list of finalists backstage before the pageant’s Top 15 were even announced.

“I saw Florida backstage and she was very, very flustered and upset. I thought it might be because she didn’t make the top 15 cut, but at that point she was able to reveal to me at least four of the five names who went on to be the top girls,” the contestant, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told FOXNews.com exclusively. “She couldn’t remember the fifth because she was so upset. Several of the girls then started hearing through the grapevine about a list; a lot of people were upset.”

Miss Pennsylvania Sheena Monnin first accused the Donald Trump-owned Miss USA pageant of rigging the competition last week. Monnin claimed Brez said she had seen a list of the top five finalists hours before last Sunday’s live telecast even started.

“Apparently the morning of June 3rd [Brez] saw a folder lying open to a page that said 'FINAL SHOW Telecast, June 3, 2012' and she saw the places for Top 5 already filled in,” Monnin wrote on her Facebook page.

I can only add to this farce that there really should be no surprise to anyone in this news and that anyone who is surprised and incredulous is living in fantasy-land. We live in a world where just about everything is fixed.

Our elections are fixed.

Our beauty contests are fixed.

Our sports are fixed.

Our economy and our stock market are fixed.

You can bet your bottom dollar that, as the money involved with any sort of event, contest or enterprise increases, so does the corruption.

The only people who don't believe so are dreaming.

'Give them bread and circuses and they will never revolt' - Roman poet Juvenal (1st and 2nd century AD)

Yeah, but don't worry about it, folks. The new season of American Idol starts real soon.


NOTE: Are you a fan of the extremely popular American TV show, "House Hunters"? Well, you'll love this: "House Hunters:" Subjects say it's fake

Japan: A Nation of Incorrigible and Depraved Criminals - If you masturbate and view pornography in Japan, you are supporting yakuza gangster activities and can go to jail! Stop it now!

It's difficult for me to admit, but admit I must. Japan is a nation full of law-breaking criminals and desperadoes. Oh sure, not all of them are robbing banks, committing grand larceny, breaking fingers and ankles, trading women in human trafficking, promoting gambling, drug use, sex, prostitution and all sorts of morally wicked deeds. But, well, the proof is in the pudding as they say: Most men in Japan (Japanese nationals and foreigners) are breaking the law with shocking regularity and that includes you if you live in Japan!

"Mukashi no Uta" (昔の歌) 1939 film. Allegedly, this film was financed with yakuza money (like many films in Japan). If you've seen this film or even if you look at this photo, you are supporting yakuza activities! Look away! Save yourself!

You're either with us or you're with the criminals. And, from where I sit, it looks like every male in Japan is a law breaker and should be apprehended and incarcerated until the end of time. 


If you are a male residing in Japan, Japanese national or not (the law is, after all, fair and color blind) then you are a criminal lawbreaker as you support the yakuza most likely on a daily basis!


You should be ashamed of yourself! You despicable low-life scum! How do you sleep at night?


What I mean to say is that roughly 100% of the male population of Japan are eagerly supporting the criminal activities of yakuza gangsters merely by association and, as such, according to new laws on the books of Japan, must be arrested and made an example of in order to protect society. If I were the chief of police in your neighborhood, you'd be the first person whose butt I locked up and threw away the key!

Give you one guess what those circles mean. So if I were, say, the beer vendor at this boxing match, or even this venue owner, or the guy cleaning the toilets, I would be committing criminal acts under the new law by selling these guys tickets to this event or even a beer or popcorn or making them feel like guests. Genius!

This comes as a deep and profound shock to me as I was under the impression that most guys in Japan were regular Joes going to work and trying to earn a living. Little did I know that every male in Japan over 16 years of age is supporting Yakuza activities. Let me repeat that for you so the gravity of the situation really sinks in: Every single male in Japan over 16 years of age is supporting Yakuza activities and therefore needs to be arrested.


As always, the Tokyo Reporter has the story. I will add my comments in between paragraphs. Please refer to: How to Spot a Yakuza Front Company

On October 5, the National Police Agency announced a revision to the Anti-Organized Crime Law to be submitted to the ordinary session of the Diet. The initiative follows anti-gang ordinances adopted by all prefectures and administrative divisions that same month.

Crucially to the general public, the latter legislation prohibits ordinary citizens from assisting the business activities of criminal organizations.


So what these morons are saying is that if I take my dirty laundry to the corner dry cleaner, which I am unaware of is actually a front for a Yakuza company, I can get fined and in trouble and eventually jailed. What bullocks! 


My question is: what's to stop some cop from abusing his power and use this law to take revenge on former business partners and people he doesn't like? What's to stop him from coming down on a legitimate dry cleaning business when it just so happens that his family owns the other dry cleaners in the same neighborhood? 


But I digress...

Media outlets, celebrities, and the sporting world have subsequently been monitoring their own activities.

No. They haven't. They've been pissing and moaning about how stupid these new laws are and an obstruction of business.

Shukan Taishu Venus (Feb. 22) sets about determining what commoners can do to protect themselves from unknowingly associating with crime syndicates.

There are thousands of yakuza front companies operating in Japan, says the tabloid. “I used to work at such an organization,” confesses a freelance writer. “Many other employees did not know, however, that a gang group was behind it.”

Hello!? Did they say, "commoners?" How about peasantry? Then they go on and say that the employees didn't even know the company was owned by yakuza so how in the hell are the customers supposed to know? Jeez!

To avoid working for such a firm, the writer suggests research. “You should at least check the company’s name on the net,” the source says. “While it is important to see what users on bulletin boards say, what’s crucial is to know the number of years it has been in business and its history.”

Idiocy! Check the company's name on the Internet? Riiiiiiiight. If it says "A yakuza corporation" on their web page, then you'll know something might not be kosher. This writer is a moron too. Since when is it the employees job to make sure that company shareholders aren't up to hijinks?


As one friend told me, "If I put my money into any bank in Japan, I cannot be sure that the yakuza are not involved... After all, all big banks the world over are corrupt, dishonest businesses!"

Companies that change their names and lines of businesses frequently are suspect, says the writer, adding: “Companies that use simple English words such as ‘consultant’ or ‘create’ following a name is certainly dubious as it is an attempt to establish a good image just from the sound of the name.”

English words? Heavens! Consultant? Create? My god! Just to show you how incredibly dumb this is, I did a Google search using the words, (コンサルタント 東京　株式会社) "consultant," "Tokyo," "corporation" to see how many companies, or references to those companies, in Tokyo I could find. I received a total of 38,000,000 hits! Thirty-eight million!

The only straight line these people who wrote this law could write is if their brains were hooked up to an electroencephalogram (EEG) to measure their brain activity. That should be plenty to prove to anyone who has any trace of cranial activity that this article and this law is complete and total bullsh*t!

Now, let's take this nonsense even one step further and I will prove to you why every man in Japan over 16 is, according to the new law, a criminal or supporting criminal activities. And that includes you, pal!


♫ Bad boys, bad boys, whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do when they come for you? ♫

I wrote about this just the other day. Please refer to Anti-Crime (Anti-Yakuza) Laws in Japan Completely Insane - Yakuza Gangsters (or those suspected of ties) can't play golf, go to Disneyland, eat at McDonald's or order Domino's Pizza either! Idiotic Laws!:

The asinine laws that went into effect last October make associating with Yakuza a crime. Yes, yes, blah, blah... But what does, "associating with Yakuza" mean? I checked Merriam-Webster dictionary for "Associate" it said:

Associate: (transitive verb)

1) to join as partner or friend

2) to join or connect together

3) to bring together into a relationship in any of various intangible ways (as in memory or imagination)

Ah! Number 3 is the tricky one. So, if you are living outside of Japan, and I live here and if you and I were to meet, you could associate me with the Yakuza because the Yakuza are from Japan too! See how this works?

Under these new laws, obviously written by people with the intelligence of chimpanzees, "associating with a Yakuza" is not limited to things like you being a card-holding gang member or their "friend" and hanging around with them at the billiard room; it's not limited to your driving in their getaway cars while they rob banks or standing around as watch out while they have "a problem in communication" and wind up roughing up uncooperative, er, "customers." It means that if you suspect that someone is a Yakuza, yet you treat them like anyone else, you could be fined or sent to prison.

If contact with the yakuza continues despite all this, a person risks up to one year in the hoosegow and a fine of ¥500,000 ($6,400).

It hit the golf industry hard.

“If customers are yakuza, we ask them to leave even if they're in the middle of playing," said the general manager of Akabane Golf Club (Mainichi newspaper article in Japanese). He is also the chairman of the Council of Golf Clubs for the Expulsion of Organized Crime in Tokyo. How would he know if someone is a yakuza? "We refer the names of suspicious people to the police,” he said.

And the pizza delivery industry is in uproar. 

"We don't know if the address we deliver to is the place of a yakuza," said the Delivery Business Safety Driving Council. But don't panic. "One or two pizzas are OK,” the Council said, “but delivering a huge amount of pizza, knowing that the customer is a yakuza is a no-no." They're planning to invite police officers to a study meeting with restaurant owners.

So it's not rocket science; if you do anything or support anything or any business run by the yakuza, then you are guilty of aiding, abetting and supporting criminal organizations and, as such, violating the new laws on the books.

Stop! You are violating the law! Close your eyes right now. This is your last warning!

Now let me show you how it is that, if you are a male in Japan, then you are guilty of supporting the yakuza and should be arrested. Everyone knows that, in Japan, the yakuza have their hand in the entertainment business. Nowhere else is this hand more evident than in the "adult entertainment" business. That means hostess clubs, dating services, prostitution and pornography. 


Yes, that's right: Pornography. Is there anyone who thinks that the yakuza do not control the pornography industry in Japan? 


Now, what's that got to do with you, you ask? Don't lie to me. Everyone knows that 98% of all men admit to masturbating and the other 2% are liars. I know what you are doing! You might say that it is nobody's business what your right hand does while viewing pictures like the one above, but, let's face it; you are a normal red-blooded guy, right?


According to the Healthy Strokes web site, 100% of all men masturbate:


Some authorities say 100% and that there are no exceptions. According to a survey of more than 10,000 males by the web site HealthyStrokes.com in the second half of 2007, 99.15 percent reported masturbating currently. Limiting the scope to those over 18 (your question refers to "men"), 99 percent report masturbating currently. All of those males report having masturbated in the past.


Okay, so it's not 100%. It's 99% (and the other 1% are liars). So, like I said, everyone knows the Yakuza control the porno industry in Japan. And what's the problem with that? Someone has to do it. It's not like your local bank, postal service or hospital is going to diversify their businesses and get into the porn industry (although there's always more openings for nurses!) 


So that means every time you view photos of sexy Japanese girls or Japanese porn, you are supporting a business run by the yakuza and, in turn, violating the new laws.


So, ultimately that means when you view porn (that is most likely created by yakuza run organizations) that includes sexy Japanese girls, you are a criminal...


Or, if you don't masturbate, then you are a liar. Which is it? 


We definitely need more intelligent laws like this on the books, wouldn't you agree?

Go to jail. Go immediately to jail. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200!