Naming and shaming

[imomus]

How do we name things? Naming Nature is an interesting BBC Radio 4 programme presented by the poet Ian McMillan. (McMillan also presents The Verb, a weekly 'cabaret of the word' on Radio 3. Along with Laurie Taylor, Radio 4's resident sociologist, I think he's the most distinctive radio voice of the post-Peel age.) The bit about the arbitrary Latin names for plants and animals made me laugh a lot.



Language represents the world, and therefore, like politicians, language inevitably betrays the world. Personally, I'm disturbed by labels, which always seem a kind of mini-betrayal. But I'm also disturbed when things don't have names. For instance, the male haircut (seen on a lot of contemporary dancers, for some reason) with 'something going on at the back' (no, not the mullet with 'a party at the back', I mean just some cute, fluffed, tufty stuff going on behind)? What do you call that? Or the baggy ass hipster jeans we've been seeing for the last couple of years, with their sagging, flat-bummed look, what are those called? I just saw a Wrangler poster featuring a pair, so I see they've made it into major manufacturers' lines. But the only word on the Wrangler poster was 'Wanted'. So tell me what you call these jeans? And how to describe my current look? Heimat Fisherman? Soldier Pierrot? Flip Spiv? When it comes to labels, I sometimes think 'the more the merrier'. That way we retain a bit of anarchy and stop any one label winning.

Browsing around clothes store Belleville the other day, I became totally absorbed in a photo book called Exactitudes. The book, by Rotterdam-based photographer Ari Versluis and stylist Ellie Uyttenbroek, shows page after page of exaggeratedly conformist 'looks', each given a name and gridded twelve to a page. Ari and Ellie's aim was to point up the contradiction between individuality and uniformity by making 'an anthropological record of people's attempts to distinguish themselves from others by assuming a group identity'. Here are three 'Chairmen':



Here are three 'Musulmen':



Here are three 'Bonitas' (a familiar New York type):



Three 'Casual Queers':



And here are three of the only group I could find that seemed to include people who dressed like me: 'Vagabonds'!



One of the reasons I love regular features like Shift's Girls on the Street snaps is that it's so tempting to try to classify and generalize the looks on offer, and yet the attempt is doomed to failure. Looks are never as rigid as the 'Exactitudes' book makes them seem, and often, by the time you've found a word for a look, it's over. If naming and betrayal are closely related, naming can also be akin to killing. The most fascinating moment for a trend-spotter is somewhere between noticing a pattern emerging and knowing what to call it. As soon as a name is found and enters into common use, the look seems rubber-stamped, reproducible, conformist, commercial, ready to be flogged to death then filed away in some costume museum, ready for revival at some later date, primed for hybrids and irony.

Recently I've been enjoying another sort of street observation, more verbal than visual. Japan Today's regular Pop Vox feature (compiled by Sachie Kanda, it might as well be called 'Kanda Camera') links styles to opinions. Ordinary Japanese people are stopped on the street, photographed, and asked about topical issues. We get to see correlations between their looks and their views, between their objective presence in the world and their subjective reflections on it.



What strikes me is how sweet and sane, how tender and community-minded most Japanese are. If you compare their views with the comments posted by the Japan-based gaijin below, remarkable contrasts emerge. The gaijin (mostly American ex-pats) emerge as volatile and irascible vigilantes, proposing extreme solutions and taking the law into their own hands.

Sample answers to the question 'Should people use cell phones while driving?'

Japanese opinion: 'I know it is convenient to be able to call somebody when you get lost, but if you get hurt in an accident, you will regret it afterwards.' Gaijin opinion: 'If I see a car driver talking on his cell phone while I'm out on my motorcycle, I pull up very close to his window and rev the engine to 4,000 RPM. The noise drowns out their conversation and it drives them crazy. Isn't that fun or wot.'

Sample answers to the question 'How do you feel about men reading porn on trains?':

Japanese opinion: 'I wonder how the daughter of one of those dirty old men would feel if they saw their father reading such a magazine or newspaper on the train or wherever? He must be thinking of only his own gratification because he is lonely.' Gaijin opinion: 'The best way to handle those guys is to walk up to them, pull the magazine out of their hands and loudly ask them in Japanese which photograph is their favorite when they pull their johnson. Public shame works well in this culture from what I have seen.'



Sample answers to the question What do you think of bosozuku biker gangs?:

Japanese opinion: 'They sometimes get together near my house, but I'm not afraid of them because they haven't bothered me yet.' First Gaijin opinion: 'One easy tactic solves all your problems. When you see a line of them parked out in front of your local Lawson, place one firm kick to the center of the first bike, then run like hell. Good ol' Domino effect.' Second Gaijin opinion: 'After being woken up repeatly night after night by the noise I soon realized that the police and general population was ready to tolerate these punks... I decided to take matters into my own hands. I saved up some eggs and let them sit out in the sun on my balcony for a few days. Once I had a couple dozen ready to go I decided it was time to shut down the show. With the lights out and the noisy bastards coming down the road I let fly with the eggs from the 8th floor and couldnt stop laughing as a few of the eggs hit their targets and brought forth a barrage of foul language.'

Question: How can Japan preserve the memory of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

Japanese opinion: 'War is not only the A-bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. War is always happening somewhere in the world every day. If the media could report timely news with details such as the use of depleted uranium shells in Iraq, we would still be more aware of the present cruelty of war and human beings.' Gaijin opinion: 'You japanese should stop bitch whipping on every Aug. 06 et Aug. 14. All you deserved it.'

Question: Should porn be wrapped in plastic?

Japanese opinion: 'Even if the plastic bag is intended to prevent kids from looking at obscene materials, preventing them from learning about such things is even worse. Kids will find out about sex in the future anyway. We should teach sex education at an early stage.' Gaijin opinion: 'The only solution is to forget about the magazines, and to wrap anyone under 17 in plastic. This will also cut down on social diseases.'

Comments

[imomus.livejournal.com]

'Hokkaido Gumby Boom', another great album title!

I actually would like to see those Japan detractors (Japan Rage Victims, Vicious Circlists, Gasoline Firemen or whatever else we might like to call them) in pictures. I'm fascinated by the link between opinion and self-presentation.

Things I don't like about Japan? Hmm. I don't like the widespread cigarette smoking, the noise pollution, the celeb-comedy TV, J-pop, endless discussion panels and drunken dinners that go on until 3am. More gripes in Kyoto Grump radio (http://www.livejournal.com/users/imomus/2004/09/19/). But Japan is by far the least objectionable country I've ever been to. Foreigners who attack it infuriate me with their bad manners, especially when what they advocate would trigger a horrible series of vicious circles which would degrade Japanese civic life to something approaching American civic life. I agree with one Japanese poster to Pop Vox, who said (http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=popvox&id=411) to the rude gaijin assembled there:

'I'm writing to you all. When I wrote some days ago for my first time, I thought I was writing to normal people that participate in a normal Forum. But after reading some other threads, I noted that you people just like to spent your time criticizing Japan as if the country you belong to (emotionally, mentally or politically) were perfect. I'm very use to it, so not only I can stand it, but I laugh about it, and at the same I simply understand that your attitudes is a clear illustration of what you criticized to those Japanese civilians: you're 'racially supremist', as someone said, that does not let you think about how you are, and just makes you criticize how other are. I really think that your attitudes here show a clear behavior pattern, proper of a culture that never in history tolerate what was different to them.'

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

So you're cool on their attitudes to women?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Check Would you support a reigning empress in future (http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=popvox&id=533). Seven out of eight men interviewed were very positive, one, a homeless man, was too paranoid to answer. A 49-year old businessman says:

'At the beginning of Japanese history, the head of the imperial family was a woman named Himiko whom we know as Amaterau Omikami (Goddess of the Sun). It's time for a woman to ascend the throne again. They've got power. Women will rule the world in the future.'

Can you imagine a 49 year-old American saying that?

[lucanus-cervus.livejournal.com]

Of course I can imagine that!

But I think I'm considerably less aware of this east/west polarity that you engage with time and time again. I don't think I'm interested in judging anyone according to their nationality. Are you? Surely you don't refuse to talk to any citizens of the U.S.A? Are you seriously more interested in race than

In fact, Momus, I believe that you're playing a clever game with us here, attempting to cajole 'us westeners' into saying that which would vindicate your ideas, hoping we'll utter a brutish "wrong, wrong!".

Well, "wrong, wrong, wrong!".

x

[lucanus-cervus.livejournal.com]

I missed out a word, see if you can guess what it was meant to be...

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

But, as people have pointed out regarding the native versus Gaijin opinions above, people tend to say nice things if they're having their name and picture put alongside their comments. Japanese men seem to be masters of the public/private split, and their attitudes to women and sex bear this out.

I just can't accept a society that worships at the altar of male sexual incontinence, and has a near feudal view of women. Women are supposed to laugh off blokes flashing, groping them (sekuhara), masturbating in public, reading porn or comics with rape/incest/paedo themes in public, etc. It's sad that the commodification of female sexuality is so endemic that girls as young as 12 essentially become prostitutes for old men to get money and designer goods (http://www.crikey.com.au/columnists/2004/07/09-0005.html). The fetish for schoolgirl stuff, and the pants vending machine thing are just creepy, and seem like very effective ways of humiliating women into accepting the subservient role Japanese men want them to have.

> Can you imagine a 49 year-old American saying that?
I can't imagine a typical 49 year old American openly offering $600 to a 12 year old for "dinner and sex".

As for a female emperor - the majority of bosses I've had in jobs have been female, and in my last job, my boss was a woman, her boss was a women, and her boss was a women. I can't imagine many 28 year-old Japanese men could say that.

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

There is no middleman or pimp controlling or exploiting the girls, rather they are willing participants in a transaction in which both parties have something the other wants and a mutual exchange takes place. While this explanation ignores the morality of the practice, it is the essential fact that both parties who enter into enjo kosai are there by choice.

The girls are doing this on their own, of their own free will, and for supplementary spending money. They are not forced into it by poverty or pimps-- they are not enslaved by prostitution to make a living. And pedophilia/pornographical practices are the bane of every society-- yes, it is latent in Western society too. Human nature.

And as for the female bosses, do they get paid as much as the men? Are they given actual respect, or are there catcalls (whether externalized or left unsaid or verbalized by small groups of bitter men behind the women's backsides?)

Signed,
Angry girl.

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

> The girls are doing this on their own, of their own free will
Nice bit of right-libertarian logic, that. Funny that enjo kosai doesn't happen in other, equally capitalist but less patriarchal cultures though, isn't it? The society these girls grow up in sends them very strong messages about the position and role of women, basically telling them that selling themselves for sex is frankly, all they're worth.

> And as for the female bosses, do they get paid as much as the men?
Yep. Government jobs have fixed pay scales. I didn't say Western culture had all gender issues sorted, but I don't see how the inequalities that still exist here excuse what goes on in Japan.

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

Funny that enjo kosai doesn't happen in other, equally capitalist but less patriarchal cultures though, isn't it?
Notice that I said it is also latent in Western society. And Western society is where such radical liberalism originates and it touted in its globalistic practices.

The society these girls grow up in sends them very strong messages about the position and role of women, basically telling them that selling themselves for sex is frankly, all they're worth.
Just watch American tv and you will see countless examples of "desperate housewives" and "nip and tuck" and "sex and the city."

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

Again, you're trying to defend the treatment of women in Japan by drawing analogies with milder examples in the US media. You're trying to set up some weird binarism where criticism of Japan is taken as praise of America. I don't get it. Apart from anything else, I'm not American.

> "sex and the city."
An occasionally misandrist programme which shows single, well-paid women making their own choices about sex. Can't imagine a similar show being a hit in Japan. Perhaps Mr Big would marry SJ Parker, never sleep with her again, and spend all his time groping teenagers on the subway.

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

Ah, cut the cultural relativism crap.

[relaxing.livejournal.com]

nice thought, but unfortunately modern psychology tells us 12 year old girls really can't make a choice in those situations as adults can. they simply lack maturity on all levels down the physical development of the faculties for reasoning.

the child cannot see all the effects of her actions and/or may feel coerced by the adult figure.


oh wait, am I insulting my host? crud.

[sparkligbeatnic.livejournal.com]

It's considerably more complicated than this. I haven't been following the enjo-kosai situation lately, however a few years ago it was being run in the style of what's known as multi-level marketing in the USA. Older high-school girls get a cut for introducing younger girls into the system. Customers get a cut for introducing new customers. The whole thing is set up using mobile phone numbers that constantly change to avoid the police should they be looking, or, more likely, random whistle blowers. And the transactions are often in privately rented apartments, which again can change should the heat show up. For a while, there were stories in the media about girls being bullied into enjo-kosai by their older classmates.

This is how it was circa the year 2000 at least. I was once approached by a sleazy gaijin customer of enjo-kosai who had just come from a deal of "3 girls, 3 hours, Y30,000". Yuck.

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

Can you imagine a 49 year-old American saying that?

Not at all. He would be laughed out of the pub, and get this: the ladies would be laughing just as hard as the men.

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

Poor women, to find the idea that they've "got power" laughable.

Re: gaijin

[(Anonymous)]

I think you're forgetting that the Colonialist group of English-speaking foreigners in Japan is essentially a self-selected collection of the worst human beings ever. Japan's overeager acceptance of anything vaguely Western-looking attracts a lot of Commonwealth charalatans and sociopaths who cannot resist the lure of the easy bird and fat paycheck.

Re: gaijin

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Ah, honto? (Checks mirror.)

Re: gaijin

[33mhz.livejournal.com]

Your response is the best/funniest post of this entire thread.