Sex, drugs and violence

After a few weeks of news starvation, Japan and global media are dining out big time on some juicy stories involving sex, drugs and violence.　On Tuesday, we blogged about the Narita cannabis sniffer dog fiasco (http://www.japaninc.com/node/3370) which has now flown around the world’s media a few times. But for the more blood thirsty journalists there are some gorier stories from Japan hitting the global headlines. There was the shocking tale of a Tokyo man who killed and cut up a young lady and then flushed her corpse piece-by-piece down the toilet, and then early this week a six-person murder-suicide in Hiroshima has been given high profile exposure by publications globally.

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In the case of the latter our favorite, the Mainichi, that reported the story with characteristic sentimentality, it quotes one witness as saying “I saw bubbles rising up around where the car sank. The surviving boy was crying at the pier, calling, 'Mom, Mom.' I thought the baby was going to survive after rescuers resuscitated her, but I heard she didn't.”

This mysterious case where a van drove off the cliff, seemingly intentionally, has predictably re-triggered interest in Japan’s suicide problem as have other suicides this week. Meanwhile, more respectable reports have focused on internal measures to curb the suicide trend such as those mentioned by Chief Cabinet Secretary Machimura on Wednesday (see here.)

And finally, for journalists more interested in sex than violence or drugs, once again, Japan has provided some good material. Laura Stott in The Times picks up on the growing market for sex dolls, perhaps inspired by a recent edition of Metropolis. Meanwhile, not to miss out, the Mainichi recently ran a cheeky piece on adult entertainment in Akihabara.

Chopped up bodies
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20080527a3.html

Sex dolls
http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/...
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/culture/waiwai/news/20080514p2g00m0dm003000c.html
http://metropolis.co.jp/tokyo/738/feature.asp