Re censorship etc.

[Eija Margit Niskanen]

I want to clarify something about my comment. I did not mean it as my
ACTUAL opinion about Japanese people's relation to sexuality, but as a
rhetorical question following something that was in Max's message - I
interpreted Max's claim to be, that since Japanese people don't react to
the pornography around them in any way, they are more repressed than their
western counterparts. I tried to raise a hypothetical question by saying
that f the pornographic stuff around Japan does not affect the people,
maybe they are in a sense 'above' it? . And there might be other reasons as
well. I went through Max's all messages, and I am afraid that I might have
misunderstood him. So please disregard my remark. 
About the fantasy/reality question: I saw at Rotterdam film festival a
Japanese soft porn film, which depicted a situation of a middle-aged man
starting to grab a young woman in a train. In the film the woman of course
was aroused and joined the action. Since I know that a lot of Japanese
women get sexually harassed in trains, and I personally have a similar
unpleasant experience, I wonder whether it is possible to take these films
as simply fantasy without any connections to everyday power relations.
Films work also on the level of reception, and in this case the female
viewer's (negative) reception would be affected by her personal experience
of real-life sexual harassment. 
Eija


John Dougill wrote:

>Let me endorse here Eija's comments....
>
>"Doesn't this show that Japanese people are actually healthier in their
>relation to sexuality than Americans?"
>
>Best wishes at this seasonal time of year, and thanks for a thoughtful
>discussion.
>
>John Dougill
>Kyoto
>
>
>