Posted on 12/06/2004 9:12:18 AM PST by MississippiMasterpiece
TOKYO – The Japanese government wants women like Taeko Mizuguchi to get married and start doing something about the nation's plunging birthrate. But she's not interested.
At least, not if her prospective husband is Japanese.
A growing number of Japanese women are giving up on their male counterparts, and taking a gamble that looking abroad for love will bring them the qualities in a partner that seem rare at home. Mr. Right, as the hope goes, is often an American or European, a man appreciative of a wife's career and more of a partner in daily tasks.
"They treat you like equals, and they don't hesitate to express mutual feelings of respect - I think Western men are more adept [at such things] than Japanese men," says the 36-year-old Ms. Mizuguchi, who works at a top trading firm. "They don't act like women are maids - I think they view women as individuals."
Underscoring that Japanese women are losing hope with the local boys, dating agencies to help snag a Western husband have sprung up in Tokyo, some with branches in the US and Europe. Such companies rigorously vet their clients, screening for education, family background, occupation, and life goals.
The kind of women who sign up for such services include doctors, lawyers, and other professionals - women who have delayed marriage to concentrate on careers and who aren't keen to give up hard won gains to become a housewife, as many Japanese men expect.
Japanese women have come to consider traditional marriage roles as "disadvantageous in terms of time resources - they have to carry the burden of domestic chores as well as lose their free time," says Chizuko Ueno, a professor of sociology at Tokyo University.
Normally, married Japanese women have not only to look after their own parents during old age, but also to care for their parents-in-law. When it comes to raising kids, "they can't expect much cooperation from their partner" because of the long work hours required at many Japanese corporations and because of established gender roles that assume that the woman does the child-rearing, Ms. Ueno adds.
A generation of women who are now entering their 30s don't want to give up single life unless prospective partners are willing to break from traditional gender roles.
Government polls conducted to find out why women have put off marriage until well after 25 years of age - known as a woman's " 'best before' date" - show that economic independence is key to the change. As most Japanese women have their own income, marriage is no longer a financial necessity and women want to find companionship in a husband.
That is where Japanese men have come up short. There is "a wide gap in men's and women's attitudes and expectations toward marriage" vis-à-vis traditional gender roles, says Sumiko Iwao, professor of social psychology at Musashi Institute of Technology in Yokohama. For instance, coming home later than your Japanese husband is a no-no.
Having ruled out an old-fashioned Japanese husband, many women here think the solution is a Western man. Indeed, some seem so enthralled with the idea that they are willing to spend thousands of dollars to inspect the wares personally. Of the more than 2,000 women on the books at one large matchmaking agency, about 200 travel to the US or Europe each month to meet prospects.
Sentimental projections have recently been extended to Korean men also, due to romantic Korean soap operas.
In 2003, Japanese women marrying American or British men outnumbered Japanese men marrying American or British women by 8 to 1. The total proportion of Japanese marrying foreigners each year has crept up from around 3.5 percent in 1995 to just over 5 percent. Japanese men are actually more than three times as likely as the women to take a foreign spouse, but this is mostly rural men marrying less well-off Chinese and Filipino women. "Such cases are elderly farmers not popular among young Japanese women," says Yuriko Hashimoto, a local government employee in the remote northern prefecture of Iwate.
To be fair, not all the blame for female angst here can be laid on Japanese men. The government has been slow to enforce equal opportunity laws, and both pay and the glass ceiling in most Japanese corporations remain low for women. Recession has hampered longer maternity leave and other family-friendly policies.
As Japan's fertility rate drops to new lows - at last count it was 1.29, well below levels required for population replacement - the ruling Liberal Democratic Party is anxiously drawing up plans to make it easier for young couples to raise children, through such measures as the provision of cheap public housing.
Mixed marriages in Japan
Japanese men marry: Chinese 10,242 Filipinos 7,794 Koreans 2,235 Americans 156 British 65
Japanese women marry: Koreans 5,318 Americans 1,529 Chinese 890 British 334 Filipinos 117
Source: 2003 Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare
So we need a seperat section of FR devoted to enabling conservative men and women finding each other? Seems like a good concept. FR could sell subscriptions to that particular dating service.
Oh no darlin'! I am past the diaper age and like I said, I don't wanna get married. The septic line is optional.
I just wanna use him for sex and discard him when he gets clingy and boring. :)
We don't. Not when we grow up and sober up.
That part was actually true!!!
LOL.
Ain't he though.
He can eat crackers in the tub any ole day he wants--- dig my septic line too! :)
I think shooting and fishing to be more of guy's activities, but I like it when ladies do them, it's sexy.
It's true that there are plenty of ladies who like shooting and fishing, it's just that they are less likely than guys to be interested. Or become fanatics.
I also think ladies are less likely to be interested in machinery, though many of them are.
I wouldn't have guessed that Fatalis was a woman in a million years.
I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but I am really getting bored by you.
Me either...
I guess my point is:
I'm not going to do something for you in hopes you'll like me, you'll do something for me in hopes of gaining some rare approval.
I've found that the less kindness and approval I give, the more a woman will do to earn it and the happier everyone is.
Dig your own septic line, I'll be playing golf. :)
I have a question here (no threat, must my brain with too much caffiene).
If a woman does a guy thing (hunt, fish etc) she is viewed as sexy.
But if a guy does a woman thing (dance, shop) then he must be gay? Why izzit?
I think I'll linger on that picture for a while.
Thanks a million.....what a man!!!!
You don't understand generalizations. When you used the phrase "one could talk about nearly everything," your statement wasn't intended as universally applicable, but as generally applicable. You made a generalization, one I happen to disagree with.
Now please tell me why it is you can't discuss a cultural phenomenon without making generalizations.
Because the word "culture" is itself a generalization. Not everyone of a given culture behaves identically, or observes all aspects of that culture. So, when we discuss changes and phenomena in a culture, we don't mean that all members of that culture change in quite the same way.
Therefore cultural changes, or phenomena, are general.
Therefore discussions of those changes of phenomena will include generalizations.
Dangers of posting before catching up...
There we go!
But that's my point--now I am meeting the quality women.
It's weird, but it works: Even the most 'quality woman' is cheap and desperate and she knows it.
I've done it many times.
************
They're also very romantic. Who can blame Japanese women?
American men are the best.
Yes, but you must agree we aren't living in 1975 anymore, and those concepts and values (or let's say, 'lack of values') have grown dramatically in the last 15 years for Japanese females. (Single motherhood, staying single, learning no conceivable 'home' skills, overeating, expecting too much from men and not giving back (i.e. getting spoiled and "Westernized"), etc.
Interestingly, Ayn Rand followed that theme, of women's desire to be dominated, in her book, "The Fountainhead." Not that I wish to open the Objectivist can of worms on this thread.
I personally don't know any women who wish this in a serious way, and wouldn't respect one who did, nor the guy who obliged her, but you hear it mentioned from time to time.
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