Japan has a worrying number of virgins, government finds

[Prowler]

Japan's demographic challenges are well-known: It's home to the world's oldest population and has a shrinking birthrate and an astonishing number of single people. And it seems that, despite government efforts to incentivize marriage and child-rearing, things aren't quite trending in the right direction.

According to the Japan Times, a new survey of Japanese people ages 18 to 34 found that 70 percent of unmarried men and 60 percent of unmarried women are not in a relationship. It gets worse: Around 42 percent of men and 44.2 percent of women admitted that they were virgins.

The study is carried out by Japan's National Institute of Population and Social Security Research every five years. The organization has noted a marked trend since its first foray on questions of relationships and sex in 1987, when it found that 48.6 percent of men and 39.5 percent of women surveyed were unmarried. In 2010, 36.2 percent of men and 38.7 percent of women in the 18-34 age bracket said they were virgins. The number of children among couples who have been married for between 15 and 19 years averaged a record low this year.

The Japanese government under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has said it wants to raise the nation's fertility rate from 1.4 to 1.8 by 2025. It's offering better child-care services and tax incentives for married couples, though such programs have yet to bear statistical fruit.

Most people surveyed said they want to get married at some point. It's just not clear when.

"They want to tie the knot eventually. But they tend to put it off as they have gaps between their ideals and the reality," Futoshi Ishii, head researcher for the study, told Japan Times. "That’s why people marry later or stay single for life, contributing to the nation’s low birthrate."

This is not unique to Japan — in various parts of the developed world, economic uncertainty is reshaping the way millennials and other young people conceive of their sex lives and marital choices. But it's particularly pronounced in the Asian nation, where experts and government officials have spent the better part of a decade fretting over the country's population decline and, as WorldViews once put it, "sexual apathy."

A booming industry surrounds Japan's growing condition of loneliness, a phenomenon at once quite particular to the Japanese, yet also a glimpse into a future where many people live atomized lives mediated exclusively through personal technology.

There was one clearly positive indicator in the survey: For the first time, the proportion of women returning to work after having their first child in Japan's once notoriously patriarchal society exceeded 50 percent.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...ernment-finds/

No wonder the birthrates in Japan are so low...

We often read/hear about more and more people feeling lonely these days, but Japan seems to have a quite extreme case of single people.

Thoughts?

[TheSkeletonMan939]

Are all Japanese people today like SAL 9000, who married a video game character?
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapc...ing/index.html

[CyberCubed]

Its because they all have anime waifu's. And i'm not joking.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by CyberCubed

Its because they all have anime waifu's. And i'm not joking.

Well, this certainly explains all the weird hentai and porn they make to some degree. It also dispells the myth that Japanese are huge perverts.

[Powder]

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Powder

http://i1.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/...76/035/460.gif

...we kinda are. Can't argue with that.

[ToTheNines]

****in statists. Mind your own business, Big Brother.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by ToTheNines

****in statists. Mind your own business, Big Brother.

True, but Japan has a birthrate problem and if people remain virgins there that problem ain't gonna get fixed, man. It's not like they're gonna force people to have sex

[sdp]

The drome isn't far behind.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by sdp

The drome isn't far behind.

Dunno man, this community seems quite normal compared to most internet ones out there. At least, as far as the most active users go, I seriously doubt most or even 50% of them are virgins.

[plastroncafe]

Originally Posted by Prowler

Well, this certainly explains all the weird hentai and porn they make to some degree. It also dispells the myth that Japanese are huge perverts.

That all depends on how you define pervert.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by plastroncafe

That all depends on how you define pervert.

Lot's of people think Anime, hentai and Japanese porn in general are accurate representations of the country. The chikan phenomenon is also infamous, which ends up painting Japanese men in a bad light. Obviously most Japanese men aren't like that, but you know how stereotypes work.

Anyway, nothing wrong with being a virgin. We've all(well, not all of us) been virgins at some point or another and that didn't kill us. If anything, this might be an underlying cause of something bigger. Like malfunctioning society or a society full of people with not so great social skills, but I guess that depends on the individual. Each case is a case, as they say.

[Utrommaniac]

There's a big combination of issues. Firstly the influx of porn everyone has already mentioned. Then that Japan is ironically conservative. And then that it's already expensive enough for a single person to live - hence giving benefits to people getting married.

On the other hand, Japan has some of the proportional lowest infant mortality rates in the world, so that's something else to look at.

[plastroncafe]

Ah, I thought you were implying that because people were reporting little to no partnered sexual activity, that they couldn't possibly be perverts.

Which is just something I don't believe is the case.

I'm curious to know what the government study considered "sex" to calculate what constitutes virginity.

Also the overall culture's view of sex before marriage. If it's strongly culturally enforced that people don't hook up before wedding up, then that could also account for the declining birth rate.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by plastroncafe

Ah, I thought you were implying that because people were reporting little to no partnered sexual activity, that they couldn't possibly be perverts.

Which is just something I don't believe is the case.

I'm curious to know what the government study considered "sex" to calculate what constitutes virginity.

Also the overall culture's view of sex before marriage. If it's strongly culturally enforced that people don't hook up before wedding up, then that could also account for the declining birth rate.

Considering Japan is not a Christian or Muslim nation doubt they have an issue with that. In fact, Japan is hard to defend religiously speaking. In Japan both Shintoism and Buddhism co-exist peacefully and many people perform rituals from both religions throughout their lives.

I remember reading a survey by Durex, the condom company, about how often people had sex in several countries and how many partners men and women in each country reported to have... Japan was pretty much dead last. I cant' remember the exact numbers but Japanese men and women reported having the lowest amount of sex partners throughout their whole lives and apparently Japanese couples had sex less than 100 times per year. It's said that sex disappears quickly after two Japanese people get married and have kids, but I'm not sure if that's a general "rule" or not.

[snake]

It's all that 2d over there. They've realized that 3d women just can't compare.

[plastroncafe]

Originally Posted by Prowler

Considering Japan is not a Christian or Muslim nation doubt they have an issue with that. In fact, Japan is hard to defend religiously speaking. In Japan both Shintoism and Buddhism co-exist peacefully and many people perform rituals from both religions throughout their lives.

I remember reading a survey by Durex, the condom company, about how often people had sex in several countries and how many partners men and women in each country reported to have... Japan was pretty much dead last. I cant' remember the exact numbers but Japanese men and women reported having the lowest amount of sex partners throughout their whole lives and apparently Japanese couples had sex less than 100 times per year. It's said that sex disappears quickly after two Japanese people get married and have kids, but I'm not sure if that's a general "rule" or not.

I don't think Abrahamic Religious sects have a patent on paternity certainty, or it's cultural enforcement.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by plastroncafe

I don't think Abrahamic Religious sects have a patent on paternity certainty, or it's cultural enforcement.

Regardless, I've never heard about pre-marital sex being a taboo in Japan. And if it ever was it must have been some decades ago already

[MsMarvelDuckie]

Considering Japan also has a healthy business of "love therapy" and romantic themed hotels(many of which charge by the hour) I'm fairly certain that the tabboo doesn't really exist there as we know it. Japan has a history as a highly sexualzed country- they're just very quiet about it. It isn't stigmatized- but it isn't talked about either.

[Ninjinister]

Sex is stupid anyway.

Effin' test tube that s**t if you want to bring up the population.