Written by Flamecaster, edited by Otaku Apologist
The Japanese porn industry is allegedly under attack by its own censors trying to stomp out any traces of obscenity. The latest wave of changes to the Japanese AV (adult video) scene has occurred when the moral busybodies representing the government have decided to go after pornographic movies with the word “joshikosei” (high school girl) in their respective titles.
Seeing this occur from an insider’s point of view, the male porn star Ken Shimizu went to Twitter to complain. According to him, the industry already has to jump through enough hoops to have the censors label their work as acceptable and not socially damaging. Until recently porn producers have labeled most of “schoolgirl” porn as “joshikosei” abbreviated to “JK”, a term which from slang has managed to make its way into mainstream use. This term, however, soon came under scrutiny and got promptly banned, which made professional linguists scramble to figure out a way to circumvent it. The solution came fast with the neologism in the form of “女子校生”, replacing the “kou” of “high” school with the “kou” of “school”.
As the battle for JK pussy is never fully won, the censors quickly stepped in once more. Even that term promptly got the boot and new productions using it will no longer get the stamp of approval to subvert Japanese obscenity laws. According to Shimizu, the regulators and people passing the laws are becoming increasingly intolerant of any wordplay. This keeps JAV producers on their toes as they try to describe their products with very specific fetishes in mind for a demanding customer base. The porn actor even jokingly added that next big term to push would be “seifuku bishoujo”, which means “cute girl in a uniform”. While this also includes actual women in traditional sailor uniforms, we’re sure that buyers of these JAVs will adjust their age accordingly in their collective minds.
Japanese Twitter users were universally unimpressed by the changes and cited them as ridiculous, to say the least:
“Seifuku bishoujo is ok, but it doesn’t have the same feeling!”
“It reminds me of Sailor Moon!”
“It’s sad when they regulate free expression like this.”
“Regulation narrows freedom of expression, but it leads us to create new expressions too…”
Government regulations get in the way of free market capitalism all the time. We never see the jobs that aren’t created, the unborn opportunities given up on. Menial things like upholding an image of public morals does nothing, when channels to supply customer demand will always appear regardless of regulation and enforcement. The government should focus its attention and resources on more important matters, like Japan’s plummeting birth rates that threaten the economy, or the worsening alienation of young men in Japanese society.
While the industry is fighting a losing linguistic battle the likes of which even Danganronpa games never saw, the content of the JAVs themselves will remain intact for the time being.
