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Age-old 'naked friendships' lay bare new bathhouse concerns
The Japan Times. Sunday, Oct. 1, 2006, by Rodger Pulvers
I do it about three times a week, but I tell you I would double that frequency if I could...
...now a row has broken out over what has always been an accepted feature of public bathing: the kazokuburo (family bath), a term that signifies "mixed bathing."
In this case, "mixed" refers to the practice of a parent taking a child of the opposite sex into the bathing area. The Asahi Shinbun reported on Sept. 16 that Hyogo Prefecture was banning children aged 6 or over from such bathing. But sento in Hyogo and adjoining prefectures have rebelled, saying they see "no diminishing of public morals" in this time-honored practice. In Shiga Prefecture, children under 8 are allowed to bathe at a sento with a parent of the opposite sex... in the past decade or so, a public outcry against the sexual abuse of children. It is now being increasingly seen as improper for a man to bathe publicly with his little daughter or, for that matter, a mother to take her little boy into the women's section of the sento.
I say "publicly" because it is still the custom in many Japanese families for fathers to bathe with daughters and mothers with sons. While it is a rather extreme case, I know one mother who bathed with her son until he was 11....more...
