Why do many men urinate in the open in Japan?

[vir-jin]

"100 tough Questions for Japan" answered by Itasaka Gen


A: Long ago, there were no lavatories at the Palace of Versailles, so people did it in the garden or behind objects like doors. The concept of elimination of bodily wastes was rather liberal throughout the world.
In Japan also, it is said that up to the Edo period (1600-1868) in Kyoto, buckets were placed along both sides of the road for the convenience of passers- by who would nonchalantly use them when the urge came. The buckets were also used by women. This scene was hailed as Kyoto's special feature by people from Tokyo.
In present day Japan however, public lavatories are available everywhere. There is also a law banning urinating in the streets, so there is probably no one who would do it in the open.
Of course, there are those who drink too much beer and resort to doing it behind telephone and electric light poles or in alleys. If a stance may be taken on their side, it's indeed unfortunate that the streets and town area in Japan are so narrow and confining. When the urge to go strikes, especially in a cramped area in a busy section of town where clubs, bars, and eating places serving food and drinks all stand in a row, and there is no place where one could possibly be inconspicuous, and one has to go- wouldn't even people from other countries do it?

Q: why do many Japanese couples have sex in the open in Ueno Park?

[Charles]

Sociologist Ed Hall wrote about the issues surrounding public urination, I recall reading about it in one of his books, perhaps he even addressed Japan directly but I don't recall. But I do recall one of his specific remarks. He described one European custom (I don't recall which country, it might have been Germany but vir-gin would know more about that than I do). In this country, it is traditional to have a guest bathroom next to the front door in one's home, because it was customary to admit anyone who happened to knock on your door asking to use your bathroom. He asserted that this country had no tradition of public toilet facilities because every home's toilet was considered public, to some small degree.

Public bathrooms are most definitely not "everywhere" in Japan. Japan suffers from a modern problem, the corporatization of public spaces. Public toilets are found in corporate spaces like train stations and stores, and are rarely a public convenience out in uncontrolled spaces that aren't owned by some corporate entity. Access to toilets is limited to people who are authorized to use that space, which is why you see the homeless hanging out in train stations in both Japan and other countries. People go where they can go.

But to address the question directly, there are simpler reasons why men urinate in public in Japan.

1. Because there are a lot of men who don't have access to public toilets when they need to go. For example, the homeless.
2. There is no social custom prohibiting public urination.

I would say more on this subject, but I'm working on a larger essay right now (including a video), working title: "The Social Life of Japanese Public Toilets." I should have it finished and posted in a few days.

A custom that interests me more is why do people put out those bottles of water around their curbs and gardens, which are believed to scare away cats from peeing? It's not cats that are doing the peeing.

[Mike Oxlong]

Two observations:
1. Once, while waiting in the car in the crowded parking lot while a friend picked up something at a shopping centre, a mother walked by with her little boy (maybe 5-6 years old). He said he had to go, so she pointed to a little bit of grass on the kerb, and he walked the few steps over, dropped his trousers, and let it fly. If this is the education children (especially little boys) receive from their parents, it's no wonder.
2. A friend & his girlfriend we walking home late one night from a night out on the town, and were just a few blocks from home when they saw a man peeing on the sidewalk. The friend made a comment to the effect of don't do that in my neighbourhood, and they got in a shouting match. A few people from nearby bars joined the shouting, so the guy's girlfriend (also a foreigner) gets involved in the shouting. The man with a weak bladder loses it and shoves my friend's girlfriend. To his credit, he came to the defense of his lady and threw down with the man. Long story short...me chum breaks the guy's arm, mob decides to try and mete out justice, he makes it to a koban while his girlfriend runs back to their place. Landlord called, my friend was sued (guy with broken arm couldn't work for a while and wanted compensation). Landlord had powerful friends and made the problem go away (probably by paying-off the guy or the cops or both).

[Taro Toporific]

Japanese T-shirt It Is Forbidden to Urinate Here (Bright Yellow)
price: $15.95

Making Japanese by Putting on Clothes
...public urination was commonplace throughout Japan in the Tokugawa period and, though still illegal, remains so today.
The overall motivation for the Meiji state's interest in personal behavior was not some inherent sense of prudery. Instead it was concerned with the image of Japan and its people in the eyes of the powerful Western countries. Elise K. Tipton explains:
A strong desire to gain Western approval and avoid its ridicule is revealed in measures seeking conformity to Western standards of public decency. A newspaper article explaining an ordinance against public nakedness directed towards rickshaw men and day laborers declared, 'you must not be laughed at by foreigners". ...(Modern Japan: A Social and Political History [New York: Routledge, 2002], p. 46)

[GomiGirl]

It is the spitting that I can't stand.... I always seem to be avoiding big globs of spit on the footpath, stairs to the subway, subway platform - everywhere it seems. It is just foul...

[DJEB]

At a carbon to nitrogen ratio of 0.8, it is a resource that should not be wasted on street sides. Compost that shit, er, piss!

As for the spit, it is only a "problem" that men seem to have. The good lord gave us a throat for swallowing spit. Why some sissies can't use that is beyond me.

[Samurai_Jerk]

Why do many men urinate in the open in Japan? Why not? If you've got to go you've got to go.

Mike Ox, your friend sounds like a real jackass. Starting a fight that ends up with a guy getting his arm broken over peeing in public. That mouthy broad he was with probably deserved to get pushed. You said they were coming home from a night on the town. I guess they were both drunk and stupid like the guy they started with.

Two of my Korean students here in Seattle found out that things in the US are a little different from Asia. They were walking home drunk at about 5 am and decided to take a piss on the side of the street. There was a cop right right across from them but they didn't think anything of it since cops in Korea don't give a shit. Well I guess the cops were bored and wanted to make an example of them because next thing they knew four squad cars descended on them. They were handcuffed and dragged down onto the sidewalk. But a girl with them started crying and saying this is my boyfriend and his friend and they just came here from Korea for a visit (not true) and didn't know that they couldn't do that here since it's normal over there. So the cops let them off with just a warning. The next day when they told me about it none of the Korean or Japanese students (male or female) could believe than police here care about that kind of shit. They thought it was ridiculous.

[Steve Bildermann]

It is the spitting that I can't stand.... I always seem to be avoiding big globs of spit on the footpath, stairs to the subway, subway platform - everywhere it seems. It is just foul...

Piss and spit maybe OK but don't you just luvvv hop skipping around the regurgitated Raman near the railway stations every Sunday morning...

[Big Booger]

I can see pissing in the country along a dirt road. But pissing in the city, with a toliet at nearly every convenience store is pathetic...

[yakinoumiso]

watched a guy urinate in the space between two cars on the yakosuka line. Far enough away to be completely disgusted...unlike the poor people that were right there...foul! we were even stopped at a station, and that lazy sonofabitch couldn't be bothered getting off the train to find a toilet.

...after that, I became much more careful about what I touched while riding the trains.

Re: Seattle's Finest, I watched them do something similar to nab a jaywalker on Capital hill. I don't think that guy's GF managed to get him out of it.

[goldenboy_ge]

Q: why do many Japanese couples have sex in the open in Ueno Park?

^haha ....

[Samurai_Jerk]

Re: Seattle's Finest, I watched them do something similar to nab a jaywalker on Capital hill. I don't think that guy's GF managed to get him out of it.

Ya know, Seattle's such a laid back city. I don't know why the cops here seem to be such dicks.

[Captain Japan]

1. Because there are a lot of men who don't have access to public toilets when they need to go. For example, the homeless.

Tokyo gov't to set up toilets in manholes in case of big earthquake
Mainichi

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government and 23 wards in the capital plan to set up a temporary toilet system in manholes in case of a major earthquake, it has been learned.

Officials said they came up with the idea of turning manholes into toilets because a shortage of toilets was a serious problem in the wake of the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake that hit Kobe and surrounding areas.

[Mike Oxlong]

Mike Ox, your friend sounds like a real jackass. Starting a fight that ends up with a guy getting his arm broken over peeing in public. That mouthy broad he was with probably deserved to get pushed. You said they were coming home from a night on the town. I guess they were both drunk and stupid like the guy they started with.

No doubt both of them were drunk and shouldn't have got into an argument about it in the first place.

But, to say that any woman deserved to be pushed/hit by a man for any reason is being quite a jackass, and then some! For that reason, the man was taken down, and if you ever touch a "broad" in anger, here's hoping that you get taken down too!!

[Samurai_Jerk]

But, to say that any woman deserved to be pushed/hit by a man for any reason is being quite a jackass, and then some! For that reason, the man was taken down, and if you ever touch a "broad" in anger, here's hoping that you get taken down too!!

I wouldn't touch a woman but they should stay the fuck out of that kind of situation because some guys will. If they do get up in someone's face then they deserve what they get for their stupidity. I've seen women use the fact that most guys won't touch them to do some really stupid aggressive shit.

[vir-jin]

But a girl with them started crying and saying this is my boyfriend and his friend and they just came here from Korea for a visit (not true) and didn't know that they couldn't do that here since it's normal over there.

never believe a womans tears...

[vir-jin]

Q: why do many Japanese couples have sex in the open in Ueno Park?

^haha ....

saw that four times- I cross the park everyday
two high school couples- the skirt is so practical
the third incident I couldnt see clearly, they were partly hidden by a monument- that was swaying tremendously
number four was during hanami- drunken?!
I didn't look out for them. they appeared on my way:D

[Samurai_Jerk]

never believe a womans tears.

The word "tears" is unnecessary in that sentence.

[vir-jin]

never believe a womans tears.

The word "tears" is unnecessary in that sentence.

[Samurai_Jerk]

Unfortunately, I don't believe your tears.

[vir-jin]

Unfortunately, I don't believe your tears.

vir-jin wrote:

never believe a womans tears.

gotcha! or is it just me you don't believe?!

[Mike Oxlong]

But, to say that any woman deserved to be pushed/hit by a man for any reason is being quite a jackass, and then some! For that reason, the man was taken down, and if you ever touch a "broad" in anger, here's hoping that you get taken down too!!

I wouldn't touch a woman but they should stay the fuck out of that kind of situation because some guys will. If they do get up in someone's face then they deserve what they get for their stupidity. I've seen women use the fact that most guys won't touch them to do some really stupid aggressive shit.

Yes, yes...don't speak! Or, you might get what's comin' to ya!! Bi-atch!!

I take it you are of the 'women should be seen and not heard' school...

[Samurai_Jerk]

Yes, yes...don't speak! Or, you might get what's comin' to ya!! Bi-atch!!

I take it you are of the 'women should be seen and not heard' school...

So you think it's acceptable and safe for a women to get up in some (drunk) guy's face and try to shout him down like she's some kind of tough guy?

I'll give you a good example. My two friends and I were eating at IHOP after last call one night. One of my friends was pretty lit and said "hello" to a girl who was walking by our table. That's all he said. Nothing more, nothing less. Her response was to turn to my friends and say, "Fuck you!" She she probably did that because he's ugly as sin but it was totally uncalled for. So my other friend told her to relax and since the guy was just saying hello. She talked some more shit so my friend called her a bitch or something then she goes over to her table and told the guy and girl she was with that "those guys are talking shit to me." Of course the guy has to stand up and say something to defend the honor of the fucking cunt he was with.

So one of my friends got up and started talking shit back. My other friend tried to calm things down but I knew if a fight started he would have been in there too. Things were quickly escalating (I just sat there and kept eating my cheesesteak). Basically the other dude was about to get the beating of his life because the bitch he was with started some shit with some drunk guys and then went and lied to him about what happened. I'm glad that idiot ended up leaving and the staff at the place held my friend back from kicking his ass because the guy didn't really deserve it. What if my friend were the type of guy to shove or smack a girl. It'd be the wrong thing for him to do, but if it happened she'd deserve it for her stupidity and for trying to get some poor guy beat into a bloody pulp.

[DJEB]

One would expect to find hicks at an IHOP, but...

If you see her again, recommend this:

[Mike Oxlong]

So you think it's acceptable and safe for a women to get up in some (drunk) guy's face and try to shout him down like she's some kind of tough guy?

I'll give you a good example. My two friends and I were eating at IHOP after last call one night. One of my friends was pretty lit and said "hello" to a girl who was walking by our table. That's all he said. Nothing more, nothing less. Her response was to turn to my friends and say, "Fuck you!" She she probably did that because he's ugly as sin but it was totally uncalled for. So my other friend told her to relax and since the guy was just saying hello. She talked some more shit so my friend called her a bitch or something then she goes over to her table and told the guy and girl she was with that "those guys are talking shit to me." Of course the guy has to stand up and say something to defend the honor of the fucking cunt he was with.

So one of my friends got up and started talking shit back. My other friend tried to calm things down but I knew if a fight started he would have been in there too. Things were quickly escalating (I just sat there and kept eating my cheesesteak). Basically the other dude was about to get the beating of his life because the bitch he was with started some shit with some drunk guys and then went and lied to him about what happened. I'm glad that idiot ended up leaving and the staff at the place held my friend back from kicking his ass because the guy didn't really deserve it. What if my friend were the type of guy to shove or smack a girl. It'd be the wrong thing for him to do, but if it happened she'd deserve it for her stupidity and for trying to get some poor guy beat into a bloody pulp.

Loudmouth ho's like that are bad news! If she took it to the physical level by shoving first, it'd sure be hard to resist givin' her the back o' yer hand!! Otherwise, no matter how much trash-talk she dishes out, best just to walk away. Damn difficult to do, but...

[blackcat]

they do it cause they have

1 terrible toilets

2no self control

3okasan never taught them manners

#2 effects everthing they do.

[Mike Oxlong]

they do it cause...

3. okasan never taught them manners

...

Sure she did! Read my first post in this topic...she taught 'em to pee in public whenever the urge strikes ie. a parking lot at a busy shopping centre in broad daylight.

[Taro Toporific]

[quote"Paul Richards' book, 'Hundred Things Japanese'"]

Tachisho-ben
It is not uncommon in our neighborhood to see men (especially older men) urinating in the street. Maybe because of the Nomiya, cheap drinking places, in our neighborhood. Even our landlord, not a man who doesn't possess a comfortable toilet at home, prefers the street. Why? A possible explanation in "Hundred Things Japanese":
"Tachisho-ben, the act of urinating in public, is typically Japanese only in that it is performed so much more openly and freely than in most other countries. Though there are occasionally enforced laws against the practice, it is still commonly encountered and had best be regarded as a typical part of the Japanese scene.

Typically, certainly, is the process of reasoning which permits tachisho-ben. Traditionally, the Japanese entertain a strong dichotomy between yours and mine - or more precisely, ours and theirs. Thus private politeness and public rudeness, and the other seeming paradoxes which have long observed by the apprehensive foreigner. The fact that no one practices tachisho-ben within the private garden but everyone does on the public street on the other side of the wall, is just another example of the dichotomy at work.

The garden belongs to us, or to the people we know, and must therefore be respected. The street, on the other hand, since it belongs to everybody belongs to no one and need not be respected at all. Also, the viewers of the tachisho-ben are either complaisant friends or else nameless strangers and, in either case if for entirely different reasons, censure is not to be expected.

There is another reason for this indulgence. Urban Japanese still cling to their rustic origins and are fond of calling even Tokyo a village, albeit an overgrown one. They secretly yearn for the rural life of a former age and admire behavior among their fellows which they feel to be natural, just as they admire a life which is natural, i.e. in tune with nature. To them the modern urban scene is not welcome, but only tolerated. No one would take a farmer to task for urinating in a stream or at a roadside while working in the paddies, and citified Japanese, recognizing the farmer in themselves, look upon those under the influence or nonchalantly relieving themselves in the street not entirely without approval, recalling perhaps a village life that once was, a life closer to nature and to the natural instincts of man.

Tachisho-ben thus joins a host of like manifestations (rowdy drunkenness in public, knocking people about in crowded trains and subways, public vomiting, etc.) which insist the civic ideal does not exist even though private politeness does."
---(Paul Richards in 'Hundred Things Japanese')
from
http://www.vincentvds.net/blog/archives/000176.html

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0870403648/qid=1065315023/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/103-3713916-0985436?v=glance&s=books#product-details
[/quote]

[FG Lurker]

Tachisho-ben

What a great word... "Standing piss".

[cstaylor]

No one would take a farmer to task for urinating in a stream or at a roadside while working in the paddies, and citified Japanese, recognizing the farmer in themselves, look upon those under the influence or nonchalantly relieving themselves in the street not entirely without approval, recalling perhaps a village life that once was, a life closer to nature and to the natural instincts of man.

Isn't that the prettiest arrangement of bullshit you've ever seen?

I have never seen a businessman (not a salaryman wannabe) drop drawers and pee in broad daylight on the street. If someone is sauced and needs relief, I totally understand, but the above explanation is ludicrous.