we're just not having enough sex.

Al emailed me an article he found online today, titled "Falling birth rate due to lack of sex" and joked that he was starting to have second thoughts about coming to Japan:

Japan's fertility rate – the average number of children a woman bears in her lifetime – fell to an all-time low of 1.25 last year. Demographers say a rate of 2.1 is needed to keep a population from declining...Japan came last among 41 nations in a poll last year by condom manufacturer Durex, with lovers there having sex just 45 times a year compared to a global average of 103 times a year.

45 times a year. Just so you know, that's less than once a week. The funny thing about this latest revelation about Japanese sex lives, is that the country has--and is known for--a substantial pornography culture. The dominant prevalence of pornography in Japan was demonstrated last year by Al's father's souvenir. Upon a brief visit to Japan, Al's father had brought back a magazine bought from a newsstand at probably a train station. The type of magazine that he had bought, however, was not only manga (a particular type of comic prevalent in Japan only), but the extremely sleazy type of manga that "stressed-out" salary-workers (men) would read on crowded train cars, regardless of the time of day. Thus, pornography is not limited to red-light districts and happy-ending massages by beautiful Asian women; it seems, more or less, part of any man's daily life.

So if Japanese men are as horny (perverted?) as I've made it sound, then why aren't they having sex? The aforementioned article of the Japan Times attributed to stress, "tiresome relationships," and--"no particular reason." Dr Kunio Kitamura, director of the Japan Family Planning Association, says couples need to start talking to increase interaction. But, I believe that there's much more to it than just stress and tiresome relationships. To begin with, Japanese men are probably satisfied, to some extent, with their porn. They get to read it on the train, they get to rent it at any local video store, and now they even have the internet. They're already stressed, and, the best part about videos and magazines is that without any physical effort, they can take their sex lives to a place far beyond a manifestable reality. Their wives aren't hot enough? All they have to do is resort to imagination. There's a lack of spice or passion in their sex? Well, fantasies can solve that. And, they don't have to get frustrated about pleasing the woman, because hey, it's a fantasy and in fantasies the women are always pleased.

All the blame can't lie in men only, however. Japanese women have their faults, too. A good friend of mine once described to me her friends in Japan: "They have their own careers, they have their own lives, they have their own apartments and their own toys, and they have money. Now they probably have vibrators, too, so why the hell would they need a man, or even have any desire to have a family, when they can just please themselves whenever and however they want?" Like every other time in their history, it seems as though the Japanese have once again taken things a bit too far. These are independent women--truly independent women, who don't need others to please them, because they figured they can do it themselves. No need to experiment, no need to think about pleasing the other. Like their male counterparts, they, too, have their own fantasies.

Conclusion: Essentially, you have an entire country whose citizens live their sex lives solely in their own fantasies. Now that is just a bit disturbing.