The Japanese male does not like responsibility. He is always controlled by someone else: his motherIt was during his final year at school, when he was immersed in the 'examination hell' that demands long hours of study, cram schools and demonic dedication from those who want to get into a good university. One day he was offered, and received, sexual favours from his mother to encourage him to persevere with his schoolwork. Afterwards he felt crushing guilt, although he came to suspect that something similar had happened to at least one of his classmates. But he had never before spoken directly about it.
Satoru Saito, head of the sociopathology department at the Psychiatric Research Institute of Tokyo, says, 'emotional incest' between mothers and their sons is almost a defining feature of Japanese society - 'the entire culture has this undertone'.
It is a vicious circle, says Dr Saito. Women who rarely see their husbands except late at night when they come home after drinking with workmates automatically funnel their emotions towards their children, particularly towards their sons.
The sons grow up with over-indulgent mothers who smother them in affection, preventing them from developing emotional independence. The sons accept the power their mothers have over them, and, when they begin dating, they naturally look for another woman to mother them.
This maza-con (mother complex) is a ritual complaint of young Japanese women seeking a husband. But as soon as they get married, they inevitably transfer the emotions that their husbands will not absorb to their children. And so the cycle perpetuates itself.
'The Japanese male does not like responsibility,' says Dr Saito. 'He is always controlled by someone else: his mother, his teacher, his boss in the company. I call this the ofukuro (pouch) function - he seeks to be protected in a maternal pouch all the time. We call our school the 'mother school'; employees regard their company as some kind of mother figure.'
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/out-of-japan-mother-love-puts-a-nation-in-the-pouch-1508595.htmlIt continues after work. Men who do not want to face up to the responsibility of the father/husband role will delay going home by taking refuge in a hostess bar, where they find the mama-san (bar-mother) and her female cohorts who treat their guests as overgrown schoolboys, pouring their drinks, lighting their cigarettes and listening to their complaints about work and, with mock disapproval, to their dirty jokes.
All this goes on in a cosy, womb-like room with low couches, soft music and a pervasive undertone of sexual promise.
'There is no clear distinction between male-female relations and mother- son relations,' says Dr Saito. 'Japanese males are always mixing these two: they want to assert their sexuality, but at the same time they want to be held by their mothers - warm, safe, secure.'