Osaka Wants To Know If Employees Have Tattoos

Is this an invasion of privacy or a paranoid city trying to protect itself from the yakuza crime syndicate?

Osaka, the second-largest city in Japan, has begun asking its city employees if they have tattoos and, if they do to state where the ink is located on the body.

The Osaka Municipal Government has as of May 1, 2012 begun the process of questioning its 38,000 city employees.

The situation arose in February after a city employee supposedly showed, or accidentally revealed some of his tattoos to children at a so-called welfare site.
That was in February? It's May now! At least it wasn't a knee-jerk reaction. That's still sarcasm!

Apparently, unlike other cultures where tattoos are considered either an art form, a part of the social culture (like the Maori) or a cry for psychological  help, in Japan a tattoo is often the brand of the yakuza. Or at least that's what it once was.

The actual Osaka Tattoo survey.

Nowadays, even Japanese people who aren't in the yakuza are getting tattoos (probably to appear as tough as a yakuza member - though sometimes it is actually just about the art of self-expression).

But, that is not stopping the hard-ass Osaka City mayor Hashimoto Toru (surname first) who on May 1, 2012 sent out a memo to the city employees instructing that "it is inappropriate to work in outfits that will expose your tattoos".

Included with the memo was a survey instructing employees who have tattoos to indicate on the provided form where the tats are located, how big they are (the tattoos) and to provide their names - and to hand it in by May 10, 2012.

Japan - It's A Wonderful Rife is unsure if the mayor also wants to know one's blood type or favorite Pokemon. Evil bastards! Not the Pokemon, of course. I have always been an old-school Hitmonlee fan.

Holy crap! Give the government your name so that they can keep its eye on you? How Orwellian.

The instructions provided by the City of Osaka include two line drawn human figures showing the front and the back so that offending sub-human yakuza wanna-be can show where the tattoos are situated: toes, fingers, ankles (ladies with the ever sexy and stupid Butterfree, I mean butterfly), arms (with fancy English words that are misspelled), neck (good god, are you really in the yakuza?) or back (how is this artwork really for?).

I would still sleep with her.

I personally do not have a tattoo anywhere on my body, as I'm a hairy bastich. I suppose I could have a bear tattooed on  and my hair could make it look like it's hairy, but really, aside from being fuzzy wuzzy, I have no real interest in bears - certainly not enough to ink my body.

I do find tattoos interesting, however. Two buddies of mine have enough ink on them to have been in a motorcycle club (and in fact are former members). The women I know with tattoos tell me they have no idea why they have them - that they were young, foolish, high or a combination of those excuses.

It's okay, I don't think tattoos are ugly, but I do they think they are stupid if you are inking yourself without a good reason. My wife has a smiley face on her shoulder. She never sees it. I do, every once in a while (you know what I mean). But she said she did it because her younger brother got one... so she got the exact same one. That's just stupid. It should have meaning.

I don't hate tattoos. I have slept with many women who have tattoos, and hope to do so again. All of the women are regular women and are not involved in criminal activity. Most of them, anyways. And my friends? Most of my friends do not have tattoos, but then again, how the hell would I know? They do cover them up when they are at work.    

Back to paranoid Osaka. 

Fill out a form? Where do I start?

“There won’t be any legal problem (with the survey),” said an official with the city’s personnel affairs section, adding that the results will be considered during personnel allocation.

No legal problem? What sort of country is this? What's next?

"Hi Mayuki... we're just doing a survey on women's panties... fill this out and have it on my desk by tomorrow morning."

Or:
"Hello, fellow work employee for nameless company. To ensure proper moral conduct is observed, we will be monitoring your movements. Please attach the transmitter to your ankle. We will know if you do not. Failure to follow company rules will be met with a stiff shouting meeting followed by public ridicule with your fellow nameless drones and then possible shinning and later exile from the company, exile from your company apartment, and banishment from the city and country. Failure to hand in your Japanese registration card will be met with death. Thank you for your voluntary cooperation. The office party will be held on Friday. Please submit 4000 yen and a sample of your blood - not for DNA purposes... the company president is just a bit of a blood-sucking vampire.:

Okay... that was a bit over the top. Maybe. But still, there are a few questions people need to start asking: Questions to ask:

• Can one lose their job in Osaka because they have a tattoo?
• Can someone NOT be hired for a job because they have a tattoo?
• How do they check to see if an employee is lying about having a tattoo?
• Once the government knows you have a tattoo, will they want to get photos of your body to ensure you do not further sully yourself? 

There are many other questions, to be sure - but this is what popped into my head these past 15 seconds. 

This whole tattoo survey is all very stupid, and a complete waste of time and money that the government could be wasting on so many other pertinent social topics, like who is using Facebook on company property, but after hours? Do you drink? Could you be an alcoholic? Tell us where you drink, what you drink, how much you drink and who you are drinking with. How do you afford to drink? We are obviously paying you too much money.

Look... I understand that the average citizen's view of tattoos borders on yakuza-paranoia. But rather than send out a questionnaire for the employees to fill out and to invade their privacy, why not just ask the employees to ensure that their tattoos are properly covered up during work hours?

Don't start a bloody Spanish Inquisition!

By the way... the top-most photo? There is nothing scary about those tattoos. What is scary is their choice of classical underwear!

Files by Andrew Joseph

   

Yakuza A-Okay

People tend to picture the Yakuza (for lack of a better reference - akin to the mafia), as a group of tattooed thugs in nice suits, taking over small businesses and shooting ninjas who get in their way. Oh - and they all know karate and are missing a finger.

Well... sort of. Like their Italian counterparts, the Yakuza can be a fearful organization of "legitimate Japanese businessmen", but they are also more than likely diversified into legitimate businesses.

All I know is that when I lived in Japan back in the early 1990s and sometimes, accidentally met with the local city Yakuza boss, it was always a cordial affair.

I was perhaps a bit ill at ease... but it was only because I wanted to make sure I didn't say or do anything stupid. I did after all teach his son at Ohtawara Chu Gakko (Ohtawara Junior High School)... a good-looking, but tough kid who always treated me with respect. he earned mine with the way he treated me. And his dad, perhaps being less Yakuza boss and more of a father, showed me the same respect by buying me a few drinks.

Anyhow... forget about the tattooed, nine-finger, ninja-shooting killers. These guys are smart. They play the stock market better than most and when it comes to the community—these guys are able to get the job done with greater efficiency than the Red Cross.

Looking back at the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami that struck the northeast coast of Japan, the Yakuza were the first on the scene sending over 70 trucks loaded with supplies - and this is according to Jake Adelstein, a crime reporter in Japan. Here's a blog I wrote about their aid back on March 26, 2011: HELP.

Hey... they aren't just guys trying to shake down some businessmen in a dark alley, the Yakuza really do consider themselves to be ninkyo dantai (humanitarian group). Well... perhaps it's not the first way they describe themselves, but you know what I mean.

Says Adelstein: "They (the Yakuza) are always in place when a disaster happens."

While that can be taken in two ways, Adelstein actually means the more positive way. 

He continues: Since Japan is in a hurry to reconstruct, eliminating organized crime elements from reconstruction and waste disposal is simply not possible.

Japan - It's A Wonderful Rife thinks he means that the Yakuza are heavily involved in construction and sanitation concerns. Hunh... go figure.

Traditionally, the Yakuza are, thanks to their strict code of conduct, are not allowed to allowed to dabble in street crimes, robberies or prostitution, Japanese society as a whole tolerates them. Fears them, sure, but they don't bother the average person and so they are welcome to go about their business. 
 
For the Yakuza, helping people helps them live up to that same code of conduct. It also means they are involved in legitimate businesses such as sanitation and reconstruction.

part of it is self-serving, and not as altruistic as they might expect you to believe. The Yakuza don't do anything without thinking about how it will affect their image. And their finances.

Japan's weak economic climate has also affected the Yakuza.

"With less money around and a stagnant economy, there's less money for them to make. So they have moved into the financial sector," explains Adelstein. "Yakuza invest in emerging stock markets, move money overseas and are involved in large-scale financial crimes.

"And then, of course, extortion, gambling and drugs are still making the revenues."

The Yakuza is not merely one outfit. It's 22 fraternal organizations with some 86,000 members. For example, the Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest such group, has about 40,000 employees, or members, if you prefer.

So... wanna join the Yakuza? There's a membership fee. It does involve money, and it's usually gained through a violent crime... which does go against the Yakuza code... but then, they aren't members and are doing the crimes to become one.

What about the whole finger thing? It is true that a finger may be cut off for transgressions against the fraternity, but it is also true that members cut off their own finger as a sign of loyalty.

We'll leave the final word to Adelstein, who dared report on one of the Yakuza's more powerful bosses - Goto Tadamasa (surname first). Adelstein reported on Goto becoming an FBI informer in exchange for a liver transplant in California.

He was told: "Erase the story... or we'll erase you. And maybe your family. But we'll do them first so you learn your lesson before you die."


For more information on the Yakuza, read this BLOG written by my self.

Files by
Andrew Joseph