‘Men know they won’t face consequences’: rise of street sex work in Tokyo is fuelling calls for change

Kabukicho is not known as “sleepless town” for nothing. The bustling centre of Tokyo’s night-time economy is a magnet for tourists and locals in search of a bite to eat, a few drinks and a karaoke session. But behind its famous neon entrance lies a darker side: backstreets populated by women offering sex in exchange for money.

Tokyo has an established fuzoku commercial sex industry that revolves around regulated establishments catering to an array of peccadilloes, from “soapland” bathhouses to “pink salons”.

But since Covid-19 restrictions were eased three years ago, a new phenomenon, fuelled in part by the boom in international tourism, has emerged: women who solicit on the street, leaving them vulnerable to abuse and sexually transmitted infections.

It is hard to gauge how many women work the streets of Kabukicho, but last year police arrested 112 women on suspicion of soliciting near a notorious Kabukicho park.

The rise in tachinbo – Japanese slang for “standing around” – has heightened concern that Japan is becoming known as a destination for international sex tourism, triggering calls among MPs and campaigners to tighten the law and, for the first time, penalise men who buy sex on the street as well the women who sell it.

The 1956 prostitution prevention law punishes anyone offering vaginal intercourse – but tolerates other forms of sexual contact – in return for payment in a public place with up to six months in prison or a fine of ¥20,000 ($128). But men who seek out sex workers do not face penalties.

The clients of Japan’s new generation of street sex workers include a rising number of foreign men who learn about Kabuchicho’s dark underbelly through social media and no longer have to worry about the language barrier or unofficial bans on non-Japanese customers at regulated sex shops. Instead, they negotiate directly using smartphone translation apps.

“Japan’s image is changing because of this, and that’s a great shame,” said Arata Sakamoto, the head of Rescue Hub, a nonprofit that supports vulnerable young women in the Kabukicho area.

“But this isn’t a foreigner problem – it’s a problem for Japanese society.”

Campaigners, and some politicians, are among those calling for change, claiming it would act as a deterrent to men who know that, under the current law, they will never pay a legal price for their use of street sex workers.

In September, a justice ministry panel of experts released a report that called for changes to the law. The report, now being studied by the ministry, did not specify which new penalties should apply, saying only that the current law was “unbalanced” and that buyers needed to be “regulated” in the same way as providers.

The opposition MP Kazunori Yamanoi is among those pushing for change. “At a time when nations around the world are cracking down on those who buy sex, in Japan the patrons are safe,” he told a parliamentary committee last year, according to the Asahi Shimbun.

“Unfortunately, newspapers and TV stations around the world are reporting that legal, cheap sex with young girls is possible … in Tokyo.”

Sakamoto supports the introduction of penalties for men. “As the law stands, men know that they won’t face any consequences, and that encourages some to use violence or film themselves having sex,” he says. “Penalties might help, but there also a risk that street prostitution will go underground, and that could put women in even more danger.”

Kabukicho’s changing sex industry

Pressure to address the rise in street sex work is increasing among Kabukicho residents who say it is ruining their neighbourhood’s atmosphere and reputation. Local officials and residents’ associations patrol the streets and broadcast messages in Japanese and English warning people that selling sex there is illegal.

But a local official said the measures had failed to deter sex workers and their clients. “We hope the government will respond in a way that has a greater deterrent effect … including penalising the buyers,” the unnamed official told the Yomiuri Shimbun.

A more visible police presence – and the arrests last year of 75 women, including nine teenagers, in Kabukicho – have forced sex workers to migrate to narrow alleyways outside the entrances to love hotels a stone’s throw from Shinjuku, the world’s busiest railway station.

The average fee is ¥15,000 (US$95) for an hour, according to campaigners. Extra payments exchange hands for particularly young or attractive women, and as an inducement to have unprotected sex.

Many of the women are Japanese, including a growing number of teenagers. “Most of the women we help are from unhappy family backgrounds or suffer from a mental health condition,” Sakamoto said. “In some cases it’s physical abuse; in others they have pushy parents who won’t let them make choices about their education, hobbies or friends.”

While Sakamoto and other campaigners welcome moves to penalise men, others believe the debate on amending the law should be an opportunity to decriminalise and regulate sex work.

Writing this month for Nikkei Asia, Teppei Kasai and Stacey-Leigh Manuel, of Human Rights Watch, said introducing penalties for men who pay for sex would increase the risks faced by women, since clients would insist on meeting in secret and force them into even more dangerous situations.

“Decriminalisation should also go hand in hand with treating sex workers like other members of society,” they wrote. “They should have access to labor protections, healthcare, housing and public benefits without discrimination.”

As MPs wait for the justice ministry to submit a bill to parliament, possibly before the end of the year, campaigners warned that new penalties would do little to help women escape sex work.

“There has to be more government support,” Sakamoto said. “Unless they get help with their rent and other bills, many women will be forced to sell their bodies.”