From: Peter Rivard
Date: Mon Jun 2, 2003 8:48:37 PM Japan
To: Newsletter
Subject: This is why I like the girls here

      Saw this in the news today. I've seen quite a few stories like this in the last couple of years.

• SAITAMA A groper on a bicyle got more than he bargained for when he tried to put his hand up the skirt of a 17-year-old girl in Tokorozawa, police said Sunday. The girl's friend, also 17, immediately gave chase and collared the man, holding him until police arrived.
  
  According to Saitama police, the 34-year-old man approached the girls Friday evening. After touching one of the girls, he pedaled off with the victim's friend in hot pursuit. The girl caught up with him three kilometers on and held him until passersby called police.

Three kilometers!!!

      Last year, a 12 year old girl in Tokyo started screaming and chased a 40 year old groper off the train and out of the station, finally grabbing him and holding him down until the police arrived. We've got some damned cool girls growing up these days. Among my students, there are quite a few girls I can picture doing this (one or two wouldn't have left anything for the police to find); sadly, among the boys, there are quite a few I can imagine acting the other part, too. Girls seem to be changing their role in society pretty quickly these days, but the boys haven't quite figured out how to deal with them yet (perhaps that frustration is why weird fetishists, stalkers, gropers, and, especially, guys with video equipment built into their shoes seem to be everywhere in Japan now [seriously, rarely does a week go by without a story in the papers about a cop, judge, legislator or teacher caught videotaping up schoolgirl's skirt; many of the young women I know have, at least once, caught someone staring at them and masturbating in plain sight--this is COMMON BEHAVIOR in Japan]).