Dr. Kunio Kitamura: I doubt whether the word "sexless" was publicly aired as much as it was during the past year. It was written up in newspapers and magazines and talked about on radio and TV. I can’t recall how many times I was asked to define sexlessness: a lack of consensual intercourse or sexual activity (kissing, petting or lying naked in bed) for at least one month without a special reason for not doing so.
At the same time, the average number of children a Japanese woman gives birth to over her life fell to an unprecedented low of 1.26. While the government realizes the need to create an environment where it’s easier to bring up children, it is doing so on the assumption that children are being born. In fact, they’re not. I have claimed that the low birthrate stems from widespread sexlessness. It seems like yesterday I was having a quiet chuckle after being told by a pen pusher at the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, which is supposed to be tackling the low birthrate problem, that "’People of Japan, Have Sex’ is not an appropriate government policy."
My worries about sexlessness stem back a while. In 2001, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper polled 1,000 couples and found 28 percent were sexless. When we surveyed couples in 2004 as part of our research on the health and labor situation, we found 32 percent of couples were sexless. In December last year, a men’s magazine discovered that 40 percent of Japanese couples were not having sex. Sexlessness is on the rise and the most frightening thing is the trend is not just confined to married couples.
Putting things simply, I’d hazard a guess to say the problem is the rapid decline in the ability to communicate between the sexes. When you consider the wooing process involved in talking somebody into the sack, sex clearly takes a lot of communication ability. This can be bothersome or brilliant, require some wonderful acting skills and require one to do this, that or the other to get what you want. Communication is vital in deciding whether you succeed.
Another worry related to sexlessness is the way adult aids I was involved in developing have been selling. I helped in the development with "Dr. G", a jelly applied to the genitals to make them feel good during masturbation. There are men’s and women’s versions. We, the developers, have been really surprised to see that for every two men’s packs we sell, we are selling one women’s pack, which far succeeds our initial expectations. Considering we developed the product to sell, I know some may complain when I say that I have mixed feelings about the sales success.
I’ve often used this column to complain about men and their invented word of "frigidness," which is nothing more than proof of poor technique, while at the same time urged women to explore their own bodies so they can find out what feels good and later tell their partners the exact areas they need to have worked on. But that doesn’t mean the frustrated women should dump their husbands for more exciting alternatives. Men’s brains can think only of erection and insertion. The reason why women need to explore their bodies is so they can tell their partners where and how they want to be touched to feel good.
I originally developed these goods so young people wouldn’t have to worry about things like unwanted pregnancies or sexually transmitted diseases, but they have not stopped unforeseen concerns. If masturbation isn’t doing much to foster communication, or in fact is contributing to sexlessness, then as the developer of "Dr. G", I certainly have something to answer for.
Via Mainichi
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