I was recently shown the following story - an article from The Japan Times: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/05/01/national/fake-school-uniforms-let-some-turn-back-the-clock/#.UYBXSkr4LTo
I like The Japan Times.
I think the story is well-written for a fluff piece - and who hasn't done one of those?
So... I am not going to criticize the Japan Times or writer Osaki Tomohiro (surname first), but I thought I would have a little fun dissecting it. My comments will in orange. Just kidding. They will be in navy blue.
Back in the day, your Rife writer says sounding like an old man (he is), we called kids like this Preps, and we (now speaking like there are more of him) hated them.
“When I spend time with my buddies wearing my blazer, it really makes me feel like I’m living in the moment as a high schooler,” said the teenager, who asked to remain anonymous. “I wouldn’t feel that way if I just go out dressed casually.”
Holy crap! This kid is an L7 square!
He is one of the growing number of teenage boys sporting “nanchatte seifuku,” or fake uniforms, a trend that was initially popular among teenage girls but is now drawing in fashion-conscious schoolboys as well.
Be fashion conscious - that's cool! Wearing fake uniforms - he's a sad little clone. Wear something that doesn't look like a school uniform. The only time wearing a school uniform works is when you are a porno star getting banged by an older Japanese man because you look like a high school girl. Or, if you are a guy, are the lead guitarist for AC/DC!)
“Demand has outpaced production,” said Takayuki Aiura, president of CONOMi Corp., a Niigata Prefecture-based maker of fake uniforms that has an outlet in Tokyo’s Harajuku district.
“Think about it,” Aiura said. “If you’re in the same school with girls who are becoming more and more beautiful, you’d feel like you have to match up to them.”
Wait... is this something new? Are Japanese girls only now becoming more and more beautiful in high school? And this is how you impress them? Do it the old fashioned way - drive a Trans-Am.
CONOMi opened its outlet in Tokyo in 2008, targeting youngsters who go to schools with no uniform code.
Wait! Japan has schools without a uniform dress code? Didn't they used to call them vocational schools for those that didn't have the marks to get into the tougher, more academic high schools?
Japan has several layers of high school - which is why they have entrance exams for junior high school kids. Your future is set with these exams.
Get into the academic school and you have a chance at getting into university and getting a job upon graduation as a salaryman or better.
Not having the marks could get you into a lower level high school where you learn a trade - like plumbing and auto mechanics where you can make more money than a salary man, but do not get the respect from the rest of society - just like it is all around the world. I'm not agreeing with the whole respect-thing, but the next tie I accidentally flush something bad down my toilet, I would pay anything to not have it come up again and visit my bathroom.
Lower levels of highschooling could mean barber school or farming or having to quit and work at the family's restaurant business busing dirty plates. All respectable jobs where I come from - but I just don't like having your future hinge on a series of exams when you are only 15.
Anyhow... guess which schools do not require a uniform dress code?
The trend found itself in the spotlight in 2009 when the government appointed Shizuka Fujioka, a chief fashion coordinator at CONOMi, as a cultural ambassador to promote Japan’s “kawaii” phenomenon worldwide.
Kawaii - that's Japanese for 'cute'. I, personally hate it, and only liked it when I was starring in Japanese porno films banging 21-year-old women who were pretending to be high school girls by wearing their cute uniforms.
Kidding. I know some of you hated me for a second for either being a sexist pig, or for actually being in porno films.
I have watched porno films, so perhaps I am a sexist pig. Regardless... the whole kawaii phenomenon makes me ill. Grow up. Take a cue from any western culture and dress like an adult. You can still look sexy - male or female.
A typical fake uniform popular among male teens is a slightly loosened tie, a comfy-looking blazer and snug-fitting trousers. For many, their fashion icon is 21-year-old pro golfer Ryo Ishikawa, who sports something of a debonair attitude, Aiura said.
This comes in stark contrast to the way teenage boys fashioned themselves to look “cool” decades ago, Aiura said.
The most symbolic example would be a pair of baggy, tight-cuffed school trousers nicknamed “bontan” in Japanese that were ubiquitous among teenage rebels back in the 1980s.
Resembling a zoot suit that became popular in African-American communities in the 1940s, the trousers were considered a symbol of machismo and protest against authorities.
Zoot suit? Oh, Japan. Unless you are into Chicano music or Swing, there is no reason for anyone to wear a zoot suit.
Do you think the Japanese wore these suits to protest against authorities because they knew that in the 1940s there were race riots between Mexican-Americans, Coloreds (update that to Negroes, Blacks and now African-Americans - geezus... pick one.) (And for the record... we're ALL from Africa!)? Nawwww.
With a hint of embarrassment, Aiura admitted that he wore bontan trousers as a teenager, at times clashing with his teachers and parents.
Based on his experiences, Aiura, 39, is convinced that no fashion is commercially viable unless it gains popularity and acceptance with the general public.
“I thought we should produce school uniforms that would be loved by everybody, including teachers and parents,” he said. “So we were very careful to strike a balance between what adults think school kids should look like and how the kids themselves want to look.”
The casual approach to the fake uniform has not been lost on the girls.
“Guys wearing blazers seem much friendlier to me. Their fashionable design somehow makes the guys look kinder and easier for me to speak to,” said a 17-year-old girl, adding that she doesn’t like the traditional gakuran high-neck jackets because they look “suffocating.”
Smart, degenerate men in their 20s will soon be wearing this crap-ass fashion to pick-up teenaged Japanese girls.
But teenagers are not the only aficionados of the latest trend, as it seems to be slowly spreading to a potentially larger fan base of people in their 20s and 30s, who are described as “nanchatte kokosei (fake high schoolers).”
See? I'm commenting as I read, so I just saw that line above... no degenerates yet, but having older people wear it - you know it's going to be trouble - especially if it makes it 'easier' for a 17-year-old girl to go up and talk to someone.
These emerging wannabes can be divided into two broad types: those obsessed with a happy past in the heyday of their adolescent youth, and those who did not have a great time and now want to experience adolescent romance, according to a 30-year-old college clerk in Tokyo, a self-proclaimed fake high schooler.
How sad. High school. There are scores of people in the West who peaked in high school as the head cheerleader and homecoming queen who married the Star quarterback and now live in a trailer park in Alabama. I know because my wife has a cousin who is doing exactly that in said US state.
Categorizing himself as the second type, the man, who asked to remain anonymous, said he likes to walk around his neighborhood clad in a pair of his old school pants plus a cardigan and a tie that he bought at CONOMi.
I'm embarrassed and don't want anyone to know who I am. Uh... except for the clothes seller, hasn't everyone remained anonymous? Bueller... Buehler... anyone... anyone...?
“Looking back, I did enjoy my school life, but I wish I’d had more fun dating girls,” he said. “As a teenager, I didn’t really feel any special attachment to my school uniforms as I do now. But watching today’s high schoolers enjoy themselves wearing a variety of uniforms, I really wish I could be one of them.”
Now I can pick up high school girls easily thanks to me being rich and being able to afford buying them alcoholic drinks laced with roofies.
This longing for an imaginary adolescent romance appears to be a common reason that binds fake high schoolers together.
“One time, I was even asked by my fellow fake uniform fan, who was only a couple years younger than me, to go out with her because she said she couldn’t really enjoy her school life as a teenager,” he said. “So we went to karaoke and a zoo on a date, just like a real couple, wearing fake uniforms.”
Uh... is this fellow fake uniform fan STILL a teenager? It sounds like it - 'she really couldn't enjoy her school life as a teenager.' Who the hell cares if she couldn't enjoy her school life as a teenager? Boo-friging-hoo. I hated my school life as a teenager. I was bullied and picked on. I rebeled by flunking damn near every course I took - until I realized I was screwing no one but me. Then I turned it around. Girls? I didn't date. And, what all these idiots wearing childish fake school uniforms fail to realize is that you can change. You can re-invent who you are. Didn't I teach Japan anything 20 years ago?
No wait... Japan's society already says that your adult life is set after you write those stupid high school exams as a 15-year-old. You can't change if you wanted too... but I guess you can change your clothes... but why the hell would you want to pretend you are happy as an adult by wearing teenager fake clothing?
Why would anyone want to pretend they are happy, and thus by pretending, are happy. That's just not being true to yourself. Of course, what do I know. I'm a realist and I'm not necessarily happy, but at least I know I'm not happy. I don't have to delude myself each and every single day. I don't whine about it.
I do need to make a change - and lord knows I've been trying in various degrees - but until such time that a change is exacted at least I'll have kept my dignity. For whatever that is worth. It is what it is, I suppose.
Genki Katsube, a 29-year-old freelance journalist based in Tokyo who calls himself a fake high schooler, said although adult school uniform lovers are just trying to relive their teenage years and turn the present into a happier life, the situation for real high schoolers wearing fake uniforms seems to be different.
Holy crap! A real person! Named Genki? The point Genki makes is good, however... even though I don;t agree with people trying to relive their teenaged years. People... live in the present. Don't the majority of you Japanese do Buddhism? The past is long gone. The future hasn't happened. All you have is the present. waste it not?
The present may suck, but it's your present. Don't fake live it.
Katsube, who created an online community for like-minded school uniform lovers, warned the growing popularity of fake uniforms among high schoolers could be an eerie signal of their increasingly risk-averse mindset and unwillingness to challenge the establishment.
Yes - an unwillingness to change the establishment - because that is the way it has always been. The nail that stands up gets hammered down.
There is nothing wrong with challenging the establishment or the status quo, and Genki is correct that high school kids who wear fake high school uniforms are knobs.
“I think today’s teenagers are becoming more and more afraid to act independently. They think, ‘If I wear fake uniforms, then it’s sure to be liked by everybody,” said Katsube. “They’re afraid to forge relationships with others from scratch and be the way they are. They might be using fake uniforms to just gain acceptance.”
That sounds right. But while Genki and I seem to agree on how fake uniforms can impact a current student, Genki and I aren't so genki (okay) on what the whole fake uniform phenomenon is doing to adults wanting to relive or create a better teenaged experience. You can't. Grow up and make changes to your current establishment. You don't have to change the world, but there is nothing wrong with taking baby steps and changing your current level of existence.
Ah me. I suppose we all just want to be loved and respected. I don't see that being gained from a fake school uniform. Although, as you can see from the photo, I did have fun.
Cheers
Andrew Joseph
I like The Japan Times.
I think the story is well-written for a fluff piece - and who hasn't done one of those?
So... I am not going to criticize the Japan Times or writer Osaki Tomohiro (surname first), but I thought I would have a little fun dissecting it. My comments will in orange. Just kidding. They will be in navy blue.
Fake school uniforms let some turn back the clock
Staff Writer
A 17-year-old high school boy in Tokyo likes to hang out with his friends on weekends sporting a blazer and white shirt, the typical uniform of high school boys — not his casual clothes or his school-designated “gakuran” high-collar jacket.Back in the day, your Rife writer says sounding like an old man (he is), we called kids like this Preps, and we (now speaking like there are more of him) hated them.
“When I spend time with my buddies wearing my blazer, it really makes me feel like I’m living in the moment as a high schooler,” said the teenager, who asked to remain anonymous. “I wouldn’t feel that way if I just go out dressed casually.”
Holy crap! This kid is an L7 square!
He is one of the growing number of teenage boys sporting “nanchatte seifuku,” or fake uniforms, a trend that was initially popular among teenage girls but is now drawing in fashion-conscious schoolboys as well.
Be fashion conscious - that's cool! Wearing fake uniforms - he's a sad little clone. Wear something that doesn't look like a school uniform. The only time wearing a school uniform works is when you are a porno star getting banged by an older Japanese man because you look like a high school girl. Or, if you are a guy, are the lead guitarist for AC/DC!)
“Demand has outpaced production,” said Takayuki Aiura, president of CONOMi Corp., a Niigata Prefecture-based maker of fake uniforms that has an outlet in Tokyo’s Harajuku district.
“Think about it,” Aiura said. “If you’re in the same school with girls who are becoming more and more beautiful, you’d feel like you have to match up to them.”
Wait... is this something new? Are Japanese girls only now becoming more and more beautiful in high school? And this is how you impress them? Do it the old fashioned way - drive a Trans-Am.
CONOMi opened its outlet in Tokyo in 2008, targeting youngsters who go to schools with no uniform code.
Wait! Japan has schools without a uniform dress code? Didn't they used to call them vocational schools for those that didn't have the marks to get into the tougher, more academic high schools?
Japan has several layers of high school - which is why they have entrance exams for junior high school kids. Your future is set with these exams.
Get into the academic school and you have a chance at getting into university and getting a job upon graduation as a salaryman or better.
Not having the marks could get you into a lower level high school where you learn a trade - like plumbing and auto mechanics where you can make more money than a salary man, but do not get the respect from the rest of society - just like it is all around the world. I'm not agreeing with the whole respect-thing, but the next tie I accidentally flush something bad down my toilet, I would pay anything to not have it come up again and visit my bathroom.
Lower levels of highschooling could mean barber school or farming or having to quit and work at the family's restaurant business busing dirty plates. All respectable jobs where I come from - but I just don't like having your future hinge on a series of exams when you are only 15.
Anyhow... guess which schools do not require a uniform dress code?
The trend found itself in the spotlight in 2009 when the government appointed Shizuka Fujioka, a chief fashion coordinator at CONOMi, as a cultural ambassador to promote Japan’s “kawaii” phenomenon worldwide.
Kawaii - that's Japanese for 'cute'. I, personally hate it, and only liked it when I was starring in Japanese porno films banging 21-year-old women who were pretending to be high school girls by wearing their cute uniforms.
Kidding. I know some of you hated me for a second for either being a sexist pig, or for actually being in porno films.
I have watched porno films, so perhaps I am a sexist pig. Regardless... the whole kawaii phenomenon makes me ill. Grow up. Take a cue from any western culture and dress like an adult. You can still look sexy - male or female.
A typical fake uniform popular among male teens is a slightly loosened tie, a comfy-looking blazer and snug-fitting trousers. For many, their fashion icon is 21-year-old pro golfer Ryo Ishikawa, who sports something of a debonair attitude, Aiura said.
This comes in stark contrast to the way teenage boys fashioned themselves to look “cool” decades ago, Aiura said.
The most symbolic example would be a pair of baggy, tight-cuffed school trousers nicknamed “bontan” in Japanese that were ubiquitous among teenage rebels back in the 1980s.
Resembling a zoot suit that became popular in African-American communities in the 1940s, the trousers were considered a symbol of machismo and protest against authorities.
Zoot suit? Oh, Japan. Unless you are into Chicano music or Swing, there is no reason for anyone to wear a zoot suit.
Do you think the Japanese wore these suits to protest against authorities because they knew that in the 1940s there were race riots between Mexican-Americans, Coloreds (update that to Negroes, Blacks and now African-Americans - geezus... pick one.) (And for the record... we're ALL from Africa!)? Nawwww.
With a hint of embarrassment, Aiura admitted that he wore bontan trousers as a teenager, at times clashing with his teachers and parents.
Based on his experiences, Aiura, 39, is convinced that no fashion is commercially viable unless it gains popularity and acceptance with the general public.
“I thought we should produce school uniforms that would be loved by everybody, including teachers and parents,” he said. “So we were very careful to strike a balance between what adults think school kids should look like and how the kids themselves want to look.”
The casual approach to the fake uniform has not been lost on the girls.
“Guys wearing blazers seem much friendlier to me. Their fashionable design somehow makes the guys look kinder and easier for me to speak to,” said a 17-year-old girl, adding that she doesn’t like the traditional gakuran high-neck jackets because they look “suffocating.”
Smart, degenerate men in their 20s will soon be wearing this crap-ass fashion to pick-up teenaged Japanese girls.
But teenagers are not the only aficionados of the latest trend, as it seems to be slowly spreading to a potentially larger fan base of people in their 20s and 30s, who are described as “nanchatte kokosei (fake high schoolers).”
See? I'm commenting as I read, so I just saw that line above... no degenerates yet, but having older people wear it - you know it's going to be trouble - especially if it makes it 'easier' for a 17-year-old girl to go up and talk to someone.
These emerging wannabes can be divided into two broad types: those obsessed with a happy past in the heyday of their adolescent youth, and those who did not have a great time and now want to experience adolescent romance, according to a 30-year-old college clerk in Tokyo, a self-proclaimed fake high schooler.
How sad. High school. There are scores of people in the West who peaked in high school as the head cheerleader and homecoming queen who married the Star quarterback and now live in a trailer park in Alabama. I know because my wife has a cousin who is doing exactly that in said US state.
Categorizing himself as the second type, the man, who asked to remain anonymous, said he likes to walk around his neighborhood clad in a pair of his old school pants plus a cardigan and a tie that he bought at CONOMi.
I'm embarrassed and don't want anyone to know who I am. Uh... except for the clothes seller, hasn't everyone remained anonymous? Bueller... Buehler... anyone... anyone...?
“Looking back, I did enjoy my school life, but I wish I’d had more fun dating girls,” he said. “As a teenager, I didn’t really feel any special attachment to my school uniforms as I do now. But watching today’s high schoolers enjoy themselves wearing a variety of uniforms, I really wish I could be one of them.”
Now I can pick up high school girls easily thanks to me being rich and being able to afford buying them alcoholic drinks laced with roofies.
This longing for an imaginary adolescent romance appears to be a common reason that binds fake high schoolers together.
“One time, I was even asked by my fellow fake uniform fan, who was only a couple years younger than me, to go out with her because she said she couldn’t really enjoy her school life as a teenager,” he said. “So we went to karaoke and a zoo on a date, just like a real couple, wearing fake uniforms.”
Uh... is this fellow fake uniform fan STILL a teenager? It sounds like it - 'she really couldn't enjoy her school life as a teenager.' Who the hell cares if she couldn't enjoy her school life as a teenager? Boo-friging-hoo. I hated my school life as a teenager. I was bullied and picked on. I rebeled by flunking damn near every course I took - until I realized I was screwing no one but me. Then I turned it around. Girls? I didn't date. And, what all these idiots wearing childish fake school uniforms fail to realize is that you can change. You can re-invent who you are. Didn't I teach Japan anything 20 years ago?
No wait... Japan's society already says that your adult life is set after you write those stupid high school exams as a 15-year-old. You can't change if you wanted too... but I guess you can change your clothes... but why the hell would you want to pretend you are happy as an adult by wearing teenager fake clothing?
Why would anyone want to pretend they are happy, and thus by pretending, are happy. That's just not being true to yourself. Of course, what do I know. I'm a realist and I'm not necessarily happy, but at least I know I'm not happy. I don't have to delude myself each and every single day. I don't whine about it.
I do need to make a change - and lord knows I've been trying in various degrees - but until such time that a change is exacted at least I'll have kept my dignity. For whatever that is worth. It is what it is, I suppose.
Genki Katsube, a 29-year-old freelance journalist based in Tokyo who calls himself a fake high schooler, said although adult school uniform lovers are just trying to relive their teenage years and turn the present into a happier life, the situation for real high schoolers wearing fake uniforms seems to be different.
Holy crap! A real person! Named Genki? The point Genki makes is good, however... even though I don;t agree with people trying to relive their teenaged years. People... live in the present. Don't the majority of you Japanese do Buddhism? The past is long gone. The future hasn't happened. All you have is the present. waste it not?
The present may suck, but it's your present. Don't fake live it.
Katsube, who created an online community for like-minded school uniform lovers, warned the growing popularity of fake uniforms among high schoolers could be an eerie signal of their increasingly risk-averse mindset and unwillingness to challenge the establishment.
Yes - an unwillingness to change the establishment - because that is the way it has always been. The nail that stands up gets hammered down.
There is nothing wrong with challenging the establishment or the status quo, and Genki is correct that high school kids who wear fake high school uniforms are knobs.
“I think today’s teenagers are becoming more and more afraid to act independently. They think, ‘If I wear fake uniforms, then it’s sure to be liked by everybody,” said Katsube. “They’re afraid to forge relationships with others from scratch and be the way they are. They might be using fake uniforms to just gain acceptance.”
 |
| That's nuts, but I wore a fake Japanese school uniform as a joke. |
Ah me. I suppose we all just want to be loved and respected. I don't see that being gained from a fake school uniform. Although, as you can see from the photo, I did have fun.
Cheers
Andrew Joseph
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