Shaved Heads and Suicide: Japan’s Idol Industry

It opens on a plain grey room. From the left corner a girl, her hair freshly shaved off, comes and sits in the centre of the frame.

Over the next three minutes she talks and begins to dissolve into tears. This isn’t a David Lynch film, nor is it a Youtube horror short where at the end she jumps at the screen to shock you. Instead, this is a video shot by a member of a Japanese music troupe, originally posted on their official Youtube channel.

The girl is Minegishi Minami, a part of Japanese idol group AKB48. She has been paraded in front of a camera and shaved for one reason: She spent the night at a man’s house. Whilst here in the UK we have groups such as One Direction, who young pre-teens proclaim to be their first love and will willingly camp outside a London hotel for, there’s not much of a male alternative though. Whilst teenagers used to be able to get sweaty about Girls Aloud, we don’t regularly see teams of young men run to a pop concert dancing and buying up all the merchandise in the arena. It’s simply one of the many cultural differences between the West and Asia.

What is an idol group, though? In Japan an idol is a ‘media personality’ in their teens and early twenties, with the key trait they need is to be cute. Cuteness isn’t the only factor that’s sought after, but as is an image of ‘purity’. This of course meaning no boyfriend, no smoking, no drinking. A photo of these things being partook by an idol can equal the death of their career overnight. This is what happened to Minegishi Minami. Now respect is a huge part of Japanese culture, which is what would’ve led to her head being shaved and the apology being so raw and public. If she hadn’t have took action, then she would’ve been looked upon negatively in the press for the rest of her lingering career and soon would’ve been dropped from the band, with chances of employment at another label being low. This isn’t hyperbole either.

In 2006, Hello Project member Ai Kago was photographed smoking at the age of 18, where the legal age in Japan is 20. She was then suspended for a year and put under house arrest for some time in her family home. Near the end of her suspension she was photographed once again smoking and also heard to be dating a 37 year old. With that, her contract was cancelled and she ended up at another company where she had some acting roles and released one single, which peaked at #52. A far cry from the multi-million selling Morning Musume that she was apart of some years previously.

In 2011 her partner was rumoured to be apart of the Yakuza and she was found at their apartment with slit wrists. She survived the suicide attempt and as of today she has not released or worked on a single project.

Here in the West we see things all the time in the press. “Take a look at Vanessa Hudgens’ muff”; “Justin Beebz Shown Toking!”; “Whoops! Our powerful flash has revealed she’s not wearing a bra!” and we read the articles. We look at the pictures, we discuss it with people, because it’s big news. Does it have much of a head on effect? No. Vanessa continued to work for Disney. Justin Bieber continues to collect underwear each night. We’re used to seeing this in the media, but in Japan these would be some of the most heinous things you could do.

AKB48 was dreamt up by lyricist and film producer Yasushi Akimoto who thought of the concept “Idols you can meet everyday”, which is exactly what you can – technically – do. This band, who sold $200 million records in 2011, perform daily at the AKB48 Theatre in Akihabara – the nerd centre of Japan. Akihabara is known for retro second hand games shops and cafés where you can have tea with a lady dressed as a maid. If I ever got the chance then I would be straight there. For the games of course. Either way, this haemorrhages the audience that the people behind AKB48 want. They don’t expect young girls who want to listen to tracks about ‘Pink Butterflies’, they expect and receive men who have money to throw at the band.

Googling will find you articles and pictures about fans who buy an obscene amount of the same cd. One example is a fan who bought 5500 copies of AKB48 single ‘Everyday, Kachuusha’ which would’ve cost him over $108,000. Why buy so many? Often the CDs come with a voucher to vote for members to get a higher ranking in the next single or, more tantalising for the fans, a voucher to attend a handshaking event with the band. The catch being you need more than one of the vouchers to be able to attend the event and they wern’t put in every copy of the single.

Idol’s make money by issuing singles, releasing photobooks which consist of them in a bikini playing with a large inflatable ball, or simply laying in seductive poses, or releasing DVDs. Same as the photobooks, the DVDs are simply that but in motion. If you think someone laying down in a bikini looking like they’re a corpse as the camera pans over them was sexy, then boy does Japan have you covered. Of course, once they get too old they have to graduate from the band. What do they do then? They might be able to do TV work or, like Nakanishi Rina who graduated from AKB48 in 2008, she released a nude phonebook followed by a ‘hardcore’ pornography DVD two years after her departure.

So what now for Minegishi Minami? She had already been downgraded to a lower ring of the group, meaning it’s doubtful you will hear her vocals in a single for any time soon, but this weekend she attended a handshake event where she once again apologised. The fans in attendance asked the managers at the show to remove the apology video. The video was removed overnight on the 2nd. Not only that, but whilst finishing this piece every copy of the video on Youtube has been taken down due to copyright, that being why I had to use a Channel 4 report at the top of the article. Are they finally seeing the international shame of this video and thus don’t want it to be seen anymore? After the hand shaking event, the band’s official blog posted the following.

“Though Minegishi’s sense of apology will not disappear until she regains the trust from you fans, please continue to support Minegishi Minami, and AKB48”.

Basic translation?

“Please continue to believe that one day, if you attend enough events, she could fall for you. The only way you’ll know is by purchasing those singles and turning up. Thank you.”