Content area
Full text
THE noticeboard at the entrance of the Osaka high school carries the sort of messages you would expect to see at educational establishments anywhere in the world, with one exception: a poster that depicts the legs of a couple - an older man and a schoolgirl - walking along the street, below which is the warning in bold Japanese characters: "Compensated dating is prostitution."
The posters, placed in Osaka high schools this term at the request of police, are a sign of the concern throughout Japan at the spread of enjo kosai, accompanying older men to karaoke clubs, restaurants and sometimes hotels, for which schoolgirls are "compensated" with cash or designer goods.
"It is a huge problem," said Hideaki Deguchi, a teacher. "Values are changing in a disturbing way. More and more young people think only of money and are not ashamed of selling their bodies to get what they want."
Fuelling this concern has been the rapid increase in the number of "telephone clubs". Men pay about 2,000 yen ( pounds 10) to enter such clubs, where they wait for calls in...