Enjo Kosai: Paid dating with Japanese teenage students

'JK' businesses shift from panty peeping too sex at hotels

In recent years, law enforcement has been cracking down on similar operations featuring minors - dubbed "JK" businesses, which originates from the phrase for high school girl (joshi kosei) - under the Child Welfare Law as they are considered breeding grounds for prostitution.

Pursuit, escape - repeat. The case is an example, says Friday (Dec. 18), for how shops in the industry are continuing to exploit legal loopholes in an effort to meet stiff demand fueled by fantasies for underage girls.

The magazine ventures to one parlor in Tokyo's Ikebukuro entertainment district which is turning the tables on law enforcement: Instead of girls being viewed by men seated in private rooms, the writer finds a number of salarymen in a large space and peeking through a mirror at a row of young women relaxing in cubicles.


Fascination with Japanese schoolgirl culture hiding a darker side?


On a cold, rainy night in Tokyo -- Japanese schoolgirls line the streets.

Shivering in short skirts they pass out fliers for "JK" or "joshi-kosei," cafes in which adult males pay for the company of girls as young as 16.

"Most are in their 30s, 40s and 50s," says 18-year-old Honoka.

The girls, all dressed in their actual high school uniforms, earn about $8 dollars an hour to socialize and serve food and drink to men often more than twice their age.

Sometimes however, the men want more than talk.

16-year-old Eli says that customers ask the girls out on dates "all the time."