Pets in Tokyo. The Plague.
The Japanese Forgo Children For Dogs And Cats.
[Transcript, slightly modified]
Hello, Dr. Pattberg here, from the suburbs of Tokyo. Today with a presentation about Japan‘s dogs and cats infestation.
Dogs piss me off. Not generally as animals, but as substitutes for children and soulmates in the big cities. Tokyo is the largest city in the world with 30 million inhabitants. They have more pets here than children.
Our Korean neighbors first bought a noisy Shiba-Inu, and then another one, a mongrel – for the kids, of course!
That idiot. If you do have real children, then you don't need a substitute child. Of course he had planned never to be around at home much. So the furry mutts were bought as playmates for his human brats.
That was 4 years ago. Of course the kids didn‘t care for the furry mutts. One was from a breeder for 5,000 euros, the other for 6,000 euros – so what?
The kids didn't give a fuck. They prefer to watch YouTube videos or play Nintendo Switch.
He's in Okubo at the market all day long; she‘s somewhere as a teacher. The children are at school until 3pm. So he locks the furry mutts out on the inside balcony. There they exist now - for 4 years - sitting in their own feces and urine.
☕️YOU CAN BUY ME A COFFEE IF YOU WANT☕️
Barking psychotically every morning at 7. Whining in the scorching sun in summer at 12, and howling in the brutal cold in winter at 6. I went downstairs once and wanted to feed them sausages. But the two cunts are completely deranged. They ran into windows like crazy.
This is animal cruelty. Having a dog in your house in a big city is sadistic. It's better to end the suffering quickly and drown the useless eaters.
A couple from Shanghai lives nearby at the canal around the corner. They married too late. They were both over 35 or something. So they only had one child. Then they got themselves 1, 3, 4 toy dogs to compensate. These tiny critters have never been outside. They are in-house dogs.
Guys, that's not normal. I see feral substitute partners here every day. There are many old people in the suburbs. They push their ugly dogs in strollers in front of them. Eventually there will be more dog buggies than baby buggies in Kichijoji, mark my words.
The neurotic women folks dress their animated meat dolls in pretty clothes. Honestly true. Their poodles wear socks and knitted hats, panties or even pampers. It's grotesque.
And then the many dog grooming schools here. Tokyo is so densely populated that hundreds of mutts share a street block - easily! And so their masters and mistresses inevitably bump into each other on the sidewalk with their four-legged friends.
Let's say it's 500 dogs from here to the supermarket over there, by the river canal. If every animal has to be walked 3 times a day, that's 1,500 walks. That's why you are bound to meet hundreds of creepers a day! You keep running into them! So their owners arrange appointments right away.
They always meet at this bridge in the evenings. Minimum 12 to 15 dog owners. There's all kinds of fur: Chihuahuas, Poodles, Pomeranians, Terriers, awkward mongrels and even a British bulldog.
Other “dog schools” meet at the children's playground. There is always this dogwalker among them. Some old fart who walks the dogs for an entire block of flats. Because he has nothing else to do. He always has 5 or 6 dogs on a leash.
There is little green here. No lawns or gardens. So the animals poop alongside the concreted river canal. Against concrete poles and wooden posts and iron bars. On dandelions at our house entrances. Against cars and children's bicycles. The Japanese are said to be so hygienic. Well, they wear masks when they go for a dog walk.
As to the dog shit, well yes, they pick it up with plastic gloves or plastic bags, tie a knot, and hang the trophies on belt pouches or let them dangle in their hands.
Of course they don't pick up the poop after 8pm when it's dark. There are hundreds such owners in this area that walk their animals in the dark.
Dog owners carry water in plastic bottles with them; first for the dog to drink and then again to water down the piss. The streets just look miserable at noon and in the evening: every three to five meters on the street a wet, damp spot.
But these are just the average, cramped neighborhoods. Look at these buildings here: Thousands of public housing units, often 10 or more stories high. Tens of thousands of households per square kilometer. The children are the children of the underclass, prefab block children. But there are more underclass dogs, prefab block dogs.
Another Korean lives here that I once befriended. He is in his 30s and lives alone. Although he's 175 cm tall and got a pretty face from his mom, he can't find a wife. Dating and family? It's all fucked up in modern Tokyo! The women are so entitled. Most relationships are short, anonymous, and precarious. Better to get a dog, man. The dog always loves you. Even if you are unemployed.
He had his mother's two terriers flown in from Seoul. She wants to immigrate later, she says. I can hardly imagine that scenario. Living with my mom in a 1-room apartment? And then the two mutts in the kitchen? With in-house doggy toilets – because Hoochi and Poochi are too afraid of using the elevator? The stench in his apartment is repulsive. A mix of kimchi, soup, dog poop and jizz.
There has been a real pet boom here in Tokyo for about 7 years now. Don‘t know how else to put it. The numbers just exploded. Especially during the 3 years of [Corona] lockdown and self-isolation. There are now 1 or 2 animal dealerships in every shopping street here. This retail chain calls itself ... Piss. P - Apostrophe - S. Supposed to mean Pets, but reads "Piss."
The Japanese pronounce City as “Shitty”. So I always say “Shitty Piss Pets” here – retailers that literally sell miniature house slaves.
The business is seasonal. Reminds me of quick Italian ice cream parlors in Germany. They may pop up anywhere in springtime and summer. This shop wasn't even there last winter! Could have been a sushi shop before. Or a toy store.
In no time at all, the latest puppies and kittens are showcased. Time flies quickly in this line of business... "Aw, look at how cute these pieces are!" But only for a few weeks. After a while, they are no longer fresh! And probably suffer from mental distress!
I think the suffering is intentional. You want to generate sympathy among the customers: ”If I don't buy this poor animal now, buy its freedom, then it's probably going to end up in... yes, where is it actually going to end up in?” An uncomfortable question that I‘d rather like to suppress.
The prices are fantastic. They steal the pensions from lonely old people and the mentally handicapped and socially disadvantaged, this is what I believe. The business with toy pets is predatory.
If you want my honest opinion from 12 years living here and seeing this scam, the focus of the pet retailers is on severely lonely and mentally disabled people.
Many Japanese hardly have any social contacts any more. They stumble past these shops in the pedestrian zone and see a speechless future life partner behind a glass window: “How nice would it be to have a true friend in my life now?”
Prices for inus and nekos – dogs, and cats – are often higher than that of used cars or housing. They often exceed at least 3 or up to 10 months' rent. The insane prices in no way reflect the value of the animal, so the profit margins in the pet industry must be enormous. Their sales scheme consists of emotional blackmail, the fear of missing out a true friend, and artificially engineered demand and supply.
Because only the beauties from each litter make it into the showroom. The other 4 or 5 siblings are disposed of, processed into – what do I know? – animal food or fodder, or sold to farmers as fertilizer? In this way, the number of premium animals is kept artificially rare.
This little gray cat here – from America, if you believe it – is exactly 8 days old. He sells for 362,780 yen. The much lower price advertised above in red, 187,350 yen, is net only and excludes tax and fees and handling. 362,780 yen – that‘s about 2,650 euros or 2,851 dollars.
But no worries. You can also buy the Kitty on debt and loans. How about 80 euros a month to boot with? Without a deposit, it is 300 euros, but still doable, right? But what if the poor animal suddenly dies? Don't worry, there is insurance: 250 euros in the first six months - great offer!
The animal should also be properly registered and get mandatory vaccinations. About 500 euros a year.
When Grandma finally gets her pure-bred Shih-Tzu, her pension is hardly enough to cover the high prices for animal products. Tokyo shopping malls have bigger pet food sections than baby food aisles or vegetables.
But the myriads of pet boutiques take the cake. There are toy department stores for your loved ones, massage parlors, gym goods, delis, and even plastic surgeons for our humanized surrogates. And if it says dog or cat on the label, this shit flies off the shelves for twice the price of human food.
Incidentally, just like in Germany, veterinarians are not (yet) covered by national health insurance. That means you have to pay the vets privately. The situation is obscene, but true: If your child in Japan has the runs, seeing a national diarrhea doctor and getting tummy pills costs NOTHING. With your dog, however, the bill must be settled in full: BANG. 150 euros per examination.
Many pet shoppers did not anticipate the future horrible costs of raising healthy animals. So later, they neglect the animals and abuse them.
Who would have anticipated a pet plague‘s coming, say 40 years ago? Japan was supposed to get robots and flying cars, remember? But it was all a propaganda lie of course.
All they got was dirty, anal-fixated animals. This is very sad. I see grown-up men on Facebook cuddling and writing poetry with their larger mastiffs.
Back to Shitty Piss First and those Kirei-desu-ka showpieces. They are cute animals, not denying it. I was able to easily cycle to all the shops for this lecture in one day. They are everywhere now.
The real Japanese kids come in here to watch. But they are not the target customers. They are looking at their replacement. Their future substitutes.
Animals are everywhere now, on telly and social media. Japan is a land of extremes. So now there are those serial cat killers like the one in Setagaya. Or the cat hoarders of Nagoya. One Tokyo woman with brain damage lived in Katsushika in her 11 square meters condo with 163 stray cats.
And what about those thousands of cat cafés spreading across the cities? This needs to be seen to believe it! What's my cappuccino supposed to taste good about in the midst of licking and farting Felidae with their litter boxes and chicken liver pâté?
How can this madness be stopped? Many will say that dog ownership has always been the rule in Germany or Europe among the bourgeoisie. You start a family, you buy a house with a garden, and then you buy a dog as a “status symbol” that completes the whole thing.
But these dogs in Japan are not status symbols. There is no bourgeoisie here either. There is the rich elite ruling caste and their feudal subjects. The simple people have hardly any living space in the big cities. They cannot have and do not want to have children.
What do you want to have children for anyway? This country has no future. The city people actually don‘t have living space for animals either – if the animals had something to say about it.
I have the suspicion that we have a completely left behind, enslaved mass of people in the big cities who have no social power and position and therefore cope with their failure by buying animals.
These animals are treated like people, i.e. like life partners, conversation partners, love partners and spoiled children. This is a serious pathological illness of society.
How to stop childlessness? How to curb this excessive animal bonding? We can't just literally let the city "go to the dogs."
There are more piss sprayed columns than bushes on my street. More barking than children's laughs.
Of course, the city government has an immediate lever against the pet plague: Pet tax up, of course! Until it hurts the underclass and they abandon their canine friends voluntarily.
The problem: What can possibly hurt more than the thought of living and dying alone?
High taxes do not deter desperate people. People no longer have any social contacts, do not maintain relationships and are forever childless. They don't need cars in the big city, no posh clothes, no luxuries at all. They need... love and validation. From pup animals, if that‘s the only way.
They will pay any price for the self-righteous drive and the feeling of being the owner of a living being. Pets are no longer new family members. They are their substitutes. HUMAN REPLACEMENT.
These people would rather not go out anymore or use public transportation than being seen alone, unhappy and miserable.
No, it's not a conspiracy theory. Yes, the Japanese are swapping children for pets.
Thanks for listening, and see you later!
The author is a German writer and cultural critic.
Substack iss blöd mit der Anmeldung. Check subscription mode. Register is pain in the bud. 😜
Finally found these! I read them on the saker but that site is closed/frozen/no longer linking.
Good to see they are preserved.