Japan's "grass eaters" movement

[Disillusioned]

Some guy on another board posted something about "grass eaters" in Japan---straight younger men who've given up on trying to get sex or trying to pursue women.

 

I googled the keywords, and got all these articles from about 2 years ago from all different sources, so I know this isn't just some troll/concocted crap.

 

Apparently, Japanese women in that age range are somewhat frustrated that the grass-eater guys are refusing to operate according to the rules, and the Japanese government is having nightmares of a future filled with kidless old duffers. IMO, these Japanese men went on strike, and it's having an effect.

 

Then I wondered, what would happen if men here in the US did the same? A few PUAs would jump for joy because they'd have a huge pool of women all to themselves, that much I can be sure of... but then how would the women feel? Would they feel relieved that they're not being chased as much anymore, or lose interest, or become flexisexual???

[Dust]

Some guy on another board posted something about "grass eaters" in Japan---straight younger men who've given up on trying to get sex or trying to pursue women.

 

I googled the keywords, and got all these articles from about 2 years ago from all different sources, so I know this isn't just some troll/concocted crap.

 

You often come off as a troll. Your avatar is a favorite of trolls... Although I'm not saying you are a troll.

 

 

Apparently' date=' Japanese women in that age range are somewhat frustrated that the grass-eater guys are refusing to operate according to the rules, and the Japanese government is having nightmares of a future filled with kidless old duffers. IMO, these Japanese men went on strike, and it's having an effect.[/quote']

 

Every civilized nation produces less and less kids and is dealing with the same nightmare. If anything the Japanese women are frustrated there arn't more suitable men... not that these men won't date them.

 

Then I wondered' date=' what would happen if men here in the US did the same? A few PUAs would jump for joy because they'd have a huge pool of women all to themselves, that much I can be sure of... but then how would the women feel? Would they feel relieved that they're not being chased as much anymore, or lose interest, or become flexisexual??? [/quote']

 

PUA's are a bunch of guys who do horrible with women. So they waste their time and money memorizing scripts/code words and silly crap that is based on time old common knowledge like ASK HER OUT, MAKE A MOVE, and most importantly BE CONFIDENT. I mean calling flirting NEGING or what ever and making pre made teasing scripts is loserly. Women like Genuine men thats why its best to work off the cuff and not come of like a presentation.

 

Also PUA's are the type of people who would be Grass eaters so it wouldn't really make any difference. It would be guys who wern't getting girls any ways going on strike. While women already complain there arn't any good men so that wouldn't change either. I don't know if you looked around but their is no shortage of single women.

 

Good day to you sir!

[dasein]

It's already happening, marriage will become irrelevant as a social institution in the U.S. sometime in the next thirty years if the trend continues. We are told:

 

It's the economy

This generation is just timid and afraid of commitment

Women don't need men any more.

Young people are self-indulgent and don't want responsibility

 

but we are not told:

 

Men are leaving a very obviously rigged carney game in droves because getting sex no longer requires lifetime servitude.

 

Who will buy her a $10-50k engagement ring?

Who will pay for her $10-50k lavish wedding?

Who will pay for the $5k honeymoon?

Who will take on her credit card debt?

Who will sit by and watch as she "maximizes" her degree by leaving the workplace permanently once she has the first child?

Who will pay for her maid?

Who will pay for her country club dues?

Who will pay for her McMansion full of custom decor?

Who will pay for her $300 per pair shoes?

Who will pay for the kids to have perfect teeth and every possible indulgence a kid could ever want?

Who will stand by helplessly as she gets bored, cheats and then still gets to take half of everything?

Who will pay outrageous "support" payments which are as much "ex support" as they are "child support?"

 

Not I.

[somedude81]

Some guy on another board posted something about "grass eaters" in Japan---straight younger men who've given up on trying to get sex or trying to pursue women.

Wow, I've never head about it.

 

My guess is that the guys that are part of the movement are the same men who shop here.

 

 

Apparently, Japanese women in that age range are somewhat frustrated that the grass-eater guys are refusing to operate according to the rules,

What rules?

Then I wondered, what would happen if men here in the US did the same? A few PUAs would jump for joy because they'd have a huge pool of women all to themselves, that much I can be sure of... but then how would the women feel? Would they feel relieved that they're not being chased as much anymore, or lose interest, or become flexisexual???

I don't know.

 

Marriage would be gone and there would be a lot more bastard children.

[ThaWholigan]

It would never happen. The only guys that would be swearing off women would be guys who don't get women anyway. It wouldn't make a blind bit of difference to the women, they will still be chasing after the same guys. It's a dumb idea anyway.

 

I wouldn't put too much stock into what the PUAs think. I like to read PUA literature and it did help me stop being a pussy with women, but actual PUA lifestyle isn't a staple of success to me. I'd imagine the instructors and a few others do OK when it comes to getting laid, but that is it.

[Ross MwcFan]

Oh I heard about this quite a while ago. It's fascinating stuff.

 

Wish I could join them, at least I'd be around guys who I could relate to.

[fishtaco]

Interesting.

 

Sounds like Japan is a good place to visit.

[ascendotum]

Nah this "grass eaters" is not a troll post. I just read an article on this over xmas, in newsweek, newscientist, time, or some other fairly mainstream media publication. 'herbivore men'..frikken weird, and there's lots of them in Japan. That country has really lost its mojo. It already has very low birth rate for yrs, massive govt debt, and the Nikkei index is still less than a 1/3 of what it was 20 yrs ago.

I just saw an article on hormone levels in different countries. Weirdly enough Japanese men have high levels of testosterone, but they also have high levels of SHBG, which blocks T, so the result was they had the lowest 'active T' levels in the nations studied. Hello! IDK - Maybe they need to eat less soy + fish (maybe they also have higher Hg levels) and get stuck into more beef (though its quite expensise there) or push for anime with muscled up characters to hopefully encourage the young dudes to hit the gym.

 

Fishtaco - I wondered what it would be like over there for a healthy & horny westerner too.

Edited January 13, 2012 by ascendotum

[verhrzn]

The grass-eater movement began as a REACTION to Japanese women refusing to date Japanese men.

 

Since World War 2, more and more Japanese women have been joining the work force. The custom was that once they married (which had better be under the age of 30, women would leave the work force and put all of their attentions on home and children. Only once the children had graduated high schools could women return to work.

 

Of course, by then, no one would hire them because they'd just spent 20+ years having obsolete skills. In addition, there's a very harsh and high standard for Japanese house wives. If a child doesn't get into a top high school, if a child misbehaves in any way... it's entirely the mother's fault. Some fathers barely even see their families-they have long commutes, and so spend the week in the city. So the only other adults the housewife has to interact with are other stressed out housewives. And forget about having 'hobbies'.... it's selfish. A housewife's life literally revolves around her child.

 

In recent years, younger women started questioning this model. They didn't want to give up their careers... they didn't want to be just baby-making factories. They wanted to earn and control their own money. They also started rebelling against the idea of the traditional Japanese marriage... subservient women under a man who used her like a slave.

 

Japan has never had a traditional Gender Quality movement, but the recent refusal of women to date or marry, in favor of a career, is similar in spirit.

 

It's men's refusal to bend to these new ideas (letting women work outside the home, treating their girlfriends/wives well) that has resulted in the Grass Feeder movement... Women saying "No thank you" to guys who won't adjust their traditional-marriage attitudes, and men saying," Mwa, well then we're not gonna date you either!" in response.

 

Japanese women are more than open to dating; I've seen the ugliest, poorest, most socially ill-adjusted foreign guy get a Japanese wife (and he didn't even speak the language!!) And it isn't for the green card; a lot of mixed couples I know continue living there. The difference is the foreign guy is nice to them. The foreign guy doesn't think it's weird she wants to keep working, the foreign guy thinks his girlfriend is sexy and fun and maybe even an equal, not a baby-making-floor-cleaning servant. The foreign guy... treats her like a person.

 

What the Japanese Grass Feeders actually teach us is that men's inflexibility towards women's desires is actually what causes the death of dating.

[piggyoink]

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/foreigners/2009/06/the_herbivores_dilemma.html

Ryoma Igarashi likes going for long drives through the mountains, taking photographs of Buddhist temples and exploring old neighborhoods. He's just taken up gardening, growing radishes in a planter in his apartment. Until recently, Igarashi, a 27-year-old Japanese television presenter, would have been considered effeminate, even gay. Japanese men have long been expected to live like characters on Mad Men, chasing secretaries, drinking with the boys, and splurging on watches, golf, and new cars.

 

 

Today, Igarashi has a new identity (and plenty of company among young Japanese men) as one of the soushoku danshi—literally translated, "grass-eating boys." Named for their lack of interest in sex and their preference for quieter, less competitive lives, Japan's "herbivores" are provoking a national debate about how the country's economic stagnation since the early 1990s has altered men's behavior.

 

 

Newspapers, magazines, and television shows are newly fixated on the herbivores. "Have men gotten weaker?" was one theme of a recent TV talk show. "Herbivores Aren't So Bad" is the title of a regular column on the Japanese Web site NB Online.

 

 

In this age of bromance and metrosexuals, why all the fuss? The short answer is that grass-eating men are alarming because they are the nexus between two of the biggest challenges facing Japanese society: the declining birth rate and anemic consumption. Herbivores represent an unspoken rebellion against many of the masculine, materialist values associated with Japan's 1980s bubble economy. Media Shakers, a consulting company that is a subsidiary of Dentsu, the country's largest advertising agency, estimates that 60 percent of men in their early 20s and at least 42 percent of men aged 23 to 34 consider themselves grass-eating men. Partner Agent, a Japanese dating agency, found in a survey that 61 percent of unmarried men in their 30s identified themselves as herbivores. Of the 1,000 single men in their 20s and 30s polled by Lifenet, a Japanese life-insurance company, 75 percent described themselves as grass-eating men.

[dasein]

Since World War 2, more and more Japanese women have been joining the work force. The custom was that once they married (which had better be under the age of 30, women would leave the work force and put all of their attentions on home and children. Only once the children had graduated high schools could women return to work.

 

God forbid women should have to make permanent choices in life that foreclose other choices, either family or career, that would interfere with "haveitall" femculture worldwide. Bad, bad, inflexible men, keeping women from "havingitall."

[aj22one]

What the Japanese Grass Feeders actually teach us is that men's inflexibility towards women's desires is actually what causes the death of dating.

 

I think there are abundant examples on this board and in real life that demonstrate that this is false. Both genders have done plenty to cause the "death of dating".

[verhrzn]

God forbid women should have to make permanent choices in life that foreclose other choices, either family or career, that would interfere with "haveitall" femculture worldwide. Bad, bad, inflexible men, keeping women from "havingitall."

 

I see, so men get to have a career and a family, but when women want the same, they're trying to "have it all." And when women say," All right then, I choose career because men in this country make marriage look like indentured servitude," and men react by passively-aggressively claiming they're the ones that don't need women/a family, it's somehow women who are inflexible?? How does you manage to type out such insane logic?

 

 

I think there are abundant examples on this board and in real life that demonstrate that this is false. Both genders have done plenty to cause the "death of dating".

 

Except we're talking specifically about Japanese culture and the Grass Feeder movement.... and the OP opened the thread by declaring that it's just like American men who have given up on dating/sex, because Japanese men aren't "playing by the rules" and frustrating Japanese women. When in fact, my post illustrates that the opposite is the case... Men are preferring to turn asexual than allow Japanese women to have careers and be actual human beings. By men insisting on following the rigid gender roles, they're doing nothing by damaging themselves.

[Queen Zenobia]

I see, so men get to have a career and a family, but when women want the same, they're trying to "have it all." And when women say," All right then, I choose career because men in this country make marriage look like indentured servitude," and men react by passively-aggressively claiming they're the ones that don't need women/a family, it's somehow women who are inflexible?? How does you manage to type out such insane logic?

 

Hmmm...well the reality is that someone has to take a backseat at some point and take on more responsibility for child rearing and housekeeping, unless of course you don't have children or you have a relatively minimalist lifestyle.

 

Women could certainly take the lead and be the primary wage earner and have a career and allow men to be stay at home parents, which of course was only possible relatively recently. But if women took on more financial responsibilities it would necessitate a change in the expectations placed on men as well.

[verhrzn]

Hmmm...well the reality is that someone has to take a backseat at some point and take on more responsibility for child rearing and housekeeping, unless of course you don't have children or you have a relatively minimalist lifestyle.

 

Women could certainly take the lead and be the primary wage earner and have a career and allow men to be stay at home parents, which of course was only possible relatively recently. But if women took on more financial responsibilities it would necessitate a change in the expectations placed on men as well.

 

Perhaps, but I think the "shared responsibility" is still too American of a concept to apply to Japan. In Japan, men have almost NO expectations when it comes to child rearing and housework.

 

Okay, here's a personal example. When I lived in Japan, one of my teachers took me under her wing. She worked very long hours, which is another unique Japanese trade mark; in order to be considered a good worker, you have to put in a LOT of overtime. I'd see my teachers still in the staff room until 10, 11 at night and there at 7 the next morning. In addition to teaching, she had three children. I had dinner at her house numerous times, would often go to the park with her kids, and I never met her husband. Not once. The children were entirely her responsibility, as well as the house work, even though she worked just as many hours as he did.

 

I once suggested to her that I could baby sit so she could have a night off. She was flummoxed by the concept; baby-sitting is incredibly rare, daycare just as much. That's how built into the society the idea of women dedicating themselves to the family is; there are literally no resources for a woman to have a family and put any time into a career.

 

This is obviously an outsider's perspective, but if I had lived long-term in Japan, I wouldn't have been that thrilled about a marriage either. Some marriages are still arranged (my teacher's was, and she was only mid-thirties.) A lot of them, the guy goes out late on the town to wine and dine clients at hostess clubs and soap bars... Monogamy on the part of the male still isn't a wide-spread assumption like it is in the US. On a purely pro/con basis, women really lose out in Japan if they choose family over career.

[dasein]

I see, so men get to have a career and a family, but when women want the same, they're trying to "have it all."

 

When men bear children for nine months, have the same maternal instincts women do, and most importantly, possess the same reproductive legal rights women do, then we can talk. Until then, it's the apples and oranges kind of "insane logic." Men actually have absolutely NO control over reproduction once sperm leaves our bodies, so we have 0 real control over whether we have a family or not. Regardless of what we want, if she wants an abortion, abortion it is. If she wants a child, child it is, together with 18 years of obligation. Men... have... no... reproductive rights other than the right to keep the semen out of the cooter, so that men can "have it all" in the same way women expect to today is an utter illusion. Insane logic my ass, or wasn't this plain distinction between men and women biologically and legally on the womens' studies syllabus? No? Imagine that.

 

And when women say," All right then, I choose career because men in this country make marriage look like indentured servitude," and men react by passively-aggressively claiming they're the ones that don't need women/a family, it's somehow women who are inflexible??

 

Wait, so which gender is griping about the other here? I don't see too many of these herbimen waving placards like feminists do, they are merely opting out of a system that I bet has a lot more in common with our crappy, slanted U.S. marriage system than you are leading us to believe. They have the right to do that. But I see, in modern femculture, you are a villain if you don't do everything women want you to, your rights be damned... do more for women! Tiresome to hear the same damn thing for 50 years. Everything is 100% to blame on men. Broken record.

[johan]

Ha ha. Let them go on strike. I'll take up the slack.

[kaylan]

You often come off as a troll. Your avatar is a favorite of trolls... Although I'm not saying you are a troll.

 

 

 

 

Every civilized nation produces less and less kids and is dealing with the same nightmare. If anything the Japanese women are frustrated there arn't more suitable men... not that these men won't date them.

 

 

 

PUA's are a bunch of guys who do horrible with women. So they waste their time and money memorizing scripts/code words and silly crap that is based on time old common knowledge like ASK HER OUT, MAKE A MOVE, and most importantly BE CONFIDENT. I mean calling flirting NEGING or what ever and making pre made teasing scripts is loserly. Women like Genuine men thats why its best to work off the cuff and not come of like a presentation.

 

Also PUA's are the type of people who would be Grass eaters so it wouldn't really make any difference. It would be guys who wern't getting girls any ways going on strike. While women already complain there arn't any good men so that wouldn't change either. I don't know if you looked around but their is no shortage of single women.

 

Good day to you sir!

^This. All of it. Im in super agreement mode.

 

Grass eaters and PUA are just dudes who did poorly with women and now "shun" them as a way to get back at them. They want to think they had power when they never did. Whining and turning your back does not give you power. Its giving up, which is why those guys end up like Dust's avatar.

 

They are foreveralone.jpg http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2010/239/d/f/forever_alone_by_foreveraloneplz.png

 

It's already happening, marriage will become irrelevant as a social institution in the U.S. sometime in the next thirty years if the trend continues. We are told:

 

It's the economy

This generation is just timid and afraid of commitment

Women don't need men any more.

Young people are self-indulgent and don't want responsibility

 

but we are not told:

 

Men are leaving a very obviously rigged carney game in droves because getting sex no longer requires lifetime servitude.

 

Who will buy her a $10-50k engagement ring?

Who will pay for her $10-50k lavish wedding?

Who will pay for the $5k honeymoon?

Who will take on her credit card debt?

Who will sit by and watch as she "maximizes" her degree by leaving the workplace permanently once she has the first child?

Who will pay for her maid?

Who will pay for her country club dues?

Who will pay for her McMansion full of custom decor?

Who will pay for her $300 per pair shoes?

Who will pay for the kids to have perfect teeth and every possible indulgence a kid could ever want?

Who will stand by helplessly as she gets bored, cheats and then still gets to take half of everything?

Who will pay outrageous "support" payments which are as much "ex support" as they are "child support?"

 

Not I.

Cry moar?

 

Why the hell do I know a bunch of dudes with long term girlfriends and wives who had to do none of that stuff.

Edited January 13, 2012 by kaylan

[kaylan]

Hmmm...well the reality is that someone has to take a backseat at some point and take on more responsibility for child rearing and housekeeping, unless of course you don't have children or you have a relatively minimalist lifestyle.

 

Women could certainly take the lead and be the primary wage earner and have a career and allow men to be stay at home parents, which of course was only possible relatively recently. But if women took on more financial responsibilities it would necessitate a change in the expectations placed on men as well.

Untrue. I know many a dude/girl who were raised in two income homes. Both parents took part in child rearing and cooking and cleaning.

 

Theres no reason men and women cant share the responsibilities of married family life.

 

 

This is obviously an outsider's perspective, but if I had lived long-term in Japan, I wouldn't have been that thrilled about a marriage either. Some marriages are still arranged (my teacher's was, and she was only mid-thirties.) A lot of them, the guy goes out late on the town to wine and dine clients at hostess clubs and soap bars... Monogamy on the part of the male still isn't a wide-spread assumption like it is in the US. On a purely pro/con basis, women really lose out in Japan if they choose family over career.

Stay at home women are losing out too if they never see there husband. Especially if hes out gallivanting with clients and what not. Its not uncommon for these marriages to be rife with cheating. Thats why sex hotels do so well in Japan.

 

Hell, some people even hire professionals to break up their marraige. They basically hire someone whos like a private eye and seducer at the same time. They seduce their spouse so the person then has evidence to divorce and get out of the relationship. Its a shame Japanese avoid any sort of confrontations....but saving face is important in their culture. It is what it is.

 

Btw, Id say a big reason women will date ugly foreigners also has to do with the novelty. Since Japan is so homogeneous and since Western culture is idealized there in some aspects, foreigners can become a novelty. Its a big part of why Asian women in America and Blacks in Germany get so fetishized. People want that rare commodity.

 

But you are also right about Japanese women liking the treatment they receive from foreigners better. One of my good friends senior year was Japanese. She always talked about how she loved the equality she got in American society...and wished Japan was more so like us that respect. She said guys were def more respectful and chivalrous. She also said she liked how flexible our society was with expectations of career and family. People could be who they wanted to be without everyone following a strict life model.

Edited January 13, 2012 by kaylan

[fishtaco]

Fishtaco - I wondered what it would be like over there for a healthy & horny westerner too.

 

Actually I'm Asian. But I'm westernized enough to earn extra bonus points with the locals when I go overseas. Not as much as westerners, but I do get some bonus points.

 

Combined with lowered competition from the locals, due to this grass eaters movement, I bet westerners will enjoy even higher social status for free in the dating scene. But of course, like anything else, an advantage is just that, an advantage. You still need to know how to make use of this higher social status for anything to happen.

 

So if you're white and you like Japanese women, seems like a great opportunity.

 

Me, I like Latinas, so I'd prefer to have this movement happen in Latin America countries, or more conveniently, California where I live. But I'm in a relationship now so it'll do me no good either way.

[Woggle]

What a sad end to a great culture.

 

I do notice that many Japanese women who come to America usually end up with American men and they genuinely do appreciate a man that treats them well. I used to work with a woman who came from Japan and she married a caucasian American man after leaving her abusive husband and could not be happier.

[Taramere]

It would never happen. The only guys that would be swearing off women would be guys who don't get women anyway.

 

Agreed. They would basically just be changing their mindset from "I can't find a woman I like, who likes me back" to "I don't want any woman". The end result would be the same, though.

 

It wouldn't make a blind bit of difference to the women, they will still be chasing after the same guys. It's a dumb idea anyway.

It would become more common for one man to impregnate lots of women, or for women to use sperm donors, and women would partner up to help eachother raise children.

 

Which is of course the classic "women don't need men" militant feminist ideal. I certainly don't think it's what the majority of women would want. Most women who are heterosexual would want a male "other half". However, if the majority of men were making a conscious decision to keep women out of their lives, then that lifestyle would be the practical solution for women who wanted children and companionship.

 

Basically what the OP is suggesting is that men employ passive aggression in an effort to increase female interest or to manipulate women into behaving in certain ways.

 

The whole "I'll show them! I'll reject them and withdraw into myself and then they'll come running after me!!! thing might feel enjoyable for an unhappy or frustrated person to vent about...but the reality is that if people withdraw, others might notice at first and try to pull them out of it, but eventually they'll just shrug and carry on with life without the person.

 

It reminds me of my nephew, when he was really small, and how if he didn't get his own way he would go behind the couch and sulk. I'd carry on doing whatever I was doing and eventually he'd come out from behind the couch and participate again because he found that sitting behind the couch sulking got tedious very quickly.

[Wolf18]

There are similar things going on in among young men in Western Europe. There is for sure a correlation between so called 'feminism' and men being unhappy with the results. A society cannot function with only men and women who try to copy men, the result is across the board a low birth rate, materialism, and a decline in morality.

 

Perhaps its too late to stop the evil plan http://www.savethemales.ca/000107.html

[kaylan]

All I have to say to green eaters and PUAs is this:http://i43.tinypic.com/2vdnvhg.gif

 

P.S. - Note that hes Asian....possibly from Nippon(Japan)? lulz

[Queen Zenobia]

Untrue. I know many a dude/girl who were raised in two income homes. Both parents took part in child rearing and cooking and cleaning.

 

Theres no reason men and women cant share the responsibilities of married family life.

 

 

Perhaps. But, up until age 5 (4 if you send your kids to preschool) someone has to be with the child. Up until the 20th century that was the mother, for a variety of reasons. And even today many people don't like the idea of sending their kids to daycare, and even those that do many stay at home with the child until 2 or so. When multiple children are involved the issue becomes even more complicated. In an equal partnership someone has to take care of the children and take care of the house by extension and someone has to go bring home the bacon as it were. I have never met a couple that had an infant at home and both worked full time.

 

I have no objections to women working outside the home after having children (as my own mother did) and I have no objections to men taking a back seat role in the family. However, whichever parent takes time out to raise the kids, will necessarily make some kind of sacrifice in their careers. It may be a small sacrifice, but it will be a sacrifice nonetheless. Whoever takes on a career will also make a sacrifice (again maybe a small one) as they won't be there for every step of their child growing up.

 

Everything has opportunity costs. You want to be made executive vice president of company x? That means you probably miss out on little Bobby's first steps, first words, maybe even his 6th birthday party. You want to be there for those moments? You probably miss out on that big promotion. If both parents are able to work and take an active role in the home it probably means both have made a sacrifice in their careers. Such are the limitations of modern life, as dasein said, you really can't have it all. Goes for both genders.

Edited January 13, 2012 by Queen Zenobia