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moyashi
May 19, 2002, 19:22
The boso-zoku also referred to in the past as the "?? nari-zolu ??" are also an interesting segment of the Japanese backside culture.

The boso-zoku are normally young boys between the ages of 14-21. Although 20 is the official adulthood age in Japan some of the leaders continue on until they can find the next leader to hand over control of the group to.

Most of these boys have very little schooling with some having even dropped out of junior high school. (Schooling will be another thread).

boso-zoku like to drive extremely slowly (10-20 km) even on highways.
boso-zoku will also be agreeable to have it out with you if you have any complaints about their driving.

90% of boso-zoku don't have a drivers license or even a registered vehicle. (driving age in Japan is 18 with the condition or having graduated or dropped out of high school).

They love driving in packs with at least 3-6 motorcycles to protect the vangard and the rear. With a car count of 2-5. Hokkaido is back to reality lately!

The police do go on boso-zoku clean up campaigns but these are seriously hillarious with a mini k-car (500cc) chasing after a big sedan (3+liter) were the sedan drives slow enough for the police to follow. Down south since their have been many incidences of boso-zoku crashing through toll booths ... efforts have increased but still ... 30-40 cars versus 3-4 patrol cars is just to much to watch as a serious crime prevention effort on the police's part.

Why .... :D ... don't ask me!!! I roll over in laughter when I watch the police follow a group with the police on their horns telling them to pull over ... like they would really just be so willing to ruin their night out?

10 years ago they were very strong in numbers. Here in Sapporo a battle was fought out at the wharf with an unaccountable number of motorcycles and with 150 cars versus a 75 car team (5 passengers per car) ... that night luckly only 1 boy died but various hospitals were busy stiching and bandaging wounds from "lead pipes, baseball bats, and wooden swords".

Recently Sapporo only suffers from 3-6 bikes and 3-6 car teams.

boso-zoku teams are normally backed with yakazu sponsorship. Each boso-zoku team has a yakuza gumi (errr family ... if I may borrow from the Italian usage) who also have the luxury of providing spending money and problem solving. IF 2 teams get too wild and have too many fights, the yakuza gumis will gather to discuss what should be done. Thereby, keeping the police out.

At the age of 20 most kids graduate and move on to hard larbor jobs such as construction work and truck driving while the more hard core members will graduate and join the sponsoring yakuza gumi.

Aren't their any girls in the teams?
Nope! they have their own organization and rules.
Of course, they go along with the boys and later they too will graduate to similar jobs and / or marry a yakuza.
The girls are simply called "ladies" with their Hokkaido counter-parts called "pinko's" ... pinko might have come from a TV talento "Izumi Pinko" but ... I haven't been able to track that done for sure yet.

hehe ... yep I have a bunch of graduate boso-zoku friends! Actually just played a double-header game with a whole slew of them. LOL ... ex-girlfriend broke up with me (well, errr, at least one of the reasons) because of my associations with this baseball group. LOL ... they all work as carpenters, plumbers, road construction now ... poor as hell ... but a pretty well mannered crew if you ask me!


ooops another long winded thread!
:wave:

Yair Lahav
May 19, 2002, 23:40
Moyashi,

Where did the parents disappear from this picture? :-(

larry_s
May 20, 2002, 00:52
So girls form similar groups. Which kind of activities do they engage in?

moyashi
May 20, 2002, 10:15
@parents
Good Question!
Some don't know, some don't care, some just hope it's a passing phase, some just can't deal with unruly kids I guess, and some just hope that their kids will wisen up. This could end being another thread on parenting. So, I'll stop.

@girls groups
Hmmm ... shop lifting, fighting between teams, raping other girls.
Basically, they get together, hang out, work in the Soap district, or sniff thiner and do drugs at times.

Not a pretty picture is it.

:(

larry_s
May 20, 2002, 20:28
So Japanese youngsters aren't so different from their Western counterparts after all...
:eek:

moyashi
May 20, 2002, 22:17
No they aren't at all.

Just thank goodness these bands of restless boys are no where like the drug gangs back in the States.

deborah gormley
May 21, 2002, 08:08
:blush: :blush:

The girl gangs are as bad as the boys, and then thet could all get married and live so called normal lives and pretend that this never happened, wow!!, now thats the scary bit, Is it illegal to be a member of these groupes? or because the members are so young are they dismissed as children and get a slap on the wrist?:eek:

thomas
May 21, 2002, 09:01
I'd say that "membership" in such groups is not illegal as long as the whole group is not illegal. If one or more of them commit criminal acts, then they'll be held responsible individually.

As for juvenile crimes: Moyashi will know more about that, but juvenile laws have been revised not so long ago. I remember there's a whole section at this forum focusing on that topic...

=> Take a look at the following forum: http://forum.japanreference.com/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=10
:bow:

moyashi
May 21, 2002, 10:31
Juvenille crimes are definitely on the up (errr at least in the news).

The stories I've heard regarding the Ladies are pretty retched, the boys are pretty simple and just stickt o fighting.

Police and Boso-zoku
Here's a pretty typical situation::::
the Boso-zoku are out for a typical parade drive, the police decide to get a little frisky and snag a boy riding a motorcycle (lol ... ones in cars get away always it seems). The boy gets pulled to the station, a guardian or parent shows up and apologizes, the police reprimand the boy and the adult. The boys unregistered bike gets returned as long as it wasn't stolen. The boy since he's a juvenile gets no punishment. And still can get a license as scheduled.

pretty cool eh!

deborah gormley
May 23, 2002, 07:36
Just read some of the issues on the forum Thomas recomended, and now I sort of get whats happening.:happy:



Surely there must be an tougher way of dealing with the Bosozoku gangs, where I live we have a (armed) gang which sorts out all the nasty boys which steal cars, then they burn them to conceal fingerprints ect; and as for the young bike riders, we have very few, because they are more frightened of the (armed) gangs than they are of the police, the police arrest and charge the nasty youths with theft and/or driving without a licence and anything else they can pin on them, but the peoples gang (I dont know any other way to discribe them), get revenge for crimes to thier people, which could consist of anything (depending on the crime) from a beaten to a "leave the country" notice, I would not wish that on your country of course, but here it proves to be a deterant from crime.


Hope that made sence, and I went off on a tanjent.lol

moyashi
May 23, 2002, 08:51
The police aren't serious enough to stop the boso-zoku. I wonder if it's bribe money from the yakuza or just allowing social pressure relief for rebels?

I'm American, but interesting ... I wonder if Japan is my country now?

lynch mobs and vigiantes ... hmmm ... yes much more scary than the police. Not nice but definitely a detereant.

tangent ... hehe ... been trying my best to stay on the issues here at these forums since I'm a pro at that :D

deborah gormley
May 24, 2002, 06:24
hmmmm bribe money, that sounds realistic, or maybe its a case of "let them go and they will distroy each other" hmmm or the thought of reprisial from such nortorious gangs gives them goose bumps, now I'v got to many options here lolol, ahhh well I'll work it all out soon with your wide knowledge and your patience,


Moyashi cant believe your American, you belong in Japan with the best of them:bow: :bow:

moyashi
May 24, 2002, 08:34
:D I grew up near the Canadian border and watched Canadian TV a lot. I wonder if that has helped in my salvation from the American curse. :)

Thanks for the kind words.

hehe ... OSEIJI (oh-say-G) = polishing the apple / giving praise to a person ;)


@topic
Yes, I'm pretty sure all those play apart of why the police don't get serious.
Unless, they're jsut plain lazy ???

thomas
Dec 18, 2002, 16:48
It seems that at least one city takes a stance against bosozoku.

Hiroshima Pref stiffens ordinance on motorbike gangs

=> http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=2&id=243071

Hiroshima takes aim at 'bosozoku'

The revised ordinance, enacted Tuesday and taking effect April 1, is Japan's first aimed at breaking ties between biker gangs and underworld syndicates by imposing penalties, including imprisonment, on those who use the yakuza to force young people to join biker gangs, according to the assembly.

The new ordinance forbids coercing people to join such gangs and obstructing those who did from leaving. It also prohibits gangs from associating with designated underworld syndicates and bans the mob from collecting money from the gangs.

Those who violate the ordinance will be subject to a maximum of six months in prison and a maximum penalty of 300,000 yen.

=> http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20021218a9.htm

Who will have the guts to enforce the bill?

deborah gormley
Dec 19, 2002, 07:59
Hmm, there's no excuse for being lazy now!! the police in that perfecture are now being given no choice but to arrest and prosecute these gangs, I do hope they know what they are doing, it sounds pretty dangerous to me, I also hope that the bosozuku dont decide to go on the "attack to survive" mode and it all gets dealt with in an orderly and safe manner:bow:

Hairyneville
Dec 20, 2002, 00:45
Send in the angry postal workers. That'll sort 'em out. . .

thomas
Jan 23, 2003, 20:27
Here's another one on bosozoku:

Gang tortures boys with wasabi, chili peppers

A gang of 10 Tokyo youths has been busted for brutally torturing members of a rival group -- with wasabi, mustard and other hot sauces, police said Thursday.

The arrested 18-year-old high school student and fellow members of his biker gang group reportedly tried to squeeze money from seven youths they ambushed on the street of Tokyo's Koto-ku last year.

Police said the group confined the seven victims in cars after accosting them at around 4 a.m. on May 29. They then falsely accused the boys of stealing a motorbike from a member of their gang and demanded 2.7 million yen in compensation.

Over the next four hours, the student and nine others tortured the captured youths by forcing them to eat large amounts of wasabi, mustard and chili peppers and stuck adhesive tapes over their mouths. They also squeezed wasabi and mustard into the victims' noses and dropped chili sauce into their eyes.

=> http://mdn.mainichi.co.jp/news/20030123p2a00m0dm006000c.html

http://www.messygourmet.com/img/wasabi.jpg

deborah gormley
Jan 26, 2003, 10:19
@ haiaryneville, hahaha
@boso-zoku,,,,,,,,,,, now thats torture!! :eek: :mad:

thomas
Feb 20, 2003, 05:29
I found an interesting Japanese site about bosozoku (translate it with Excite.co.jp (http://www.japanreference.com/cgi-bin/jump.cgi?ID=3704)'s tool), expanding on their criminal activities as well as their right-wing connections

=> http://www.jingai.com/bosozoku.html

http://www.jingai.com/bosozoku_002.jpg