Hikikomori

Masaru Emoto, for most of his life, was an ordinary middle-manager for a newspaper. Then one day he stepped out of the shadows to announce that he had discovered a new fundamental force in the universe - emotional water memory.

Check my album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Skeptical Inquirer - https://skepticalinquirer.org/exclusive/a-grain-of-truth-recreating-dr-emotos-rice-experiment/

• Medium blog by James Donner - https://medium.com/@jamesbonner_63058/masaru-emoto-our-spiritual-enlightenment-e6999cf45fde

• Guardian article on What the Bleep Do We Know? - https://www.theguardian.com/science/2005/may/16/g2.science

• Good Therapy - positive intentions - https://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/mindfulness-matters-dr-emoto-studies-reveal-power-of-positive-emotion-012914

• The Wellness Enterprise - https://thewellnessenterprise.com/emoto/

• The Irish Times - https://www.irishtimes.com/news/science/the-pseudoscience-of-creating-beautiful-or-ugly-water-1.574583

• Neurologica article on Emoto - https://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/the-pseudoscience-of-masaru-emoto/

• Rational Wiki - https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Masaru_Emoto

• Hado World - https://hado.com/ihm/

• Google Patents - Automated computerized magnetic resonance detector and analyzer

• The website for Masaru Emoto

• The website for the Emoto Peace Project

• Wikipedia - Masaru Emoto

• The Cut - That's Not How Physical Reality Works, Gwyneth

We continue covering the environmental disaster that resulted in Minamata Disease, how those responsible knowingly continued to harm all living things around them with mercury, and the legacy that the dozens of mass poisonings by corporations left on Japan

Today's guest is Hannah Lane! You can find her via her Instagram page, and she is also the co-host of our horror movie review podcast that we do together, Not Another Film podcast.

Check my album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Ministry of the Environment - Minamata Disease

• Minamata, by W Eugene Smith and Aileen M Smith

• National Institute of Minamata Disease - What We Have Learned from the Experience of Minamata Disease

• Japan at the Crossroads: Conflict and Compromise after Anpo, by Nick Kapur (2018)

• The Lancet - Japan remembers Minamata, by J McCurry

• PubMed - Minamata disease: methylmercury poisoning in Japan caused by environmental pollution, by M Harada

• Kumamoto Prefectural Government - Minamata Disease for Beginners

• Wikipedia - Four Big Pollution Diseases

• Wikipedia - Itai-Itai Disease

• Wikipedia - Minamata Disease

• Wikipedia - Niigata Minamata Disease

We start a 2-parter on what might be the most terrifying man-made environmental disaster in Japanese history, namely the purposeful, prolonged and secret dumping of toxic waste into coastal waters by multiple Japanese chemical companies, some of which are still around and thriving.

Today's guest is Hannah Lane! You can find her via her Instagram page, and she is also the co-host of our horror movie review podcast that we do together, Not Another Film podcast.

Check my album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Ministry of the Environment - Minamata Disease

• Minamata, by W Eugene Smith and Aileen M Smith

• National Institute of Minamata Disease - What We Have Learned from the Experience of Minamata Disease

• Japan at the Crossroads: Conflict and Compromise after Anpo, by Nick Kapur (2018)

• The Lancet - Japan remembers Minamata, by J McCurry

• PubMed - Minamata disease: methylmercury poisoning in Japan caused by environmental pollution, by M Harada

• Kumamoto Prefectural Government - Minamata Disease for Beginners

• Wikipedia - Four Big Pollution Diseases

• Wikipedia - Itai-Itai Disease

• Wikipedia - Minamata Disease

• Wikipedia - Niigata Minamata Disease

Today's guest is Hannah Lane! You can find her via her Instagram page, and she is also the co-host of our horror movie review podcast that we do together, Not Another Film podcast.

Check my album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Ryukyu Shimpo - Editorial: Sixty years after Miyamori Elementary School plane crash, the dangerous conditions have not changed

• New York Times - 3 Dead Marines and a Secret of Wartime Okinawa

• Guardian - US air force Osprey crash wreckage and remains of five crew found off Japan

• Wikipedia - Protests of US military presence in Okinawa

• The Interpreter - Okinawa's vocal anti-US military base movement

• Associated Press - Japan's top court orders Okinawa to allow a divisive government plan to build US military runways

The continued US military presence in Okinawa has long been a complex and thorny issue, particularly for the locals who frequently suffer the consequences of their occupation in 1945 never quite ending.

We look at the moments over the past 80 years that have proven pivotal to the anti-base movement in Okinawa.

Today's guest is Hannah Lane! You can find her via her Instagram page, and she is also the co-host of our horror movie review podcast that we do together, Not Another Film podcast.

Check my album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Ryukyu Shimpo - Editorial: Sixty years after Miyamori Elementary School plane crash, the dangerous conditions have not changed

• New York Times - 3 Dead Marines and a Secret of Wartime Okinawa

• Guardian - US air force Osprey crash wreckage and remains of five crew found off Japan

• Wikipedia - Protests of US military presence in Okinawa

• The Interpreter - Okinawa's vocal anti-US military base movement

• Associated Press - Japan's top court orders Okinawa to allow a divisive government plan to build US military runways

Following from the high-profile case of Mai Watanabe, aka Itadaki-Joshi, we look at the reason why she conned millions of yen - to support her favourite host.

Today's guest is Hannah Lane! You can find her via her Instagram page, and she is also the co-host of our horror movie review podcast that we do together, Not Another Film podcast.

Check my album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Japan Times - How Japan's host clubs trap young women under mountains of debt

• Asahi Shimbun - Host-addicted 'sugar baby' gets 9-year prison term for fraud

• Asahi Shimbun - 'Host crazy' women fall into debt hell through pay-later system

• Mainichi Shimbun - Japan host clubs' shady dealings that can lead women to prostitution must stop

• Japan Times - How Japan's host clubs trap young women under mountains of debt

• Guardian - 'Host clubs' in Tokyo force women into sex work to pay off huge debts

• South China Morning Post - From 'princess' to prostitute: how Japan's host clubs are driving young women into debt and sex work

• Japan Times (Jake Adelstein) - Host clubs: a hotbed of human trafficking

• News on Japan - Tokyo tax office scandal: Three female employees busted working in nightclubs

• Kyodo News - Ex-Kabukicho host club worker allegedly forced customer into prostitution

• Tokyo Reporter - Tokyo cops bust Korean hostess club frequented by celebs on immigration charges

• Nil Nilgiree (YouTube) - The Dark Reality of Japanese Host Clubs

• The Week - Why Japan is clamping down on host clubs

• The Economist - The controversial cult of the host club in Japan

• Japan Times - Japan's police crack down on host clubs

• Wikipedia - Host and hostess clubs

• Host x Host

• Institute for Asian Studies - Selling Intimacy under Post-Industrial Capitalism: An Ethnography of Japanese Host Clubs

Today we look at the evolution of "compensated dating" into its modern form, "Papa-Katsu", where women seek out sugar daddies as a form of sex work. We also consider the con-artist Mai Watanabe, known more widely as Itadaki Joshi, who made headlines across the world for her merciless acts of fraud.

Today's guest is Hannah Lane! You can find her via her Instagram page, and she is also the co-host of our horror movie review podcast that we do together, Not Another Film podcast.

Check my new album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Japan Times - 'Sugar Baby Riri' gets nine-year prison term over romance scam

• Asahi Shimbun - Host-addicted 'sugar baby' gets 9-year prison term for fraud

• Business Insider - Japanese "sugar baby" gets 9 years for scamming men out of 155 million yen

• Fortune - Japanese 'sugar baby' sent to prison for swindling men out of $1 million and selling a guide on how to do it: 'She took advantage of feelings for her'

• Unseen Japan - "Sugar Baby Riri" – and Her Host – Face Jail Time for Fraud

• Japan Today - Foreign women catching on to 'papa-katsu' as a means of economic survival

• YouTube - Japanalysis - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSDGv2DvJXg

• YouTube - Why Why Japan - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93VdR2Q6MIE

Content Warning: Mass Murder

It's rough.

Today's guest is Hannah Lane! You can find her via her Instagram page, and she is also the co-host of our horror movie review podcast that we do together, Not Another Film podcast.

Check my new album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Sankei News - The suspect in the attack, Uematsu, was prejudiced against people with disabilities

• Sankei News - Residents rescue tied up staff members and cut cable ties with scissors to prevent further damage

• News PostSever - Suspect Uematsu, who apprenticed to a tattoo artist, was excommunicated after talking about killing everyone

• Mainichi Shimbun - Sagamihara murder - Victim's sister: "I can't reveal the name"

• Mainichi Shimbun - 3 arrested for alleged habitual abuse of disabled Osaka Pref. care home resident who died

• Nikkan Gendai - "I admire strong people" An acquaintance talks about the suspect who murdered 45 people in Sagamihara

• Tokyo Shimbun - Testimonies of the Sagamihara Massacre Incident: The bright central presence "Sato-kun"

• Aljazeera - Ex-employee stabs 19 people to death in Japan care home

• Kyodo News - Japan care home requires sterilization of mentally disabled couples

• BBC News - Tokyo Paralympics: The lowdown on being disabled in Japan

• Asahi Shimbun - U.N. committee urges Japan to revise laws for disabled people

• WION - Japan's disabled lawmakers fight to end the invisibility of people with disabilities

• Tokyo Weekender - Why is Japan Still Biased Against People with Disabilities?

• Science Direct - Disability policies in Japan and Sweden: A comparative perspective

• TokyoDev - Living with a disability in Japan

• Tofugu - Hidden No More: What Happens When The Intellectually Disabled Join Japanese Society

• Japan Times - 90% in Japan feel discrimination against disabled exists, survey finds

• Life Where I'm From X - Living in Japan with a Physical Disability

• Wikipedia - Sagamihara Stabbings

Following on from the previous episode's theme of eugenics in Japan, we look at how individuals who express eugenic beliefs can impact the world around them in horrific, horrific ways.

Today's guest is Hannah Lane! You can find her via her Instagram page, and she is also the co-host of our horror movie review podcast that we do together, Not Another Film podcast.

Check my new album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Sankei News - The suspect in the attack, Uematsu, was prejudiced against people with disabilities

• Sankei News - Residents rescue tied up staff members and cut cable ties with scissors to prevent further damage

• News PostSever - Suspect Uematsu, who apprenticed to a tattoo artist, was excommunicated after talking about killing everyone

• Mainichi Shimbun - Sagamihara murder - Victim's sister: "I can't reveal the name"

• Mainichi Shimbun - 3 arrested for alleged habitual abuse of disabled Osaka Pref. care home resident who died

• Nikkan Gendai - "I admire strong people" An acquaintance talks about the suspect who murdered 45 people in Sagamihara

• Tokyo Shimbun - Testimonies of the Sagamihara Massacre Incident: The bright central presence "Sato-kun"

• Aljazeera - Ex-employee stabs 19 people to death in Japan care home

• Kyodo News - Japan care home requires sterilization of mentally disabled couples

• BBC News - Tokyo Paralympics: The lowdown on being disabled in Japan

• Asahi Shimbun - U.N. committee urges Japan to revise laws for disabled people

• WION - Japan's disabled lawmakers fight to end the invisibility of people with disabilities

• Tokyo Weekender - Why is Japan Still Biased Against People with Disabilities?

• Science Direct - Disability policies in Japan and Sweden: A comparative perspective

• TokyoDev - Living with a disability in Japan

• Tofugu - Hidden No More: What Happens When The Intellectually Disabled Join Japanese Society

• Japan Times - 90% in Japan feel discrimination against disabled exists, survey finds

• Life Where I'm From X - Living in Japan with a Physical Disability

• Wikipedia - Sagamihara Stabbings

In 1948 the Japanese Government, still under firm control by the Allied occupation forces, wrote into law the Eugenic Protection Law. While this law was similar to the myriad of pro-eugenic laws across the world, Japan's eugenics law is notable for having been only repealed in the 90s.

Today's guest is Kieran Bennett! You can follow him via his Twitter profile, or check out his portfolio of video editing work at kgbennett.myportfolio.com.

Check my new album, Ruined Numbers, for sale on Bandcamp! It's an album of acoustic arrangements of Final Fantasy music. You can also stream the album on Spotify or YouTube Music. Enjoy!

You can also find me on Twitter @sequencepod, or you can listen to my other podcasts Final Fanservice and Not Another Film on any big podcast app.

Sources:

• Human Rights Watch - Japan: Compelled Sterilization of Transgender People

• Human Rights Watch - Japan Court Rules Against Mandatory Transgender Sterilization

• Japan Times - Some duped into sterilization surgery under eugenics law, parliament report says

• Japan Times - Lawyers set up hotlines for victims of 1948-1996 eugenics law

• AP - Japan's top court strikes down required sterilization surgery to officially change gender

• Takashi Tsuchiya of Osaka City University - Eugenic Sterilizations in Japan and Recent Demands for Apology: A Report

• Asahi Shimbun - Tokyo court rejects bid for compensation over sterilization

• Asahi Shimbun - Court denies compensation for unconstitutional sterilization

• Guardian - Japan court awards damages to victims of forced sterilisation for first time

• Guardian - Anger in Japan as report reveals children were forcibly sterilised

• Independent - Japan to pay compensation to people sterilised under eugenics law modelled on Nazi programmes

• Independent - Japanese woman forcibly sterilised as teenager suing government for breach of human rights

• BBC News - Japan sterilisation law victims included nine-year-olds

• Huffington Post - Japan Publishes Report Detailing 25,000 Forced Sterilizations On Citizens, Including 9-Year-Olds

• Time - Japan Apologizes To Victims Of Forced Sterilization And Promises Compensation

• Wikipedia - Eugenics in Japan