This is tangentially related but fascinating. A terrific movie called Minbo came out in Japan thirty or so years ago. It's about the Yakuza and not very flattering. The director was stabbed at the premier. Then, later, died of suicide in very suspicious circumstances.<p><a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minbo" rel="nofollow">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minbo</a><p>All his movies were terrific.
You can watch a fictional(ized?) series (Tokyo Vice) about and produced by the author Jake Adelstein on HBO. I’ve watched the first season, season 2 recently released.
As mentioned in several other comments, the numbers of yakuza members have reduced significantly in the 25 years since this article was published.<p>An often unmentioned aspect of these gangs is that many people end up in them due to the ongoing discrimination against Japanese people of buraku descent:<p><a href="https://www.kcpinternational.com/2021/09/the-burakumin-of-japan/" rel="nofollow">https://www.kcpinternational.com/2021/09/the-burakumin-of-ja...</a><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakuza#Burakumin" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakuza#Burakumin</a><p>The buraku are not genetically distinct from other yamato Japanese, they were just stigmatized due to buddhist concepts of "impurity", and an effort to replicate the "untouchable" practices of India while importing buddhism.<p>As such, in the modern world, they often had little other opportunity in life outside of yakuza membership.<p>Many yakuza practices are violent and abusive, and I don't want to offer any apologetics for those practices. But like a lot of discussion of crime, the root cause (mostly poverty) is often overlooked, and the elimination of poverty and lack of opportunity downplayed as a possible solution.
FEDS magazine is probably the closest US equivalent<p><a href="https://youtu.be/-KYMn8Pwygw" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/-KYMn8Pwygw</a>
The article seems to glorify Yakuza. However, most sources indicate Yakuza are in decline.
"but by 2022 it had only 11,400 members and 11,000 quasi-members."
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakuza" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakuza</a> and <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20230329161113/https://www.npa.go.jp/sosikihanzai/R04sotaijousei/R4jousei.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://web.archive.org/web/20230329161113/https://www.npa.g...</a><p>Can find plenty of other articles on internet showing the same trend.
By way of comparison, <a href="https://www.insideprison.com/regional_gang_activity_county.asp?ID=1892" rel="nofollow">https://www.insideprison.com/regional_gang_activity_county.a...</a> indicates about 20k gang members in NYC alone.
Related, "Tokyo Vice: An American Reporter on the Police Beat in Japan" by by Jake Adelstein is absolutely fascinating. So too is the drama produced by HBO based on the book, but I am partial to the book. Adelstein becomes friendly with the Yakuza and comes to understand them. Very eye opening.
> A tasteful photo spread features Yamaguchi-gumi members making their first annual visit to a hatsumode, a Shinto shrine, and pounding rice cakes<p>A hatsumode is not a Shinto shrine, but the first visit to a shrine on New Years. Getting this wrong makes me doubt the rest of this article.
Jake Adelstein, the author, just released his best book to date in my opinion:<p>the last Yakuza<p><a href="https://a.co/d/gsAFYw8" rel="nofollow">https://a.co/d/gsAFYw8</a><p>Yakuza are disappearing, the government drowned them in forms, fines, imprisonment and attacked their supporters
We now know that mafias are endorsed by the (deep) state.<p>This is after the situation in Salvador where the government has apparently jailed every single gang member and murder rates fell to average Latin American rates.<p>If Japan wanted Yakuza to go they would just put all of them behind bars.
>Myway Publishing is ceasing publication of Gekkan Jitsuwa Document, a monthly tabloid that covers (and caters to) Japan’s organized crime members. The last issue (May) will hit newsstands on March 29. (2017)<p>So ya. I would have subscribed tho.
I really hate that people glorificate ilegal activity. I'm from Mexico and now we've a big problem with Cartels, people can't work because cartels extortion them, and now they commit terrorist acts to civilian towns with dronebombs. That's not cool, but in Mexico there are also Narco corridos, that glorificates narcotrafic. It sucks, there are no place for criminal in a civilized country. They have to be hated not loved.<p>Also<p>>evil foreign criminals<p>Like who?
Interesting timing.<p>Just watching 'Tokyo Vice'[1] on Amazon Prime now.<p>There was an episode or two where Jake is chasing down a Yakusa Fan Magazine author to get intel on Tozawa.<p>Amazing Show! Reminds me a bit of 'The Wire'.<p>1. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Tokyo-Vice-Season-1/dp/B0B73QR4TM" rel="nofollow">https://www.amazon.com/Tokyo-Vice-Season-1/dp/B0B73QR4TM</a>