Young Virginity in Japan and in the United States

The increase in young men not having sex in Japan, reported by CNN, mirrors what is happening internationally. In the United States as well, there’s been a similar rise in young-male virginity (18-30 age group), up from 15 percent in 1989 to 28 percent in 2018. The percent of US male virgins is now higher than the percent of female virgins (18 percent). These are data from the General Social Survey published by the Washington Post.

In Japan, these figures are close. Roughly a decade ago, 20 percent of males 18-30 were virgins; today, that number is 25.8 percent. Japanese females in this age group were less experienced (21.7 percent virgins) than the males a decade ago; today, the females are even less experienced than before (but more experienced than the males: 24.1 percent of the females are virgins). Same as in the US. In both countries, in both genders, there is a rise in sexual inexperience.

Astonishing Virginity-Related Statistics

What’s causing these astonishing increases in the sexual inexperience of the young?

Common to both countries are huge increases in porn consumption. So, they get off in the bathroom and don’t need partners? No. I think it’s more complex than that.

Porn Themes

What is interesting about porn is the themes that people choose to download. It’s usually not plain-vanilla generic sex but themed. And the themes people choose are the opposite of being nice-nice in public. They are forbidden, tabued themes, in other words.

An example: what themes do women in the various US states download? According to Pornhub data, in the US Southwest and California, it’s “lesbian.” In Idaho and Wyoming, it’s “threesome.” In the American South, it’s “ebony.” And not just any old ebony. In Arkansas and Louisiana, it’s “ebony lesbians.” In Florida, it’s “ebony threesome.”

And here is the interesting part: In Mississippi, Alabama, and South Carolina, the favorite theme, relative to what women elsewhere are watching, is “big black dick.” If there is one theme that women in these states are not encouraged to articulate at dinner parties, it’s “big black dick” (or BBC, Big Black Cock, as it is known in the industry).

Results for Japan are also interesting: Pornhub says that women in Japan watch “pissing” 123 percent more than do women elsewhere in the world. Golden showers. Japanese women tend to shelter at home. To discover that golden showers are their secret fantasy theme is discovering that they, like women and men everywhere, have dark-side fantasy lives that streaming porn in the privacy of their bedrooms brings out.

How do we get from BBC and golden showers to sexual inexperience? The link may be that, for both young men and women, porn alerts them to their fondness for everything that is deeply tabued, stuff that they are definitely not going to experience on their first overnight. Young people cling to the fantasy. They are aroused by the fantasy, but not by the idea of Sally or Billy, with their bad breath and pimples, in front of them.