Host clubs in Japan have come under fire for forcing some of their best customers – mostly young women – into bankruptcy. Under a proposed revision to Japan’s entertainment law, businesses caught operating illicitly – including promoting the illusion of love – will be subject to whopping fines.
Host clubs are nightlife businesses where young men entertain (接待; settai) customers, often young women, by sitting and drinking with them at their tables. Patrons who become smitten with a host end up buying expensive items, such as overpriced champagne, to help their oshi become the number one earner at a club. Hosts often convince women they’re in romantic relationships to encourage this behavior.
Many hosts and their clubs have encouraged women to accumulate huge debts using the urikakekin (売掛金) system, a sort of payday loan system in which customers use credit that’s due the next month. Some hosts have pressured their customers into prostitution – both legal and illegal forms – to make good on those debts.
As stories abound in Japanese media of women taking up street prostitution or working in legal sex businesses – soaplands, delivery health, etc. – to fund their host club habits, politicians have eyed ways to curb these clubs’ worst abuses.
Under the proposed revisions to the company’s Entertainment (fuuzoku) Law, which governs host clubs, cabaret clubs, and other nightlife businesses, businesses suspected of engaging in “romance trade” – fostering a nonexistent romantic relationship to boost sales – could be shut down.
The changes would also impose criminal penalties for coercing customers into sex work to pay off urikakekin or for taking kickbacks from legal sex businesses for introducing customers. The penalty could include up to six months in jail and a one million yen (USD $6,300) fine.
Furthermore, a host club that operates without the correct Entertainment license would face stiffer fines, with individuals facing up to five years in jail and a 10 million yen ($63,300) fine. Meanwhile, the business itself could face a whopping 300 million yen ($1.89M) fine.
The government expects to introduce the legislation at the next regular session in January 2025.
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