Watched a documentary about the japanese mafia!

I have been watching a lot of Australian television these days.(Sick and tired of American Television)


I seem to have taken a liking to Australia network,Especially the documentary series . American television is no good anymore.Most American television has become shallow,senseless,full of worthless reality shows of the downright scummy order.


Australian television on the other hand is balanced with the right mix of art related programs,politics,science,documentaries etc etc..
Also,much to my relief, there are no repetitive pharmaceutical commercials on Australian television.

I am tired of the constant commercials on American television that end with, "Talk to your physician about yada yada yada drug" and me being in the cadre of the "physicians" that drug companies want all the viewers to talk to .. hmmmm.big sigh..
I know what those drugs can do to a human body.I know how the ads cleverly misrepresent information ..oh boy! Poor lil viewers actually believe those good-for-nothing commercials and come pestering me - They are not really aware of all the actual facts about each drug and yet they think that some drug company advertisement is to be taken at face value.I digress!

Anyways, coming back to Australian television.
I particularly like this program called FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT.Primarily because it is courageous journalism bringing to you stories from all over the world..
Very recently,prolly last week, I watched this documentary on the Japanese mafia..yakuza

Clearly, this documentary left me disturbed for a long bit after i finished watching it.
It is a grim scenario.Sigh!
In fact,Each time that i watch a documentary about any kind of mafia or drug trafficking or human trafficking scenario in any country, I get depressed.
These mafia stories are not a joke.. it is a dangerous game.. a dangerous life..much afar from the safe childhood and safe and clean adult life i am leading..IT SCARES ME to watch the ugly-confused-whirlpool lives of those involved in sex,drugs and mafia.
Funnily(NOT-so-funnily,actually)..all three co-exist most of the time..They tend to be seen together..It is the 'mess' part of it all that disturbs me the most.


It is like quicksand and once people get into this mess they can't get out and sadly, when get initiated into this lifestyle , they are far too young to know any better..Most of them are in their teens..early teens even..

It suddenly reminded me of the poor boys that are being pumped from all over the world into the Taliban..What these boy-men are fighting for?They themselves don't know..All they know is that they will now get some food to eat..Most poverty stricken dirt poor african moslem kids are prone/target to this kind of Taliban human trafficking mafia business..pch.. scares me once again

Anyways, coming back to the JAPANESE MAFIA documentary

As is usual with me,I managed to catch this documentary only at the fag end of it.. much like most all the other programs that i accidentally come across while i am surfing channels in the middle of cooking or doing other chores in the meager hours apart from work that I get to spend at home.

There was one particular section of the documentary that disturbed me the most.It is this part where this daughter(shoko tendo?) of this mafia man ...now probably in her 20s or 30s (I just found out, she is in her 40s-from the program transcript) describes her messy life.

She starts the story with when her father was a henchman mafia boss and how someone cut their finger and gave it to him or some such..Again, i was only running around the living room while this part was running on TV.So didn't quiet manage to read the subtitles and she was speaking only in japanese and not in english.
It was only when i read the word CUT FINGER that i got alarmed and gave it my full attention.I gave up what i was doing in the kitchen and actually sat down to watch it further(whatever was left of the running time anyways)
She also then proceeds to shows her naked body to the camera.It is covered fully by tattoos as is tradition in the japanese mafia clan.Each clan has their own type of full body tattooing.Very artistic and thus Ironic and strangely again, It is scary..


What is most disenchanting is the POKER FACE with which she describes the whole thing,
her whole life,
as if she is dead on the inside,
as if nothing matters anymore,
as if cut fingers are nothing but just cut fingers,
as if it is the life of someone else she is describing,

She is so emotionally cut off, disconnected, when she describes this, that it disturbs me to the core.I just want to go and hug her and make her human again. Like become human so easily after years and years of abuse.Everybody bears the burden of their birth circumstances and childhood environment.

She then talks about how by the time she reaches her early teens she is already the girlfriend of another mafia guy and how he would first inject her with drugs or force her to take them and then how they would have sex all day and then how he would beat her up very brutally and just as she talks about being brutally beaten up, I am trying to look closely at her eyes to see a hint of a tear.No tear..the tears dried up long ago i guess..I am alarmed

I am suddenly reminded of Godfather-The movie..The italian mafia are a grim reality..a big grim reality.

I often wonder if the mafia arises from utter poverty..Utter poverty ,where 'life' doesn't matter anymore..Where a poor person's life is dispensable..it becomes dispensable..The poor person has nothing to lose anyways when his life is spent in squalor.. hmmmm

To read more about his documentary or watch video clips of it>go here

http://www.abc.net.au/foreign/content/2009/s2719326.htm

MARK WILLACY is the brave foreign correspondent who shows us this story..I think all trash journalists who sensationalize worthless news needs to learn and get inspired from such REAL JOURNALISTS..Mark willacy,in this time and day still understands the concept of what the job description of a real journalists constitutes of and adheres to doing what he is supposed to do as journalists.


If you want to watch video clips you can go here

http://www.abc.net.au/reslib/200910/r456657_2234003.flv


Since I only caught the fag end of the documentary, I went and read the transcript of this documentary on the australian television website and realize that i missed most of it..I hope they re-telecast this documentary. I would so like to see the whole of it and then get scared some more

This documentary is a MUST WATCH in my opinion.

By the way,even if they want to rehabilitate the 80,000 odd mafia gang members,how would they go about it?
For one, all of them would be so messed up in their heads that no amount of psychotherapy would work for them.