Today's fake: 'professional seducers'

Courtesy Melissa Gira: a story from the Times of London about an agency that employees young Japanese women to seduce husbands whose wives want a divorce. The story goes into quite some detail about how it all works, complete with case studies. What's strange to me is that the women -- the wives, that is -- are so desperate that they are basically paying a prostitute not just to to fuck their husbands but to make the men fall in love with them so as to convince them they'd be better off without their wives. Once the men agree to let their wives go, the young ladies disappear, naturally.

Takashi works for a company called ACYours. It was founded in 1997 by Mr Mishima, a rather sinister-looking character with a sparse beard, earrings and a tattooed arm. He explains solemnly that the business is all about helping people.

If this all sounds like a film noir setup, remember the opening scenes of "Chinatown," for example: Jack Nicholson's character specializes in capturing spouses on film in flagrante delicto. Such practices used not to be unheard of in the U.S., before the era of no-fault divorce and other advances in women's rights.

technorati: Japan