Connected to the world with sophisticated devices, these geeks lead an isolated life
Any country that dispenses girls' used panties from vending machines needs its collective mind examined. No wonder Japan has some of the world's most dysfunctional geeks. Just look at the case of Tsutomu Miyazaki. Between 1988 and 1989, Miyazaki mutilated and killed four girls, aged four to seven, then raped their corpses. He even ate portions of his third and fourth victims.
The authorities eventually arrested Miyazaki for an unrelated sexual assault involving a zoom lens. In his flat they found a stash of pornographic and slasher videotapes along with videos and pictures of his victims, earning the deformed printing assistant the nickname, the Otaku Murderer.
Miyazaki, also known as Dracula, has given otaku a bad name, but an otaku is not necessarily a psychopath, just a little crazy, according to sci-fi seer William Gibson, who inserted the term into his 1996 novel Idoru. The meaning supplied by a Japanese translation computer used by a character in the book was 'pathological techno-fetishist with social deficit'.
That should be right. On one hand, the otaku worships technical sophistication, tapping into the national appetite for artifice embodied by bonsai, rock gardens, robots and devices such as smart vacuum cleaners.
On the other hand, the otaku is a recluse with a hankering for innocence and a fondness for indulging in fantasy to alleviate loneliness. Confounding the Asian herd mentality stereotype, he or she lives at home, is rather short on work experience, or indeed experience of any kind, and unable to handle the cut, thrust and tedium of office life.
Although Japan's estimated 3million otaku do communicate electronically, they have very little physical contact with other human beings. Apart from occasional visits from mummy, who pushes meals through the door, the otaku is intensely isolated.