Behind the Yakuza: documenting the women of Japan’s mafia (2018)

True. Most do not allow tattoos.

I have never seen any other gangs at this sento, which is located not too far from Kabukicho. My guess is that it's a private arrangement between the owner and this boss. It would presumably only be a problem if another gang showed up. But the tinted-window black limo with driver outside is a pretty good clue of who is inside.

I would say the crimes they seem to deal in are much different than the type gangsters in The Sopranos would deal in.

I've seen an obvious yakuza in the onsen near where I live -- though only once. I stayed well away from him, as did everyone else. Sometimes even if a bathhouse has a no-tattoo policy you can get special permission. You need to know who and how to ask. I have found that this is generally true in Japan. It seems reasonable to me that at some places a yakuza could get permission to bathe at a non-busy time.

Incidentally, I have been told that there used to be a fairly powerful yakuza clan in Fujieda city (a few towns over from where I live). There used to be a sumo jungyo (unofficial tournament) held there every year and I was told that it was done as a favour to the resident yakuza head. After the crackdown on yakuza involvement in sumo, they cancelled the jungyo, lending at least some credibility to the story. I also heard that sometime about 2010 something happened and the yakuza clan in Fujieda is no more. My friend who told me did not want to elaborate. When I first moved here in 2007, I would occasionally see a couple of guys hanging out at the beach -- pretty obvious: dressed in suits even though it was 35C, with their tattoo sleeves just peeking out from underneath their coats. They would just stand there for hours. I don't know what they were doing (the beach where I live is almost always empty).

Haven't seen any of these guys for years and years, though.

As far as I know from my thesis on organized crime, Yakuza is a different breed say than Hell's Angels, Mafia and Vor V Zakone (Russian "Mafia", although I use the word mafia here tentatively because with the exception of providing illegal goods and services they have nothing in common).

The difference is yakuza is accepted as a semi-legal entity in the minds of the people.

Historically first yakuza (which were proto-yakuza, like nobody used the term yet) protected the city against ronin (masterless) samurais who came to loot the city. (Kaplan & Dubro, p.12) In addition to this they carry a Robin Hood-esque theme and one of the well known histories about them involves Chobei Banzuiin who, supposedly, repaired the roads and walls in Tokyo and opened up a casino.

But the word yakuza appears after a century more or less. Their origins involve traveling gamblers and street sellers. Even the word itself, yakuza, is a term for losing hand (ya-ku-sa, cards of 8-9-3)

Another term that's important, and unique if I may say, in Yakuza is the relation of oyabun-kobun. Oyabun acts as a father figure and kobun is the child figure. Kobun provides service and commitment to the Oyabun with no questions or hesitation. and Oyabun protects and helps the Kobun.

Everybody knows about the tattoos so I'll pass this.

Yakuza formalized in the beginning of 1960s with the help of Yoshio Kodama. He was charged with creating a spy network in China and given the rank of Admiral for his war effort even though he was a criminal.

If you want to read more about this, these were the books I've used in my Thesis on this section

Amaruso D. Gangster Incorporated. Glencoe:Free Press

Kaplan, D, Dubro A. (2003) Yakuza: Japan's Criminal Underworld. California: University of California Press

Lyman M. & Potter, G. (2009) Organized Crime, New Jersey: Prentice Hall

"There will always be crime, so it's better to have organized crime than disorganized crime." seems to be the idea.