Japan Today Spotlight cover art

All Episodes

Japan Today Spotlight — 60 episodes

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Title
1

Mosque under fire: Japan’s Muslims — welcome or wanted?

2

Why Japanese fans clean up stadiums — and why it sparked debate

3

Why Japan struggles with mental health

4

Mount Fuji has a people problem

5

Japan’s new criminal underworld

6

Japan’s ‘hikikomori’ shut-ins are getting older — and the clock is ticking

7

Why Japan ranks last in G7 gender equality

8

Why tattoos are still taboo in Japan

9

Japan just started selling weapons. Here’s why that’s a big deal

10

Japan prefecture will pay residents to report illegal foreign workers

11

Inside Japan’s ‘Toyoko Kids’ in Kabukicho

12

New divorce and child custody rules in Japan

13

Why Japan has almost no gun crime

14

Can foreigners own land in Japan?

15

Japan’s bicycle crackdown

16

Japan’s new idol culture trend

17

Japan’s hidden homelessness

18

Japan under pressure as Takaichi meets Trump

19

What’s wrong with Japan’s police?

20

Can you carry a knife in Japan?

21

Iran conflict: Japan exposed?

22

Japan’s military is short on recruits

23

The Senkakus: Little islands, big tensions

24

How Japan chooses its prime minister

25

The death penalty in Japan

26

Japan and nuclear weapons: A line it hasn’t crossed — yet

27

Inside Japan's troubled classrooms

28

New rules for foreigners in Japan

29

Can Japan power its AI future?

30

Japan Today Spotlight: The stories that defined Japan in 2025

31

Japan’s rising cost of living

32

‘Akiya’: Japan’s hottest property boom

33

How scammers target you in Japan

34

Japan–China standoff over Taiwan

35

Running on empty

36

Japan’s vanishing countryside

37

Japan’s NHK fee

38

Sanae Takaichi meets Donald Trump: Flattery or strategy?

39

Japan’s ‘foreigner problem’: Kimi Onoda and the politics of coexistence

40

Trial of Shinzo Abe’s assassin: The fallout Japan still faces

41

Japan’s marijuana paradox: Legal CBD, harsh laws, big arrests

42

Drunk pilots at JAL: Scandals Japan can’t ignore

43

Why stalking cases in Japan keep ending in tragedy

44

Why nuisance YouTubers are causing outrage in Japan

45

Why Japan’s ‘lost generation’ is still losing

46

Why bear attacks are surging in Japan

47

Why so many people go missing in Japan

48

Japan’s hostage justice: Guilty until proven innocent

49

Scrolling for truth: News for the swipe generation

50

80 years after the Pacific War: Japan’s reckoning with history

51

Why these Japanese homes are so cheap (and so creepy)

52

Japan’s far-right surge: Sanseito and ‘Japan First’ politics in 2025

53

Is Trump blowing up Japan-U.S. relations?

54

Japan’s newspaper crisis: Losing readers, relevance and the next generation

55

Japan’s big heat: June’s deadly start to summer

56

Why Japan’s 2,000-year imperial family may not survive this century

57

Why Japan’s J-pop idol industry bans sex, dating and romance

58

Japan’s rice crisis: Why prices are soaring and what’s behind it

59

Why is Nissan failing — and what speed bumps lie ahead?

60

Japan’s sex industry boom: How tourism and the yen are changing everything