Police Regulation and Reactivity - Contradictions between the perfumed society and power in the 1920s

Police Regulation and Reactivity - Contradictions between the perfumed society and power in the 1920s

The society of the 1920s was based on stalls at urban fairs and festivals, but their activities were always subject to police regulations. If they were involved in dangerous spectacles or performances that were considered problematic in terms of public morals, they were subject to immediate restrictions, and their stalls were sometimes shut down or even cracked down on. For the perfume makers, the judgment and mood of the police was a matter of life and death, along with the weather, and was an unavoidable condition that governed their lives. Thus, they had a weakness that made them unable to resist authority.

The police were not merely a security agency, but functioned as a device for enforcing and controlling social order. In order to survive, the perfume makers had no choice but to accept their control, and sometimes they were mobilized as "subcontractors" for the powerful side. For example, when socialist rallies or labor disputes broke out, the interests of the police and the perfume makers sometimes coincided and their activities were restricted, and they unwittingly assumed a reactionary role.

At that time, while the liberal trend of the Taisho democracy was spreading in Japan, the security policy was strengthened against the backdrop of the confusion after the Great Kanto Earthquake, and the socialist movement was suppressed under the Security Police Law. Although the kagushi society was responsible for the entertainment of the common people, its activities were always under the surveillance and control of the authorities. As a result, they were forced into a position that was inconsistent with the socialist ideals of freedom and equality.

In this way, while the Kogushi valued the spirit of chivalry and mutual support, in reality they lived under the control of the police power, and this contradiction is the reason why they were called the "Kogushi" in Japan. This contradiction symbolized the "reactionary nature" of the Kagushi society and its unique position in the social structure of the era.