Well, this is the country that brought us Hello Kitty and any number of cutesy fads. So I'm not surprised by this. Frankly it doesn't seem all that cute to me and I drive a MINI!

This is Japan. The country whose women adorn themselves with Hello Kitty crap and have an entire subculture that dresses like five year old school girls.

They introduce this here, and I'll be offended.

And any woman stupid enough to pay thousands more for a car because it's got "girly" crap on it deserves to be taken.

When I was at a conference about mobile phone applications, a Korean group showed off a sword-and-sorcery game that was very technologically advanced. And the game characters looked like Hello Kitty characters with big swords. Apparently cuteness sells even to men there.

The March/April 2007 issue of Psychology Today has an article titled "One Nation Under Cute," which is about the "Kawaii" (or cute) culture in Japan. The article does not seem to be available online.

Think Hello Kitty and Pokemon. Kawaii is very popular among adult women and men. Cutesy images are even used in government publications. Info also available on wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kawaii

A company makes something, people buy it, Salon complains because the people who are choosing what they wish to spend their money on are breaking Salon's rules of choice or something. Women can only choose things like their careers and whether or not to carry a foetus to term; they're not allowed to choose what car they drive, that would be patriarchofacist.

...it seems to be the case, in Japan especially, and maybe to a lesser degree in certain social classes in China, that males want to infantalize women to an extreme degree.

I've met too many asian women in their 20s and 30s who have a strange fascination with *all* forms of cuteness, from Hello Kitty to stuffed animals, to weird pre-teen tchotchkes, that it can't be coincidence.

The Japanese seem especially inclined to this strange obsession--to remain, in some sense, under 12 years old, into their 30s...

Clearly the success of the car suggests that this seemingly infantilization is not, perhaps, so seeming...

They've been marketing the Mazda brand exclusively to women for years. "It just feels right."

Maybe it's marketed in a kitchy way but the car you drive home is rather sterile. Call that green "apple happiness" it's still bland and cold. Oh well damned if you damned if you don't.

Am I really the only one who thinks sparkly hub caps sound kind of pretty? I really do love a nice, big sparkly.

My Korean is totally nonexistent but it looks like it gets good gas mileage and it’s got a well thought out interior. I guess I don’t see how this is so wildly different then that new Beatle having a flower holder.

Men will often go out and buy some huge Hummer or a huge truck or a silly expensive sports car to underscore how masculine they are. So what if woman want a car that’s kiwi green and cute and easy to park.

Of all the ‘cute’ things being marketed at woman lately I’m most interested in Camels new pink ‘no. 9’ cigarettes. This car seems like no big deal.

Unless it comes with a tampon dispenser and a taser, you're going to be opposed to it on political grounds anyway.

The men and women in Japan and some other asian countries just seem to like the weird cuteness of fluffy bunnies. I mean they wear yellow paired with hot pink and think it looks cool, I grew up in Chinatown, the crazy color combinations and tons of cutesy animal stuff is just their normal. Their fantasy TV shows are filled with talking animals, and lets not pretend we're immune to this, how many of you have seen Finding Nemo? People think I'm weird because I still watch cartoons. Big deal.

So you've met a few of these rare 'Asian people', and now you can make a sweeping generalization about all of them! You know, they're all very similar, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Thai ... once you know one or two, you pretty much know them all. And apparently they're all infantile?

Saying that knowing a few Asian women who were really really into cute things makes you able to now say that Asian culture tries to keep women infantile is about as accurate as ... saying the widespread number of female kung fu experts in Chinese kung fu films is a clear indicator that Asian society tries to militarize its women.

The first thing you might want to consider is that Asia is a big continent, which holds a whole bunch of countries, each of which has different cultures.

Were it not for that sealed hood, the "Woman's Volvo" sounds like a great car. A low-maintenance, ultra reliable hybrid with extra safety features? I think of that wrap-around bumper less as accommodating female drivers than as insurance against the nitwits who always seem to bash my car in supermarket parking lots while I'm inside buying groceries.

I just wish I could afford one.

But lets face it, how many men do you know (of if not personally) who spend thousands on customizing their cars? Nobody bats an eye at that, even though they often take it to a shop and have the same level of involvement as the women who buy these cars.

There. Was that so hard? Call it a victory for women everywhere. Whatever.

...that there is no star-patterned interior available on the decorate-your-own-Pino site, as Broadsheet reported. I went to go mix-and-match the backseat and had to settle for a drab gingham. For shame, Broadsheet, for shame.

This is the nation that gave us the Hello Kitty toaster (so that even your breakfast can be cute!), so what's the surprise here? I'll save my outrage for the fact that Japan and every other country outside of the US is given the option of purchasing a wide variety of small, economical vehicles that get amazing gas mileage without the overpriced upgrade of a hybrid motor. I don't care if it's a Pino or a Punto or a Micra. Why can't women OR men buy them here? That seems like a story actually worth pursuing.