Wow, that took me by surprise just reading it. Would have been a lot more surprising for you!
Can you report people through these apps? I assume a brand new account is probably a bit of a red flag, as the flashers and scammers probably get banned then have to start new ones.
HelloTalk does have a report function although I’ve heard of people getting around it by blocking you first after moving off app. HT specifically recommends to stay on app and I’d personally recommend screenshotting a partner’s profile before trying anything off app. This loophole may have already been closed, but I’m an inconsistent user 
They’re probably being selfish in the language exchange. I currently live in Japan and I have made a couple of Japanese friends who speak very good English (usually from them studying in North America/Australia/UK/etc.). When we meet up and have drinks/talk, whenever I try and speak Japanese they just continue the conversation in English as if I was speaking English the whole time. They rarely get a chance to speak to native speakers outside of a school setting, so a lot of them are keen to keep up and practice their speaking ability.
Edit: Also, that being said, my exchanges have been in person rather than on the internet so it is different than your experience.
I’ve heard of more experiences of these types not necessarilly not being japanese but just being horny men who use hello talk and the like to find foreign women to harrass or hook up with.
If anyone immediately wants to do a video call just stay away and report the profile. Better safe than sorry.
Context matters. Your wife calling you あなた is very different than a random man who just ‘met’ me and knows my name repeatedly calling me it and never by name.
I unfortunately don’t have access to the chat history after blocking him, but I sent one of his longer Japanese messages to a friend (with a “wtf”) so can quote it here. For context my previous message was something about telling him to ask me to explain if my English messages were ever too difficult:
あなたが書いた英文は読むことできます。あなたの日本語は素晴らしいです。あなたみたいに英語を話せるようになりたい。書いたり、聴く練習は毎日していますが、話す練習はする機会がありません。なのであなたと話す練習がしたいです。
In any case, it doesn’t sound like an epidemic of fake Japanese people on these sites, but possibly some with a sprinkle of pervs and selfish jerks in the mix. Thanks all!
Of course if anyone wants to continue sharing horror stories I’m all ears
She told me differently I think it depends on region and dialect. It is true in general you dont want to say “you” too much in a sentence in the same way you dont want to talk about a person like they aren’t there in the conversation (e.g. Russell Brand’s famous MSNBC interview).
Wouldn’t you immediately know if they were Japanese the minute they started to speak English, though? Unless they were extremely fluent.
That implies they can tell Engrish accents apart, though. I know how Japanese people usually speak English, but I don’t know how every other nationality does.
I’m honestly not that great at telling apart 2nd language accents (or even first language ones…) and his was pretty minimal from what I recall. Unless an accent is super thick it’s not going to be something I think about too much
I have been surprised at the amount of 3rd country people approaching me to learn english (and the sadly less amounts of japanese wanting the same).
I am considering switching to a paid italki hour chat payment to practice what i learn when my next evening course starts up. Not teaching which in my experience seems to be more expensive and often involves them reading the text book to me (which i can do faster) and then doing the questions/answers (admittedly more useful).
MMORPG stands for Mostly Men Online Role Playing Girls.
Never understood this. Did any woman ever, upon seeing the “magic wand”, ever suddenly become enchanted by it enough to overcome the whole creepy deception? You’d think it must work at least 0.0001% of the time or they’d stop doing it, but I doubt it does.
Are you saying it’s a million-to-one chance? But magicians have calculated that million-to-one chances crop up nine times out of ten. 
I would think that as well, but we’ve got a guy like that at work (FFS) that I’m trying to catch at it and get rid of with a flamethrower. In the meantime, though, there’s always some idiot or other who thinks it’s funny enough to give him a chance. For a short time, until they figure out that he really IS a creep. It’s not only a low-probablility strategy, but even when it works it isn’t worth the effort, and then the target population is reduced by one. And the actively-hostile, he better hope they don’t get a chance to burn him, because they will do it in a heartbeat, populaton increased by one. On the internet, though, the targets are essentially unlimited.
It’s not an “enchantment” sort of thing. It’s a means of asserting control over people they perceive as weaker than them. Most sexual crimes are about power and control.
Yes, and not even that. The “shocking”, “transgressive”, “bad boy” thing is attractive to some. I mean, nobody falls in love or immediately gets horny from being sent a D pic, but some laugh and find it… I don’t know, different? not boring?
Until they learn it isn’t an attempt to joke around and be silly, it’s all they know how to do because they can’t get a date any other way. There’s no there there, no personality, nothing worth having. Just shock value, no substance.
The truly head scratching thing is that the… photography subject in question… is usually not that photogenic or noteworthy. Perhaps if women were more honest and less polite, that kind of thing could be curbed a bit. “Aww… that is beyond adorable. Does it come in adult sizes?”
That’s usually the best kind of response. No shock, disappointed look. Any chance you have a friend with a bigger one?
“Where’s the rest? Is this a… MINI… series?”
