This Jeopardy Contestant's Story About Japanese Men's Sex Lives Will Leave You Bewildered

With its big board of punny trivia and the clever wage-work of its Daily Doubles, Jeopardy stands out from everything else that TV offers. Another unique component is the brief “meet the contestants” segment that follows the first commercial break, and those random and often mediocre stories are some of life’s greatest guilty pleasures. One recent Jeopardy hopeful went a little out there for her story involving Japanese men and rumors about their sex lives. Check it out!

Connecticut resident Liz Miles, a doctoral candidate in anthropology, used her solo moment in the Jeopardy spotlight to call out what she finds is a media bias against Japanese men. Nothing wrong with that, really, as it’s arguably a more admirable stance to take than saying you’ve knitted sweaters for over 200 dogs. But then her single example for this bias is a claim that “Japanese men don’t have sex,” which I’ve never heard in my life and would never have assumed, given that roughly 8% of the Internet is Japanese porn.

Now, she didn’t get specific about anything in the least, and her language was definitely safe for work and afternoon network TV. But I’m still not quite sure how this bizarre offering made its way to the air. One of the judges should have given Alex a small finger wag to let him know everything had imploded and they’d need to empty the studio to get the mood back to normal. But then it went one step further, which is like four steps too far, when she backed up that statement with this one.

I found, you know, it depends on how we define sex.

What does that even mean? No, I’m not offering a guess in Jeopardy fashion. I’m just sincerely wondering how a different definition of sex proves to this woman that Japanese men are having it a lot more than the news would have us believing. This is a place where a game show involving handjobs and karaoke performances existed, so maybe she includes that in her particular definition. It just isn’t sex unless a studio audience can tell how well you can keep a tune. I mean, unless there’s a robot involved.

It’s the kind of story you’d expect to hear from Louis C.K. during his recent appearance, not your normal contestant. Surprisingly, the episode continued on without any of the three players sharing rumors about how often Australian and Brazilian men supposedly get down with it.

Liz Miles did not win that particular game, but she certainly won our attention and our curiosity well beyond the Final Jeopardy round. That’s worth more than $1,000, right?

Nick Venable
Assistant Managing Editor

Nick is a Cajun Country native and an Assistant Managing Editor with a focus on TV and features. His humble origin story with CinemaBlend began all the way back in the pre-streaming era, circa 2009, as a freelancing DVD reviewer and TV recapper.  Nick leapfrogged over to the small screen to cover more and more television news and interviews, eventually taking over the section for the current era and covering topics like Yellowstone, The Walking Dead and horror. Born in Louisiana and currently living in Texas — Who Dat Nation over America’s Team all day, all night — Nick spent several years in the hospitality industry, and also worked as a 911 operator. If you ever happened to hear his music or read his comics/short stories, you have his sympathy.