The 'Kanreki Ishin' (Sixtieth Birthday Restoration) and the Question of Why Women Read It

There is a magazine called "Kanreki Ishin" (Sixtieth Birthday Restoration).
Judging by the font of the title, it's aimed at men. The cover, which says "Our True Identity," and the content are thoroughly designed for middle-aged men. Thinking about it normally, women wouldn't even pick it up.

However, that doesn't seem to be the case. For some reason, it has many female readers. The editor-in-chief was puzzled by this and wrote a note article about it, asking, "Why do women support us?"

The article is here ↓

I laughed when I read that article. In fact, the "excellent article" introduced in that piece was one I had written. It was titled "The story of buying a book my husband told me 'don't buy that'," and I never expected to be featured in such a way! I'm simply happy ^^

Let's get back to the point. The mystery of "why women support us." It's not a mystery at all. The answer is set. There are women who are called "us" and read it fully intending to be part of "us." That's all there is to it.

Perhaps among the women who like and read this magazine, there is a high probability that they are "middle-aged men" at heart.

This isn't about appearance. It's about the inside.
Rather than having lived by using their femininity as a weapon, they are women who have accepted living shoulder-to-shoulder with men as a perfectly normal thing. They are women who know the heat, sense of responsibility, and competitive spirit (?) of that era at the same temperature as men.

Born in the year of the Fire Horse (1966, including those born early in 1967), we are the generation that entered society at the time the "Equal Employment Opportunity Law" was enacted. We are the children of a new era where women could stand on the same playing field as men, and where women's advancement in society began to be discussed.

Setting aside superstitions like "women born in the year of the Fire Horse have violent tempers" or "they will eat their husbands alive," I feel that the passionate temperament to do anything somehow applies to me as well. Even if I look cool-headed, I actually have more passion than anyone else. Don't many people in our generation feel that way?

We don't use our femininity as a weapon. We don't hold back. We walk with our heads held high.
This worldview is also heavily influenced by the beautiful women who appear in Yoshio Kataoka's novels (at least for me and the female friends who appeared in my previous article). In any case, "working" and "living actively" were cool.

Appearance is female, inside is a middle-aged man.
I'm not saying this as self-deprecation, but rather as something I'm quite proud of. The women who like and read "Kanreki Ishin" are probably "middle-aged men." From their 20s until now in their 60s, they have lived that way the whole time.Women who overlap themselves with the word "us."Of course, they would become readers.

In 1989, I joined a major apparel manufacturer as a pattern maker. It was an era when we, now at our sixtieth birthday, were called the "new human race." The commercial "Can you work 24 hours?" was playing on TV as a matter of course. The chime would ring at 6:00 PM, the end of the workday, and the three hours of overtime that followed were already at the level of a daily routine. At the time, there wasn't even a negative image associated with the sound of the word "overtime." (The hourly wage for overtime was higher than the base pay, and we were grateful for it, weren't we?)

Once the office building entrance closed, that was when the real work began. We would take a taxi to Minami, catch a division manager sitting at the counter next to us, and passionately talk about brand awareness expansion strategies. Thinking about it now, it was quite brazen for a rookie. But no one said anything unpleasant, and the participating members gradually increased, making it exciting. Everyone loved their own work.

Working with all my might during the bubble era. This is undoubtedly a treasure of my life. Back then, I gained the job of a pattern maker and learned the joy of creating something with my own hands. I didn't do it because someone told me to, but chose with my own senses and completed my work with my own sensibility. People who know this feeling probably can't stop "working (not limited to jobs)" no matter how old they get. I think the axis of my current life, "living by doing what I love," was also formed during those battlefield-like days.

The women who picked up "Kanreki Ishin" must also feel the same scent. In the title "us," they find the memory of "we were like that too, weren't we?"

Now then. For you, what was "something you devoted yourself to with all your might back then"?
It still lives firmly within you even now.

<Recommended book for today>

Kanreki Ishin (Motor Magazine Mook)
Akihiro Kitamura (Editor) Motor Magazine Ltd.

"Kanreki Ishin" is a passionate mook for R55+ that breaks down the idea that "sixtieth birthday = retirement."

"Kanreki Ishin" is a "specialized magazine for the sixtieth birthday" aimed at energetic people over 55.
According to the official explanation, there are two main concepts.

☆Changing the sixtieth birthday, changing the sixtieth birthday
Treating 60 not as the "entrance to old age," but as a "restart point in life"

☆ Living a second cycle of life with dreams and vitality
Considering the time up to age 59 as the first cycle, and life from 60 onwards as the main event.

Editor-in-chief Akihiro Kitamura is an editor and producer who has worked on motorcycle magazines, music magazines, and the age-restricted men's magazine 'Showa 40-nen Otoko' (Men Born in 1965). He launched 'Showa 40-nen Otoko' in 2009 and published 'Ore-tachi no Showa Koki' (Our Late Showa Era) in 2025.

In the 'Declaration' on the official 'Kanreki Ishin' (Kanreki Restoration) website, this magazine is positioned as the 'final touch to realize the spirit' following 'Ore-tachi no Showa Koki.' In other words, the foundation is not just about reminiscing about the late Showa era, but a philosophy of giving back to society the benefits one has received. It proclaims not a 'Kanreki celebration,' but a 're-deployment from Kanreki.'

That is why I can understand why there are so many female readers. Women who have navigated through the changes in work, family, and society from the late Showa era through the Heisei era are responding to the 'heat of the times' rather than to gender.