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Japanese men are facing accusations of hypocrisy over household responsibilities after male football fans were seen tidying up stadiums following World Cup matches.

The issue of gender roles in Japan has resurfaced after a social media post mocked football supporters cleaning stadium litter, carrying the caption “please do it at home”, a phrase inspired by Tokyo Metro’s well-known etiquette posters.

The AI-generated parody poster portrayed a Japanese football fan dressed in the national team’s colours reclining on a sofa while a woman washed dishes. The message accompanying it urged men to prioritise domestic chores and caregiving duties “at home first”.

The post, which has been viewed over a million times, contrasted that image with photos of Japanese fans cleaning up after the 14 June match.

Japanese supporters earned global praise for their post-match clean-up after the final whistle of the World Cup 2026 encounter against the Netherlands, which ended in a 2–2 draw.

The “please do it at home” message also highlighted statistics showing that Japanese men spend comparatively little time on unpaid domestic work such as cleaning, shopping, and childcare, leaving most of the responsibility to women.

“Most of them don’t do that at their own home,” one commenter wrote under a video on the official World Cup 2026 X account that celebrated the fans’ clean-up efforts.

Other users questioned the inconsistency of this behaviour, noting that although fans often tidy up after matches both in Japan and abroad, significant amounts of rubbish still accumulate on the streets following major weekend events.

Data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on household labour distribution revealed that Japanese men spend among the least time on unpaid care work compared to peers in other developed nations.

According to the OECD’s analysis of its 34 member countries, the average Japanese man spends 6.3 hours a day on paid employment and only 1.5 hours on domestic tasks. Japanese women, by contrast, balance paid work and unpaid household duties, devoting about three hours daily to their jobs and 3.3 hours to chores and childcare.

A 2021 Japanese government study found an even wider gap, showing that men spent just 51 minutes a day on unpaid work, while women averaged three hours and 24 minutes.