Japanese TV became famous abroad in the 1980s and created an image of Japan for outsiders that still lingers. The shows were the gaman taikai (endurance contests), where members of the public carried out tasks in which they suffered pain: The winners were the ones who endured the most.
I'm sure many of us remember the men doing handstands against aluminum in blazing sunshine, while staff focused the sun on the men's nipples with magnifying glasses.
Shows with similar objectives (to entertain by showing people in pain) are still common on Japanese TV. You might see, for example, women in bikinis being immersed in tanks of scalding water and emerging lobster pink. Pain appears to have a different status in Japanese culture than it does in the West.