“Hate crime is nonexistent in Japan,” “Japan only recently started having pride marches,” “homosexuality is accepted in Japan because of the traditional male-male shudo sexual/romantic culture,” “Japanese media are LGBT-friendly,” and “Taiga Ishikawa is the first openly gay politician in Japan” are all false! Read more →
Queer Filmmaker Graham Kolbeins talks about interviewing queer people, funding for queer documentary filmmakers, creative freedom vs focus, the Western gaze, the male gaze, the issue of representation of minorities, and his upcoming project Queer Japan. Read more →
While a gay YouTuber in the US asks his fans to donate money to an anti-LGBT bullying charity, YouTube Japan is filled with homophobic content like “let’s go inside a gay bathhouse” and stuff. In this video I invite Kody, born in Japan and currently residing in the UK, to talk with me about the differences between YouTube Japan and… Read more →
Translated by Masaki C. Same-sex partner code proposition: Shibuya ward’s “human rights” double-standard? Different stances on sexual & gender minority and the homeless In March, the Shibuya ward council will submit the bill that if passed would allow the local government to issue partnership certificates to same-sex couples who would then be recognized as having a relationship equivalent to a… Read more →
Although this isn’t intended to be an exhaustive summary of history of LGBT politics in Japan, which I cannot possibly provide given my limited knowledge, I just couldn’t take anymore the shittiness of the news articles written about LGBT politics in Japan.
The most typical, all-too-common article written in English never fails to make the followings clear:
And I say, THIS IS BULLSHIT. Read more →
At SWAAY I found out about this new campaign calling for a moratorium on arrests etc. of sex workers until the end of the Olympics. Stop the Arrests Campaign is calling for a moratorium on arrests, detention and deportation of sex workers in London with immediate effect until the end of the Olympic Games. But what happens after the end… Read more →
ORIGINALLY POSTED ONLINE MAY 3, 2011. The following quote has been and still is circulating rapidly on the Internet, even spreading beyond the English-language online communities: Read more →
Japan tsunami and earthquake: 30 children sit silent in classroom after parents vanish | Mail Online. Ok. I almost cried. I almost cried not because of the devastation that those people in those stories and photos are experiencing, but because they are now a target of the Western pornographic gaze. I mean, look at that picture of ‘an old Asian… Read more →
There is no doubt you can get all sorts of benefits and rights through marriage. I myself will not stubbornly stick to my anti-marriage belief if I really need to marry someone for, say, the purpose of surviving. I will even let myself take up a job in the marketing industry who utilizes gayness as a commodity, if there is… Read more →
Beaten and burned, a gay man was found dead in Cumnock, Scotland, possibly for being gay, although the attacker’s motive has yet to be investigated. I have seen some online responses to this incident describing how it was shocking. This reminds me of the now-almost-vanishing stereotype of Scots being brutal, savage monsters. Read more →
