Japan’s conservative ruling party cites ‘gay rights’ in manifesto in bid to burnish image overseas
Winning hosting rights for the Tokyo games – which mandates anti-discrimination as part of its charter – has helped bring change in attitudes towards same-sex community, say lawmakers
When openly gay independent candidate Wataru Ishizaka campaigned for a 2007 Tokyo local election, people snickered at his speeches, but now even Japan’s conservative ruling party mentions gay rights in its platform for this year’s upper house election.
Though the paragraph is deep in the manifesto of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and refers only to promoting understanding of sexual diversity, even this was unthinkable a decade ago.
By Asian standards, Japanese laws are relatively liberal – homosexual sex has been legal since 1880 – but social attitudes keep the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community largely invisible.
LGBT rights are not covered in Japan’s Equal Opportunity Act and there are no anti-discrimination laws.
But things are changing.
Without this outside pressure, things might not have come this far
Several municipalities, including two Tokyo districts, now give same-sex partners rights similar to spouses, as do a growing number of companies.