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Japan Gay News, July 9 2003, translated by Keiko Ofuji The Movement against Gender-Bias-Free Education The Kagoshima Prefectural Assembly passed a regulation based on a petition (or appeal) supported by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP, **It is the most "conservative" party in JPN.), that gender free education should not be conducted in kindergarten, elementary, and junior and senior high schools (**Senior high school is not mandatory in Japan) in Kagoshima Prefecture. This led to disagreements because this regulation is contrary to the movement, started several years ago, which had the goal of establishing a gender free society in order to abolish all kinds of social discrimination. The petition, which was supported by the LDP, defined "gender fee" as the "denial of masculinity and femininity" but did not include not as "abolishment of discrimination against men and women." The petition also stated that, in their opinion, black backpacks should not be used by both boys and girls and that girls should not play certain games, such as 'cavalry battle,Õ in physical education classes. Citing the national government's comment that "we do not mean we regularly and automatically do not accept the acknowledge that there are differences between men and women" (**This is a literal translation of the document. I understand that the government wants to accept men and women based on physical characteristics and traditional gender criterion.) The petition hopes that "gender free education" should be eliminated from education in Kagoshima and that a "joint planning society" in which men and women help each other should be established. The petition was submitted by the Association of Prefecutural People for Supporting Elimination of Gender Free Education" in Ijyuin Town. At the Assembly, a legislator from the Communist Party spoke against it, but legislator(s) from the Liberal Democratic Party jeered her at that time. The expression "gender free" is defined as the elimination of social discrimination based on the general idea that "men and women should be a certain way." Also, "gender free" in education opposes the idea that a man may only love a woman or a woman may only love a man, but supports love between people from of the same sex. |