{"id":11646,"date":"2013-07-26T13:08:02","date_gmt":"2013-07-26T23:08:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=11646"},"modified":"2013-07-26T13:08:02","modified_gmt":"2013-07-26T23:08:02","slug":"japan-times-politicians-silent-on-curbing-hate-speech-and-post-election-i-see-no-pressure-to-do-so","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/?p=11646","title":{"rendered":"Japan Times: Politicians silent on curbing hate speech, and post-election I see no pressure to do so"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Hi Blog. This article is a bit stale, sorry, but discussions here of last week’s Upper House Election<\/a> was more focused on constitutional revisions. Here’s Eric Johnston surveying how last winter’s hate speech finally blew up into a social issue during the spring (enough so that even Abe had to publicly disavow it), then did not gain enough political traction to become a campaign issue during the election. It’s a shame, really, as how people voice their opinions about groups of people in public have profound effects on how those groups will be treated both in public debate and in public policy. Even with PM Abe’s Facebook record of jingoistic and revisionistic “mobilization of the otakusphere”,<\/a> voters indicated last week that they didn’t care. If anything, they gave Abe a strengthened mandate to continue in this vein<\/a>. So even though this article talks about events before the Upper House election, I foresee no change to how hate speech is used to continue Japan’s rightward swing<\/a> in Japan’s social discussions and politics. There is simply no pressure to. Arudou Debito<\/p>\n

=================================<\/p>\n

NATIONAL \/ SOCIAL ISSUES<\/strong>
\n Reining in anti-foreigner tirades a nonstarter in Diet<\/strong>
\n Politicians silent on curbing hate speech<\/strong>
\n BY ERIC JOHNSTON, STAFF WRITER<\/strong>
\n The Japan Times, JUL 10, 2013, courtesy lots of people<\/strong>
\nhttp:\/\/www.japantimes.co.jp\/news\/2013\/07\/10\/national\/politicians-silent-on-curbing-hate-speech\/<\/a><\/p>\n

OSAKA \u2013 Calls in the Diet for legislation to curb hate speech targeting foreign residents of Japan are being made even as the issue barely registers on the campaign trail for the July 21 Upper House poll.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Over the past six months, demonstrations and parades against foreign residents, especially Koreans, have grown in intensity. In Osaka\u2019s Tsuruhashi district, home to large numbers of \u201czainichi\u201d resident Koreans, a 14-year-old girl in February using a microphone loudly maligned Korean residents, saying she despised them and warned them to relocate to the Korean Peninsula or be massacred.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Her comments were reported worldwide and were followed in the months afterward by anti-Korean demonstrations in Tokyo and Osaka that grew, with protestors holding signs saying \u201cGood or Bad Koreans: Kill them All.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Yoshifu Arita, an Upper House member of the Democratic Party of Japan who is leading a Diet effort to enact legal measures curbing such speech, says things have calmed down only recently after politicians began speaking out.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cOn May 7 in the Upper House, (Prime Minister Shinzo) Abe said these demonstrations were \u2018regrettable.\u2019 Justice Minister Taniguchi used the same word. Chief Cabinet Secretary (Yoshihide) Suga also said these were \u2018not good things,\u2019 \u201d Arita told the Foreign Correspondents\u2019 Club of Japan on Tuesday in Tokyo, referring to terms habitually trotted out by politicians in lieu of serious condemnation.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Over the past six months or so, it has been the rightist group Zaitokukai that has been responsible for much of the hate speech. Arita said this was not a coincidence. \u201cZaitokukai was established during the \u201cright-leaning\u201d Abe\u2019s first administration in 2006 and 2007, and started escalating their aggression after the resurgence of (Abe\u2019s) Liberal Democratic Party and the advent of his second administration last year,\u201d Arita said.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Judging from Abe\u2019s rhetoric in May, Arita doubts the prime minister in particular would be seriously inclined to sign on to any sincere legislative effort to ban such virulent talk.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cIn the most recent edition of the monthly magazine Bungei Shunju, Abe was asked about hate speech. His response was \u2018I leave this matter to the good conscience of the average Japanese,\u2019 \u201d Arita said. \u201cBut politicians must take responsibility for trying to resolve this issue. The fact that Abe can make such a comment fills me with doubt about how seriously he\u2019s taking it.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Nor do most Diet members seem to want to mull legal bans.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

In late May, a network of 84 human rights nongovernmental organizations conducted a poll of all 717 Diet lawmakers on how they felt about hate speech, getting replies from only 46, although they represented all major parties except the Japanese Communist Party and Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Restoration Party), whose co-leader, Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto, drew international scorn over his attempt to justify wartime Japan\u2019s use of sex slaves, in large part Korean, for the military.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Forty-three of the 46 said they thought a national response to the rise in hate speech was necessary, while 41 said they supported the idea of the Diet investigating hate speech incidents. All 46 indicated the Diet should consider an antidiscrimination law that bans certain kinds of hate speech.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Arita said hate speech not only targets foreign residents and also has the potential to escalate.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

He noted incidents in which politicians, during speeches that may touch on topics certain members of the audience may disagree with, find hecklers calling them \u201ctraitors\u201d or \u201cpeople selling out our country.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThese are words you see not only on the Internet but actually thrown in politicians\u2019 faces when they\u2019re giving their speeches. We\u2019ve not really seen this kind of situation in Japan in the postwar era.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

ENDS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here’s Eric Johnston surveying how last winter’s hate speech finally blew up into a social issue during the spring (enough so that even Abe had to publicly disavow it), then did not gain enough political traction to become a campaign issue during the election. It’s a shame, really, as how people voice their opinions about groups of people in public have profound effects on how those groups will be treated both in public debate and in public policy. Even with PM Abe’s Facebook record of jingoistic and revisionistic “mobilization of the otakusphere”, voters indicated last week that they didn’t care. If anything, they gave Abe a strengthened mandate to continue in this vein. So even though this article talks about events before the Upper House election, I foresee no change to how hate speech is used to continue Japan’s rightward swing in Japan’s social discussions and politics. There is simply no pressure to.<\/p>\n

JT: Over the past six months or so, it has been the rightist group Zaitokukai that has been responsible for much of the hate speech. Arita said this was not a coincidence. \u201cZaitokukai was established during the \u201cright-leaning\u201d Abe\u2019s first administration in 2006 and 2007, and started escalating their aggression after the resurgence of (Abe\u2019s) Liberal Democratic Party and the advent of his second administration last year,\u201d Arita said. Judging from Abe\u2019s rhetoric in May, Arita doubts the prime minister in particular would be seriously inclined to sign on to any sincere legislative effort to ban such virulent talk.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the most recent edition of the monthly magazine Bungei Shunju, Abe was asked about hate speech. His response was \u2018I leave this matter to the good conscience of the average Japanese,\u2019 \u201d Arita said. \u201cBut politicians must take responsibility for trying to resolve this issue. The fact that Abe can make such a comment fills me with doubt about how seriously he\u2019s taking it.\u201d Nor do most Diet members seem to want to mull legal bans.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,52,5,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cultural-issue","category-hate-speech","category-human-rights","category-japanese-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11646","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11646"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11646\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}