April 18, 2002
Well, I found-out a bit information about sexual harassment rules here. It's like a good news/bad news joke. The good news: there are minimal sexual harassment rules in Japan. The bad news: there are minimal sexual harassment rules in Japan. Yes, Japan seems to be a country where women experience a certain level of institutionalized sexism, and the lack of harassment rules is one of the ways in which this is manifested.
Make no mistake: this is not to say that Japanese men have everything all great and women are always trampled underfoot- that's just not true. Men are practically shackled to their desks and factory consoles for long hours. They have long, uncomfortable commutes and after work, many of them drink large quantities of alcohol in order to deaden the pains of existence. They are obliged at any and all times to display obeisance to the whims of their employers to a degree that is entirely unimaginable back in the States... on top of that, they get precious little time to be with their kids or relax.
And it's not all bleak: women here do have niches in which they exercise their authority. In Japanese households, it is women who typically manage the family budget... it is not uncommon for an overwhelming percentage of the guy's earnings to go straight into a bank account that is in her name. (This gets visibly demonstrated whenever you walk into a Japanese bank: there will be only 1 or 2 male customers but two dozen female customers lined-up at the tellers. No major purchase ever gets made without the wife saying 'yes'.) And if you spend any time in a typical Japanese household, it eventually becomes obvious who calls the shots (hint: it isn't the husband). The point is: there is more overt sexism here, but it is also clear that neither gender gets everything it wants.
But anyway, the possibility of sexual harassment in the workplace is a fact of life for Japanese women. She either lives with the possibility, or she quits her job. However, this is not to say that a typical day for a female employee is a barrage of non-stop ass-slapping, either. I'm not sure how often harassment happens or what avenues of protest exist when it does, but I'll try to find out. I work in an office with all women, (save myself and Miles). This situation makes me feel a little more comfortable with interacting with my female coworkers than I do in America- because here, I can compliment a woman on her outfit without first pausing to wonder if I'm kicking a hornets' nest. I also feel bad for the Japanese women who actually have to put-up with harassment. (I hope this isn't surprising to you, but I do have sympathy for those women... seeing as how they aren't Americans.)
Anyway, I don't think there have been any harassment court-cases at all in Japan. Well, going to court here is rather rare anyway, and many people say this is so by arguing that Japan isn't a litigious society. That sounds like a good explanation, but it isn't entirely true... In the days preceding the 1600s, Japanese appear to have been quite willing to drag wrongdoers to the town magistrates for justice. The fact of the matter is, the Japanese court system today systematically denies people success in litigation. The judges are often trained to be biased against the plaintiffs, thinking that they are impudent for daring to bring the matter to court in the first place. Furthermore, judges are promoted based on how many cases they can shift into out-of-course settlement in X amount of time, so a judge is not rewarded for taking a case to its conclusion. Lawyers are damnably expensive, fairly inaccessible, and they mostly often belong to the same law-school old-boy network as the judges. Court cases can take a very long time to reach a final decision. Consider the Minamata Bay industrial poisoning case... In the 1950s and 1960s, the Chisso Chemical company dumped toxic compounds into Minamata bay, tainting the fish. The surrounding residents got ill from eating the fish and their children were born with debilitating deformities. The case was taken to court. While the judges in the case kept asking that the plaintiffs settle out of court, the chemical company resorted to all sorts of chicanery. They hired gangsters to rough-up the plaintiffs. They bribed members of the medical establishment to testify that eating mercury-tainted fish wasn't all that bad for you. They arranged police-beatings against the anti-pollution activists who held rallies in support of the plaintiffs. But eventually, the plaintiffs showed rare perseverance in the face of adversity; it took about ten years for the victims to get justice.
In short, it's not that Japan is a non-litigious society, it's because the legal system structurally discourages Japanese people from seeking legal recourse. Out-of-court conciliation is always more productive than going through the judiciary. I think this fact might also be a major factor in the dearth of sexual harassment litigation: suing for harassment is just not a lucrative activity in Japan like it is in the States.
Anyway, in the U.S., the reaction to sexual harassment appears to have been taken to a ludicrous extreme: the laws are vague enough to be overly sweeping and gives any woman the ability to ruin a male coworker's career with a fabricated complaint. In any given dispute, her word is automatically accepted as indisputable truth. An American man, although given similar rights, is almost never taken seriously when it comes to harassment cases of his own. But in Japan, the harassment situation appears to be at the opposite extreme of the spectrum: neither sex has any protection from harassment at all. I have no idea how prevalent harassment is. Maybe if I were in mixed company in the workplace, I'd have a better idea?
Naturally, if I ever see a guy harassing a woman, I'll definitely make an effort to intervene on the woman's behalf. I mean... there must be an ideal legal arrangement between the two extreme poles of the spectrum whereby both sexes are protected from harassment and false accusations. Can't there?
Anyway, work is proceeding apace. I went to the museum with Michiko, (I found-out some days before that she has a husband). After viewing the displays of samurai armor and calligraphy from the Muromachi, Momoyama and Tokugawa eras, we went to her house for sushi with her husband. Dinner was really good (of course) and I filled my face with raw fish and sliced octopus stuffed inside rolled rice and seaweed paper. I also tried some new savory delights such as natto (fermented soybeans suspended in a syrupy, snot-like contrivance of indeterminable origin) and plum-flavored sake (quite nice, if slightly prune-smelling). Anyway, rumor around the office has it that I'm single, and I've quietly asked a few coworkers if they might consider setting me-up on a blind-date or two with one of their friends in the near future... We'll see how that turns-out, if at all. Something tells me that if I get so much as one date through coworkers, it'll be a very long shot indeed.
Of course it is far, far too early to declare the Grand Experiment finished. Were are not even close to concluding it. But the important fact of the matter is, so far I'm actually quite happy interacting with the women here. They are a joy to be around, even if I don't have a romantic relationship with any of them. So far, they have largely demonstrated their public demeanor to be that of pleasant Ladies. But I'll reserve judgement for quite a while yet...
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