Japan, it seems, is forever discriminating against someone. Women, ethnic minorities, sexual minorities, lifestyle minorities, the disabled, part-time workers ¡ª all have made claims against a state and a national psychology that define acceptability very narrowly relative to most other developed societies. Who in this country isn¡¯t discriminated against? Heterosexual able-bodied Japanese males?
No, they too are victims, and a headline introducing a report on the subject in the weekly Aera is accorded two exclamation points: ¡°Discrimination against men is unforgivable!!¡±
Almost every week, the magazine tells us, angry men demonstrate outside one or another JR train station on Tokyo¡¯s Yamanote loop line. The numbers are not imposing ¡ª 10 participants are counted at one rally ¡ª but the placards are big and bold: ¡°This affects all of us. Men¡¯s rights are being violated!¡±
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