Change is slow in Japan. To nudge the country towards legally recognising same-sex marriage, on Sunday crowds of cheering, flag-waving crowds in Tokyo came together for the nation’s first full Pride parade in four years. The Pride parade comes ahead of next month’s Group of Seven (G7) summit.
Japan as per Reuters is the only G7 industrial power that does not recognise same-sex marriage.
However, growing support from the nation’s top business lobby and major companies is putting pressure on Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s government and his conservative ruling party to change that.
As per organiser estimates, around 10,000 people marched in Sunday’s Pride parade in Tokyo’s Shibuya district.
“Japan is really far behind … We will fight until the entire country has same-sex marriage,” said Himama, one of the participants to Reuters.
The traditional nation’s constitution refers to marriage as being between “both sexes” and mentions “the equal rights of husband and wife”.
For Japan to allow same-sex marriage, an amendment to its civil code would be required.
However, ahead of the summit, some lawmakers have vowed to pass a law promoting “understanding of LGBTQ”. Activists and business leaders have called this a good step, but say that it falls short of Japan’s last year G7 commitment to ensuring equal rights and anti-discrimination measures for LGBTQ.
Reuters reports that in Japan, the number of municipalities allowing same-sex couples to enter partnership agreements has increased significantly from 26 to around 300 since the last pre-pandemic Pride parade in 2019, covering roughly 65 per cent of the population.
However, these agreements do not grant partners the right to inherit each other’s assets or parental rights to each other’s children, and hospital visits are not guaranteed. Despite this, it is considered a positive development in a country where LGBTQ+ rights have been slow to progress.
A district court in Japan’s Sapporo in March 2021 ruled the nation’s ban on same-sex marriages unconstitutional. The Sapporo court argued that laws or regulations that deprive same-sex couples of the legal benefits of marriage are discriminatory and violate Article 14 of the Japanese Constitution. The court also ruled that Article 24 of the Constitution, which defines marriage as “based only on the mutual consent of both sexes”, does not prohibit the recognition of same-sex marriages. However, in June 2022, another district court, this one in Osaka, upheld the constitutionality of the ban on same-sex marriage.
(With inputs from agencies)
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