The right person is Mr. Matsunaka. At the pride house in Rio de Janeiro Olympic. A Tokyo-based nonprofit advocacy organization for LGBT, Good Aging Yells announced its plan to open “Pride House Tokyo”, an information center on LGBT and sports during the 2020 Summer Olympics. Good Aging Yells joined an international conference hosted by Pride House International in Toronto, 2014. Since then, the NPO has had a series of discussion with other support groups that participated in the conference, leading to the announcement that the NPO would host “Pride House Tokyo.” “Pride House Tokyo” aims to play four roles. In
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A transgender woman who underwent a sex- change operation and runs a company in Kyoto city consulted with the national health insurance association in Kyoto about using her female name on her health insurance card. The association allowed her to do so. She is the first woman in Japan that is allowed to use an alias on a document as formal as an identification card such as a health insurance card. The transgender woman, who’s in her 50s, was diagnosed with gender identity disorder in 2012 and underwent a sex-change operation in 2014. However, she was not allowed to identify
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Mr.Maekawa speaking at the seminar of Diversity Fukushima On January 27th, a rough draft was proposed to the council as a part of the revised proposal of Basic Act for Gender Equal Society in Fukushima Prefecture. The draft, aimed at achieving better understanding of LGBTs and setting up a consultation system at educational institutions in the prefecture will be enacted by the end of March this year. According to Japan Alliance for LGBT Legislation(J-ALL), other prefectures have already created basic plans for LGBT rights in Japan, but Fukushima Prefecture is the first local government that will start specific measures for
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Photo at press conference about LGBT League. Kunihiro Maeda is second person from the right. On July 6th, five LGBT assembly members, including Aya Uekawa of Setagaya Ward, Taiga Ishikawa of Toshima Ward, Wataru Ishizaka of Nankan Ward, Tomoya Hosoda of Iruma City and Kunihiro Maeda of Bunkyo Ward, held a news conference to announce that they have set up a league for protecting the rights of sexual minorities. Kunihiro Maeda of Bunkyo Ward came out as gay for the first time in public. LGBT League is aimed at (1) establishing ordinances and making policy measures that protect the rights
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Nobuto Hosaka, director of Setagaya Ward On June 22nd, the Congress of Setagaya Ward, Tokyo unanimously passed a reform bill to revise its municipal ordinance so that same-sex couples can live in municipal housing. Setagaya Ward will accept applications for municipal housing starting from this November. Setagaya Ward, well-known for its active campaign of introducing same- sex partnership system, tried to pass a reform bill to change the requirements where applicants must live in municipal housing with family members only. Same-sex couples are not regarded as family in Japan, so the requirements denied same-sex couples the use of municipal housing
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AERA, one of the most popular weekly magazines in Japan, features LGBT this month. The magazine picked LGBT as the cover story two years ago, putting a rainbow decoration on its logo and Tiffany’s advertisement with a couple of gay models on it. This time, the cover story has a richer content than the last one. One thing which is very different from other LGBT featured magazines is that AERA does not blindly believe today’s LGBT-friendly trend, spurred by big companies in Japan. The cover story begins with the title, “Illusion of LGBT trend. What’s behind the shiny rainbow? What
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  Keito has worked as wedding model, too. On July 1st, Asakura Kate, a male-to- female (MtF) transgender singer and fashion model, told her fans about her new career as a Hollywood star. Asakura Kate is a MtF transgender woman living with gender identity disorder (GID) in the city of Osaka. When she was a kid, she strongly believed that her male body would change into a female body as she grew up, but it didn’t. She was constantly told to “act like a real man” by many people and she started hiding her true feelings. After graduating from high
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On June 1st, Sapporo City, Hokkaido launched “Sapporo City Same-Sex Partnership Declaration System” to officially recognize same-sex couples living in the city. Under the new partnership system, the city issues a copy of the partnership certificate to same-sex coupes who have submitted a written oath of their partnership. Anyone, who is twenty or older and living in the city, or planning to do so, can apply for the certificate. Although it is not legally- binding, the city has set the guidelines and will allow same-sex couples to receive life insurance payouts, visit their partner in hospital, and make a lease
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“Eigatengoku,” a Japanese midnight TV show that broadcasts a variety of movies, created by Nippon Television Network, is to broadcast an LGBT movie four weeks in a raw, starting from June 5th. June is “LGBT-Pride-Month” and “Eigatengoku” decided to do this “LGBT Film Festival” to celebrate “LGBT-Pride- Month.” Nippon Television Network will become the first major private key station that publicly broadcasts a set of LGBT movies in Japan. (TOKYO MX, a terrestrial broadcasting station broadcast “Breakfast on Pluto” as part of the projects for supporting Tokyo Rainbow Pride in 2014.) The four movies are “Loose Cannons,” “Ma vie en
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On May 17th, Ayumi Hamasaki, one of the most popular gay icons, expressed her support and love toward her beloved LGBT town, Ni-chome and her sentiments on the issues facing sexual minority in Japan. I’ve loved Ni-chome ever since my debut. I’ve spent so much time, good and sad, with my friends there. My youth wouldn’t be the same without Ni-chome. After my debut, I became really busy and I started going to Ni-chome. After work, I had dinner with my friends there. I went to Ni-chome, again and again, for girls night outs. My Ni-chome friends were always there
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