Cross-examinations began this week in a case in Tokyo District Court aimed at reinforcing a publication ban of an infamous list that, some argue, is fanning the flames of discrimination in Japan.
Persistent Discrimination
The suit centers around Japan’s burakumin (部落民), or “untouchables” class. As we’ve discussed before on Unseen Japan, the burakumin are a social group of “outcasts” who have historically been consigned to do society’s “dirty” jobs. While exact numbers are hard to come by, Japan’s Burakumin Liberation League (BLL) estimates some three million citizens can be considered “burakumin”.
Discrimination against the burakumin persists to this day. Even now, being outed as burakumin can cost someone their job, ruin their prospects of marriage, or subject them to ostracism from the larger community.
In 1972, a publisher in Osaka began distributing a list purported to contain the names of burakumin and burakumin settlements. Experts believe the list is compiled from actual Japanese family records (戸籍; koseki), as government officials made sure to record such information during Japan’s Meiji era.
“I Can’t Tell Anyone”
A publisher in Kawasaki resuscitated and republished the list in 2016. This led the Burakumin Liberation League and 248 of its members to sue the publisher. A lower court ruled in the burakumin’s favor and temporarily forbidden the publication of the list. That decision led the publisher to countersue in Tokyo District Court.
The publisher denies they have any ill intent in publishing the list and is fighting on free speech grounds. They argue that they published the list for “scholarly and research purposes.” Furthermore, they maintain that the information in the book is already a matter of public record.
The parties to the lawsuit obviously disagree. One man from the Kanto region who’s a party to the lawsuit told a reporter: “I don’t often tell people I’m a burakumin. There are people who don’t know why this is a problem or who endorse discrimination, so I don’t reveal that to people who aren’t familiar with the [burakumin liberation] movement….If my origins are confirmed and my identity revealed, it’d destroy my family’s job prospects, marriages, and other key moments of our lives.”
A law passed in the Japanese Diet in 2016 aims to educate the Japanese public about the “burakumin problem” and eliminate discrimination towards the burakumin. Burakumin discrimination is one of several major forms of racial and social discrimination in Japan. Zainichi Koreans and Chinese, other resident foreigners, Japan’s native Ainu population, Okinawans, Black residents, and mixed-race (“half”) Japanese also face discrimination on a regular basis.
