Japanese mothers, many with no history of political activism, have started taking to the streets to urge the government to protect their children from radiation leaking from the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.
Using social networking media, they have organized antinuclear energy rallies nationwide attended by thousands of protesters, and even attracted offers from overseas to house Japanese families with children.
"If the Fukushima accident had not happened, I would not have come all the way to Tokyo to protest," Masako Kobayashi, a mother with a 10-year-old daughter from the city of Fukushima, said at a rally in Tokyo.