The past year or two have seen progress for two often-marginalized sectors of Japanese society — women and the LGBT community. Voices are finally being heard, after years of being lost amid a general conspiracy of silence and reluctance to challenge the status quo.
In line with the international phenomenon of #MeToo, Japanese women are speaking up more about issues such as sexual harassment and assault. The LGBT community is also making inroads toward having their rights recognized. Some municipalities now recognize same-sex partnerships, and in 2017 Osaka approved two men as the first same-sex couple to be official foster parents of a child.
Nevertheless, politicians still often make sweeping statements with impunity, with a recent example being Mio Sugita's controversial remarks last month that LGBT couples were "unproductive" members of society for not being able to produce offspring, and that policies to support them were a waste of money. Sugita also criticized Shiori Ito, a journalist who went public last year with an accusation that she had been raped by a high-profile fellow journalist, saying Ito was at fault for "drinking so much."