Experts question Tokyo medical school's reasoning behind gender bias

How is women being discriminated against in Japan a shock? This is repugnant, but nothing new.

cough cough governance, bro culture, old boys club, protect the rich... cough

What’s amazing to me is the amount of mothers and women who defend this action to me. And it’s always the same...”Women don’t want careers, so it’s understandable that the institution put men first”.

In Japan things don’t change because half the women are in the old men’s club.

What’s amazing to me is the amount of mothers and women who defend this action to me. And it’s always the same...”Women don’t want careers, so it’s understandable that the institution put men first”.

I can share quite a few experiences that back this up as well. Many women are a big part of the problem too.

Lack of education and empowerment!

One less qualified female doctor means one more disqualified male doctor. Over the thousands of years, a male dominated Japan qualifies for a disqualified tribe.

"Women are more mature and have better communication skills than men," a Juntendo official said then, revealing that the university had set different pass scores for men and women for at least the past decade.

While ridiculous in its own right, if true, this would be what then, an affirmative action program for the less qualified gender, which so happens to be the one running every single institution in this country.

What’s amazing to me is the amount of mothers and women who defend this action to me. And it’s always the same...”Women don’t want careers, so it’s understandable that the institution put men first”. In Japan things don’t change because half the women are in the old men’s club.

Hard to argue with this but you forgot to mention that the entirety of Japanese culture has always cultivated exactly this mindset. I've taught college for more than 20 years in Japan and the US. When I discussed future careers with young women back home I never encountered a single student who didn't have professional goals. When I ask my current female students what they want to do after graduation, I regularly hear "get married" as the sum total of their post-graduate dreams, and who knows how many feel that way but are reluctant to say so.

This is a product of culture and family life. If my daughter at 18 said to me I want to go to college, then get married and be a housewife, I would think I've failed as a parent. I'm not saying we should impose this mindset on Japan but the notion that young women come to this conclusion on their own is ludicrous. They are being actively groomed to accept less, to set their sights low. Equally sad, for those families and young women who are driven to achieve more, there are barriers as exposed in this scandal. Progress is certainly being made but it's a slog.

How is women being discriminated against in Japan a shock? This is repugnant, but nothing new.

That women are discriminated against in Japan is not new. But having the details of the discrimination laid bare in such detail is definitely news.

Is this feigned shock? The discrimination against women in Japan is disgusting to say the least.

When Japanese ask me what kind of culture shock I went through when I came to Japan, they often expect me to say something like taking off my shoes in the house or using a Japanese style toilet or whatever.

When I honestly answer that the amount of sexual discrimination that's prevalent here is what shocked me the most, they're often a bit taken aback.

Jcjapan

Agreed man.

As a kid who grew up with a Japanese mom and a American dad and lived in both nations, there’s a stark difference in ideology. I do believe there’s many good things about Japanese culture, but women are treated like girls here more often than not.

Whether sub consciously or because they don’t know any better...yeah the goal to just marry the best you can and be content in that way.

What you may have forgot to mention :) is that it’s not only a mentality, it’s also a reality.

You can’t expect to be intelligent, hard working, and have good grades and then also go on to make real money and be respected in the work force here (in general). Japan lags wat behind the world in this.

It is, in my opinion the reason why many young ladies don’t even bother. I mean, if you think about it, why should they? There’s almost no point! It’s intelligent to not bang your head against an unmoving wall.

quote from a book titled The Tattooed Men....

"...Japan has not gone so far as to allow much change in the traditional role of women ........ there is a reluctance to let them out of the psychological kimonos in which they have been wrapped for centuries...."

written in 1975.....

This is the great "mikoshi" the locals here crow about all the time. How many of these women denied medical careers could have saved hundreds of lives and researched to have cured numerous diseases, and eased the suffering of many. That is the result of discrimination. The unseen. But we can all just shake our heads and mutter "shoganai" and celebrate the wondrous results of "mikoshi".

My guess is that too many of the interviews saw a cute girl and their looks "influenced" their scoring, so this subtraction is supposed to counter that although of course they'd never admit it.

The medical institutes will say “women leave work to have babies”. Case closed.

Juntendo University, which received the Tokyo metropolitan government's top award this year for its contribution to female empowerment, acknowledged the unfair treatment at a press conference earlier this month

Female empowerment.............in the kitchen!

It's strange how most other countries manage to have so many female doctors.

"Women are more mature and have better communication skills than men," 

This is a fact!

male students tend to catch up with female students in communication skills after joining the university

This is NOT a fact! - The only reason male students catch up is by keeping the female students' scores low and awarding 'bonus points' to the male students..

After many years of teaching in private high schools, colleges and universities I can tell you for a fact that the women consistently out-perform the men academically by at least a third in every subject. This is result of the hierarchy and male dominated society. The male students know they will get a job and will always be first in line for promotions, so they don't care about academic achievement. Whereas, women are genuinely concerned about academic achievement and do succeed on academics. This is only a general observation. Of course there are exceptions. If you look at Japanese companies, it always the women who are given the difficult and mentally challenging assignments, but it's always the men who take credit for the achievement. A good example of a well educated and powerful Japanese woman is the Tokyo governor, Kioke. She ius a very educated woman and uses her education in her position. Her predecessor, Ishihara is just a brain dead zombie by comparison.

If my daughter at 18 said to me I want to go to college, then get married and be a housewife, I would think I've failed as a parent. I'm not saying we should impose this mindset on Japan but the notion that young women come to this conclusion on their own is ludicrous. They are being actively groomed to accept less, to set their sights low.

So deciding to focus on raising a family is setting your sights low? I think that is one problem in Western society, a mindset has been imposed on Western women that to choose to be a housewife and focusing on raising children is an inferior choice. It isn't, and neither is choosing career.

You would fail as a parent if you make your daughter feel guilty for choosing to be a housewife or for pushing her to pursue a career just to please her daddy.

 a male dominated Japan qualifies for a disqualified tribe.

what does that even mean, almost all races/tribes over the millenia where dominated by men, but as cultures evolved they understood that discriminating against women just because they are the weaker sex even when their mental strengths and intelligence are equal to men was actually hindering their advancement . unfortunately some cultures still haven't caught on to these facts yet. We don't chase down or hunt our food or beat up the other male challengers to become alpha anymore so the physical strength isn't a quality that makes good leaders nowadays.

a mindset has been imposed on Western women that to choose to be a housewife and focusing on raising children is an inferior choice. It isn't, and neither is choosing career.

I dont know any western society that does that, I do know that with women empowerment and equal opportunity、women can choose to be a housewife, have a career or even do both .Real men dont put pressure on their wives to choose only one no matter what is culturally expected of them.

The true reason behind the discriminatory practice is that female medical school graduates are more likely to become ophthalmologists or ENT doctors rather than surgeons. If admission were to be solely based on entrance exam scores, there would be an acute shortage of surgeons.

Juntendo University, which received the Tokyo metropolitan government's top award this year for its contribution to female empowerment, acknowledged the unfair treatment at a press conference earlier this month but said it had considered the practice a measure for narrowing the wide gap between the abilities of men and women.

Lol! This whole paragraph could be copy/pasted into a Rising Wasabi story. If the creator/s are reading, this one is begging for airtime!

That excuse is an absolute lie. Compounding one piece of shadiness with another. Shame on them!

The number of female professors at its medical department increased to 11 in 2017 from two in 2011. It was one of the main reasons why the Tokyo government selected the university for the female empowerment award.

Again Japan (and the old cronies who own it), stop with the photo-op mentality and learn how to get to the core of things. More mud on your face with this one.

"They are pretending that there are academic grounds (for their practice), but this is nothing more than plain discrimination against women," Sakata said, adding that differences in communication skills are far more related to individual abilities than gender.

Even if it is true that women are better communicators at a younger age (I happen to agree that they are - especially in Japan), that should mean that there ought to be MORE women in the field of medicine, not less.

This story is a really warped excuse for good ol' cronyism.

how those heartless men can hurt women easily,

women are not similar to men, that is a nature fact, but they deserve to be protected and have more rights

I'm with thepersoniamnow. These practices are terrible, but would have been eradicated a long time ago if they did not have the tacit consent of a decent number of Japanese women. I am convinced that ambitious women in Japan are held back by both men and other, unambitious women who enjoy the status quo.

I do know that with women empowerment and equal opportunity、women can choose to be a housewife, have a career or even do both .Real men dont put pressure on their wives to choose only one no matter what is culturally expected of them.

I agree, but there are many like jcapan who would think they would have "failed as a parent" if their daughter chose to be a housewife, and consider that option as "setting their sights low".

All I was pointing out is that there is absolutely nothing wrong, low, or inferior to chosing to be a housewife; and there those who are trying to push women away from that option.

And that's how they treat their own women, imagin how they treat foreign women they being of even lower on the scale. It's good that these practices are being talked about in 2018.

I'm going to start a medical school, only for women! How about that? Cash me outside!

So deciding to focus on raising a family is setting your sights low? I think that is one problem in Western society, a mindset has been imposed on Western women that to choose to be a housewife and focusing on raising children is an inferior choice. It isn't, and neither is choosing career.

Raw Beer, maybe you missed the part where I said "I'm not saying we should impose this mindset on Japan" or whatever your country is? I would add that I don't think taking a few years off to raise your kids is a bad thing. Noticeably absent from your response is how you'd feel if your college-educated son said he just wanted to raise his kids and let his wife be a breadwinner? Would that be an inferior choice?

The choices a young woman makes can put them in a box. I'm extremely close to a woman here who is in her 70s and has been married to a serial adulterer more than 50 years. She often tells me how much she regrets not having better options available to her as a young woman. Her parents sent her to a women's college, i.e. a finishing school, and their only expectations for her were that she'd make a good match. Mission accomplished--she married a rich guy who has always made plenty of money but has treated her like crap for most of her life. She feels that had she had a career of her own she would have been far more empowered in her marriage and, of course, would have divorced him decades ago. She pushed her own daughters to aim higher and they both now practice medicine. One has a happy marriage. One married another loser and promptly divorced him.

"Experts" in what? Did they also attend university? Seems more protecting their own again.

So many male applicants gaining their place not because of merit

"Women are more mature and have better communication skills than men," a Juntendo official said then, revealing that the university had set different pass scores for men and women for at least the past decade.

The first example of positive discrimination in Japan - and it favours men.

This is Japan in a nutshell.