Nearly all Japan's school boards scrap gender field on applications

Next thing they abolish will be gender-specific bathrooms at high schools.

Ever lived in Japan? This used to be rather common, not in schools, but in countless locations!

Gender is decided by chromosomes, not by what a person feels they "identify as."

Applications are one thing, what are they going to do when they a "girl" come in a boys uniform and vice versa?

"What gender is someone with xxy chromosomes?"

Well .1% with that mutation can choose male or female. The 99.9% of the rest of us do not have bend all of society to accomodate them.

Applications are one thing, what are they going to do when they a "girl" come in a boys uniform and vice versa?

Some of them will freak out, some of them will deal with it, and some of them will ignore it. A range of responses.

I had to fill in a gender field when applying for a bank account in Japan. No idea why the gender is relevant. Is my money different to someone else's?

Gender is irrelevant in most application forms.

The decision comes amid growing awareness of transgender and nonbinary individuals in Japan, many of whom may face psychological distress having to specify a gender they do not identify with.

It looks like Japan is slowly nibbling at the transgender ideology that has infected the West. It is nice wanting to appease the feelings of a tiny minority of people, but do they even realize what slippery slope they are on here? I think not.

They should have three choices Girl ☐ Boy ☐ Other, please state ☐ ......................................................

Do not allow the minority to dictate what the majority can express themselves as. Be proud to be a boy, girl or other but don't take away other people's right to express their identity as a girl or boy.... or other!

There are two sexes: male and female. That’s biology. We can’t change that. We can mess with our body, add bits and chop bits off, but we can’t change that. In optimum health and age, a male can impregnate; a female can become pregnant.

Gender, in recent times, has come simply to mean ‘personality’, how we choose to present ourselves to the world. That’s up to me and you and, if we’re harming nobody, it’s nobody else’s business.

Be sensible, and be kind, and we can all be happy and have some fun.

TT

Your either a Boy or Girl period!

Next thing they abolish will be gender-specific bathrooms at high schools.

@Khaos

Sex is science. Gender is politics.

What gender is someone with xxy chromosomes?

What a stupid comment typical of the shear stupidity and simplistic view of the world entrenched in the woke ideology. The Klinefelter syndrome has no direct correlation with the topic here and in fact science defines this syndrome as where a male has an additional copy of the X chromosome. The primary features are infertility and small, poorly functioning testicles.

The syndrome does not necessarily correlate to gender identities issues. In fact most boys with Klinefelter Syndrome grow up to live as men, only a few do develop atypical gender identities, and some do develop female gender identities. But that’s a minority and not a significant issue you seem to believe it is.

It's getting way out of hand now. Trying to go out of your way to accommodate every single person only ends up inconveniencing most of the others and causing other related problems.

Your either a Boy or Girl period!

That's the way I see it too.

Gender is indeed decided by Chromosomes. How someone identifies is a different matter entirely.

So, fantasy then.

Sure, you can identify as whatever you want. But that doesn't give you the right or power to dictate what others think. If I "identify" as the prime minister of Japan I just roll in there making new laws, right?

Have seen this in schools in the US, (biological) boys joins in a girls sport like wrestling and simply dominates.

Applications are one thing, what are they going to do when they a "girl" come in a boys uniform and vice versa?

There are a few schools now that allow girls to wear pants. I suspect this will happen more in the future. What's interesting is that there has also been a push to phase out using "chan" for girls and "kun" for boys. Teachers are being instructed to refer to all students as "san."

An interesting move. It's not like that tidbit is wholly necessary anyway when applying for a school.

Guess they'll stop looking at the pictures attached to the applications, stop balancing classes out between male and female.

Having a gender field makes sense on school applications. For others it's basically for reference and data.

Are they also doing away with pictures on applications? If not, this is meaningless.

kyushubillToday  07:49 am JST

"What gender is someone with xxy chromosomes?"

Well .1% with that mutation can choose male or female. The 99.9% of the rest of us do not have bend all of society to accomodate them.

Good answer.

Maybe in the future any forms having a tick box asking whether male or female should be followed by another tick box asking "Are you sure? Y/N".

time to allow girls to also wear pants as a uniform, or completely get rid of them all together as they are irrelevant to education

Blimey. At my school, girls often had the colour of their pants checked (navy blue knickers only, I recall), but they certainly weren’t encouraged to ‘go commando’. World’s gone mad!

TT

AlongfortherideToday 09:03 am JST

Your either a Boy or Girl period!

Tom SanToday 09:06 am JST

That's the way I see it too.

ZaphodToday 12:06 pm JST

......It is nice wanting to appease the feelings of a tiny minority of people, 

I see it somehow similar, you are either a straight man or a straight woman OR something else.

I was talking a while ago with a man who identified himself as gay, but open to a very good talk. He told me he thinks at least 90 % to 95 % of all people are either straight men or straight women. - The remaining - maybe 5 but not over 10 % are 'something else' - gay, bi-sexual, transgender etc. etc.

The question is how large is really this 'tiny minority' which is divided again into various subgroups. It's OK to consider the feelings of a minority group, but it should never go so far that these minority groups telling the majority what they have to do or not have to do.

Well .1% with that mutation can choose male or female.

But by chromosome, they are neither male nor female. Why should they have to be pigeonholed into these decisions just because you're uncomfortable with the idea of other genders?

If the authorities respect "sexual diversity" why do away with the gender field? Better to augment it?

@Yubaru: Bertie is saying nothing of the sort and THAT is putting words into his mouth. Gender is indeed decided by Chromosomes. How someone identifies is a different matter entirely.

Does this mean someone that is physically male can go to an all girls high school if they identify as female? Things may get interesting.

Why not just let the gender field remain, and state any requirement to participate with the relevant information optional?

At least the education establishment will come someway to analyze the logistical classroom needs.

I really don't care what a person wants to identify themselves as. They can identify as a snake, a rat or a pig for all I care. What I don't like is this word "understanding" from them when I don't accept it. Instead, they want to "force" their way or identification on others.

If you want to identify that way, fine. But don't expect us to identify with what you are not. I will be "offended"

As for Bathrooms, when I first came to Japan 34 years ago, most bathrooms, either could use. Many times, you would especially see girls using the boys room when boys were only using the urinals anyways. But I feel that there is more crime and freaks out there today and I am happy that they have separated for young girls sake.

Just use “sex assigned at birth”.

Why do a particular mindset of person either bang on about the past, make bizarre predictions for the future or talk about other countries rather than commenting on what is happening now, in this article, in this country?

Because history, potential future consequences, and the relevant experience of others should all be taken into account when decisions (and laws) are made here and now.

TT

They’ll get you anyway, if you anytime dare to come with slightly colored hair or the wrong clothes length.

what about those who want to say "I'm a boy" or "I'm a girl", will they be required to 'deny' themselves? I wonder why the Ed, authorities didn't just add provision for 'other', or allow people to designate themselves according to their choice.....

But by chromosome, they are neither male nor female. Why should they have to be pigeonholed into these decisions just because you're uncomfortable with the idea of other genders?

Men/boys with XXY have Klinefelter syndrome

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/klinefelters-syndrome/

Please, let's not ignore biology, science and facts.

Riggghhht.

So how are they gonna make classes 20 boys and 20 girls across the board?

Obviously you can guess some, but Sora? Makoto? Tomo?

This won’t sit well with the dinosaurs.

SDCAToday  12:20 pm JST

time to allow girls to also wear pants as a uniform, or completely get rid of them all together as they are irrelevant towards education.

Whether girls wear pants or skirts to school is totally irrelevant and off-topic as far as this thread is concerned.

Students applying to enter public high schools from next spring will no longer be required to specify their gender on the application form 

This might be a good start and if it continues up to company recruitment it will benefit straight men, as all these job quotas, women only train cars, women-only schools and salary disputes between men and women and early retirement allowances for women only etc. will disappear. A step forward to equality.

I think however feminists do not like that...

@girl in Tokyo, you don't seem to understand the issue despite the fact that you are impacted, as a girl

It's incredible how nasty people can get about something that doesn't affect them in the slightest.

This is how it will impact all women and girls :

People will simply use the restroom they feel most comfortable using.

So men will be able to use women toilets, lockers and sports competition just because they "identify" as a woman?

What about women's privacy? Added risk of agression? What about girls, especially younger ones?

They will be more exposed to men's violence, will lose all their competitions and they will also stop using restrooms at school and will suffer from health issues because of that

How can you pretend to be feminist and defend women when transgenderism is all about men trampling women's rights?

Look at the rate of sexual offense among transgenders in the UK, you will see they are way more likely than men to commit a sexual offence. Yet, because they identify as a woman, they are being transferred into women prison where they commit more sexual offense.

Look also into autogynephilia, that is a fetish where men are aroused by wearing women clothes and pretending to be women.

If you want to defend women, you cannot side with fantasy, women is a fact, sex matters.

@Bob Fosse,

It is not sci-fi, I wish it was but as I said just look up the transgenders sexuel offense rate, look up autogynephilia and look at cities or schools who implemented unisex toilets, you will see all I said is reality.

Yes, removing the gender on the form is not this (yet), but this is the first step before all of that I described happen as it is already happening in other countries. Look it up before calling it fiction.

time to allow girls to also wear pants as a uniform, or completely get rid of them all together as they are irrelevant towards education.

Gender is decided by chromosomes, not by what a person feels they "identify as."

What gender is someone with xxy chromosomes?

but do they even realize what slippery slope they are on here?

Do you? All these slippery slopes seem to move very very slowly or just don’t exist.

I think not.

Yep.

Sad to see so many comments denying science. The science says: Sex is different from Gender. Please, get educated.

So men will be able to use women toilets, lockers and sports competition just because they "identify" as a woman?

What about women's privacy? Added risk of agression? What about girls, especially younger ones?

What about reading the article before the comments?

Very first sentence. Understand that first, save the sci-fi for later.

Look it up before calling it fiction.

You mean “do your own research?”

So allowing all children to enter public school in Japan, disregarding gender quotas, which is the crux of this issue, will lead to transgender ‘sexual’ ‘offense’ rate?

I’d recommend you read the article.

This is great news. Unless they have different curriculums based on gender, then gender is irrelevant. About the quotas, which effectively makes it harder for a group of people to get education is kind of a violation of human rights. Instead of being unfair, make more schools.

@Iron Lad

Both are usually very political. You can't deny the existence of genders in humans.

They’ll be __ next!

Same argument anything changes.

Deal with it.

A good start. Next, get rid of gender specific school uniforms, replace them with one piece coveralls. The only ones who would object are creepy pedophiles turned on by schoolgirl uniforms.

@Todd

Seems like you truly don't understand gender. Being a man, a woman (or in some cultures a different gender), is part of a person's identity. That part of identity is what is called gender identity. Do you really believe that identifying as a man or woman, is the same as identifying as a pig ?

@SAME#

What you're saying are TERF arguments, all of them debunked, all of them exclusively targeting and demonizing trans women.

No matter what one might think about the gender identity topic, the decision overall is a good thing. No reason for anyone to know the gender of the applicant and no reason to decide who wears what based on gender. don't care about stuff that doesn't affect you. Only real problem I see is with bathrooms/changing rooms. I guess the only real fix is to have a third room that is free for anyone to use.

girl_in_tokyo

No more need be said. Most excellent.

Because history, potential future consequences, and the relevant experience of others should all be taken into account when decisions (and laws) are made here and now.

TT

Here and now is talking about PUBLIC schools which are mixed but the usuals are already in a tizzy about something else.

Gender recognition should only apply to medical policies and practices. Everything else - irrelevant.

Gender is decided by chromosomes, not by what a person feels they "identify as."

No, “sex” is decided by chromosomes. Gender is engendered (by a myriad of experiences and influences). It’s not solely what a person identifies as but that is certainly a part of it. You were perhaps born a male or female but for the most part you learned the behavior of a man or a woman and/or anything in between or adjacent.

Does this mean someone that is physically male can go to an all girls high school if they identify as female?

No. Read the very first sentence in the article.

Things may get interesting

Why do a particular mindset of person either bang on about the past, make bizarre predictions for the future or talk about other countries rather than commenting on what is happening now, in this article, in this country?

In my household gender has never been a issue. We all use the same toilet and bathroom never had a need for have a male or female toilet etc .but out in the public sphere uni toilets and onsen are not tolerated Will onsen be next to not identify their customers by gender. I hope not. I used the onsen because in has gender identification. It where I can fully relax without having my heterosexual wife me. I am not willing to give up this most needed social aspect of my life.

Next thing they abolish will be gender-specific bathrooms at high schools.

It's coming bro. And it should. It's just a place perform basic body functions after all. Back in the day it was a shared communal thing. At least you have a cubicle. Be happy and get on with things. What is this gender nonsense anyway ?

girl_in_tokyo: Well said.

It's incredible how nasty people can get about something that doesn't affect them in the slightest.

The number of transgender people has not and will not change; but the number of people identifying themselves and coming out as transgender will increase simply because they will feel more comfortable coming out with increased acceptance.

Gendered restrooms won't disappear. People will simply use the restroom they feel most comfortable using. But I do predict that the number of single restrooms that are non-gendered will increase. This is just a smart thing to do.

Chromosomes have nothing to do with gender identity, and transgender people's identity is valid regardless of your personal opinion. You can be mean and nasty and resist, or you can be kind and accepting. Which of those you chose will show everyone around you exactly what kind of person you are.

Finally, people don't just up and suddenly decide they want to change their gender. This type of comment reminds me of back in the day when people would say that you could become gay just by being around gay people. It's a mark of ignorance stemming from personal prejudice. Again, you have a choice: you can chose to be accepting, decide it's none of your business, ignore it, and refrain from commenting; or you can openly make bigoted comments. Which you chose shows everyone around you exactly what kind of person you are. And I say go ahead and show us who you are, because then everyone will know who to avoid associating with. Because really, how nasty are you that you would talk like that about anyone?

Gender is decided by chromosomes, not by what a person feels they "identify as."

So, you are openly stating that you discriminate against LGBTQ? Thank you for clarifying that.