Philip Brasor - The Japan Times

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Oct 28, 2017

Organ donations and transplants still face obstacles in Japan

It has been 20 years since the government legalized organ transplants from brain-dead donors, and seven years since the law was revised to allow children to donate organs and families to approve organ donations of loved ones unilaterally.

CULTURE / Film

Oct 25, 2017

Tokyo International Film Festival opens with a rainy red carpet

After walking the red carpet on the opening night of the 30th Tokyo International Film Festival, Yu Aoi pointed out to the emcee that she and the other three "muses" of the festival — fellow actresses Sakura Ando, Hikari Mitsushima and Aoi Miyazaki — were all born in the same year, 1985,...

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Oct 21, 2017

Identifying the 'liberal' in Japanese politics

The current group of conservative public figures in the United States wants to return to an age when certain middle-class values were ascendant, without acknowledging that many of those values were realized because President Franklin Roosevelt implemented progressive social policies and trade unions...

CULTURE / Film

Oct 18, 2017

Busan International Film Festival spotlights female directors and plenty of Japanese content

The 22nd Busan International Film Festival, which opened Oct. 12 and ends Saturday, seemed to be in better shape this year.

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Oct 14, 2017

The bottom line in publicly shaming celebrities

Anyone interested in Japanese television is familiar with the term "yarase," which refers to on-air situations staged to look natural and spontaneous.

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Oct 7, 2017

Hate speech thrives on social media platforms

On Sept. 8, the anti-hate speech group Tokyo No Hate demonstrated in front of the Tokyo offices of Twitter. The group wants the social networking service to police its users more diligently with regard to racist and other discriminatory tweets.

COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS

Oct 1, 2017

Re-registering property: The lie of the land

According to an article that appeared in the Asahi Shimbun last June, authorities are unsure of the title holders to 4.1 million hectares of land in Japan — in total, an area equivalent in size to the island of Kyushu. Though this problem has been evident at least since the 1980s, the government...

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Sep 30, 2017

Japan's pensioners are literally getting older

Because of the election announced by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday, the new Cabinet he formed last summer to boost his falling support rate will do no work, since it was launched during the summer vacation and Abe dissolved the Diet as soon as it opened on Thursday.

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Sep 23, 2017

Political protest or textbook harassment?

In 1979, The New Yorker ran a very long article by Frances FitzGerald about American history textbooks and how they had changed over the years. She said that the framing of history depends on who is writing it and, more importantly, who is supporting that writing. Publishers present history in such a...

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Sep 16, 2017

There's no business like a star's personal business

If you've got a Twitter account in Japan, you've probably seen the promoted tweets for Netflix featuring comedian Sanma Akashiya. In these video spots, Sanma compares working for a streaming service to working for a commercial broadcaster, but doesn't mention the context for his remarks.

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Sep 9, 2017

Severe school anxiety puts teens at risk

For the past two weeks there have been projections about a spike in juvenile suicides as the new school term approached. Suicides among junior high and high school students rise around Sept. 1, and teachers and parents were urged to pay close attention to young people.

BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING

Sep 8, 2017

Japan's lottery rakes in declining revenues as younger generation gives jackpot chances a pass

Several weeks ago Mavis Wanczyk, a 53-year-old woman from Massachusetts, won $758 million in the Powerball lottery — the largest single winner jackpot in North American history. Wanczyk said at a news conference that she had already quit her job and plans to "hide in bed."

COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS

Sep 3, 2017

The hot topic of high-rise fire prevention

The fire that killed at least 80 people in London's Grenfell Tower in June, as well as similar apartment building blazes that recently occured in Dubai and Hawaii, has brought the world's attention to the issue of safety in high-rise residences.

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Sep 2, 2017

No one else wants Okinawa's U.S. bases

On Aug. 15, the 72nd anniversary of the Japanese surrender, there was a symposium in Tokyo about changing the Constitution. One of the panelists, documentarian Tatsuya Mori, pointed out that earlier that day Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had given remarks at an annual memorial event, and at no point did...

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Aug 26, 2017

Japan's female politicians showing the way forward on maternity harassment

Since July 12, when Lower House lawmaker Takako Suzuki announced she was pregnant with her first child, the news media has been full of stories about "maternity harassment."

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Aug 19, 2017

Facing up to the cold hard truth of war

Although Japan and South Korea reached a final settlement several years ago involving payments to Korean women who were forced to sexually service Japanese troops in the 1930s and '40s, the issue won't go away, and not just because the new South Korean president is questioning the settlement, which was...

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Aug 12, 2017

METI seeks to pass nuclear buck with release of waste disposal map

Taro Kono's appointment as the new foreign minister is raising eyebrows. Though he hasn't shown any indication that he will buck Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's agenda, Kono is considered a leftish maverick within the Liberal Democratic Party, especially with regard to its nuclear energy policy, which he...

BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING

Aug 11, 2017

Japan's health care is far from free, and ballooning costs could mean higher premiums

Japan's health insurance system is considered "universal," since it covers everyone in the country, but it is hardly "free" in the sense of having the government pay for everything with tax revenue.

COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS

Aug 6, 2017

Reviving Japan's old shopping arcades

As everyone knows, Japan has an unmanageable surplus of vacant housing. According to the latest government surveys there are more than 8 million unoccupied houses and apartment units in Japan and that number will increase to the point where one in four or five residences will be empty by 2030.

JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX

Aug 5, 2017

Parsing gender stereotypes in Japan's media landscape

Tomomi Inada's resignation as defense minister ended a tenure that often made reporters wonder if her transgressions had more to do with ignorance than with incompetence. It would be wrong to associate her failures with her sex, though there were some in the media who harped on her fashion sense or supposed...

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