How Are Men, Foreign and Domestic, Viewed in Japan.

Before I begin since this is my first article as an official contributor to the Honey Badger Brigade. I would like to thank both Alison and Hannah for accepting me into the group. It is rather humbling and encouraging to see my work viewed as beneficial to helping find humanity’s faults and balancing them out.  Especially knowing the strength of the people involved openly with this group. I can only hope to come close to showing as much dedication and ability that they do.

This is the third in my trilogy of articles on the subject of how Japanese culture threatens to destroy the feminist narrative that deems all men absolute agents and women absolute victims. I plan on showing how the development has changed over the nearly 500 years of exposure they have had to Western men to act as a gauge, going all the way from the days of the Jesuits all the way to interviewing a man who has essentially grown up in both Eastern and Western culture. Through this, I hope to provide distinct proof that not only is the gynocentric nature of our species provable, but breakable.  If it’s done right, feminism and its stranglehold can be broken by looking at this differing culture.

To begin we shall, of course, go from the beginning with the Jesuits. When they were allowed into Japan in 1549CE, they were welcomed warmly by the Emperor Gounara and Oda Nobunaga during the early parts of the Sengoku Jidai (Warring States Era). This was primarily due to the interest the future Tokugawa leader took in the early matchlock rifles carried by the crew of the ship. In addition, the Jesuit priests weren’t like the Chinese and Mongolian Christian raiders they had previous experience with, so curiosity got the better of them.  They even gave the missionaries a plot of land in Kyoto along with a yearly allowance for the monks, treating them very similarly to their own Shinto and Buddhist priests.

However, soon they understood exactly what the new religion and cultural changes entailed and how they highly conflicted with traditional Japanese life, as the group following them in was actually an invading army. They not only used their new firearms and immense knowledge of their terrain and their newly unified nature, they pushed the Jesuits and remaining Westerners out of the country and swiftly killed those that stayed. They enacted edicts that kept all Japanese at home as well as restricting even trade with China purely to Nagasaki at the coast. This state of affairs lasted from 1639 CE to 1853, a little over 2oo years.

Enter United States Navel Commodore Matthew Perry, with state-of-the-art naval artillery the likes of which Japan had no idea existed. Forged in the wars that bolstered the then young American country, these forced the young Emperor Meiji, for whom the era of the time was named (Meiji Restoration,) to sign an eternal peace treaty with the United States. This led to Commodore Perry backing Meiji on overthrowing the then weakened Tokugawa Shogunate and mimicking the Western militaries soon afterward, outlawing the traditional blades being worn in public. The Americans were widely hated by most of the citizenry as being deceitful, a potential holdover from the bad actions of the Jesuits in addition to their boastful nature.

This kept pace until they took over Korea and pushed back the Russians at the time. These actions being influenced by Britain eventually led to World War I, among other activities elsewhere in the world. After World War I the now arrogant Japanese Empire was taken over by Emperor Taisho, followed by then Prince Regent Hirohito, later dubbed Emperor Showa, whose reign lasted until 1989, even after his office was stripped of all of its powers and benefits and turned into nothing more than a figurehead similar to British Royalty by General Douglas MacArthur after World War II. At this point, the Americans were begrudgingly accepted as the de facto rulers of Japan, as they formed the new constitutional parliament system that Japan uses to this day. Some were infuriated as they turned in their katana only to learn that they had been destroy,  melted down for spoils.

Even today, there is a mixed love and hate relationship between the Japanese and the ‘Gaijin’ or foreigners. Americans in particular are made to sound like complete imbeciles in much of the related media despite a surprising mixing of the races at some points.

One such point would be a particular animation artist that was interviewed for the purposes of this article. Steve R Bennett IV is the child of a U.S. Marine and a Japanese woman. He was raised on a German Base early in his life but was given several stories by his brothers and his mother of being raised in Japan both during the aftermath of the war and before his birth. These stories have led to an interesting realization. The Japanese school system, a heavily modified variant of the American system at the time, encourages such a unity of their class structure that men and women get equal chores and stick together almost for life. They would seem to be one of the most egalitarian or “patriarchal” (as the neighborhood rabid feminist would tell us) structures on the face of the earth.

This is in fact not the case as Japanese culture as a whole view themselves as a specifically “Matriarchal” society. This can be seen in the majority of media depictions of class presidents, high-ranking women in companies, and even a high amount of strong female depictions throughout the rest of the culture. On top of this, it is also standard to view the eldest woman the head of the household. Albeit this is typically the husband’s mother, the position still stands. This is not seen as a political power structure but a social one. Or as Mr. Bennett so plainly put it in the interview “the power of pussy” that rules all.

So how does this all relate to what we are facing and why feminism fears those that embrace tenets of Japanese culture and Bushido? It’s that we not only see clearly the power they hold over all, but understand it in such a way that we can not only create our own counter to it, but use Japanese culture that has developed since the 1950’s as our solid examples of how feminism is and reveal them for the religious zealots they are. We can prove wholesale using this model of society that is right in front of our eyes to show that Western women absolutely are not oppressed.

I plan henceforth to further study this using various methods and interviewing other native Japanese on this subject to give solid evidence to this theory for the sake of the MRM. With such perhaps we can even the playing field. Any feedback on this will be appreciated as it is with the prior articles and I look forward to continuing this important work along with everyone here. Or as they say in Japan: ”よろしくお願いします。” (“Its my sincerest pleasure.”)

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Alex Tinsley

A student of Fine Arts and Japanese culture of six years at Murray State University. Having never graduated due to difficulties with a specific teacher has gained a unique perspective upon the issues being faced by men and boys. A father of a young boy and loving husband.

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