1Haha yo! Korosu na 母よ殺すな (Mother, don’t kill me!) was one of the hardest hitting and most controversial slogans launched by Aoi Shiba no Kai 青い芝の会, a pioneer in the emancipation movement fought by disabled people in the early 1970s. It forcefully conveys the group’s furious rejection of the policies, ideas, actions and social representations collectively referred to as “eugenics” (yūseigaku 優生学).
2Civil associations for people with disabilities already existed in Japan at the end of WWII, born from the ashes of the country’s pre-war movements. Each advocated for a specific group (wounded war veterans, the visually impaired, tuberculosis sufferers, etc.) and expressed demands that would later be shared by the entire disability rights movement (de-medicalising care, securing access to employment). At the time, however, there was no attempt to present a united front. That particular role fell to Aoi Shiba no Kai.
- 1 The name Aoi Shiba no Kai means Green Grass Association. It was chosen to convey the idea that “gr (...)
3The group’s origins date back to 1947, when graduates of special schools in Tokyo created the literary journal Shinonome しののめ to connect people living with cerebral palsy. Over the years, the texts published by the journal became increasingly theoretical and political, inspiring some of its contributors (all former students at Kōmei, a special needs school in Setagaya, Tokyo) to create the association Aoi Shiba no Kai in 1957,1 with the aim of bringing some of the ideas advocated in the journal to fruition.
- 2 Correspondence was limited in the early years because few of Aoi Shiba no Kai’s members spoke Engl (...)
- 3 Osaragi inherited the running of Ganjōji temple (願成寺) from his father but had studied at a Catholi (...)
- 4 Although this paper focuses exclusively on the early 1970s, a crucial period when Aoi Shiba no Kai (...)
- 5 The film in question, Sayōnara CP, was not made by Aoi Shiba no Kai members but by Hara Kazuo (原一男 (...)
4The association began life with 40 members, all living with cerebral palsy. Initially it was conceived as a platform where members could exchange opinions (notably in writing), organise leisure activities and correspond with similar groups in the United States.2 Within a decade, regional branches had sprung up throughout Japan and the group’s activities had become increasingly political. The association questioned the way disability was managed in society, particularly in terms of welfare, and attempted to open negotiations with the Ministry of Health and Welfare (Kōseishō, 厚生省). In 1964 it set up an experimental commune in the mountains of Ibaraki Prefecture (known as Maharaba mura マハラバ村, Maharaba Village), led by Osaragi Akira 大仏空 (1930–1984), a monk from the Jōdo Shinshū school of Buddhism.3 It also created a national coalition—the Aoi Shiba no Kai National Federation (Zenkoku aoi shiba no kai sōrengōkai 全国青い芝の会総連合会)—and campaigned to give disabled people a voice in society.4 Activities included demonstrating, handing out leaflets, meeting with other civil society groups and making a documentary.5
5While Aoi Shiba no Kai’s views echoed those already expressed by other associations (in particular de-medicalising disability), the group stood out for the way it radically challenged the established social order. It was the first to claim disability as an identity (the “right to exist” as a disabled person) rather than merely demanding practical support (most often granted as a form of charity). The group called for a paradigm shift from compensating for disability (still seen as a disadvantage, impairment or deficiency) to recognising it (i.e. no longer trying to “conceal” the disability but rather adapting to it as a specific circumstance).
6One of the main proponents of this change was Yokozuka Kōichi 横塚晃 一 (1935–1978), a resident of Maharaba Village, vice-chair of the Kanagawa chapter of Aoi Shiba no Kai and chair of the national federation from 1973 until his death in 1978. His collected writings were published in 1975 under the title Haha yo! Korosu na 母よ殺すな (Mother, don’t kill me!6), then in a revised edition prefaced by the sociologist Tateiwa Shin’ya in 2007.
7Eugenics was a central concept in the political arguments adopted by Yokozuka, who used it to denounce the treatment of disabled people in Japan and give them a voice, particularly during the proposed revision of the Eugenic Protection Law (Yūsei hogo-hō 優生保護法). Yokozuka applied the term to a vast array of situations, frequently drawing uncomfortable parallels with Nazi racial hygiene, hence the virulent reactions his discourse elicited. Nevertheless, as provocative as his views sometimes seemed, they radically changed the way disabled people were perceived in Japanese society and, more importantly, how these individuals perceived their own identity.
8How did Yokozuka turn the fight against “eugenics” into a tool for self-assertion and emancipation, and with what consequences?
9This paper analyses Yokozuka’s writings in order to identify his main arguments and explain his rationale for encouraging people with disabilities to embrace a disabled identity in response to eugenics. Extended extracts of his texts have thus been translated, the aim being to convey their virulence (and at times lack of restraint), since this is what makes them so unique. Yokozuka’s radicality lay not only in his claiming a “right to exist” but in his assertion that disability was a specific circumstance that should be acknowledged by society rather than experienced individually as a source of shame.
- 7 Using the expression “social model of disability” to describe Yokozuka’s thought is nevertheless a (...)
- 8 This is evidenced by Asaka Yūho’s self-narrative, Iyashi no sekushī torippu (Asaka, 1993), in whic (...)
- 9 One of the criticisms later made of the “social model of disability” is that it mainly reflects th (...)
- 10 Yokozuka, 2007, p. 97 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono” ある障害 (...)
10It is essential to note that the “disabled voice” presented here belongs specifically to people with cerebral palsy, since Aoi Shiba no Kai’s first members were all living with this condition. While Yokozuka generally wrote on behalf of “disabled people” (shōgaisha 障害者), he made no attempt to define “disability” (shōgai 障害), nor the range of situations it covered. By focusing on the discrimination suffered by disabled people rather than the difficulties linked to an identified medical impairment, Yokozuka in some ways prefigured the “social model of disability”, which sees handicap as a “social disadvantage” rather than a “medical defect”.7 His arguments were thus not confined to people with cerebral palsy. In fact, his calls for emancipation impacted a much wider group of “disabled people”.8 Nevertheless, the specificity of his views must be stressed, since they may not have perfectly represented all people with disabilities,9 as evidenced by the mixed reception they sometimes received within certain sections of that population.10
11This paper analyses how Yokozuka made the fight against eugenics a core part of his calls for emancipation. The aim is to show that, as much as a historical reality, the concept of “eugenics” served to advance a political discourse. Yokozuka’s at-times provocative anti-eugenic rhetoric sought to encourage people with disabilities to assert their identity (as disabled people, against a normalising society and in a context of latent eugenics) and live independent lives (outside institutions and away from the normative constraints of society). His statements met with sharp reactions, however, causing rifts with other protest movements fighting similar causes yet labelled by Yokozuka as “oppressors” (notably feminist groups and parent associations).
12Movements to emancipate people with disabilities emerged in many countries in the 1960s and 1970s, influenced in particular by British and American associations. The American disability rights movement began in the 1960s as an off-shoot of the civil rights and feminist movements. It sparked a growth in studies highlighting the barriers disabled people faced in their everyday lives (particularly in terms of mobility and access to public spaces), along with possible solutions. This in turn gave rise to the Independent Living movement, founded in California in 1970, which argued that disabled people should be able to live in society and enjoy the same rights as their fellow citizens. The movement drew on the idea that people with disabilities knew their needs best and should be able to make their own decisions, without having their voices confiscated (notably by doctors).
13Although the Japanese disability rights movement was undoubtedly inspired by its counterparts overseas, as evidenced by its abundant use of the expression jiritsu seikatsu (自立生活, the translation of “independent living”), some of its demands were specific to Japan and reflected post-war social and political issues there.11 The main difference was the emphasis on the fight against eugenics (yūseigaku 優生学) and eugenic ideology (yūsei shisō 優生思想), which were more present in Japan than in Britain or the United States.
- 12 For more on the subject, see Thomann, 2015; Matsubara, 2000.
14Without going back over the history of Japanese eugenics,12 it is essential to note that the Eugenic Protection Law (1948), the cornerstone of Japan’s post-war eugenic policy, opens with the following words:
Article 1 (Object of this Law)
- 13 English translation by the Institute of Population Problems, Ministry of Health and Welfare, 1960, (...)
The object of this Law is to prevent the increase of inferior descendants from the eugenic point of view and to protect the life and health of the mother as well.13
第一条 【 この法律の目的 】
この法律は、優生上の見地から不良な子孫の出生を防止するとともに、母性の生命健康を保護することを目的とする。
15The expression “inferior descendants” (furyō na shison 不良な子孫) was at the heart of Yokozuka’s anti-eugenic discourse. It was this that drove him to champion disabled people’s right to exist and call for them to assert their identity and reclaim the stigma attached to disability.
- 14 See Yokozuka, 2007, p. 105–118 (original article: “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono”); see also S (...)
- 15 Yokozuka’s political inspirations are less clear. Osaragi Akira was a Marxist and the disability r (...)
- 16 See Yokozuka, 2007, p. 105–118 (original article: “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono”); Yoritaka, (...)
16Before beginning our analysis of Yokozuka’s writings it would be useful to recap his life.14 He was born in Saitama Prefecture in 1935 and developed cerebral palsy following a high fever at the age of 10 months, leaving him almost entirely paralysed and with severe speech difficulties. Like most disabled people at the time, he grew up in his parents’ care until the age of 16, when he entered a special needs school to receive the equivalent of a primary and middle school education. He was forced to leave at 25 due to the age limit imposed in such establishments. He then spent a year in a specialised institution before setting up his own home. In 1964, aged 28, he moved to Maharaba Village, founded by Aoi Shiba no Kai and run by the Buddhist monk Osaragi Akira. There, he lived independently with other people with cerebral palsy in a non-medicalised and almost self-sufficient setting. Couples formed within the community and children were born. It was following these births that the community began to fracture, with some couples choosing to “return to able-bodied society” in order to allow their (able-bodied) children to live an ordinary life. Yokozuka was one of the last to leave the village but he eventually returned to Kanagawa with his wife. His experience at Maharaba left a lasting impression on him, not only because it proved people with cerebral palsy could live independently in a non-medicalised setting, but because the influence of Osaragi Akira and Pure Land Buddhism15 radically shaped his way of thinking.16
17Yokozuka’s discourse on emancipation and self-assertion can be split into three stages: 1) the desire to speak out “on behalf of the murdered”, those who were oppressed and sometimes even suppressed by eugenic society; 2) a denunciation of the “internalised eugenics” that underpinned society, based in particular on industrial norms; and 3) a call for disabled people to aggressively assert their identity in order to resist the threat posed to their existence by eugenics.
18Aoi Shiba no Kai was spurred into action in 1970 by a legal case in which a mother in Yokohama killed her two-year-old daughter who had cerebral palsy. A support group campaigned for lenient sentencing, stressing it was an act of desperation driven by the mother’s failure to find a care facility for her child. The court case subsequently focused on whether there really was a lack of specialised institutions in the city, with the mother ultimately receiving a two-year prison term, much lower than the minimum sentence for murder.
19Yokozuka and the Kanagawa branch of Aoi Shiba no Kai were shocked into speaking out “on behalf of the murdered” (korosareru tachiba kara 殺される立場から), arguing that the Yokohama case was not merely the desperate act of a distressed mother but quite simply infanticide, the murder of a human being whose life had value in itself. In doing so, they asserted the disabled child’s “right to exist” (seizonken 生存権) and have her point of view heard. The following extract is from Yokozuka’s first text on the subject, an open letter addressed in particular to the court authorities in Yokohama:
With regards the defendant in this case, Hakamata Mihoko, it seems that while she faced many everyday difficulties looking after two disabled children, the generally accepted idea that these children were “not the way they were supposed to be” was an extra psychological burden and caused her to despair about their future and her own. Yet isn’t true social welfare about showing respect and consideration for those who are different or weaker than ourselves? Even the life of paralysed children with severe disabilities should be respected. Blaming this case on a lack of specialised institutions and welfare measures is too easy. If these are used to erase the defendant’s crime, if the court declares her innocent, this would set a precedent that would further fuel the tendency to dismiss the lives of children (and people) with serious conditions and ultimately mark those with cerebral palsy as beings that should not exist. We do not hate the accused mother, nor do we want her to receive a harsh sentence. On the contrary, we believe that she too is a victim of today’s society. Nevertheless, given the seriousness of her crime, it is only right she receive some form of punishment.
- 17 Yokozuka, 2007, p. 95 (original article: “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono”).
本事件の被告袴田美保子においてもたとえ2人の障害児を抱え幾多の生活上の困難があったにしろ、この「本来あるべき姿ではない」という一般通念が彼女に実際以上の精神的負担となっておおいかぶさり、子供の将来・自分の前途を悲観し絶望的になってしまったと思われます。しかしながら真の社会福祉とは社会の一人一人が、自分とは異なった姿の者、自分より弱い立場の者に対する思いやりを持ち、その立場を尊重することではないでしょうか。たとえ寝たきりの重症児でもその生命は尊ばれなければなりません。本事件の原因を施設が足りないこと、福祉政策の貧困に帰してしまうことは簡単です。しかしそのことによって被告の罪が消えるならば、即ち本裁判においてもしも無罪の判決がくだされるならば、その判例によって重症児(者)の人命軽視の風潮をますます助長し脳性まひ者をいよいよこの世にあってはならない存在に追い込むことになると思われます。私達は被告である母親を憎む気持ちはなく、ことさらに重罪に処せというものでは毛頭ありません。それどころか彼女もまた、現代社会における被害者の一人であると思われます。しかし犯した罪の深さからいって何等かの裁きを受けるのは当然でありましょう。17
20The expression “not the way it is supposed to be” (honrai aru beki sugata de wa nai 本来あるべき姿ではない) echoes the “inferior descendants” (furyō na shison 不良な子孫) found in the Eugenic Protection Law. In borrowing this term, Aoi Shiba no Kai was condemning the fact that people with disabilities were seen as useless, superfluous beings whose lives were worth less than those of other people.
21Yokozuka became increasingly vocal after this case, speaking out in public and in writing, while Aoi Shiba no Kai gained prominence through its protests and link-ups with other organisations. This first foray into activism fundamentally informed Yokozuka’s future actions and helped him develop his ideas.
22In his eyes, asserting disabled people’s “right to exist” and, more importantly, their “right to be disabled and to identify as such”, was a way of challenging a fundamentally eugenicist society. While Yokozuka never sought to give a theoretical definition of eugenics in his writing, he applied the term to two types of situations: the physical destruction (usually more hypothetical than real) of people with disabilities and their internment in specialised institutions. Accordingly, if we are to understand Yokozuka’s discourse on emancipation, we must examine the way disability was managed in 1960s Japan (from what was he seeking independence?) and precisely determine his perception and analysis of the two situations he identified as eugenicist.
- 18 Ibid., p. 80–81 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “Sabetsu izen no nanika ga aru” 差別以前の何かがある [Be (...)
23With regards the physical destruction of people with disabilities—specifically in the form of infanticide –, Yokozuka analysed public reactions to the aforementioned Yokohama case in an article entitled “Beyond Discrimination” (Sabetsu izen no nanika ga aru 差別以前の何かがある), published in August 1970 in the magazine Ayumi (あゆみ Advance).18 There, Yokozuka argued that the killing of disabled children was not merely a result of parental distress or a lack of welfare measures but reflected a wider context of discrimination against disabled people in society. This discrimination was marked by the idea that people with disabilities were less than human or, at the very least, belonged to an alternative world, one outside ordinary existence. In Yokozuka’s eyes, “whether the charges are dropped or the accused acquitted, or whether she is found guilty, it will be a moment of truth that tells us if ordinary society, beginning with the judges, sees severely disabled children as fellow human beings (if they identify with them) or as a radically different species.”
- 19 Stiker, 2005, chapter 7.
24Japan is not the only country where the humanity of disabled people is questioned. Henri-Jacques Stiker has adopted a broader anthropological perspective to show how, in many cultures, people with disabilities are seen as not belonging to the ordinary world: they are either looked down upon and discriminated against—i.e. treated as inferior to the rest of the human race—or, on the contrary, ascribed superhuman and supernatural traits.19 Sometimes the two attitudes are ambiguously intertwined. According to Stiker, people with disabilities are seen by the able-bodied as reflecting the disturbing strangeness of everyday life—both a mirror in which they recognise themselves and the embodiment of a frightening irrationality, hence people’s reactions blending fascination and rejection. Yokozuka wanted society, in particular the courts, to put aside such ideas and see people with disabilities as human by focusing on their similarities rather than their differences.
25He particularly rejected the widely held belief that a disabled child was fundamentally unhappy and therefore better off dead than living such a life.
Why did she (the mother who murdered her daughter) decide to kill her child? This urge to kill must be the starting point of any discussion of the case. By the mother’s own admission, she thought, “this child will not get better. She would be happier dead than living in this state.” Deciding a human being’s worth based on whether or not they can be cured, whether or not they can work, is problematic. In this value system that excludes those who cannot work, people with disabilities are treated as beings that should not exist and are subject to constant oppression.
- 20 Yokozuka, 2007, p. 12 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “CP to shite ikiru” CPとして生きる [Living as (...)
なぜ彼女(子殺しの母)が殺意をもったのだろうか。この殺意こそがこの問題を論ずる場合のすべての起点とならなければならない。彼女も述べているとおり「この子は治らない。こんな姿で生きているよりも死んだほうが幸せなのだ」と思ったという。治るか治らないか、働けるか否かによって決めようとする、この人間に対する価値観が問題なのである。この働かざる者人に非ずという価値観によって、障害者は本来あってはならない存在とされ、日夜抑圧され続けている。20
26Yokozuka particularly criticised a value system that drove the able-bodied to see disabled people as necessarily unhappy according to able-bodied criteria (based, as we shall see, on a person’s ability to fulfil the needs of the industrial society), without considering how the individual felt. This system echoed the beliefs surrounding birth, which Carolyn Stevens has shown to be marked by rituals aimed at guaranteeing the birth of a healthy, “normal” child, anything else being seen as fundamentally unhappy.21 The introduction of antenatal screening programmes generated debate on the question of selective abortion. In June 1972, a proposed amendment to the Eugenic Protection Law suggested removing the “economic reasons” clause—invoked in the majority of abortions—, provoking outrage among feminist organisations. It also suggested introducing selective abortion on the grounds of foetal abnormality (now detectable through antenatal screening). Yokozuka saw this as a dangerous measure likely to exacerbate discrimination against the disabled:
According to this law, from the moment a child is identified as “disabled”, right back to the mother’s womb, it becomes possible and perfectly legal to kill it. These inferior descendants mentioned in the law—from just whose point of view are they inferior? In a production-driven society, unproductive disabled people are social parasites, (inferior) beings who should not exist and must be erased. […] The proposed amendment to the Eugenic Protection Law, which legally justifies this logic of extermination, is it fundamentally any different to the policy of Nazi Germany, which in addition to carrying out the Holocaust, proudly killed hundreds of thousands of mentally and physically disabled people in the name of strengthening the Germanic race (in order to eradicate inferior descendants)?
- 22 Yokozuka, 2007, p. 129–131 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “Yūseihogo-hō to watashi” 優生保護法と私 [ (...)
この改正案によると「障害児」と分かったとたん、しかも母親の胎内にまでさかのぼった状態で天下晴れて「合法」の名のもとに抹殺できるわけです。この法律でいうところの不良な子孫とは一体誰にとっての不良なのでしょうか。生産第一主義の社会においては、生産力に乏しい障害者は社会の厄介者・あってはならない存在性(不良)な者は抹殺するということなのです。[…] この抹殺する論理を法律によって正当化する優生保護法改正案は、かつてナチスドイツがユダヤ人大量虐殺とともに、誇り高きゲルマン民族の強化という大義名分のもとに(劣悪な子孫をなくすため)数十万の身体障害者、精薄者を殺したことと基本的にどこが違うのでしょうか。22
- 23 For more on this subject, see Matsubara & Ichinokawa, 2000.
27This equation of Japan’s post-war eugenic policy with the Nazi extermination programme has been dismantled by historians of science since the 1990s.23 Nevertheless, while it seems factually questionable today, this amalgam conveys Yokozuka’s deep-seated fear that the proposed legislation would only reinforce discrimination. Given the inferior status of disabled people at the time and their inability to defend themselves and have their voices heard, Yokozuka’s argument reflected his awareness that society considered people like him to be “beings who should not exist”. His suspicion that the proposed amendment concealed a desire to exterminate the disabled was a logical outgrowth of his denunciation of infanticide.
28Beyond the (mostly hypothetical) issue of disabled people being physically exterminated and the cases of infanticide that gave rise to the movement, Yokozuka also denounced the living conditions in residential facilities. As mentioned earlier, this period saw the building of huge institutions known as koronī コロニー, housing between 200 and 800 residents with profound intellectual or physical disabilities. Launched in 1966, this initiative was intended to provide a place where severely disabled people could live together, provide mutual support, receive rehabilitation care (although in principle, medical intervention was kept to a minimum) and undertake professional training. One of the aims was to offer decent living conditions to people with profound or multiple disabilities and ensure they received appropriate care, all the while alleviating the burden on families. A key priority was to provide continuity of care for disabled adults leaving Japan’s growing number of special needs schools (although education was not yet compulsory for children with disabilities). In 1971 there were 19 such establishments housing 8,909 residents from a total identified population of 11,359 people with severe intellectual or physical disabilities (i.e. 78.4 percent).24
29Yokozuka saw this as a less overt form of eugenics and believed that specialised institutions mainly served to segregate disabled people from the rest of society, with no real concern for their living conditions. He frequently compared such establishments to prisons or even concentration camps. Note, however, that segregation was not the stated objective of such establishments, unlike the leper colonies openly designed to isolate suffers and avoid the supposed risk of contamination. In contrast, care homes for the disabled were presented as places to rehabilitate them (notably through professional training) and help them “return to society” (shakai fukki 社会復帰), although in reality reintegration was rare. Any intent to exclude disabled people was thus implicit and not set out in law, as was the case with other populations.
30Yokozuka described one particular institution in the following words:
At Fuchū Centre, 50 people are confined to one room; the door is always locked and staff remove the key each time they arrive or leave. Inside, there is a staffroom from where you can see the entire room and all 50 people in it. Visitors can only go as far as the entrance. The disabled people inside wear matching pyjamas (although the heating is on so it is not cold) and have almost no personal possessions. In order to go out or spend the night away, [residents] must have their parents request permission two weeks in advance and only legal guardians receive permission. What is more, with 50 people crammed together, there is no time or space to be alone and think; individual liberties are completely disregarded.
- 25 Yokozuka, 2007, p. 78 (original article: “Sabetsu izen no nanika ga aru”).
府中センターでは一部屋で五十人ずつ収容され、入口には常に鍵がかけられ、職員の出入にもいちいち鍵をかけはずしする。入り口の内側に職員の詰所があり、そこから五十人入りの部屋が一望できるようになっている。外来者はその入り口までしか行くことができない。中にいる障害者はお揃いのパジャマ一枚(暖房付きの為寒くはないが)で、私物は殆ど持たされない。外泊、外出は親が二週間前に申し入れを行い許可を得なければならず、保護者以外では許可されない。そのほか、五十人も一緒に詰め込まれているため、ひとりになってものを考える時間も空間もなく、個人的自由など全く無視されているとのことである。25
- 26 Ibid., p. 78 (original article: “Sabetsu izen no nanika ga aru”).
- 27 Ibid., p. 103 (original article: “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono”).
- 28 Ibid., p. 79 (original article: “Sabetsu izen no nanika ga aru”).
31The living conditions described here are certainly strongly reminiscent of a prison, a place that strips individuals of their selfhood and freedom. 26 For this reason, instead of the word “institution” (shisetsu 施設), Yokozuka frequently used the term shōgaisha shūyō shisetsu 障害者収容施設, meaning “accommodation facility” but equally “detention centre” for the disabled. He also noted in one of his texts that he often felt people’s eyes on him when he walked alone in the street and heard them wondering, “what institution does he belong to?” or even, “what institution has he escaped from?”27 This starkly illustrates the way specialised institutions were equated with deprivation of liberty and individuality, with society’s consent. It also explains the concentration camp analogy employed by Yokozuka, who argued that large institutions—a modern, collective version of the Edo-period home-confinement rooms (zashikirō 座敷牢)—performed the same role as Auschwitz in Nazi Germany, i.e. the mobilisation of society against its weakest members.28
- 29 Ibid., p. 104 (original article: “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono”).
- 30 For more on the social context and practice of operations, see Toshimitsu, 2016.
32While Yokozuka did not openly accuse the state of wanting to commit genocide (which would be factually incorrect), he condemned the oppression he said justified the comparison with Nazi Germany. He believed that specialised institutions were designed to exclude anyone unable to contribute to Japan’s economic growth, which was the new form of national mobilisation. Segregation allowed the rest of society to present itself in a favourable light while concealing the existence of undesirables, who were abandoned in rudimentary living conditions, receiving only the barest minimum of care. In some cases their bodily integrity was directly violated, for example when eugenic sterilisation29 was practiced.30 Yokozuka pithily concluded that:
People also say, “rather than punishing a mother who has killed her disabled child, we should build institutions.” But establishments founded on such ideas cannot possibly be linked to the happiness of people with disabilities. This is because they conceal the fact that they steal disabled children’s lives and jeopardise their right to exist. Here, under the label of welfare, lurks the egoism and discriminatory mindset of parents and society.
- 31 Yokozuka, 2007, p. 101 (original article: “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono”).
「重症児を殺した母親を罰するよりもまず収容施設をつくることだ」とも言われます。しかしこのような発想から作られる施設が、障害者の幸せにつながる筈はありません。なぜならそれは重症児の生命を奪ったことを曖昧にし、障害者の生存権をも危うくする思想から作られるものだからです。ここにこそ福祉に名を借りた親たちや社会のエゴイズムと差別意識が潜んでいるのです。31
33What Yokozuka denounced, with persistent references to Nazi totalitarianism, was a eugenics that threatened disabled people rather than protected them. Conflating segregation and physical extermination, his criticism focused more on a welfare system that robbed disabled people of their freedom and individual rights rather than the actual practice of eugenics. He backed up his arguments by analysing the causes of this situation and the nature of “eugenic” oppression.
34Yokozuka saw the eugenics underpinning Japanese society as taking several forms: it was both explicit, in the sense of being rooted in laws with a clear eugenic aim (in particular the Eugenic Protection Law of 1948), and insidious, linked to the internalising by all members of society (including disabled individuals and their families) of industrialisation-based standards of rationality and efficiency. It was this duality that he analysed in his writings.
- 32 Matsubara, 2000, p. 171.
35The direct consequences of the Eugenic Protection Law are well known: according to official figures, during the law’s 50-year enforcement period around 16,500 people deemed liable to produce inferior descendants were involuntarily sterilised32 and certain population groups were placed in quarantine (notably leprosy sufferers), with no possibility of returning to their normal lives. Paradoxically, however, Yokozuka devoted little space in his writing to the explicitly eugenic measures introduced by the state.
36Yokozuka’s opposition to the system established by the Eugenic Protection Law, and attempts to reinforce it, is clearly visible in the passages he wrote on selective abortion and the sterilisations carried out at specialised institutions. The media campaigns and protests waged by Aoi Shiba no Kai, as well as the group’s attempts to negotiate with the government, were also clearly designed to challenge state-backed eugenics. However, Yokozuka’s overriding message was that denouncing Japan’s laws and political system was necessary but insufficient. What was needed was wider social criticism that went beyond merely challenging the Eugenic Protection Law. This explains why many of his texts aimed to draw attention to internalised eugenics within society, even among disabled persons themselves, ideas that were founded on industrial norms.
37Indeed, as argued by Michael Oliver,33 one of the founders of disability studies, the advent of industrial society created a clear distinction between “useful” people (those physically and intellectually able to work) and “useless” people (those unable to provide industrial labour). Yokozuka saw industry and productivism as causing disabled people to be marginalised and have their “usefulness” to society denied.
In societies like Japan aiming to achieve strong economic growth, the fastest, cheapest and most attractive are sought after, while disabled people, who are inefficient and have a poor appearance, are surely the lowest of the low.
- 34 Yokozuka, 2007, p. 53–55 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “Shōgaisha to rōdō” 障害者と労働 [Disabled (...)
日本のように高度経済成長を目的とする社会においては、いかに早く、いかに安く、いかにみかけがよくということが要求され、能率の悪い、みかけの悪い障害者が下の下であることは確かです。34
- 35 Ibid., p. 55 (original article: “Shōgaisha to rōdō”).
38For Yokozuka, industrialisation was largely responsible for the low social status of people with disabilities. He described an idealised past in which elderly and disabled people served as custodians of the fire or intermediaries with the spirit world, giving them a social role regardless of their physical abilities.35 Industrialisation, with its norms of efficiency, led to a rationalisation of society and a standardisation of bodies and minds. Disabled people had no place in such a system and their only defence was to oppose these industrial norms by asserting their identity as “irrational beings”.
In order to boost production and profits, modern rational society is moving ever faster towards rationalisation, functional division and standardisation. However, it is only natural there be resistance to this [trend], because man is intrinsically irrational. […] In any case, disabled people are the archetypical irrational being […]. If we stop uselessly worshipping and envying the “able-bodied”, while the “abled-bodied” social system—which is racing towards rationalisation without reflecting humanity—continues to exclude us disabled people for not conforming to standards, we must continue our movement to the bitter end, based on our awareness of being irrational beings.
- 36 Ibid., p. 84–85 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “Fugōri na sonzai to shite” 不合理な存在として [As Irra (...)
近代合理社会は生産性を高め、利潤を上げるためにますます合理化、機能化、画一化への方向へ加速度を強めております。しかし人間は本来不合理なものですから、それへの抵抗が起きるのは当然です。[…] とにかく障害者は不合理な存在の典型であり、[…] 我々がいたずらに「健全者」を崇拝し、あこがれるのではなく、合理化へと究っ走り人間性を省みない「健全者」の社会体制が我々障害者を規格にはまらないとして疎外し続けるならば、我々はあくまで不合理な存在としての自覚に基づいて、我々の運動を続けなければなりません。36
39This awareness of belonging to a section of the human race that society wanted to eliminate drove Yokozuka to see self-assertion—i.e. the asserting of a disabled identity—as the only possible response to discrimination.
- 37 Yoritaka, 2012, p. 52.
- 38 Shinran (親鸞) (1173–1262) was the founder of Pure Land Buddhism (Jōdo shinshū).
- 39 Ibid., p. 113 (original article: “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono”).
- 40 Ibid., p. 97 (original article: “Aru shōgaisha undō no mezasu mono”).
40Yokozuka’s call for disabled people to assert their identity was deeply rooted in his experience of Buddhism and his time living in a religious community, as mentioned in the introduction to this paper.37 The community in question was known as Maharaba Village, from the Sanskrit word mahārāva, meaning a “great cry”. Drawn from the writings of Shinran,38 this great cry informed the thinking of Osaragi Akira, who recognised that human beings were inherently shaped by evil and incapable of living without hurting others. The first step towards enlightenment was thus accepting this side of human nature, recognising it within oneself and addressing a cry for help to Amida Buddha by chanting the nembutsu.39 Accordingly, Yokozuka believed that disabled people should not define themselves solely as oppressed victims but as fully fledged human beings capable of doing harm. This self-examination was the first step towards self-assertion (jiko shuchō 自己主張), the only means of avoiding the threat to their existence.40
- 41 Ibid., p. 89 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “Nōsei mahisha no shakai sanka ni tsuite” 脳性まひ者の社 (...)
- 42 Ibid., p. 63–66 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “Nōsei mahi to shite ikiru” 脳性マヒとして生きる [Living (...)
- 43 Ibid., p. 75 (original article: Yokozuka Kōichi, “N jo e no henshin” N女への返信 [Reply to Ms N.], Ayum (...)
41Yokozuka showed that in order to make ordinary society aware of their existence, disabled people needed to examine themselves and reject the able-bodied norms they had internalised. This was first and foremost a kind of self-work requiring reflection and self-awareness, hence Yokozuka’s emphasis on the importance of subjectivity: before seeking to join activities in ordinary society, disabled people needed to develop a personality, an individual subjectivity and recognise themselves as an individual with as much right to live as anyone else.41 People with disabilities needed to rid themselves of their illusions about the able-bodied and their supposed superiority.42 It was not about overcoming the disability itself (which would suppose the existence of a universal norm to aim for43) but the feeling of loss and inferiority associated with it in modern society. Individual self-assertion was thus the starting point of the movement. It was a “great cry” rooted in the practice of nembutsu, as advocated by Osaragi Akira.
42In order for this “great cry” to be heard by society, disabled people needed to go into the street, show themselves and make their voices heard.
Speaking of which, trains, buses, footbridges, station staircases and other architectural structures, everything about towns ignores our existence and refuses to allow us to live there. For this reason, I thought our movement had to begin with our going out into the street. That means showing ourselves as we are, forcefully asserting ourselves.
- 44 Ibid., p. 63 (original article: “Nōsei mahi to shite ikiru”).
そういえば電車、バス、歩道橋、駅の階段やいろいろの建築物など町そのものが私達の存在を無視し、そこで私達が生きていくことを拒否しているのです。そこで私達の運動は街に出ることから始めなければならないと考えたのです。それは私達のありのままをさらけだすことであり、強烈自己主張であります。44
- 45 Ibid., p. 66 (original article: “Nōsei mahi to shite ikiru”).
- 46 Ibid., p. 74–75 (original article: “N jo e no henshin”).
- 47 Ibid., p. 90 (original article: “Nōsei mahisha no shakai sanka ni tsuite”).
- 48 Ibid., p. 91 (original article: “Nōsei mahisha no shakai sanka ni tsuite”).
43One notable way for disabled people to assert themselves was through artistic expression.45 But at a time when involuntary sterilisations were taking place, another was by having children, as Yokozuka and other inhabitants of Maharaba Village did. 46 And this despite the practical difficulties associated with parenting (Yokozuka’s demands thus extended beyond the right to be born and included the right to reproduce). The strong association between work and individual worth in modern society made it particularly difficult for disabled people to assert themselves.47 Nevertheless, Yokozuka argued, they must challenge standardisation and a society determined to “force all feet into a precast shoe by cutting to size those who don’t fit”.48
- 49 Ibid., p. 82 (original article: “Fugōri na sonzai to shite”).
- 50 Manifesto written not by Yokozuka but by another of Aoi Shiba no Kai’s leaders, Yokota Hiroshi 横田弘 (...)
44This desire for disabled people to assert their existence led Aoi Shiba no Kai to organise a series of public actions and media campaigns in the first half of the 1970s.49 The most memorable was the publishing of a manifesto in 197050:
– We recognise ourselves as people with cerebral palsy (CP). We are aware of our position in modern society as “people who should not exist”. We believe this recognition should be the starting point of our entire movement, and we act on this belief.
– We assert ourselves forcefully. When we identify as people with CP, what results is a will to protect ourselves. We believe the only way to achieve this is through forceful self-assertion, and we act on this belief.
– We deny love and justice. We condemn egoism that takes the name of love and justice. We believe that mutual understanding, accompanied by the human gaze that arises from the refusal of love and justice, is true welfare, and we act on this belief.
– We choose not to take the path of problem-solving. We have learned from personal experience that seeking easy solutions to problems leads to dangerous compromises. We believe that tackling each problem in turn is the only possible course of action for our movement, and we act on this belief.
われらは自らがCP者であることを自覚する。我々は現代社会にあって「本来あってはならない存在」とされつつある自らの位置を認識し、そこに一切の運動の原点をかけなければならないと信じ、且つ行動する。
われらは強烈な自己主張を行う。われらがCP者であることを自覚したとき、そこに起こるのは自らを守ろうとする意志である。われらは強烈な自己主張こそこれを成し得る唯一の路であると信じ、且つ行動する。
われらは愛と正義を否定する。われらは愛と正義のもつエゴイズムを鋭く告発し、それを否定することによって生じる人間凝視に伴う相互理解こそ真の福祉であると信じ、且つ行動する。
- 51 Quoted in Yoritaka, 2012, p. 70.
われらは問題解決の路を選ばない。われらは安易に問題の解決を図ろうとすることがいかに危険な妥協への出発であるか、身をもって知ってきた。われらは、次々と問題提起を行うことのみわれらの行いうる運動であると信じ、且つ行動する。51
- 52 Yamazaki, 2010, p. 10.
45This manifesto echoes the main arguments put forward by Yokozuka in his writings. Note that the third point, the famous “refusal of love and justice”, contains criticism of a religious nature. Until then, the welfare system for the disabled had been based on the principle of “helping the weakest”, drawing on either Buddhist compassion (following the long tradition of care for the disabled in Japan) or Christian charity (with Christian-inspired initiatives, notably in the form of private care facilities, flourishing throughout Japan from the Meiji period onwards). Yokozuka, influenced by the religious philosophy of Osaragi Akira, believed that such thinking was based on an illusion: that able-bodied people represented Goodness and that disabled people needed saving because they were touched by Evil (due to being rejected and seen as beings that should not exist). This good-versus-evil binary obscured the fact that each human being has a “criminal” side (zaiakusei 罪悪性). It was only by acknowledging one’s crimes—one’s own evilness—and using this knowledge as the impetus to want to change the world that people could help each other based on genuine solidarity.52 Yokozuka did not simply turn this thinking on its head and accuse the able-bodied of being evil. Instead, he showed that people with disabilities also needed to search inside themselves and recognise their crimes (in particular when interacting with people more severely disabled than themselves) in order to create an egalitarian system of care and mutual aid.
46Aoi Shiba no Kai’s manifesto drew on the group’s strong awareness of belonging to a threatened minority. It responded with self-assertion, defined as the only response possible in the face of eugenics, whether latent or explicit. Choosing the path of self-assertion excluded any form of compromise. Problems were to be resolved not through negotiation but by systematically denouncing discrimination, leading to potential clashes.
- 53 Yokozuka, 2007, p. 73 (original article: “N jo e no henshin”).
- 54 Hori, 2014.
- 55 Katō, 2009.
- 56 Hori, 2014, chapter 4.
47Indeed, Yokozuka’s criticisms triggered a variety of reactions, reflecting the radical nature of his views. Three social groups that might naturally have been allies of the movement were denounced as “oppressors”. Firstly, parents and their representative associations were accused not only of confiscating disabled people’s voices but of burdening their children from birth with a feeling of inferiority compared to their able-bodied siblings.53 This accusation stung the families, caught between the discrimination they suffered due to their children’s disability and the resentment expressed by the children themselves.54 Secondly, Yokozuka’s criticism was in reality directed specifically at mothers, as evidenced by the slogan Haha yo! Korosu na 母よ殺すな (Mother, don’t kill me!). This caused friction with feminist associations, particularly during the abortion debate that accompanied the proposed revision of the Eugenic Protection Law in 1972.55 Thirdly, medical professionals and staff working at specialised institutions were accused of supporting a system that denied the humanity and individuality of disabled people. However, this period coincided with the arrival of new blood at medical schools (the birthplace of the student movement in the late 1960s): the new generation of psychologists and health professionals was seeking fresh ways to increase patient autonomy.56 Paradoxically then, while staff at specialised institutions were relatively quick to acknowledge the potentially damaging effects of their expertise and work with disabled associations to uphold the individuality and humanity of their patients, other groups of “oppressors” were less willing to accept criticism, were disconcerted or even shocked to be the target of such virulence. Although Aoi Shiba no Kai’s campaign was fought in a context of general social unrest, it was initially difficult for the different movements to work together. It was only a decade later that common ground emerged between disability organisations, feminist groups and parent associations. This reflects the powerful hold of “internalised eugenics” in society and the difficulty of weaving together the different protest movements into a unified criticism of eugenics, echoing the ambiguous nature of the concept itself and the many uses made of it.
48Finally, the state, a less tangible kind of “oppressor”, also gradually took on board Yokozuka’s criticisms. In the mid-1970s, for example, municipal initiatives were introduced to make public transport and infrastructure more accessible. Then in the 1980s, in response to demands to deinstitutionalize disability, policies were implemented to enable disabled people to live in mainstream society. It was not until 1996, however, that the Eugenic Protection Law was completely revised, putting an end to involuntary sterilisation.
49This paper analysed eugenics in Japan through the prism of the objections voiced by people with disabilities (or at least, on their behalf, by Yokozuka Kōichi) in the early 1970s, a pivotal period in which disabled people began to speak out in the media and on the political stage. The aim was to demonstrate how criticism of eugenics was a crucial component in the fight for emancipation.
50I showed how Yokozuka’s criticism focused on two aspects of eugenics. One was the threat of physical extermination, although in reality this was incomparable to the euthanasia programme carried out by Nazi Germany (described in detail by Götz Aly).57 In Japan, this threat manifested itself in cases of infanticide and in the emergence of prenatal screening, which paved the way for selective abortion. Yokozuka also condemned the segregation of people with disabilities in prison-like institutions (a policy that was not strictly speaking “eugenicist”). He analysed the origins of these two phenomena: on the one hand, state-led eugenics, concentrated in the Eugenic Protection Law of 1948 (which allowed for involuntary sterilisation), and on the other, a less explicit form of eugenics that underpinned social relations, fuelled by internalised norms of efficiency and rationality driven by industrial needs. Yokozuka believed that the only response possible to this kind of eugenics was for disabled people to assert themselves, forge a disabled identity, highlight mainstream society’s denial of their existence and confront other social groups condemned as “oppressors”. Thus, from demanding a right to exist (in a society perceived as wanting disabled people to disappear), he claimed a right to recognition (of disability as an individual trait, something to be asserted rather than experienced as shameful and stigmatising). This criticism of eugenics gave rise to a discourse on emancipation that transcended the eugenic policies of the period.
51So radical was this discourse that it triggered a variety of reactions, some of them virulent. While staff working at specialised institutions were quick to re-examine their actions, relations with parent associations remained fraught for almost a decade and there was open conflict between Aoi Shiba no Kai and feminist associations, despite their shared opposition to the proposed revision of the Eugenic Protection Law.
52Although Yokozuka’s views received mixed reactions initially, they played a crucial role in the history of Japanese eugenics, contributing to the shift from a “preventative” view of eugenics as an instrument to improve the population and living conditions (as evidenced by the creation and wording of the Eugenic Protection Law) to a more critical vision fuelled by references to Nazi Germany and the idea that eugenics was a threat. This shift was officially recognised in 1996 by the suppression of terms relating to eugenics in the revised law, renamed the Maternal Body Protection Law (Bōtai hogo-hō 母体保護法). The effects of Yokozuka’s criticism are still visible today in the way eugenics is routinely equated with oppression of the disabled.
53Furthermore, beyond its influence on Japanese laws and policies, Yokozuka’s discourse struck a chord with its intended target—disabled people themselves, making them realise for the first time that their voices deserved to be heard. This was a revelation for young disabled people on the cusp of adulthood, inspiring them to have confidence and accept their disability as an identity rather than a source of shame. In this way, through his virulence and radicality, Yokozuka offered a fresh new political discourse on emancipation rather than simply bearing witness to the eugenic policies of the post-war era.