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Japan minister slammed for calling women 'child-bearing machines'
Yahoo! News ^
| Sat Jan 27, 10:52 PM ET
| AFP
Posted on 01/31/2007 3:37:45 PM PST by DTogo
TOKYO (AFP) - Japan's health minister has come under fire after referring to women as "child-bearing machines" in a speech on the country's declining birth rate. ADVERTISEMENT
"The number of women aged between 15 and 50 is fixed," Hakuo Yanagisawa said Saturday at a meeting with local members of the ruling conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in the western city of Matsue, Kyodo News reported.
"Because the number of child-bearing machines and devices is fixed, all we can ask is they do their best per capita."
Yanagisawa, a 71-year-old former finance ministry bureaucrat, apologised for his remarks during his 30-minute speech, but his comments sparked anger from two of the country's leading women writers.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
TOPICS: Extended News; Foreign Affairs; Japan; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: babymachines; birthrate; birthrates; footinmouthdisease; future; japan; population
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Never a shortage of older Japanese politicians suffering from "foot-in-mouth" afflictions.
1
posted on
01/31/2007 3:37:48 PM PST
by
DTogo
To: DTogo
LOL! That sad part is, he's right. 100 years ago that would have been a compliment.
2
posted on
01/31/2007 3:39:02 PM PST
by
L98Fiero
(A fool who'll waste his life, God rest his guts.)
To: DTogo
Why is sensitivity so overvalued? It's the compelling question of our era.
To: maikeru; Dr. Marten; Eric in the Ozarks; Al Gator; snowsislander; sushiman; AmericanInTokyo; ...
Japan * ping * (kono risuto ni hairitai ka detai wo shirasete kudasai : let me know if you want on or off this list)
4
posted on
01/31/2007 3:40:09 PM PST
by
DTogo
(I haven't left the GOP, the GOP left me.)
To: L98Fiero
It takes two to Tango: even in Japan.
5
posted on
01/31/2007 3:41:35 PM PST
by
DTogo
(I haven't left the GOP, the GOP left me.)
To: DTogo
That's pretty pathetic, why doesn't he refer to all men as just sperm machines. I hope there is more to me than that.
6
posted on
01/31/2007 3:41:57 PM PST
by
Mazda3Fan
To: DTogo
With the rise of artificial insemination techniques, ....
... not anymore it doesn't.
To: canuck_conservative
In Japan they still Tango, for the most part.
8
posted on
01/31/2007 3:45:32 PM PST
by
DTogo
(I haven't left the GOP, the GOP left me.)
To: DTogo
The average number of children per woman stood at 1.26 in 2005 and the birthrate will gradually decline to 1.21 in 2013, the survey showed. Yanagisawa was wrong on two counts. Japanese women are not machines. Nor are they doing much child-bearing these days.
9
posted on
01/31/2007 3:46:21 PM PST
by
Logophile
To: DTogo
When discussing reproduction, the number of offspring is determined by the number of females, as the old man is pointing out. Regarding the same topic, I'm a sperm-donor and a female is a "child-bearing machine".
The old-timer was discussing birth-rates, it seems so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.
10
posted on
01/31/2007 3:46:57 PM PST
by
L98Fiero
(A fool who'll waste his life, God rest his guts.)
To: DTogo
They'll waste their time having a fit about this, but, in a few (non-)generations, the Japanese people will disappear...
11
posted on
01/31/2007 3:47:19 PM PST
by
atomicpossum
(Replies must follow approved guidelines or you will be kill-filed without appeal.)
To: DTogo
This guy's been watching too much anime.
I think he may have this in mind:
(Anyone who knows the anime it's from knows why posting this is an apt comment on Yanagisawa's gaffe.)
12
posted on
01/31/2007 3:47:26 PM PST
by
The_Reader_David
(And when they behead your own people in the wars which are to come, then you will know. . .)
To: DTogo
LOL! He pissed off some Japanese feminists. His comments weren't inaccurate. His real offense isn't how he made the comment, it was that he asked feminists to do something as distasteful as bearing children.
He should have just told them that he was sorry that his comments offended them, but political correctness tends to avoid issues rather than addressing them so he's rather be politically incorrect than useless.
To: Logophile
Yanagisawa is part of the problem on 2 counts: he's a "typical" Japanese male, and part of the government.
Both major inhibitors to Japanese women having more kids.
14
posted on
01/31/2007 3:49:40 PM PST
by
DTogo
(I haven't left the GOP, the GOP left me.)
To: DTogo
ROTFLOL! The Japanese version of Biden.
15
posted on
01/31/2007 3:50:54 PM PST
by
onyx
(DEFEAT Hillary Clinton, Marxist, student of Saul Alinsky & ally and beneficiary of Soros.)
To: atomicpossum
I've done my part to prevent that! ;^)
16
posted on
01/31/2007 3:51:22 PM PST
by
DTogo
(I haven't left the GOP, the GOP left me.)
To: DTogo
So What? What ever happened to "Sticks and stones will hurt my bones but names will never hurt me"?
To: DTogo
I've heard, the TAXES are very heavy in Japan....is any sign, the taxes may go DOWN?....more kids now, more taxpayers.
18
posted on
01/31/2007 4:30:34 PM PST
by
skinkinthegrass
(Just b/c your paranoid; Doesn't mean they're NOT out to get you. :^)
To: SteveMcKing
Yes - but people are living much longer.
Maybe we SHOULD ratchet things (reproduction) back, a bit.
Global population continues to climb.
Unless you think we need more "whites" or other racial groups etc. reproducing. Something with which I disagree & find repulsive, frankly.
19
posted on
01/31/2007 4:49:05 PM PST
by
4Liberty
( forced charity = theft)
To: canuck_conservative
Off topic (sort of) but if they can make a working birthing tank (incidentally, it the Japanese that are behind a lot of the research), then theoretically all abortion can be outlawed. Abortionists would loose their arguments (except for overpopulation--hopeful society doesn't sink so low that abortion is encouraged to prevent an "overpopulated" Earth).
20
posted on
01/31/2007 4:50:09 PM PST
by
Jedi Master Pikachu
( WND, NewsMax, Townhall.com, Brietbart.com, and Drudge Report are not valid news sources.)
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