Gender in Contemporary Japan - Final Paper

Defne Buyukduman

Legal Practices and Narratives of Rape in Japan and Turkey

In February 2015, the body of zgecan Aslan, a 20-year-old university student in
Turkey was found charred in a riverbed; she had been brutally murdered and burned after
being raped by the driver of the bus she took home. In the wake of this event, feminist
groups demanded that authorities, as the producers of an increasingly misogynistic
discourse, admit their responsibility in zgecans murder; while the then Prime Minister
Erdoan berated feminist groups for rejecting to be entrusted to men as Islam commands
(Feldman). On a different vein, Japan is working towards bridging the gender gap, and as
a part of their active efforts, a bill has been proposed to the Diet to expand the definition
of rape in Japan to include a wider variety of sexual offenses, and to increase
punishments (The Japan Times). However, despite the difference in politicians approach
to sexual crimes, Japan and Turkey show surprising similarity in how individual rape
cases are handled by the police and in the courtroom, which might account for the very
existence of these crimes in the first place. In fact, far from working towards eradicating
rape in the stereotypes surrounding rape, thereby further traumatizing the victim. While
in Japan, victims are either discouraged by prosecutors to bring the issue to court if they
dont have enough evidence and are subjected to invasive questioning to prove that they
have indeed not given their consent, in Turkey the situation is similar; and the question of
the victims consent is determined by the court on the basis of how much the case fits
into the prevailing rape stereotypes.

How have authorities approached sexual crimes in Turkey and Japan? This is an
important question to answer considering the role that official discourses and laws play in
shaping public opinion, which in turn reflects on individual cases. In fact Gordon and
Rieger in their 1989 book contend that sexual violence results from years of [gender]
inequity and reinforcement of myths and social lessons taught to both women and men by
the way [sexual violence] has been handled in the criminal justice system, medical
facilities, media, schools, churches, and other important institutions in (...) society
(Gordon ve Riger).

Firstly, it must be born in mind that both countries have culturally had a highly
strict gender based status quo. This was of course reflected in their judicial systems.
Turkish law during the Ottoman rule was based on the Islamic Shari a, and in the penal
code adopted in 1926 after the fall of the Ottoman Empire, crimes of sexual violence
were included under the section Crimes against Traditions of Public Morality and
Family Order (Ilkkaracan). Tugce Ellialti underlines that These classifications reveal,
among many other things, the codes foundational premises that 1) womens bodies and
sexuality are the property of men, family and society, that 2) the community, not the
individual woman, is the party that suffers most harm consequent to the crime, and that 3)
the harm done concerns a womans honor rather than her physical integrity (Ellialti). In
2005, Turkey was still a prominent candidate for EU membership and in its efforts to
make its laws compatible with EU requirements; a new penal code was adopted that
finally classified sexual crimes under crimes against persons (Ellialti).

Similarly judicial experts Yatagawa and Nakano explain in their 2008 interview
that Japans legal framework regarding rape is still based on the pre-modern one that
places womens sexuality in the custody of men. According to them, the logic behind the
current penal code regarding rape aims to protect the property of men that is a womans
sexuality and chastity, rather than her integrity as a person (Nakano ve Yatagawa).

Considering that law has a symbolic function through which it reinforces various
social values every time it deems an action criminal; how a crime is handled, therefore, to
a degree, reflects and points out how offensive that crime should be considered by the
society (Clarkson). Both Turkish and Japanese judiciary system clearly fails to send out
messages that condemn rape as an unacceptable act of violence, thus legitimizing it.
This legitimization takes on exceedingly similar faades in Turkey and Japan. Catherine
Burns 2004 article emphasizes the fact that there are pervasive stereotypes as to what
rape is, how it is committed and who a rape victim is. Burns describes the some of the
stereotypes that judicial officials take to be true as follows: Rape is an attack by a
stranger at night; women ask to be raped; if a woman struggles hard enough she can
escape; and a new variation articulated recently by a Japanese politician, that rape is
evidence of healthy virile masculine sexuality. (Burns). Burns also makes a compelling
point that there are stock stories that get produced around the axis of the aforementioned
questions about rape. These stories build on rape stereotypes and according to Burns, a
case that does not conform to stock stories gets disqualified as a sexual crime. Burns
assesses several cases in her article, focusing on how the police, prosecutors, and judges
handle individual rape cases. One of the explanations she brings to the verdicts that
aggrieve the rape victim in the courtroom is that Confronted with two competing
accounts of events and little compelling evidence, judges draw on conventional or
familiar narratives to determine what makes the most sense. (Burns).

The situation in Turkish courtrooms seems to be similar, however aggravated by

the remissions that rapists are granted very frequently. Cases that depend on the question
of consent are not immediately dismissed, however perpetrators are often let off without
reprise until the case expires. However, the situation that connects rape cases in Japanese
and Turkish courts is the frequent remissions that rapist are given on the basis of the
stock stories. It is not infrequent that judges refer to the aforementioned stock stories of
rape to legitimize the remissions that they grant rapists. For example, a thirteen year old
was raped by twenty-six adults in the Turkish city of Mardin in 2003, the court ruled that
the victim had given her consent and the rapist were given remissions on the sentence
(DHA). Especially in cases where the victim has previous acquaintance with the rapist
almost always results in remissions on sentence or acquittance. A woman was raped by
two of her friends, but a selfie they had taken before that day granted the acquittance of
the rapists (IHA). In another case, a woman who was raped had uploaded a photograph
on Instagram and the judge extended the trial with the rapists acquitted in pending, on the
basis that if the woman had truly been raped, she would be too upset to use social media
(DHA).

In conclusion, both Japan and Turkey present in their judicial system flaws
that aggrieve rape victims. These flaws stem from the historical conjuncture of womens
unequal stance beside men, which is further legitimized and abused by the sexist
practices of law enforcers. One of the most important factors that determine the fate of a
case is the stock stories and stereotypes that the police, prosecutors and judges refer to
when making decisions. It is crucial to recognize and take action against the sexist
approach that professionals make in order to improve the dire situation of the
underreporting of rape and the increased aggrievement of rape victims that stem from the
discourse around rape. However, while Japanese officials are making an attempt to curb
sexual violence, the situation seems to be going for worse in Turkey, which is getting
progressively less secular, and where femicides have increased by 1400 percent since the
Islamist government took power in 2002 (Hurriyet Daily News with Radikal).
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