“Extreme pressure”: gendered negotiations of violence and vulnerability in Japanese antiracism movements

Abstract

Situated in the emergence of hate speech and anti-racism counter protest in Japan, this article poses two questions: why do activists enact exclusions while attempting to fight against social inequality, and how do interpretations of gender shape activists’ understandings of anti-racism? This article explores three findings: activists conceptualize the risk of being targets of hate speech and abuse as both gendered and racialized; anti-racist activists interpret anti-racism as a practice of redirecting vulnerabilities–a practice that is, itself, gendered; and anti-racist activist communities struggle with ambivalence around masculinity and other “gender problems.” Although gender functions as a key lens through which anti-racism is conceptualized, movements devoid of an intersectional feminist analysis encounter exacerbated difficulties in resolving internal problems such as sexual harassment. This article focuses on the theme of vulnerability, which is enmeshed with the vocabulary of gender. Through analyzing vulnerability, this article offers an ethnographic account to explain why the reproduction of inequalities persist, even within social justice movements that aim to promote equality.