OBACHAN'S SCRIBBLES

Princess Kiko gave birth to a baby boy this morning. I guess many of us Japanese felt somewhat relieved by the news, not because the birth solves all the problems but it bought us some time. I have to admit that I am one of them.

I have to confess that I wasn’t clear about the difference between supporting “a female emperor” and supporting “maternal-based succession of the throne” until this morning. Well, I’m still not 100% clear, but I did a bit of net search and now I understand at least better than before. Now I know that the real issue was not whether a female is qualified as an emperor; it was whether it is OK to end the “paternal line of succession” which has continued for over 2600 years. Whether Princess Aiko (the only daughter of Crown Prince) becomes an emperor or not is not the real issue -- it is what would happen when she married someone and had a baby.

The Imperial House Law allows paternal line of succession only. The law was almost going to be changed in order to allow Princess Aiko to be a female emperor because the birth of a male heir seemed hopeless. But many do not want to change the law because they fear that if Princess Aiko became a female emperor and “married someone from outside the Imperial Family, the male Y chromosome from the current line would be forever lost, replaced by the Y chromosome of whoever she marries,” as mentioned in this site.

I can see the fear of abandoning something which continued for over 2600 years and cannot be found in any other countries. But at the same time, I can’t help raising questions such as “What indispensable quality does the imperial Y chromosome have? Or is it just the‘continuation’per se that is honored?”“Are we still thinking that a boy is better than a girl, or a mother who gave birth to a boy is a winner?”“Is passing down the Y chromosome the ultimate role of the imperial families? Does it mean that it’s the proper Y chromosome, not the ability/personality of the emperor that matters?” Then I realized that I have never thought about what kind of ability/personality I wanted for the emperor to have.

So I guess, after all, my questions can be boiled down to these basic ones: “What is emperor? What is royal family? What is the role we want them to play --- or is it us or them who should decide on their roles?” No easy answer... right? I think it is a blessing that this baby boy gave us time to discuss these issues more carefully and thoroughly. To me it doesn’t seem to be a good idea to change the Imperial House Law in a hurry when Crown Princess Masako is still psychologically vulnerable.