The death of Kimura Hana earlier this year sparked a debate around social media and legal culpability. What responsibility do users have for their hate speech – especially when it drives someone to self-harm? But a new case could push the boundary of social media responsibility in Japan even further.
Ito Shiori vs. Sugita Mio
This case interests me, in part, because it’s been launched by one of the people in Japan I most admire against one of the ones I most despise.
The plaintiff is journalist Ito Shiori, whose fight to bring her rapist to justice we’ve discussed often in our pages. After winning a civil lawsuit against her assailant, Yamaguchi Noriyuki, Ito set her sights on those who had slandered her online. As I wrote previously, right-wing figures in Japan like Hasumi Toshiko spilled a lot of digital ink painting Ito as an opportunist bent on sleeping her way to success. Ito is currently suing Hasumi and several others for slander over their Twitter posts and re-tweets defaming her.
If you’re a regular reader, you are also overly familiar with this story’s antagonist: Liberal Democratic Party (自民党; jimintou) national Diet member Sugita Mio. On the plus side, Sugita is one of the few Japanese women (around 10) serving in the National Diet. On the minus side is…well, everything else. Sugita has questioned the integrity of sexual slavery survivors from World War II (the so-called “Comfort Women”), made dismissive comments about sexual assault survivors, and called LGBT people “non-productive” members of society.
It seems Sugita was also involved in the smearing of Ito Shiori. Instead of re-tweeting anything, however, she merely liked a series of tweets bad-mouthing Ito. But that was enough for Ito to haul Sugita into court, suing her for ￥2.2 million (around USD $21,000) for defamation and slander.
Ito: Say No to “Second Rape”
According to Huffington Post JP, Ito is suing Sugita for liking a series of 13 tweets. The tweets, among other things, called Ito’s rape charge against Noriguchi a “failed attempt at screwing for success” and called Ito herself a “money-grubbing provocateur.” Ito also charged that Sugita liked a series of tweets bashing other Twitter users who spoke up in her defense.
Proceedings in the case opened on October 21st. Sugita wasn’t present. Through her lawyers, she requested that the case be dismissed.
The case poses a challenge for the Japanese legal system. There are precedents for Twitters users being held liable for retweets. In a recent case, the Japan Supreme Court ruled that users who had retweeted a photograph where Twitter automatically cropped out the photographer’s name were liable for copyright infringement. To date, however, no one has been held liable for liking a social media comment.
Ito is resting her case on Sugita’s position and popularity. The Diet member’s Twitter account has almost 200,000 followers. That makes her the country’s 24th most followed politician on the social media service. Ito also argues that Sugita’s as someone with the power to propose and promote legislation added an additional element of coercion and “fear” to her actions.
「今の社会では、被害を届け出た、訴え出た人への風当たりもいまだに厳しいものがあります。。。。裁判官の方々には、このようなセカンドレイプに対して、私たちのような被害者がはっきりと『NO』と言えるようになるよう、このケースと向き合っていただけたらと思います」
In today’s society, the backlash against those who report and sue over thei injuries is harsh. I brought this case in the hopes that the judges would confront this problem so that victims can clearly say “no” to this form of second rape.
– Ito Shiori
It remains to be seen whether Ito’s innovative legal argument will carry the day. We’ll update this article as the case progresses.
