Sound-bite version of legal ruling is an imbalanced substitute for a proper meal/understanding of the situation.

Before we get into the meat of this article, let’s start with a linguistics appetizer. Pretty much anyone with a passing interest in the Japanese language, or even Japanese culture in general, knows that the suffix -san often gets used after people’s names in Japan. It often gets approximated to “Mr.” or “Ms.,” but -san’s actual nuance is a little more complex, since it gets used after given names too, but the key point is that it’s used as a sign of polite respect, especially since addressing someone with no suffix at all in Japanese can sound brusque and overbearing.

However, -san isn’t the only commonly used name suffix in Japan. There’s also -chan, which has a warmer, more affectionate tone. That’s not necessarily affectionate in the sense of romantic affection, either, as -chan is often used when talking to kids. It’s also pretty common within friend groups of young women, and it’s not shocking for it to be used by guys addressing platonic female friends with whom they’re on good terms (and to be clear, “good terms” means just that, with no wink or nudge).

And now, on to the main course: following a verdict announced on October 23, a number of Japanese media outlets have posted articles with headlines saying, in one way or another, that the Tokyo District Court ruled that using -chan in the workplace constitutes sexual harassment.

The nature of modern news being what it is, the urge to condense a complex issue down to its pithiest, most impactful single-bite summary is understandable. That doesn’t make it applaudable, though, and there are definitely other factors to take into consideration here.

The lawsuit was filed by an ex-employee of Sagawa Express, one of Japan’s largest home delivery service companies. The woman, who is in her 40s, began working at a Sagawa sales office in Tokyo in 2020. Among her coworkers was the older man who she would eventually sue for sexual harassment. According to the suit, the man’s conduct caused the woman to suffer from depression, and after she was diagnosed with the condition she took a leave of absence from work before later quitting her job in 2021.

Two years later, the woman filed lawsuits against both the man himself and Sagawa Express, seeking monetary damages from sexual harassment. This past February, Sagawa settled out of court for a sum of 700,000 yen (US$4,665), but the man chose to fight the accusations in court, ultimately losing the case.

Because the woman’s grievances included the man’s use of -chan when addressing her, the verdict resulted in alarmist headlines presenting the situation as the court ruling that -chan qualifies as punishable sexual harassment. And it is true that in explaining the ruling, presiding judge Shinji Tahara mentioned the suffix, calling it unnecessary in a business environment and saying that even if used with the intent of friendly familiarity, in light of the age and gender difference between the plaintiff and defendant, and the fact that they were simply coworkers without a personal friendship, the use of -chan could be considered offensive to the woman. Though she was awarded far less than the 5.5 million yen she was seeking from the man in the suit, the court has ordered him to pay her 220,000 yen in damages.

▼ Definitely not life-changing money, but at least month-changing money.

However, framing this as “using -chan is now legally classified as sexual harassment” or “if a man uses -chan in talking to a woman it means he’s a creep” is a gross oversimplification. What the soundbite headlines are leaving out is that in addition to addressing the woman with -chan, he also had a pattern of telling her things like “You’re cute” and “You have a good figure.” As such, this doesn’t appear to be a case of someone whose office conduct and conversational habits were otherwise impeccably courteous getting the judicial hammer slammed down on him just for being too familiar in his choice of suffix. Instead, it paints a picture of someone who didn’t understand or didn’t care about common-sense boundaries in a professional environment, and it’s the basket of questionable comments that got him in trouble, not the use of -chan alone.

Linguistic fine points and societal norms often don’t have a one-to-one translation into other cultures, but if you were looking for one for the tone that -chan has, it’s kind of similar to putting a -y or -ie on someone’s name. Let’s say, for example, that you have a coworker whose name is Susan. Calling her “Susy” could be seen as a warm, friendly way of speaking, but it’s important to make sure that she’s comfortable being addressed that way, and to respect her opinion if she’s not. Insisting on calling her Susy regardless of how she feels about it would be inappropriate, and if you’re choosing to call her that while saying things like “You sure are good-looking, Susy” or “Nice bod, Susy!”, then yeah, that’s not cool for multiple reasons.

All of which is to say that it’s not using -chan that’ll get a man accused of sexual harassment in Japan, but unilaterally deciding that it’s OK to press in past established baseline formality when dealing with a woman, which is true in any language or culture.

Source: 47 News, Nihon Keizai Shimbun, Teleasa News, Hachima Kiko
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert images: Pakutaso (1, 2)
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