December 30, 2005--Fanaticisms XV--That Old Y Chromosome
I know you have been wondering what is going on with Crown Princess Masako of Japan. She hasn’t been seen in public very much. Actually since about 2003. You remember her? Harvard and Oxford educated, a diplomat, who in 1993 married the future Emperor.
Things were going very well. She was reported to have adjusted to her new life of comparative isolation and even gave birth in 2001 to Princess Aiko, who is also reported to be a lovely little girl.
But that’s the problem you see—she’s a girl—and although the Crown Princess has been under pressure to have a second child, actually she is under severe pressure to have a male child. This hasn’t happened and all indications are that they have stopped “trying” (how they know that is anyone’s guess). Crown Princess Masako has apparently even undergone therapy (psyco- it is thought) but still no additional issue. And without a male heir to the throne after both the current and future Emperors die, the Japanese are in a fit about what to do.
Knowing a little history sometimes helps, and leave it the NY Times to supply it (see link for full story). They report that this has happened before—which is no surprise since Japan has had Emperors for up to 2,665 years. During so much time everything has happened. It would be inappropriate in this family medium for me to tell you the everything. Suffice it to say that other non-Emperor male members of the imperial family saw sons of theirs ascend to the throne when an Emperor died without a direct male heir.
This is serious business—to quote Tsuneyasu Takeda, a member of a former branch of the imperial family, “The Emperor is valued not because he is intelligent or handsome [gotcha]. It’s because he is the inheritor of the [male] blood that has been preserved for 2,000 years.”
This is such serious business, the need to see someone with the right Y chromosome on the throne, that a deeper look at history suggests a solution that some say is under consideration—
The Paper of Record reports that most Emperors have had numerous concubines and that many of them bore imperial children. So many actually had male children that at least half of all the Emperors in Japanese history were the sons of concubines. One imperial prince, Tomohito of Mikasa had the courage to write recently, “I wholeheartedly support a return to the concubine system. But I think the social mood inside and outside the country may make it a little difficult.”
Just a little?
Things were going very well. She was reported to have adjusted to her new life of comparative isolation and even gave birth in 2001 to Princess Aiko, who is also reported to be a lovely little girl.
But that’s the problem you see—she’s a girl—and although the Crown Princess has been under pressure to have a second child, actually she is under severe pressure to have a male child. This hasn’t happened and all indications are that they have stopped “trying” (how they know that is anyone’s guess). Crown Princess Masako has apparently even undergone therapy (psyco- it is thought) but still no additional issue. And without a male heir to the throne after both the current and future Emperors die, the Japanese are in a fit about what to do.
Knowing a little history sometimes helps, and leave it the NY Times to supply it (see link for full story). They report that this has happened before—which is no surprise since Japan has had Emperors for up to 2,665 years. During so much time everything has happened. It would be inappropriate in this family medium for me to tell you the everything. Suffice it to say that other non-Emperor male members of the imperial family saw sons of theirs ascend to the throne when an Emperor died without a direct male heir.
This is serious business—to quote Tsuneyasu Takeda, a member of a former branch of the imperial family, “The Emperor is valued not because he is intelligent or handsome [gotcha]. It’s because he is the inheritor of the [male] blood that has been preserved for 2,000 years.”
This is such serious business, the need to see someone with the right Y chromosome on the throne, that a deeper look at history suggests a solution that some say is under consideration—
The Paper of Record reports that most Emperors have had numerous concubines and that many of them bore imperial children. So many actually had male children that at least half of all the Emperors in Japanese history were the sons of concubines. One imperial prince, Tomohito of Mikasa had the courage to write recently, “I wholeheartedly support a return to the concubine system. But I think the social mood inside and outside the country may make it a little difficult.”
Just a little?
posted by Steven Zwerling at
5:29 PM
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