sensei

I wonder if it would be okay for a male kindergarten teacher to be gay in Japan? Women are seen as okay regarding being around children, while men in general are regarded with more suspicion (though I agree with you that being unmanly is probably less of an issue in Japan). We already know that some people associate gay people with pedophiles so it would be nice if being gay isn't an issue.

On your comment of disappearing mums I do agree that it's pretty hilarious how conveniently they are erased for plot purposes. I've read yaoi (mostly untranslated) where single fathers (with sole-custody) have male partners with whom they raise the child together as their own. I don't know why the mother let the father obtain sole custody in the first place, but I doubt she or the in-laws would be okay with two men raising her child (especially if it was an ugly divorce and she didn't know ex-husband was gay) without her knowledge. Japanese society is still fairly traditional and I don't think you can hide that your male lover lives together with you and your child. Especially when neighbors and grandparents are constantly asking when are you are going to remarry someone new.

MMM. However traditional Japanese society still may be, homosexuality or any form of sexuality has never been as much an issue there as it was in Christian or Muslim countries: before the country was opened to the world, every husband had, besides his wife, several lovers, some male, some female. Kind of like in the Roman or Greek society, really. And homosexuality has never been linked to pedophilia in Japan either: that is a typically western mistake!
So, no, a person's sexual orientation wouldn't be as much a problem in Japan as it would be in say, Russia, Poland or the USA, to do any type of job.

About the lack of believability of the "dissappearing mums": that would be less due to the ex-husband being gay, but rather because the rearing of children has always been the exclusive task of the mother, in Japan. Their education, their upbringing, everything was her responsibility and it still is: Therefor, it is much more likely to think in most cases after a divorce, whether the husband be gay or not, the children would always be given to the mother, since the man is still the provider in most cases, and has to work long hours to bring in the bacon. He would probably get visiting time and pay alimony, just as it is done in the west. His being gay wouldn't come into the picture, or at least it woudn't make things any worse. It would in European conservative countries, or in America; but not in Japan. Not as a rule.

says someone who didtn write the fact that homosexuals in japan neither can marry nor be openly gay in economic oriented buisness. bc japan and other asian countries rather have a married man than a single in important positions in a firm.these happy go lucky yaoi marriage with adoption is a way but most jap. ppl dont do that bc of the shame for the family.

Well, regarding gay marriage, you must take into consideration that the Japanese Consitution hasn't been made by Japanese, but by Americans, by the victorious American army under the lead of general McArthur to be precise, after WW2. It is totally obvious that homosexuality, which was still a crime punishable by death in some States of the USA and a vice crime everywhere, wasn't going to be put into that Constitution as something that was okay in Japan. Even if in Japan, it was really okay and had always been okay...
Ever since, Japan has been under strict political influence of the USA, mainly because America wanted it to be an Army base against their ennemy of post-Worldwar time: the Soviet Union and China. The CIA always took care left-wing parties never stood a chance of being elected into the Japanese government, only conservatieve ones; hence the lack of progressive civil and penal law. But in daily practice, Japanese gay couples have always had a handy way to bypass the dissadvantages of there not being a gay marriage-arrangement: the fact that there is no age limit to adoption! In most western countries, you can only adopt a kid, up to his age of consent. You can't legally adopt an adult! But in many countries in Asia you can, it has always been possible. So, gay couples have always taken care of preventing heritage problems that way: the oldest man (or woman) in the gay couple simply adopted the youngest one. This way, him or her being his hair, nobody could prevent him/her of their rights to the house, the custody of the children, and everything else.
So, there is not such an urgent need for a legal arrangment for gay marriage in Japan as there is in western countries. Politicians therefor don't really are asked and urged to fight for it or put into their program as often as they are in the west, were a gay "widower", after the death of his partner, can be thrown out of his house, his children be given to others and never have any legal right to anything, because the marriage arrangement is the only way you can proove to the Law that you belong to somebody. And if there only exists a mn-woman-marriage arrangement and no same sex-equivalent, this becomes a big problem when one dies, or in case of divorce; one is always going to be suffering, in case of demise it's the one left alive who doesn't only lose his beloved partner, but also everything that made up his life.
If there exists an easy way to tiptoe around that problem, it becomes less urgent.
The mentality about "being openly gay in the corporation milieu" is already changing. It goes together with the breaking of the famous Glass Sealing; and also, since Japanese are slowly evolving towards returning to their ancient moral standards, away from this Americanization of their culture, the intolerance toward things considered Evil by Biblical standards, that have been inflicted upon Japan by the American occupier in 1945 will become less and less important. In Edo Era, every leader or man of importance had a wife, who was the Mistress of the house, mother of his children, and responsible of the household, the education of the kids and the care of the parents-in-law in their old age; the wife still holds the household budget and gives her husband a monthly allowance, just as she does the kids. That has always been like that.
Next to his wife, a well-to-do man used to have either lovers or concubines, legally kept ladies who had a right to calling him their "husband" as well as the Lady of the Manor, but in a lower rank. And he also often had male lovers, why not? Who was to stop him?
But there was the fact that a base had to exist, a stepstone to the future: a family, a man, a wife and children. Else who was going to succeed the Lord? So all men of a certain importance were married, usually by their parents, to some daughter of an other family. There was no love involved, it was a matter of founding a family, nothing more. Romance and love was for the Kabuki theatre or for the concubines, both male or female. A man was never considered eithere "gay" or "straight" with a strict fronteer in between the two. Sex had nothing to do with morals nor with family matters, it was part of culture, of enjoying life, like gastronomy and fashion.
That is why in big corporation business, men are supposed to be married, not single nor only married to an other man; it is a continuation of this Family Tradition. The age-free adoption rule is also born into this same Family Tradition: after all, you could lose your children to sickness, or have no sons, and then usually a man would adopt his son-in-law or an other boy, in order to have an heir. That could happen at any time, and it didn't need to be a child.
So the fact that gay marriage doesn't exist (yet, must I add) in Japan doesn't deny anything I said before. Some man turning ot to be gay suddenly doesn't mean shame for the family: Shame is something much more complicated in Asian cultures, especially family shame.