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Sign up for\u00a0The Agenda<\/a>, Them\u2019s news and politics newsletter, delivered Thursdays.<\/p>\n The Osaka High Court has ruled that Japan\u2019s family registration system only allowing \u201cmale\u201d and \u201cfemale\u201d as gender options violates the equality principle laid out in the country\u2019s constitution. The ruling, issued May 8, determined that the lack of a nonbinary gender option in the national system violates Article 14\u2019s anti-discrimination protections.<\/p>\n The family registry, or \u201ckoseki,\u201d is a mandatory national recordkeeping system<\/a> in Japan that tracks major life events, such as birth, deaths, and marriages, and is usually managed by individual towns or cities.<\/p>\n In December 2024, a 50-year-old nonbinary resident of Kyoto Prefecture filed a petition in family court to change their gender marker in the koseki to reflect their identity, seeking to change the designation of \u201celdest daughter\u201d to a gender-neutral term like \u201celdest child.\u201d Their request was initially denied by the Kyoto Family Court, a decision that was upheld in the May 8 ruling by presiding Judge Masahiro Oshima, who determined that the system needed to be maintained consistently nationwide \u2014 and that the nonbinary exclusion violated Japan\u2019s equality protections.<\/p>\n While the judicial body \u2014 one of eight regional high courts in the nation \u2014 said that changing this individual petitioner\u2019s gender marker in the koseki would not be appropriate at this time, it also ruled that the lack of nonbinary gender marker options should be reconsidered for the national system. If it is determined at a later date that there should be a nonbinary option, then the petitioner\u2019s request should be reconsidered. As Japanese daily newspaper The Asahi Shimbun<\/a> reported, the court ruled that it is \u201cappropriate to open a path to allow corrections in a form that aligns with an individual\u2019s gender identity.\u201d<\/p>\n The court further stated that gender identity is \u201cdirectly linked to an individual\u2019s personal existence, making it a significant legal good,\u201d per reporting in The Japan Times<\/a>. Advocates say such a determination marks a significant move towards the existence of nonbinary people being acknowledged by Japanese law.<\/p>\n \u201cThe existence of nonbinary gender has been legally unrecognized,\u201d attorney Shun Nakaoka told The Japan Times<\/a>. \u201c[The High Court\u2019s statement on gender identity] is a huge step toward legal recognition.\u201d<\/p>\n Get the best of what\u2019s queer.\u00a0Sign up for\u00a0Them\u2019s weekly newsletter here.<\/a><\/p>\n