JAPAN: Survey on US-Japan Relations & more – 4th Dec 2025

Konnichiwa from BA! This is the Rorshok Japan Update from the 4th of December twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what's going down in Japan.

A Cabinet Office survey released on Friday the 28th of November showed that many Japanese people aren’t quite as happy with the US as they used to be, thanks to President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Japanese imports. The Public Opinion Survey on Diplomacy, which is done every year, asked people whether they thought Japan-US relations were good. The number who said yes fell to seventy percent, down almost fifteen points from last year and the second-lowest level since nineteen ninety-eight.

The number of people who said they felt a strong affinity toward the US also fell to seventy-seven points, eight points lower than last year.

You know who is getting popular, though? Princess Aiko. She’s gotten so popular that, in fact, during her twenty-fourth birthday on Monday the 1st of December, many online said that Japan should revise its male-only imperial succession law.

Those who support Princess Aiko say the imperial family is at risk of dying out, because right now there’s only one viable young male heir remaining. She’s also gotten a lot of people to root for her because so far, she’s done a good job in her official duties, including overseas diplomatic trips to places like Brazil. However, those on the more conservative side aren’t okay with a woman inheriting the throne.

For historical context, Japan actually has had eight female emperors throughout its history. However, the current law bars women from succession and strips status upon marriage.

On the financial front, Felix Prehn, an investment and finance specialist, wrote about how Japan’s rising interest rates are disrupting the long-standing yen carry trade, where investors borrow yen at their decades-long near-zero interest rates to buy higher-yielding currency or assets and then pocket the difference in the interest rate. However, with Japanese yields going up, some Japanese firms may sell US Treasuries to bring some money back home. This will likely cause a butterfly effect that may make loans more expensive and the investing market more volatile.

In Japan, many people see the yen carry trade as the reason why the value of the yen is low compared to the US dollar, with one dollar equaling 154 yen on Thursday the 4th of December. Some Japanese people believe it hurts the country’s economy as a whole, and that the Bank of Japan should raise interest rates to stop the yen carry trade.

Next up, on Friday the 28th of November, the Tokyo High Court ruled that Japan’s ban on same-sex marriage is constitutional, even though high courts in six other cases ruled that it wasn’t. The court said the current system, defining marriage as between a man and a woman, remains reasonable for child-rearing and that constitutional marriage rights do not extend to same-sex couples, noting some legal effects can be secured through contracts or legal gender change. Plaintiffs plan to appeal to the Supreme Court.

Online reaction was mixed, with the majority saying that this was a sad decision that was out of touch with modern times, when almost every other advanced nation has legalized same-sex marriage. Those on the other side argued that marriage is meant to support couples who want to have kids, something that a country with a nose-diving birth rate should prioritize.

In international news, the organizers of the Japanese pop star Ayumi Hamasaki concert in Shanghai canceled the event on Friday the 28th of November, one day before the concert was meant to take place. The pop star said she was shocked that the organizers asked her to cancel on such short notice, but they said they didn’t really have a choice because of China’s reaction to Takaichi’s comments from two weeks earlier about a possible Taiwan emergency—which we have covered in previous shows.

This follows a series of other canceled or postponed appearances by Japanese artists in China since the country objected to Takaichi’s remarks.

Speaking of cancellations, Shibuya Ward announced on Wednesday the 3rd of December that it will not have a New Year countdown near Shibuya Station. It used to be an annual celebration, but not so much anymore, as it’s been cancelled every year since the pandemic.

Mayor Ken Hasebe said that even though the area around Shibuya Station has become very popular for celebrations like New Year’s and Halloween, it’s important to maintain safety for residents, who are worried about overcrowding and disorderly behavior from nighttime street drinking.

Authorities will increase security on New Year’s Eve and ask local shops to stop nighttime alcohol sales. Media interviews will also be limited to designated press zones.

In business news, Taiwanese prosecutors indicted a subsidiary of Japan’s Tokyo Electron on Tuesday the 2nd for allegedly failing to prevent the theft of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company trade secrets. In August, a former employee of Tokyo Electron and two others allegedly stole sensitive semiconductor technology.

Prosecutors say the company is partly responsible because it didn’t properly protect the tech. They are seeking a fine of about 120 million New Taiwan dollars, which is around four million US dollars. They said it’s important to protect Taiwan’s key industries and economic competitiveness.

In an interesting bit of science news, a group of researchers in Japan and the US found six types of sugar in material collected from the asteroid Bennu. Scientists have been studying Bennu for a while and found amino acids and nucleobases that are important to DNA and RNA, but this marks the first time scientists have found sugars in the asteroid. Other scientists have found a few types of sugars in different asteroids.

Yoshihiro Furukawa, one of the members of the research group, said the discovery supports the theory that life on Earth might have started thanks to meteorites crashing onto the planet and bringing the ingredients for life with them. The alternative argument is that they formed on Earth from chemical reactions.

Meanwhile, on Tuesday the 2nd, famous American actor Johnny Depp met in Tokyo with Shinobu Sakamoto, a prominent survivor of Minamata mercury poisoning, while visiting Japan for the Japanese premier screening of a film he directed, Modi: Three Days on the Wing of Madness. Sakamoto, who was born with the disease, spoke about the victims’ suffering, and Depp said he wanted to visit Minamata and help.

Depp portrayed photographer Eugene Smith in the twenty twenty-one film Minamata, which documented the mercury pollution crisis and had a key scene that was inspired by Sakamoto’s late mother.

On a lighter note, on Saturday the 29th, the Imperial Palace in Tokyo opened part of its grounds to the public to view the fall foliage. Entry is free, and visitors can go in through the Sakashita Gate, walk along Inui Street, and take photos of the many-colored leaves of the seventy maple trees.

The Imperial Palace has opened this street to the public every year since twenty fourteen in celebration of Emperor Akihito’s birthday. This year, it will stay open until the 7th of December.

And to close this edition, officials in Kamakura, Kanagawa Prefecture, eastern Japan, recently said that as of January twenty twenty-six, they will no longer issue the city’s popular license plates featuring the famous railway crossing from Slam Dunk, the popular manga and anime about basketball.

Officials said the railway crossing has become an overcrowded tourist hotspot, with fans, especially from other Asian countries, packing the area near the train station, resulting in traffic problems and illegal parking. They hope that getting rid of the license plate might make fewer fans crowd the area, since the license plate was only introduced in twenty fourteen to promote tourism to the area.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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