A Demand to the Japan Sumo Association

On April 4, 2018, women trying to give emergency treatment to a man who collapsed in a sumo ring was urged to leave the ring because sumo rings are sacred and therefore women are not allowed to enter them. Please go to https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180405_04/ or other websites for details.

It's appalling and I don't know what to say. A man collapses before you. He may die. Several women are resuscitating him by providing emergency medical treatment, but are told to step down from the ring because a sumo ring is sacred and women are not allowed to enter it....... The Japan Sumo Association apologized. But for what and to whom?

Whether or not women should be allowed to enter a sumo ring has been discussed for a long time since at least 1990 when the then chief cabinet secretary, Ms. Mayumi Moriyama, was barred from giving sumo trophies to wrestlers in the ring because she is a woman. I remember this and felt angry, but let it go. I hate discriminatory treatment against women, but I also understood that sumo was a traditional sport and it would take time to change the culture. But this time, the issue is life or death. Which is more important between a man's life or the outdated tradition? What would the person(s) telling the women to stop saving a man's life have done if he had died? Isn't is an attempted murder or at least a manslaughter? It is obvious that the sumo culture is not only outdated but also wrong.

This incident and the Takanohana scandal both suggest that the Japanese sumo world is rotten to the core and among other things, they seem to have forgotten the most important thing, i.e., sumo is one of the most loved Japanese traditions. Are we okay that in the sumo world, just a rule is more important than people's life?

Chairperson Hakkaku, please find the person(s) who made such stupid and discriminatory remarks which potentially may have killed a man and more severely punish them than you did to Takanohana. The gravity of this incident is much more greater than that of the Takanohana scandal.