Baby badges
East Japan Railway Company (JR East) and 15 private railway companies in Kanto have decided to start issuing “maternity mark” badges that identify a woman as being pregnant. This his being done in hopes that more people will be willing to give up their seats to women who are pregnant. The scheme was implemented after “a stream of requests from passengers” (mostly pregnant women, no doubt).
“When you’re in the early stages of pregnancy, it’s hard (for people) to tell just from your appearance, and you can’t get the passengers around you to notice,” one passenger said. Another passenger commented, “Even if you think someone is pregnant, you can’t give up your seat because you’re afraid of being wrong.”
I wonder why this is necessary, since all Japanese trains have special sections of seats set aside for the infirm and aged.
Thanks to Mr. Pink for the tip.
Well the 優先席 (priority seats) are not for the ‘infirm and aged’ only; anyone can sit there, you just have to give the seats up when needed.[1] The problem is that if you can’t tell if a women is pregnant for example, you won’t feel obliged to give up a seat for her. Like the passenger in the article said, if you’re not sure, it’s really embarrassing to give up a seat to someone thinking they are pregnant when in fact they were just, the ‘f-word’.
My question is how long will it take for the badges to get into “the wrong hands”? I want a badge. I wonder if anyone will give up a seat for me, a 23-year old able bodied male :). Haha.
[1] Saying you have to be pregnant etc to sit in the seats would be like saying black people can’t sit in the front of the bus. The priority seats aren’t really a rule, just a friendly reminder to be polite. Same with the ‘women only’ cars. Companies can’t enforce women only as that would be discrimination. Instead people are suppose to segregate themselves.
July 28th, 2006 at 12:27 amI don’t want this to come out the wrong way (no doubt, however, it will), but does a woman who’s 2-3 months pregnant really need a seat before anyone else? Sure, in the later stages I can see how it would be necessary. But when it’s so early that you need a badge to let people know you’re pregnant, do you really need to displace someone from a train seat??
July 28th, 2006 at 9:10 amTo chime in a little late…
Are you kidding? That’s when you need it the most! That’s when you are nauseous and so tired you’re just going directly to bed as soon as you get home if you can keep yourself upright long enough to get there.
November 3rd, 2008 at 9:45 am