Photo/Illutration A company employee speaks at a news conference in Tokyo on Nov. 10 about her SOGI harassment case after it was recognized as an industrial accident. (Hideaki Ishiyama)

A labor standards inspection office in Kanagawa Prefecture has recognized a worker’s depression as an industrial accident because it was caused by a manager’s persistent harassment over sexual identity.

The recognition entitles the employee to receive worker’s compensation payments.

“It is very rare for a case to be recognized as an industrial accident solely because of SOGI harassment and without other factors, such as long working hours,” Shizuka Onoyama, the employee’s lawyer, said at a news conference in Tokyo on Nov. 10. “The decision is significant because it could prevent similar cases, too.”

SOGI is an acronym for sexual, orientation, gender, and identity.

The employee, who also attended the news conference, and Onoyama said the office made the judgment concerning the SOGI harassment on June 30.

The employee, who is in her 40s, said she told her employer that although she was listed as male in her family register, her sexual identity is female.

However, her manager kept calling her “him” even after being informed of that she identifies as female.

She asked her boss to stop it but to no avail.

During a meeting with management, the boss said to the employee: “I’m talking about your family register. You can change your sex (on the family register). After you do that, you can ask (to be addressed as a female).”

The manager also said, “If you want to be considered a feminine person, I guess you need some kind of delicate thoughtfulness.”

The employee was diagnosed as having depression in winter 2018 and took a leave from work.

She applied to the labor standards inspection office to recognize her depression as an industrial accident in September 2021.

According to Onoyama, the office recognized her case as an industrial accident after acknowledging that the manager denied her personality and subjected her to persistent mental abuse.

“I believe that a factor that played a significant role in enabling me to gain the recognition was that I recorded (the manager’s comments),” the employee said at the news conference. “I want people who are having a hard time to fight rather than stay silent and accept the situation.”

Her employer, a large manufacturer, told The Asahi Shimbun: “Our company takes seriously the fact that a recognition of an industrial accident was made. We will try to prevent a recurrence.”

Kanami Tsuno, associate professor of social epidemiology at Kanagawa University of Human Services and an expert on harassment issues, said SOGI harassment is included in guidelines of the Revised Comprehensively Advancing Labor Measures Law.

“But only a small number of managers understand the concept, and few companies have implemented effective measures to tackle it,” Tsuno said. “SOGI harassment is power harassment. The fact that an industrial accident was recognized as being caused only by SOGI harassment will have a huge impact on society.”

(This article was written by Hideaki Ishiyama and Emi Hirai.)

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