Japanese Female Succession.

I'm going off to the Doctor's soon. A month ago I swapped my mouth splint for a CPAP machine. A CPAP machine bascially is a compressor and you wear a nasal mask which pushes pressurised air into your nose. As such, it pushes pressure into your throat and keeps your nasal and throat passages open so you can breathe. My mother likes it, as it's another way to stop me snoring as well. I'm still not getting the sort of sleep I would like to get, and still am very tired. Anyway, I'm taking the machine back to the Doctor today, and he's going to download all the information the machine collected while I was sleeping. Hopefully it will tell him a lot, and also he will be able to decide if I need a constant pressure machine, or a variable pressure machine.

****************

As per the Title, today a Japanese Prince challenged the fact that Japan is discussing changing their 'Royal Succession Rules'. In 1947, they changed them so that ONLY male heirs could descend the throne ... they didn't think it through too well, as they have only given birth to FEMALES in the last forty years. This means NO MALE heirs to continue the line. As the 1947 law made it illegal for females to descend the throne, it means NO ONE can descend the throne. They have had eight female empress previously. The Prince has suggested that instead of going back to the old way of allowing Females to ascend the throne, that they renew old lines of Royalty so that the will always have a Male on the throne. Personally, I think it is a little archaic to go to a system which ONLY allows males to sit on the throne. It even means going outside the immediate family and ignoring the Princesses in order to resurrect other lines just to stick a male on the throne. As the role of Emperors/Empresss, Kings/Queens etc are becoming almost completely ceremonial now a days, who cares whether it is a male or female who is on the throne, as long as they have been trained to do it. Personally, I feel the whole system is antiquated and we should liberate those people to allow them to chose what they would do for their lives anyway. Prince Edward probably would have been allowed to become an actor if that was the case, like he wanted. Instead, Royal families are locked into being what they are told to be ... and they are told not by the people, but by people long dead. In the case of the Japanese, I think they shoudl go back to having females descend the throne, and forget about reviving old royal lines which have become 'ordinary families'. It would also skip the problem they might have of every Royal family (including the old lines) having only females ... where would they turn then if they insist on refusing to allow females to descend the throne. Personally, I think it's a bit of a push by Prince Tomohito to give himself a shot at becoming Emporer, or maybe one of his children. Either way, I find it rather sexist, and what's worse, sexist in a way MORE sexist than the old system. In a world which is trying to break down the sexism barriers, WHY BECOME MORE SEXIST in the eyes of the world? It doesn't make sense. Especially in a role which doesn't really care if you are male or female. In fact, a female on the throne might even help in relations between Japan and other nations. It makes as much sense as a Wookie living on Endor!!!!

**********

In other news - my father flies into Perth tonight. He was going to stay at my younger brother's house, but he has now refused that request (as I said earlier, now that he understands what was in the legal documents, he's now swapping sides ... or at least vassilating ... no, that's nopt a dirty word!) The hearsay regarding my Aunt who died runs something like this - my father told my brother she isn't having a funeral till later in the week, as they are performing an autopsy on her as Doctors have no idea what she died of. They just say it was a brain haemorrhage caused by an unknown virus - and as such are looking into it. My father said he was going to come around and get my mother to sign the papers. My mother asked 'why?' as my father knows she hasn't had time to visit a solicitor yet - plus she has refused to sign them before. Last time this happened, my father turned up on her doorstep with some papers demanding seventy five percent of the house and screamed at her to sign them. She refused - why the hell should she sign her house over to him. So, tomorrow might result in a similar thing. To add to all that, all the lies etc in the papers, my father admitted to my brother he knew they were in the papers. He claims he signed them as he wanted to get it all out the way as soon as possible and didn't want to correct the solicitor ... like ... he was the one who would have given the information to the solicitor. Anyway, we start things rolling with our legal team tomorrow ... not sure what will become of it ... but I'm sure it will be favourable for my mother.