Kanno Sugako

People often assume feminism is contemporary and western. Not so. As proof I give you Kanno Sugako. Sugako, born in 1881. was a Japanese feminist, anarchist, socialist, and (at times) pacifist. She was executed by the Japanese government for  high treason in 1911 at the age of 29. 

Kanno Sugako (管野 須賀子, June 7, 1881 – January 25, 1911), also known as Kanno Suga (管野 スガ), was a Japanese anarcha-feminist journalist. She was the author of a series of articles about gender oppression, and a defender of freedom and equal rights for men and women.

In 1910, she was accused of treason by the Japanese government for her alleged involvement in what became known as the High Treason Incident, aimed at the assassination of Emperor Meiji. Kanno was executed by hanging on January 25, 1911, at the age of 29. She was the first woman with the status of political prisoner to be executed in the history of modern Japan.

Specific to gender equality Sugako wrote:

"In these postwar years there are many tasks facing the nation in politics, economy, industry, education, and so on. But for us women the most urgent task is to develop our own self-awareness. In accordance with long-standing customs, we have seen as a form of material property. Women in Japan are in a state of slavery. Japan has become an advanced, civilized nation, but we women are still denied our freedom by an invisible iron fence. There are women who take pride in their apparel, who are content to eat good food, and who regard going to the theater as the highest form of pleasure. We could ignore for the time being these pitiful women with slavish sentiments and hapless plights, women who give no thought to anything but their own self-interest. But women with some education and some degree of social knowledge must surely be discontented and angry about their status ..."