Tokyo Disneyland condoned this and all future same-sex ceremonies after receiving an inquiry from Higashi. Cue a confused response from a subsidiary, Oriental Land Company, which licenses the name and characters from Disney in the United States.

Higashi, 27, and her partner could “marry” at the park, they were told, but only if they dressed “like a man and a woman.” Park officials were worried that other visitors might be offended by the sight of two women in wedding dresses or morning suits.

The park relented on the dress code after a storm of protest on Twitter and other social media networks — it had all been a misunderstanding by an individual employee, it said — but the couple will not be allowed to exchange vows in the park’s chapel due to “Christian teachings.”

Those restrictions go to the heart of the flimsy protection offered to the rights of LGBT people in Japan, say campaigners. Homosexuality is not illegal, but same-sex marriages are not legally recognized.

“There needs to be more pressure for legal unions between gay people in Japan,” said Taiga Ishikawa, one of only a handful of openly gay politicians in the country. “This is only a guess, but I’d say there are more people now who are in long-term relationships and want that to be recognized in the form of a civil partnership.”

The 37-year-old, who won a seat on the Toshima Ward assembly in Tokyo last year, is campaigning to introduce an ordinance in the area to offer some form of marital recognition and to increase the number of administrative rights and services afforded to same-sex couples. But he admits that it’s “some way off.”

If Disneyland was being held up as an agent of progress, one of Japan’s most popular celebrities popped up to demonstrate that, in some quarters, ignorance reigns.

Commenting on TV on President Barack Obama’s recent declaration of support for gay marriages in the US, the film director and comedian Takeshi Kitano told a fellow guest: “Obama supports gay marriage. You would support marriage between humanoid and animals eventually, then,” before questioning the ability of gay couples to raise children.

Kitano has since tried to explain his outburst: “I was only talking about people who love their pets so much that they may think of marrying them,” AFP reported him as saying. “There is no way I look at gay people in the same way as I do animals, let alone implying sexual relations with animals.”

His were not the first comments with homophobic overtones to be made by a high-profile public figure in Japan. In late 2010, Shintaro Ishihara, the outspoken governor of Tokyo, suggested gay people were “deficient” after watching same-sex couples take part in a parade in San Francisco. “We have even got homosexuals casually appearing on television,” he said. “Japan has become far too untamed.”

Yuji Kitamaru, a journalist who writes about LGBT issues, said he was “very disappointed” by Kitano’s remarks, particularly as he has spoken up for minorities, including transgender people, in the past. “I felt it was a big betrayal not only to us and the audience, but also to himself. Public figures like Kitano can easily indulge in that kind of bigotry because Japanese people in general haven’t considered the difference between public discourse and private gossip.”

Yet Kitamaru, who has written on LGBT issues in Japan for two decades, believes social media has quickly become the forum for a more open discussion about sexuality, citing Twitter’s role in the Disneyland decision and a meeting held in Ni-chome, a gay neighborhood of Tokyo, to thank Obama for his support.

Higashi and her partner, meanwhile, have visited Disneyland to break their good news to Mickey Mouse. They have yet to set a date for the wedding, and there are reports that their inquiries were intended only to test the theme park’s commitment to equality.

Ishikawa welcomed Disneyland’s decision, which apparently came after officials in Tokyo contacted the company’s US headquarters. “I wrote 10 years ago that I looked forward to the day when gay and lesbian couples could hold hands and go to Tokyo Disneyland, so I’m very happy,” he said. “But we’re still not at the point where a man or woman can tell people, especially co-workers, that they have a same-sex partner.”

But she was barred from entry, an insult added to injury by the military, a powerful and patriarchal institution that has been accused of many violations, including the sexual assault of its own female prisoners and aggressive indifference to the rights of women on a wide scale.

“They were denying me entry because it was 2 a.m., with the excuse that I am a female so it is ‘too late’ for me to enter the premises,” she told GlobalPost. “I stood there regardless and continued to demand to enter because each detainee has the right to a lawyer.”

Fifteen months after the fall of Hosni Mubarak, Egyptians head to the polls Wednesday and Thursday to choose the country’s first-ever civilian president. This election and the constitution to be framed in its aftermath will set a course for Egypt’s fledgling democracy, and there is almost no one who has more at stake than the country’s women.

As the debate continues about how much power the new president will have relative to the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) and how much influence the majority Islamist parliament will exert on society, women like Omran who were on the forefront of the revolution say they’re now being pushed out of public and political life, at best an afterthought to two rival and very male camps — Mubarak’s “old guard” and the Islamists.

None of the presidential candidates — all men after former television presenter Bothaina Kamel failed to qualify for the ballot — have demonstrated significant interest in women’s issues, advocates say, while many women have been targeted for violence and intimidation by the ruling military. But many women are pushing back against this campaign of marginalization, fighting to secure a role in Egyptian society at a pivotal time in the country’s history.

“Not a single candidate made efforts to sit down with the female coalition’s movement during his campaign, except for Amr Moussa,” said Fatma Emam, who is currently a researcher at Nazra for Feminist Studies and an activist blogger.

Emam, an outspoken 29-year-old woman from Nubia in Southern Egypt, said she is disappointed by the current front-runners, which include Moussa, the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohamed Morsi, Abdel Moniem Aboul Fotouh and the Nasserite candidate Hamdeen Sabahy.

“What’s happening now in the elections shows that women’s rights are not a concern,” she said.

Emam believes economic and security concerns have trumped social issues — including women’s rights, fair laws and education reform — in voters’ minds. Recent Pew Research Center polling confirms that 81 percent of Egyptians consider economic improvement to be “very important” in the election — more than any other issue.

However, according to Egypt’s National Council for Women, 33 percent of Egyptian households are headed by women.

“Up until recently, five years or so ago, women were not given tax cuts by the tax authority because they were not considered heads of households, even though now at least 33 percent of women are breadwinners,” Emam said.

Though women are currently a crucial part of the Egyptian economy, the society still lacks a fair legal system that would guarantee the rights of all citizens, according to Mozn Hassan, a self-described women rights defender and head of Nazra for Feminist Studies.

From “virginity tests” allegedly administered by the army upon Samira Ibrahim and dozens of other women, to excessive violence strategically targeting female protesters like the “girl in the blue bra,” the women’s struggle has been closely tied to a larger movement against military rule in Egypt.

“A huge part of the idea of militarization in society involves targeting women,” said Hassan. “All of these events, including the virginity tests, are a part of it all, [and] this won’t end with presidential elections.”

The Women’s Vote

While many Egyptians hope that significant change will come with a newly elected president, Egyptian women say they must retrieve their rights themselves.

Dalia Ziada, one of the country’s most active women’s rights advocates, is currently leading a study at the Ibn Khaldun Center for Democratic Studies that focuses on the situation of women after the Arab Spring.

Ziada, director for the Ibn Khaldun in Egypt, will be working closely with the center’s researchers to monitor this week’s elections in 22 governorates across the country, including Cairo, Alexandria and Upper Egypt.

As an Egyptian woman, Ziada believes that many of today’s candidates have failed to address female voters, which make up 52 percent of society.

“Although he is associated with remnants of the old regime and he may easily prolong military rule behind the scenes, [Amr] Moussa, as a liberal, is the only candidate who has reasserted that women’s rights would be a priority,” she said.

But Ziada believes even Moussa exhibits a chauvinism that is pervasive in Egyptian politics.

“When asked about the role of the first lady, all of the candidates said they do not want their wives to be involved in politics,” said Ziada.

“If a president does not respect his wife and does not see that she can play a role in politics, then how will he respect the average Egyptian woman?”

Women Taking Action

Shortly after Hosni Mubarak’s ouster in February 2011, a few hundred women marched on International Women’s Day hoping to protest against sexual harassment, which has been a social epidemic in the Arab world’s most populous country for years.

But the women were attacked and harassed by small groups of men in Tahrir Square, the epicenter of the country’s uprising. The men yelled “now is not the time” for trivial demands.

Later in December 2011, images of soldiers slapping elderly women on the face, stripping young female protesters, and dragging women by their hair quickly circulated.

Despite evidence of violence, many people brought blame on the women, criticizing their presence in the streets and, in some cases, their “provocative” clothing.

This time, thousands of determined women of all ages and social backgrounds marched in unprecedented numbers to protest the Egyptian army’s excessive use of force and sexual harassment against pro-democracy protesters. As the women marched, male protesters made a human cordon around them, fearing that the women might be attacked again.

Meanwhile, the SCAF defended the soldiers’ actions, stating that they were acting “according to the circumstances.”

In March 2012, a court ruled against Samira Ibrahim, who accused a military doctor of forcefully administering a virginity test after she was detained by the military while protesting against the SCAF’s prolonged rule on March 9, 2011.

Although military generals had publicly admitted that the military conducts virginity tests as a safeguard against allegations of sexual assault or rape in military confinement, the court stopped short of assigning specific blame.

Many advocates see it as their role to denounce the autocratic regime, which is still “very much in place” and without much female representation.

Just 10 women won seats in Egypt’s parliamentary elections earlier this year. Women’s representation in the constituent assembly, which will be tasked with drafting Egypt’s new constitution, remains a contested issue.

“We have drafted a list of amendments in the constitution that need to be adjusted immediately, said Emam.

“The Egyptian Young Feminist Movement has also provided the speaker of parliament with a list of women who are eligible to serve on the constituent assembly who can help draft a constitution, but all of these efforts have been overlooked,” she added.

The Struggle with Legal Reform

With Islamists making up as much as 70 percent of the people’s assembly, Hassan fears that women’s voices will continue to be stifled.

“Till this day, the parliament has not passed a single progressive decision regarding the past incidents of violence,” she said. “There is also no law till now that would protect women from domestic violence.”

As the country’s ruling powers fail to hold accountable those responsible for such violence, society follows suit.

“The Nadim Center [for Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence] recently drafted a petition hoping to include a law that would support victims of domestic violence, but only 2,000 citizens actually signed the petition,” Emam said.

Parallel to legal reform, Emam strongly believes there must be societal and governmental restructuring so that women can successfully work to achieve their rights.

“I hoped they would discuss these issues in parliament, but instead they discuss our age of marriage,” Hassan said, referring to parliament’s controversial debates regarding a bill that would lower a woman’s legal age of marriage from 16 to 14.

However, Hassan believes that while the current people’s assembly ignores women’s concerns, the military institution does not even hear them.

“Even if Islamists are aggressive in their decisions regarding women’s rights, the military does not even see us,” she said.

Despite these obstacles, however, Egyptian women are proving that they are doers, not victims.

“I’m against the idea of victimizing women,” Hassan stressed. “You are in a patriarchal society, they already see you as victims. But if we are subjected to violence, we are not looking to be consoled. We are aiming to empower ourselves and to to be in positions that would allow us to put an end to these problems.”

Although they both work independently, Ziada from Ibn Khaldun shares Hassan’s sentiment when it comes to the threat of rising extremism.

“The rising Islamism gave a justification for the patriarchal mentality,” said Ziada. “Everything in the past was inappropriate for women to do; now it is not only inappropriate, it is haram, or a sin. Before, it was not right to challenge society; but now you can’t challenge God, according to Islamists.”

Taking matters into her own hands, Ziada is currently working with Ibn Khaldun on a program that aims to empower women from Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia and Saudi Arabia.

Still in the works, the program will choose women activists from the region and provide them with the tools that would allow them to compete for positions of power.

“We are going to start this initiative in two or three months. It will take about a year, and we hope to recruit women who have potential to lead in legal, religious, economic or political fields,” said Ziada.

By starting from the grassroots level and equipping Arab women with the skills of communication and international relations, the project aims to give them the opportunity to be part of the decision-making process.

“Our aim is to empower young women. This is what will achieve real change,” she added.

Hollande knows however that there is little chance the German chancellor will warm to the idea, even faced with the mounting concern that, without drastic action, the euro zone is headed toward a disastrous breakup.

“We spoke about it and both sides confirmed their well-known positions,” said France’s Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici, after meeting with his German counterpart on Monday to prepare the summit.

“Francois Hollande plans to put everything on the table … even those proposals that cannot be agreed immediately,” Moscovici added.

As the euro zone’s strongest economy, Germany knows that euro bonds will mean its taxpayers end up taking on debts incurred by Greece, Spain, Italy and other troubled economies.

That would ease the immediate pain in the southern Europe and the risk of the euro’s early demise. But, critics argue, euro bonds would reward financial sloppiness and relax pressure on the southerners to purse the painful reforms and fiscal discipline needed to get their economies back in shape.

And if the euro bonds didn’t work, paying out for the south could undermine Germany’s financial stability.

“That’s a prescription that comes at the wrong time and carries the wrong side effects,” Germany’s Deputy Finance Minister Steffen Kampeter told Deutschlandfunk radio over the weekend.

He contended that common financing was unlikely to be in place for a decade or more, and certainly would not be decided when Hollande holds his first meeting with other euro zone leaders at Wednesday dinnertime summit in Brussels.

Hollande is expected to get support for euro bonds from the leaders of Spain, Italy and many smaller members of the 17-nation currency bloc, as well as the European Union’s head office which put forward a plan for jointly issued debt last year.

“It would make economic sense to create a deep, liquid and stable market for government bonds with the joint issuance of common debt — euro bonds — at least, once we have reinforced our economic governance further to ensure fiscal prudence,” EU Economics Commissioner Olli Rehn said at a speech in Oxford last week.

Even were the Germans to agree, the legal complexities involved in introducing jointly-issued debt would mean that euro bonds are years away. However, supporters say an agreement to work on their creation could help calm jittery markets and convince voters in Greece and Ireland to support European debt-fighting plans when they go to the polls in the coming weeks.

A “no” vote in Ireland’s May 31 referendum on the new EU fiscal discipline treaty could leave the country cut off from further European rescue funding. However polls show a significant number of voters, disgruntled with the austerity that came as a condition for a 67 billion euro bailout in 2010, are considering rejection.

Greece is holding a fresh election on June 17, six weeks after a nationwide vote produced political stalemate after a surge in support for parties on the far left and far right who oppose austerity measures attached to a 130 billion euro rescue plan.

Polls show most Greeks want to keep the euro, but they are deeply dissatisfied with mainstream politicians and what they view as foreign-imposed hardship.

Although other European leaders have lined up to say they want Greece to stay in the euro zone, the Greeks have been warned that could be impossible if they vote for parties that refuse to implement the bailout conditions.

“There is a choice: you can either vote to stay in the euro, with all the commitments you’ve made, or if you vote another way you’re effectively voting to leave,” British Prime Minister David Cameron told the Greeks Sunday on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Chicago.

Britain is outside the euro zone, but like other world leaders, Cameron is acutely aware of the potentially catastrophic impact a Greek exit could have on the global economy – through the risk it could also force out larger economies such as Spain and Italy, causing the collapse of the euro.

With that in mind, Wednesday’s meeting of euro zone presidents and prime ministers is expected to place new emphasis on pro-growth policies.

Merkel, Hollande and other leaders are working to find common ground on ideas such as frontloading EU funding lines to support job-creation projects in Greece and other hard hit nations, or leveraging up to 60 billion euros in funding from the EU’s investment bank.

Hollande wants a “growth pact” to complement the EU’s new fiscal discipline treaty, and there’s talk of easing austerity by giving countries like Spain, France and Italy more time to cut budget deficits.

The hope is that a more growth-friendly agenda and some signs of compromise from Merkel will produce an “Hollande-effect” on Greek voters, boosting mainstream parties who support the bailout and euro membership.