Fusako Shigenobu (Japanese: 重信 房子, Hepburn: Shigenobu Fusako, born 28 September 1945) is a Japanese communist activist, writer, and the founder and leader of the now-disbanded militant group Japanese Red Army (JRA).

Born in Japan, Shigenobu became involved in New Left activism while attending night school at Meiji University in Tokyo. In 1969, she joined the Red Army Faction (RAF), a communist group that advocated immediate, armed revolution against the governments of the United States and Japan. Eventually becoming one of its senior leaders, Shigenobu played a significant role in establishing the International Relations Bureau for the organization.

In 1971, she helped found the JRA as an offshoot of the RAF. That same year, Shigenobu and the JRA relocated to the Middle East in an effort to start a world revolution, as well as to assist with the Palestinian struggle against Israeli occupation while working in concert with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). During the 1970s and 1980s, members of the JRA took part in a number of violent incidents, including bombings, mass shootings, and hijackings. Although Shigenobu did not directly participate in these activities, during this time she attained international fame as the leader and public-facing spokesperson for the JRA.

Throughout her years in hiding and later imprisonment, Shigenobu authored 10 books, including a book of poetry.

Following her arrest in 2000 after several years of hiding, Shigenobu was put on trial for passport forgery and alleged conspiracy involving an attempted hostage-taking operation at the French Embassy in The Hague in 1974. She was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2006 and released in 2022.

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  • KittyBobo [he/him, comrade/them]
    ·
    11 months ago

    I got so high I took off all my clothes and put on a dog collar, turned all the lights in my house blue, and blared a ten hour video of wolves howling in a blizzard into my headphones just below uncomfortable volume. Now the furries are trying to convince me I'm a therian, whatever that is.

    • Frank [he/him, he/him]
      ·
      11 months ago

      Please be cautious about your headphones. Hearing damage is cumulative over time. Also, and I just learned this last year, your ears adapt to sound in a similar way that your eyes adapt to light - ie if you're in a loud environment your ears will normalize it, while if you're in a quiet environment your ears will adjust to pick up the quiet sounds. The take away is it's better to keep your headphones set to a low volume and let your ears adjust to them than set them to a high volume and risk hearing damage over time.

      I learned this bc I play a game where sound cues and footsteps are vital. I used to turn the audio up to just below painful, but then I got to worrying about hearing damage and looked this all up. And sure enough, I can still hear just fine with my audio set to 15% instead of 95%.

      Also check out the ear-trumpet program for windows. It gives you granular control over all your sound volumes.

      • KittyBobo [he/him, comrade/them]
        ·
        11 months ago

        Yeah, I normally keep my audio pretty quiet since my ears are sensitive but I was high. Not something I wanna do all the time but after a while I turned it down to just audible under a different video I was spacing out to. Was quite a trip!