I know, E and Chuck are real big on Japan right now, and I'm sure it's a lovely country but to this day it's not very hard to have animosity towards their government. Well, many have heard of my personal opinion on Japan, but it was quite unbelieveable to see this in the news today. I thought to drive the story deeper I would include my own personal research.
Also, while you read keep in mind that the abuse did not maintain itself within the makeshift brothels that Japanese soldiers created. It was well known that during WWII you could get raped anywhere (i.e. on the side of the road) just by being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Beside my great grandfather's house in Tanjay, neighbors used to tell me that there were several Santelmo (similar to Saint Elmo's Fire) sightings caused by the spirit of a girl who was raped and killed there by a Japanese soldier during WWII. Now, that particular story may not be true but the fact that these incidents have embeded themselves in Filipino folklore means that it did create a huge impact. Now the Japaneses PM Shinzo Abe is saying "Even if it is passed, it does not mean we will apologize." "EVEN IF"? Ugh!
Okay, enough blabbering or I'll never get done with this blog. First a Wikipedia definition:
"Comfort women (Japanese: 慰安婦, ianfu?) or military comfort women (Japanese: 従軍慰安婦, jūgun-ianfu?) is a euphemism for the up to 200,000 women who served in the Japanese army's brothels during World War II."
The "recruitment" process:
"In the early stages of the war, Japanese authorities recruited prostitutes through conventional means. Middlemen advertised in newspapers circulating in Japan and the Japanese colonies of Korea, Taiwan, Manchukuo, and mainland China. Many who answered the advertisements were already prostitutes and offered their services voluntarily. Others were sold by their families to the military due to economic hardship. However, these sources soon dried up, especially from Japan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs resisted further issuance of travel visas for Japanese prostitutes, feeling it tarnished the image of the Japanese Empire. The military turned to acquiring comfort women outside mainland Japan, especially from Korea and occupied China. Many women were tricked or defrauded into joining the military brothels. The US Army Force Office report of interview with 20 comfort women in Burma found that the girls were induced by the offer of plenty of money, an opportunity to pay off the family debts, and on the basis of these false representations many girls enlisted for overseas duty and were rewarded with advance of a few hundred yen.
In urban areas, conventional advertising through middlemen was used alongside kidnapping. However, along the front lines, especially in the countryside where middlemen were rare, the military often directly demanded that local leaders procure women for the brothels. This situation became worse as the war progressed. Under the strain of the war effort, the military became unable to provide enough supplies to Japanese units; in response, the units made up the difference by demanding or looting supplies from the locals. Moreover, when the locals, especially Chinese, were considered hostile, Japanese soldiers carried out the "Three Alls Policy", which included indiscriminately kidnapping and raping local civilians.
*The Three Alls - Kill All, Burn All, Loot All.
Below a video of Lola Dolor,
The video was found on the Support 121 Website. 121 Coalition is a national coalition representing nearly 200 civic organizations. We are united to defend human rights and support the passage of House Resolution 121 that calls upon the government of Japan to apologize for its war crime enslaving over 200,000 girls and women during World War II as "comfort women." The victims were referred to as "comfort women," but they were mostly girls under eighteen, some as young as twelve. They were kept in military "comfort stations" and were subjected to inhuman and degrading forms of sexual violence.
Click on the link to learn more.
Getting off the soap box now. That should be it for awhile. Thank you.
wait, what? women have rights?